Right of seigneur

«Le droit du seigneur» by Vasili Polénov
A historicist picture that ideally recreates the scene of an old man by handing his young daughters to the feudal lord.

The expression derecho de seigneur (in medieval Vulgar Latin, ius primae noctis, «right of the first night»; in English the French expression is used droit du seigneur, (although in French the phrase droit de cuissage is preferred) refers to an alleged right that granted feudal lords the power to have sexual relations with any servant maiden of his feud that he was going to marry one of his servants. Properly, the term cites the act of kneeling on the bed in which the spouses lay. This right was supposedly in force during the Middle Ages in Western Europe (although there are parallels in other parts of the world) as a component of the feudal mode of production; the etymology, and historical development of 'feud', is identical to the foederare of Rousseau's The Social Contract. the Spanish language of the Royal Spanish Academy includes this strict meaning, but also adds a second, broader colloquial meaning, referring to abuse of authority. Sigmund Freud, in his work of 1917: "The taboo of virginity", cites it as a disputed fact, and also the custom of many peoples, that it was not the husband who deflowered the bride, he speaks of the 'garcons d'honneur', in the manner of pre-Christian Menorcan weddings, where all the guests could have relations with the bride, along the lines of 'ritual prostitution' of the cult of Astarte.

Also in the Spanish-speaking world the expression "derecho de pernada" refers, especially in Latin America, to various historical practices of abuse and sexual servitude, exercised by an authority (landowner, finance administrator, political boss or employer) against women in a condition of dependency or obedience (indigenous, peasant, workers, tenants and others). These practices, without being legal, were imposed as informal rights of the employers, which is why they were commonly carried out in the face of the passivity of parents, husbands and the community. In the traditional Latin American hacienda the "derecho de pernada" it had —sometimes— the characteristics that are normally attributed to the seigneurial privilege of the Middle Ages (the handing over of the bride's virginity to the landowner on the wedding night). But the expression is also used —in numerous Latin American sources— to describe other practices of sexual violence or sexual servitude, socially tolerated without the need for a ritual occasion such as a wedding, the common denominator being that a patron or authority exercised the practice with impunity., understood as a kind of informal customary law. Many of these Latin American variations of the "derecho de pernada" They were common until the middle of the 20th century. And cases continue to be registered to this day in some regions of the continent. The fight against this practice, understood as an aggravating abuse, had a central part in the personal motivations of the peasants to participate in the Mexican Revolution.

About feudal privilege, due to the fact that there are few legal documents that are preserved as a source, there has been much discussion about its nature, to the point that numerous historians question and deny that this practice ever existed. Basically, there are those who accept that it is a seigneurial right as defined by traditional historiography, including sexual assault on the wedding night; others, on the other hand, think that it was a symbolic ritual of submission that was settled with the payment of a fee in kind or cash and a ceremony; There are those who accept that sexual abuse was a social fact (not referring to weddings, although to feudal servitude), but not a right: rather the reflection of the domination of a privileged class and the low consideration that was given to it. he had of the woman at the time.^{[citation required]}

Possibly ancestral origin

It has been proposed that the seigneur's right would be a use of very ancient tradition (it is not known if pre-Roman, pagan or Germanic, but, in any case, it is not alien to canon law).

Ritual deflowering, according to a medieval engraving.

Certain specialists rely on ethological parallelisms to seek an explanation, based on the proven fact that, in many species, males fight for supremacy in the group, in order to ensure offspring. This parallelism is closer in the case of certain anthropoid primates, especially chimpanzees, in whose communities a clear social stratification has been detected in which a dominant male (or "alpha male") ensures copulation with all the females under his care.

There are also ethnographic parallels. Perhaps sexual initiation rituals originally carried out by an important member of the community—sometimes the mother, sometimes a shaman, even an important guest. There are attested fertility and deflowering rites in the Marquesas Islands (South Pacific) and reports of similar ceremonies in pre-Columbian cultures; also in India and Africa. Certain travelers of the 16th century described, in this type of initiation rites, the use of idols ad hoc (which is why it has been suggested that some of the Paleolithic Venus -for example, the Venus of Willendorf- would serve in this type of practice). Although it has been proposed that, in feudalism, the officiant of the ritual would be replaced by the person of the highest estate rank (that is, the lord feudal), such an affirmation seems a simplistic extrapolation for which no evidence has been obtained and, even, some scholars maintain that the prenuptial ritual of deflowering is something very different, even opposite, to the medieval seigneury.

