Note 62 — Chapter III

There is a curious collection of documents, published by royal authority, (Madrid, 1829-33, 6 tom. 8vo,) called “Coleccion de Cédulas, Cartas, Patentes,” etc., relating to Biscay and the Northern provinces, where the Castilian first appeared. They contain nothing in that language so old as the letter of confirmation to the Fueros of Avilés by Alfonso the Seventh already noted; but they contain materials of some value for tracing the decay of the Latin, by documents dated from the year 804 downwards. (Tom. VI. p. 1.) There is, however, a difficulty relating both to the documents in Latin and to those in the early modern dialect; e. g. in relation to the one in Tom. V. p. 120, dated 1197. It is, that we are not certain that we possess them in precisely their original form and integrity. Indeed, in not a few instances we are sure of the opposite. For these Fueros, Privilegios, or whatever they are called, being but arbitrary grants of an absolute monarch, the persons to whom they were made were careful to procure confirmations of them from succeeding sovereigns, as often as they could; and when these confirmations were made, the original document, if in Latin, was sometimes translated, as was that of Peter the Cruel, given by Marina (Teoría de las Cortes, Madrid, 1813, 4to, Tom. III. p. 11); or, if in the modern dialect, it was sometimes copied and accommodated to the changed language and spelling of the age. Such confirmations were in some cases numerous, as in the grant first cited, which was confirmed thirteen times between 1231 and 1621. Now it does not appear from the published documents in this Coleccion what is, in each instance, the true date of the particular version used. The Avilés document, however, is not liable to this objection. It is extant on the original parchment, upon which the confirmation was made in 1155, with the original signatures of the persons who made it, as testified by the most competent witnesses. See post, Vol. III., Appendix (A), near the end.