"The resistance to the manorial jurisdictions and the civil service examination to the prerogatives of the lords in the towns was constant throughout the Modern Age, but the process accelerated as a consequence of the French Revolution". This is the thesis sustained by Jesús Mª Usunáriz, Deputy Director of the department of History of the University of Navarra, in his last book, El ocaso del régimen señorial en Navarra.

"The invasion of the Napoleonic armies and, subsequently, the decrees approved by the Cortes of Cadiz in 1811 and 1813 opened the definitive process of the abolition of the manors, which had its culmination in the law of 1837," he stressed.

The work analyzes specific examples of lawsuits related to the refusal of the neighbors to respect the lord's rights. Some of these privileges consisted of the lord being able to receive a series of rents from the leasing of his properties, collect a wide variety of taxes, enjoy monopolies (mills, threshing floors) or be buried in a prominent place (in the parish church, in the family tomb...). This explains cases such as those of Falces, Lodosa, Peralta, San Adrián, Igúzquiza or Ochovi.

The study of hundreds of court proceedings: a first-hand view

The historian of the University of Navarra analyzes in the publication all these phenomena related to the final period of the Navarrese seigniory between 1808 and 1860, organized in two phases. The first, from 1808 to the 1930s, focuses on the effects of the application and repeal of the decrees of Cadiz. Meanwhile, the second one deals with the years between 1837 and 1860, when the phase final of the abolition of the fiefs takes place.

In order to carry out the research, Jesús Mª Usunáriz has studied hundreds of judicial processes found in the file General of Navarra. In this sense, he comments that these documents have provided him with "a first-hand view of the role and attitude of the peasants towards the feudal regime, the positions adopted by the nobility and the response given by the courts and the political authorities to the requirements of both parties".