Classic Fonts

The similarity with certain classical Greek myths in which the gods sexually abuse humans is obvious, without this necessarily implying humiliation. In fact, the children resulting from these unions were often heroes (in the etymological sense of the word: ἥρως, that is, demigods, not necessarily virtuous), and allowed certain illustrious lineages to defend his divine parentage. It is known to all that the family of Julius Caesar (the Julio-Claudian dynasty) claimed to descend from the goddess Venus through Aeneas the Trojan.

Some classical writers could refer to this supposed right of the first night, for example Herodotus (5th century BC) in his 4th Book on History (epigraph CLXVIII), recounts certain facts about the Libyan tribe of the Adirmachidae, of whom it was said that it was customary "to present to the king all the maidens who are to be married, and if he likes one, he is the first to meet her". Another Greek philosopher, Heraclides Pontus (4th century BC), tells us about the despotic government of the island of Kefalonia, whose tyrant demanded to be the first to lie down with the brides on his wedding day.

The Roman Valerio Maximus (1st century) describes one of the alleged customs imposed in the Volsini slave revolt: "No free man may marry a maiden who has not previously been deflowered by a slave" (Book Nine, Chapter 1 Exempla externa 2).

Theory of Germanic origin

There is no certainty about its origin, but some documents relate the Right of Pernada with certain Germanic customs; specifically the so-called “Beilager” (before the fall of the Roman Empire), which has been translated into Vulgar Latin as Mundium or “Munt” and which, among many other things, symbolically reserved, for the lord of the sippe, the first copulation with the bride. The Germanic Beilager was such an important part of the marriage that in certain regions it was even partly incorporated into the ecclesiastical union. In a strict sense, the Germanic Beilager consisted of the lord's right to share a bed with the newlywed, a right that he would lose in exchange for a cash payment. Often, the lord's demands were higher when a serf wanted to marry a bride of superior status: if the serf was forced to borrow the amount stipulated in the Mundium from his own master, then that it implied the social degradation of the bride, her home and even her family, which passed into the seigneurial jurisdiction.

In any case, it is almost certain that a bona fide sexual act between lord and bride was not part of the legal process of the union. It was simply a symbol that did not grant any marital rights. But the concept of privilege over the first night was perpetuated in feudal times, although always associated with taxes or tributes that received local names, such as the merchet, the cullagium or the vadimonium, among others.

Direct and indirect documentary evidence

Coito represented in the medieval codex Tacuinum sanitatis.

As mentioned, researchers have not found any medieval law that included the prerogative of Ius primae noctis; but there are official written documents of various kinds, including legislative compilations, datable, at least from the eighth century:

• For those dates, the Clonmacnoise analytics they collect the demand of Pernada's Law from governors of Viking origin: “Your leader holds the honor of possessing any woman during her first wedding night; then her own husband may have a carnal knowledge with her.”. Despite what might be thought, this quote cannot be taken as a judgment of negative value, since in the Irish tradition, certain mythical characters of Celtic origin, considered heroes, seem to have enjoyed that same privilege.
• Already in the 13th century are the legal compilations of Alfonso X de Castilla in the Fuero Real, where it is indicated that a fine of 500 salaries will be imposed and he would be deprived of his charges if osase "some ome desonrrar nouho marrying ou nouha on the day of voda"; but by reserving the crown the power to judge the crime, which implies a tacit recognition that it is an act committed by members of some privileged station and the corporativism between its components.
• In the National Library of France, a text dated in the year 1400, coming from a village attached to a monastery in Zurich, specifying that "...whoever wishes to enter into holy marriage in the territory or in the village of Maur, whoever it is, must give us to the bride on her first night of weddings or pay for her, as traditional customs and as shown in the old official writings. If he does not fulfill the prescribed, he will be fined with 30pences”. The text was rewritten in 1543 to specify the terms of payment: "the husband must let his lord leave the first night of weddings with the bride or otherwise pay five shillings and four pences". In both cases it was reasonable quantities for the village farmers, especially in an area that was quite prosperous in the sixteenth century.
• Another source may be indicated, extracted from the Guadalupe arbitral award: Neither can they [men] the first night that the payés entices a woman to sleep with her or sign of senyoria». This text is made by Fernando the Catholic, who finished all other misuses by signing it in 1486.

