POR SU POBREZA RECIBIRÍAN GRAN FATIGA. EL CLERO PARROQUIAL AURIENSE A FINES DE LA EDAD MEDIA

Abstract

Pope Innocent VIII and the "Reyes Católicos" start a ecclesiastical reform that has repercusion in Galicia and more concretely in the diocese of Ourense. In its Cathedral archives is kept the memorial-tumbo of 1489 that collects diverse information about its secular clergy and the state and value of their parochial benefits. This information had to be sent to Santiago de Compostela where was based the reformer D. Alonso Carrillo de Albornoz. Working with the data from three administrative territories of the diocese -Tierra del Cabildo, Chantría and Arcedianato de Celanova- we study the rectors or other clergymen at the head of the parishes, the number of parishioners that pay their tithes, the wholesale yearly rent of each parish, its composition and origin - tithes, "destros", properties with "foro", and tributes (particularly "procuraciones" and "patronatos").The high number of parishes -123, and 22 annexed - and their small number of parishioners (from six to ten families in most cases) explain the low levels of rent, although there are ample variations. The payments of the "procuraciones" are heavier than the "patronatos", although this provides to laymen a cover to make usurpations and violences that now -with the new monarchs- seem to have diminished or so some clergymen of the diocese say. Many of these clergymen must find it hard to make both ends meet: their complaints about their parishe's poverty ring true. This state of affairs explains Carrillo de Albornoz excusing the clergymen from the expense of going personally to Santiago de Compostela to bring the titles of their benefits as he had first ordered.