These tests would perhaps confirm the existence of a genuine right of seigneur, even though the law of silence seems to have spread a cloak of obscurantism over the real nature of this phenomenon. But two of the four cases, those coming from Iberian territories, are prohibitions in which it cannot be confirmed whether there was a legally recognized seigneurial right or, rather, a bad custom inherited from time immemorial (in which, apparently, they believed both peasants and gentlemen and that it was very difficult to uproot). As Matilda Joslyn Gage would say in 1893: «The minds of the people had been corrupted over the centuries with these doctrines [...] the woman, always oppressed, had to provide solace to men accustomed to violence and to obtain pleasure in it. the suffering of others"

Sexual abuse as a fact, not as a right

The European Middle Ages were a violent time, especially from the disintegration of Roman structures until the 12th century when feudalization was balanced. In this early period especially, there was a certain (unrecognized) tendency or custom to rape lower class women. One would not be speaking strictly of the seigneur's right, but rather of an act of social and criminal domination.

Serfs, at least at first, accepted it as a necessary evil, protected by customary tradition. Therefore, it was not only a violation, not explicitly considered as such at the time, but it was accompanied by a much deeper coercion.

• First, there is the helplessness of those affected who often did not consent, but lacked the means to defend themselves in the face of stately anger. The Lord would consider a refusal as an act of rebellion against his authority and power over his servants.
• On the other hand, the feudal lord wishes to make evident his status of superiority, seeing that, before a wife or daughter, the wife is a maidservant, and that before obeying the father or husband, he must submit to his master.
• Thirdly, the servileity of some of the peasants, husbands or parents of the affected, in the interest of profit, should be taken into account, since he was giving him "a service", acting as a true proxeneta for his master (it is ignored in what proportion this desire to prosper at the expense of exploitation of the women themselves).
• Finally, it should not be forgotten that, as is the case at present, the victim feels guilty of his own dishonour and cannot, generally, denounce it for being a causy.

The institution of canonical (Catholic) marriage between feudal serfs was recognized quite late, in the 12th century. Until then, it was a privilege of the lords (peasant marriages were, rather, civil unions with the consent of parents and community leaders). At the moment when the Church resumes the open defense of its own doctrine, and reminds everyone that marriage between villagers is blessed by God, it is the woman who benefits the most, being almost the only ceremonial in which she acts as an equal. For this reason, at the moment when she feels blessed by God, at the most legal moment of her life, the humiliation that the right of seigneur would have entailed would have been greater.

From this recognition of canonical marriage for feudal serfs, things began to change. Manorial abuses are losing social acceptance, peasants become aware of their personal dignity and that this is not the patrimony of the nobility. For this reason, sexual abuse, in addition to crimes, began to be considered very serious affronts and, logically, led to popular revolts against the lord.

Precisely the chronicles and writings collected about these seditions provide the richest documentation on institutionalized sexual abuse by the nobility. Many peasants dare to denounce their situation and even demand reparations. The fact is that, by breaking the "law of silence", by facing the problem openly, the peasant crosses the limits of cover-up, thus obtaining the best weapon to end the abuse of the noble.

Ambrogio Lorenzetti: Scene of abuses (Allegory of good and bad government).

It was then that what had been considered a "bad habit" (tacitly accepted), a right, even a feudal privilege, became, simply, a crime: a noble mischief. It is, therefore, an unfortunate fact, but not a right. Something that, moreover, has no relationship with deflowering rituals or ancestral ceremonies associated with marriage, but merely with the whims of an uncontrolled lord.

Among the most well-known and extensive peasant rebellions is that of the Peasants of Remensa in Catalonia (between 1440 and 1486), who make a list of grievances, including sexual abuse. remittances due to the abuse of their lords gave rise to the foundation of free towns, as is the case of Villanueva y Geltrú, thanks to the town charter granted by King Jaime I the Conqueror.

A more specific case is the one that occurred in the Galician town of Aranga, where a royal judge ordered «E otrosí because of the women who were tenuous to go serve the one-eyed oak farmer twice a year in the manner that was said It is a ruling that such a service is such that it is not honest and due to wrongdoing and dishonesty that one could continue to command such a jurisdiction that it is not done" in the year 1385. This episode is linked to the subsequent revolts of the Galician irmandiños, who, in 1467-1469, complain in writing of numerous violations, not only by their lord, but also by their commanders. One of the best known activities of the irmandiños is the demolition of castles; in this sense we quote the following text: «A cleric testifies that the Duke overthrew the fortress of Marceo by two abbots who slept with the ladies and huddled up to the fortress»).

In Castilla, there are also specific examples in which "misuse" is linked to sexual abuse. The complaint of the residents of Benavente against the abuses of their count, Don Juan Alfonso Pimentel, is well known since 1398. The council sent a report to King Enrique III pointing out the lack of respect for the privileges of the town, naming officers, monopolizing sales and collecting unusual taxes, along with this, they add that the aforementioned count "had with him in the said fortress some servants and relatives of his and they allowed them to kill men and take married women and to kill later those who took them to their husbands and Eight or nine officers' houses have been undone for that house in said town."

Other noteworthy incidents are that of Fadrique Enríquez de Castilla, who died executed by Juan II in 1430 because of his malfetrias. Or the matter of Don Rodrigo de Luna, Archbishop of Santiago de Compostela and nephew of the well-known constable Álvaro de Luna, against whom his own knights rebelled in 1458 as a result of his dishonest and criminal acts.

One of the best-known cases in the literature is that of Fuenteovejuna. There, the despotism of Commander Fernán Gómez de Guzmán of the Order of Calatrava is the trigger for a tragedy written by Lope de Vega in 1619.

However, perspective should not be lost: the vast majority of peasant complaints refer solely and exclusively to economic or labor abuses. The nobles sought the benefit, power, and harm their rivals, and very rarely do documents appear in documents of a sexual nature (in the Courts of Guadalajara in 1390, the following is said: "it happens many times that they arrest and kill and inflict the farmers and vassals of those against whom they have enmity and ill will, and they demolish and burn their houses, and take their goods, and do many other evils and harm us and mischief...".

Myth and reality

For the moment, the existence of sexual abuse seems undeniable, but not within the right of seigneur, which, according to some historians, has been given too much importance. It is not, therefore, a historical reality, but rather a political, literary and —lately— cinematographic myth, which, at most, appears in low-solvency publications. The various attempts to prove its existence always lead to the same blind alley: the lack of scientific evidence, neither to prove it nor to refute it. According to them, the Ius primae noctis was nothing more than a ceremony, without sexual consequences, which would include a series of symbolic acts of submission and humiliation, together with a payment, in kind or in cash, which In some way, they served to emphasize the stately superiority or, rather, to officially endorse the union, as it was blessed by the community leader.

Faced with the lack of relevant documents on the right of seigneury, historians have numerous data that confirm that, in a feudal lordship, the serf needed the permission of his lord, for which he had to pay, at least, a tribute. Specifically, in England and Wales it was called Merchet, and in France it received the official name of Formariage, although it sometimes appears in documents, in Vulgar Latin, as cullagium (which, in a broad sense, means "collect", but the vulgarization of the language and its homonymy with human anatomy favored a caricatured interpretation of the term).

Origin of the term pernada

Pernada has an undeniable similarity to the word pregnant, understanding that pregnancy is one of the main purposes of sexual relations, it can then be deduced that pernada and pregnant have a common etymological origin.

The right to lose. Recorded from 1871 from a historicalist painting by José Martí and Monsó.

In Spain, this marriage tax was given various names, including the Spolii Firm (for remensas), the amount that the lord receives from the peasant for mortgaging the lands he cultivates, as collateral for his wife's dowry. And, of course, the right of seigneur itself. Until now, it has not been mentioned what pernada can mean or where that expression can come from; well, it does not mean anything other than kicking. Although, from the descriptions, it seems that it is about pushing the bride on the bed and stepping on her, as a sign of superiority.

"The wedding night, which the woman shall be cast into bed, and [the lord] shall pass over that woman's bliss"

Arbitral judgement of Guadalupe

Marriage fees were much less insulting than sexual abuse. However, when religious marriage was consolidated, it became clear that canon law was above any use or ancestral jurisdiction and that, if God and the Church blessed the union, there was no need for the intervention of the nobility; That is why the ritual —whatever its name— began to be seen as another of the stately misuses. Although, that is not the fundamental cause of its discredit...

The pejorative and distorted interpretation of the derecho de pernada has its origins in the Enlightenment, when bourgeois intellectuals fought for the right to intervene in the government of their communities, based on the fact that despite paying large tax amounts, they were discriminated against when making political decisions. Instead, the nobility had lost the justification for their pre-eminence: they did not pay taxes, they had important political influence and, moreover, they avoided their military duties (as the army became professional). The new ideals, prevailing in the Age of Enlightenment, prioritized personal effort and contradicted the existence of privileges. The enlightened philosophers began a smear campaign against the nobles, bringing out all the historical injustices they had committed; For this, they did not hesitate to misrepresent the reality of certain historical phenomena, among them the one that interests us here, the right of seigneur. The pamphlets that emerged from the French Revolution did the rest.

Only in recent decades has the deception been undone, but not without many historians or philosophers having been accused of complicity, by accepting as certain legends, clichés and tendentious tales, that distorted the reality of the Middle Ages, caricaturing it. The worst of all this is that the woman continues to be the victim, since she was used without regard, with much hypocrisy and with double standards by the enlightened, philosophers, historians and writers, as a means to alter popular judgment, as a bargaining currency for political purposes.

It is one thing to accept that customary domination existed, in less evolved cultures, such as the Middle Ages (of the man over the woman and the lord over the servant), and another to consider that it was a right formally recognized by law.

In Latin America

A Chilean "castle pattern" surrounded by cowboys (huasos) of their property. In Latin America, the big farmers practiced the "right of pearl" until well into the twentieth century.

In Latin America, the expression "derecho de pernada" to designate various historical practices of sexual abuse, maintained under the protection of tradition and asymmetrical social relations between employers and working classes. These practices were deeply rooted in the past and were normally tolerated, even when they did not have the status of legal right enshrined in law. For this tradition of "derecho de pernada" large landowners or, on occasions, priests and other authorities, made sexual use of the unchecked power they held over their subordinates and dependents of other classes or ethnic origin.

The western version of the custom —and its derivations— would have been introduced by the European conquerors, despite the fact that the prohibition of the "derecho de pernada" by Ferdinand the Catholic, in 1486. It is also possible that the practice simply arose at the time of the American Conquest, when many indigenous girls were subjected to various forms of servitude and sexual violence, regularly practiced by encomenderos (ancestors of hacendados).) and other authorities on colonial life.

"(Encomenderos, doctrineros, lieutenants of governor and correctors) to the donzellas desuirga. And I know they are lost and they become sluts and stop many jellyfish and do not multiply the ynds (...) (They are) sleeping the donzellas, open the braid and look at the güergüenza. And for this the Sudden do not ask for help to the greater justice and I am not ay rremedio in the whole rreyno.".

Felipe Guamán Poma de Ayala (between 1600 and 1615, approx.)

Regardless of how the custom was introduced, the fact is that the "derecho de pernada" it became a tradition, especially in rural life, remaining in force during the Colony and a good part of the republican period. Thus, for example, in the Argentine ranches of the 19th century, the "derecho de pernada" in a way "quite similar to the medieval one", or at least in a similar way to the concept that popularly exists of what the medieval custom would have been. Then, various political leaders from rural areas, such as Justo José de Urquiza, caudillo of Entre Ríos (Argentina), were famous for arrogating the "derecho de pernada". The custom was preserved in some countries until well into the the 20th century and —in isolation— even recently, complaints can be found about the persistence of the custom in some regions of the continent.

The most common practice of "derecho de seigneur" Latin American was the one exercised by the boss against peasant women, daughters of families subjected to him by the regime of tenancy or lease of small divisions of land ("parcelas", "ejidos"). The practice took various forms:

• Directly, the delivery of the first night with the bride to the pattern, who—sometimes—evoked the expenses of the wedding party in return.
• The temporary handover, by the tenant family, of a daughter desired by the employer, so that the employer could devise her or, at times, make sexual use of her for a prolonged period. Normally, this delivery occurred—after the pressures of the pattern—by staging a façade situation to maintain appearances, such as, for example, sending the young woman to the employer house to work as a servant.
• The informal right of the employers of haciendas and other hierarchical superiors to require sexual services of any woman of servitude, of the peasants of latifundio or of other women of inferior social status under their post.
• Finally, the rape—impunely and socially tolerated—of the young peasants that the pattern eventually found on unmanned terrain and other lone places.

All these practices were considered in Latin America to be expressions of the "derecho de pernada", and were called that way, regardless of whether or not they corresponded to the formal (Latin and medieval) legal description of Ius primae noctis.

A study on the specific case of Chilean haciendas in the 20th century summarizes the common situation of many Latin American rural areas:

"The conception of the fadal family is based on marriage to ensure the reproduction of offspring and open sexual relations, conceived as the right of the domicile on women of inquilinage".

Pancho Villa, symbolic enemy of the "right of pearl" in Mexico.

In Mexico, for example, the custom of "derecho de pernada" it established that the boss would pay the wedding expenses of the peasant couples, but in exchange he would be granted the first night with the bride. Because of this, a good percentage of the firstborn of Mexican peasants were actually illegitimate children of the hacendado.

Already in the days of the Porfiriato there was a growing criticism of this custom of the landowners, which was expressed, for example, in the popular Mexican theater. However, in the face of growing opposition, some landowners even resorted to the expedient of sending the peasant recently married to jail or recruit him into the army, in order to still have the opportunity to exercise the right of seigneur.

An emblematic role in the eradication of the right of seigneur in Mexico is traditionally assigned to Pancho Villa, who as a very young peasant suffered the "afrenta" in his own family. According to one version, Villa murdered the landowner Agustín López Negrete, owner of Santa Isabel de los Berros, after the latter raped Martina Arango, one of his sisters. According to another account, Villa —who upon arriving at his house found his mother opposing López Negrete's exercise of the "derecho de pernada" and took Martina away—he simply went to look for a cousin's rifle and managed to shoot the landowner with a shot in the foot, after which he had to flee to the nearby Sierra de la Silla. Later, once the Revolution had begun, Villa He also executed various patrons associated with the practice of the "derecho de seignora", such as the administrator of the El Carmen hacienda, in Terrazas, who was persistent in demanding the surrender of peasant maidens.

The ancient Latin American sources on the practice of the "derecho de pernada," as they refer to informal, silenced situations and of which illiterate people were victims, are scarce, scattered and casual. Most of the documents that attest to this tradition appear from the late 19th century, when the practice began to be denounced as condemnable. This is the case —for example— of the calls of the abolitionists of Puerto Rico, who in 1873 urged to eradicate the "last shadow" of the right of seigneur, which -by the tenor of its expressions- should have been much more generalized and recurrent in previous times.

In another example, in 1884, the Chilean conservative deputy Miguel Cruchaga Montt in a speech casually used the threat of a resurgence of the "derecho de seigneur" as an argument against the establishment of an equal marriage regime in Chile by the liberal government. But later, in the same country, in 1910, Alejandro Venegas denounced that primary teachers in public schools were subjected to "the governors and even sub-delegates who demand recognition of their right of seigneur". And, again in Chile, it was critical witnesses of the first decades of the 20th century who revealed that this "right" was exercised actively and frequently by the landlords:

"(by 1920) the pattern had the right to lose. They took the girl they wanted. And it was considered natural".

Pedro Gandulfo, leader of FECH in the 1920s

Dominican dictator Rafael Leónidas Trujillo (in the image, with his second wife, Welcome Ricardo) was famous for exercising the right of pernada.

A famous case in the Dominican Republic is that of the dictator Rafael Leónidas Trujillo, a strong man in the country between 1930 and 1961:

"...The dictator and his sons exercised the medieval right of pernada. In hundreds of cases, the Chivo (Trujillo) and his heir Ramfis took the wives and daughters of Dominicans as if they were inseparable booties of power. They did not need to take them to concentration camps or storm chambers, as happened in other countries decades later. By terror or by adulation, women were often surrendered voluntarily".

Tomás Eloy Martínez

Similarly, in the farms of Brazil, especially in the northeast region, until the second half of the 20th century it was common for the boss to be the one who deflowered peasant women when they got married, a practice that in the language of that area is also known as the "derecho de pernada".

Peru, Bolivia and Ecuador: Priests' Right of Seigneur

Regarding Peru, there are authors who affirm that: "'the priests, like the landowners, also had in Peru (like the patrons of the haciendas in Ecuador) what was called the &# 34;derecho de pernada", that is, the privilege of being the first to sexually initiate the maidens'". In Bolivia, there is also a record of this practice of "derecho de pernada& #3. 4; by the priests during the Colony; who lodged the indigenous brides for a few nights under the euphemism that they should initiate them into the mysteries of religion, in order to have the opportunity to rape them.

(The cure) still in certain regions of Ecuador exercises the right of pernada, the first night with the Indian woman.

Regis Debray, 1976.

Recent cases in Latin America

It is known that the "derecho de seignora" it continued to have occasional validity in some corners of Mexico, such as in the state of Chiapas, at least until the 1980s or, according to the version of the EZLN communiqués, until 1993.

Even in more recent years, cases have been reported that have been classified as "derecho de seignora" in some Latin American countries. In 2003, in the Province of Salta, in Argentina, a landowner was denounced for raping a young woman in front of her relatives, who did not prevent the act, "'aware that if they opposed it they would endanger their work and even their survival'. Before, in Argentina, a similar event that occurred in the province of Catamarca also achieved notoriety. Also on that date, in Brazil the Landless Movement (MST) denounced the persistence of sexual vassalage in the fazendas of the northeast. While in Ecuador the practice of the "derecho de pernada", locally called "malonada", would still be carried out in rubber mills, according to the version of local indigenous organizations. While in 2004 it was denounced that the "derecho de pernada" was still in force on various farms in Guatemala, to the detriment of the daughters of the indigenous people. Regarding Guatemala, it has also been reported (in 1995) that the existence of this practice on the farms "is a fact unanimously admitted by all the community".

In countries of the Andean region (Peru, Bolivia, Ecuador) the "derecho de pernada" in the still surviving colonial institution of the huasicamía, through which the indigenous woman (or huasicama) must deliver one month of domestic service to the landowner every year.

Pre-Columbian versions

According to Cieza de León, in the Inca Empire there was a custom similar to the seigneur's right, through which relatives and close friends of the groom had the right to maintain relations with the bride after the husband, according to what was agreed in the marriage agreement.

Carl Lumholtz, in his book Unknown Mexico from the end of the 19th century, narrates a trip through the Tarahumara area. He there he mentions that the indigenous priests / shamans had this right. However, the context that he describes, in which this occurs, seems to be quite free in affective terms for women, although in certain aspects men have primacy.

In Venezuela, Colombia and Guatemala, according to what other Spanish chroniclers say, there was a custom for young brides to be deflowered by priests of pre-Columbian cults.

The right of seigneur in works of fiction

Being very lax, and admitting the various colloquial connotations of the right of seigneur, works such as the following can be cited:

• The Poem of Gilgamesh (II millennium BC):

Gilgamesh does not leave the maid to [his mother], the daughter of the warrior, the wife of the noble!» When [Anu] had heard his complaints, To the great Aruru they called: "You, Aruru, created [the man]; Create now his double; With his gentle heart he rewards. Fight with one another, so that Uruk may know peace!"

• The gestation song "Baudouin de Sebourc"dated in the 14th century (perhaps written in Hanau) and set in the Crusades. A despotic feudal lord demands the bride a substantial part of the dowry, since if he did not lend himself to pay, he would exercise his right to the first night. In the work, the dowry of the woman refers to her honor, and this measured manor demand is a clear attack on the chastity of the bride. In general, the epic poem seems to reflect the popular belief that, throughout the Middle Ages, jus primae noctis It was a very old and accepted custom, not necessarily linked to sexual abuse, but it was a reflection of power over the women of the plain people.
• Boece, Héctor (1527). Scottorum historiae a prima gentis origine. Paris.: In this work, reference is made to a decree of the Scottish king Evenus III (supposedly historical, but that the investigation has proved to be legendary), according to which "the lord of the ground shall have the maidenhead of all virgins dwelling on the same" (The feudal lord will have the virginity of all the maidens who live in their land). Legend continues to show how Santa Margarita managed to replace jus primae noctis for a marriage tax called merchet.
• Buchanan, George (1582). "Rerum Scoticarum Historia" (The University of California, Irvine edition). published on February 20, 2003. Copyright Statement (English). Archived from the original on 9 June 2011. Consultation on 16 June 2006.:

«Adversus nobilitatem crudelis et avarus, infimi generis hominibus familiais. Cum in stupra virginum et matronarum, et immoderata convivia se totum daret, circa se symphoniacos et histriones omnisque generis voluptatum Ministers semper habebat. »

"Facing the nobility (though he himself was a nobleman) was cruel and greedy, a friend of the men of the lowest kind. As the rape of maidens and midwives, and the inmoderate banquets, always had around them musicians and buphones (histrions, comedians) and servants of all kinds of pleasures"

Rerum Scoticarum History, Liber V, XLIII REX

• Fuenteovejuna, by Lope de Vega: It was already mentioned that it is inspired by a real drama. In this case, a fragment of Act I, Scene III, is cited:

Then condeno infamy.
How many mosses in the villa,
of the fiancée,
They're out!
[... ]
I'll have a wonderful time
that you escape from his hand...
[... ]
For in vain is what you see,
Because it's followed me a month,
and all, Pascuala, in vain.

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• The mayor of Zalamea by Calderón de la Barca: Captain Don Alvaro de Ataide (of noble origin) is housed in the house of the rich husbandman of Zalamea de la Serena, Pedro Crespo, where he meets his daughter Isabel whom he rapes. The case is not Right of PernadaBut it's a clear example of malfet nobleman in which the nobleman does not regard the honour of the peasant or his daughter. The crime is denounced but only the king (Philip II) has jurisdiction, as has been said to determine the tradition of these crimes since the time of Alfonso X. It's a way to cover up this kind of crime. The peasant not only demands that his dignity be taken into account as a human being (he is willing to sin, that is, to comply with his fiscal obligations, but the other servants are Bad uses forgotten, hence the famous phrase of the mayor: "To the king the goods and the life shall be given; but the honor is the heritage of the soul, and the soul is only of God"); it also demands its power to punish the criminal, denying his social preeminence. Now we offer a fragment of Day III, Scene XVII:

This process, in which
proven the crime is,
worthy of death, to be
a maiden steal,
force her in a depopulate,
and not want to marry
with her, having her father
with peace
[... ]
Okay.
sentenced; but you
You have no authority
to execute the sentence
which plays another court

Page 216

The weddings of Figaro, Act III
The Count and Susanna.

• The weddings of Figaro, by Pierre-Augustin de Beaumarchais, on which Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart writes the opera buff of the same title, with entanglements around what could be considered right of of Count Almaviva on Susanna (camarera and fiancée of Figaro).
• Billardon de Sauvigny, Louis Edme (1768). L'innocence du premier âge en France. De Lalain, Paris.: A fable in which the people are confronted with government abuses and celebrates their triumph.

«Alors fut bornée l'autorité paternelle. Seize ans le fils est libre. L'Etat and gagne un citoyen, le père un ami. Dans la fête qu'ils célébrèrent au jour de leurs mariages, le Ciel et leurs compagnes reçurent leurs serments à la lueur d'un vaste bûcher dont, chaque année, on renouvelle la mémoire. Là furent consumés, avec joie, ces titres pompeux, faible aliment de la vanité des nobles, garant plus faible encore de leur mérite. »

"Then the authority of the patriarchs was limited: at the age of sixteen the son became a free man. The state won a citizen and the father a friend. At the feast they celebrated the day of their sponsals, Heaven and their witnesses heard their vows in the brightness of a great bonfire; which, every year, served to reaffirm them. There they were consummated, with joy, their pompous titles of nobility, little food of noble vanity, indebted guarantee of their privileges”

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To which other works of the same author and in the same romantic line against the Old Regime (Histoire amoureuse de Pierre Le Long et de sa trés-honorée Dame Blanche Bazu, The Rose or La fête de Salency...).

• George Orwell's novel, 1984where, in chapter 7 of part one, it is said: «the law by which every capitalist had the right to sleep with any woman working in one of his factories» ("The law by which every employer had the right to sleep with any of the women who work in their business").
• The Mexican Film At the farm (1921), by Ernesto Vollrath.
• The American film The Lord of War (The war lord1965, by Franklin J. Schaffner, interpreted by Charlton Heston.
• The Mexican Film There in the Big Rancho, of director Fernando de Fuentes, below his layer of comedy is an allegation against the right of loss.
• The Spanish film Nobleza baturra (1935) by Florián Rey.
• Argentine films Nobleza gaucha and Nobleza gaucha.
• The Chilean novel by Eduardo Barrios, Great Lord and Rajadiablos (1948).
• The film by Joseph Losey (1963) The Servant, in which the butler, Hugo Barret (Dirk Bogarde), serves his supposed sister Vera (Sarah Miles), with the purpose of seducing his master (James Fox) and keeping the domain he has gained over him.
• The Japanese animated film Kanashimi no Belladonna (1973) begins with the ritual rape of the protagonist, Jeanne, under the framework of the law of pernada when the local baron does not find the paid tribute satisfactory.
• It is mentioned in the work of Gabriel García Márquez, The general in his maze (1989), in which he mentions the father of Simon Bolivar, Juan Vicente Bolivar, accused of rapes of the elderly and minors appealing to such a right. Also mentioned in the story The funerals of the big mom.
• Mel Gibson's movie, Braveheart1995), in which a member of the community of William Wallace is subjected to this humiliation at the beginning of the story.
• The Mexican soap opera of the time Passion shows, in the first chapter of history, the lord of the valley where they inhabit by forcing the protagonist to maintain this kind of relationship.
• In the movie Avengers: Age of Ultron (2015), Tony Stark mentions that, if he was appointed king of Asgard, he would declare the right of a slurry.
• In the song Mecano “The blues of the slave”, the letter refers to this right, says: «Let them be finished / past, / the beatings of the boss / and the right of pernada».