Una comarca periférica en la Edad MediaSayago, de la autonomía a la dependencia feudal

Abstract

Sayago is part of a group of districts forming the westernmost area of Castile and León, from La Cabrera to the Cordillera Central. This group makes up a kind of "interior periphery" in which Sayago shows one of the highest degrees o explains these features, since the indigenous structures survived Romanization and Visigoth occupation, both of which had to adapt to them. The indigenous society was based on warrior activity and livestock-raising, in extensive settlements of the type with a central place on a hill and segmented leadership, which underwent a process of mozarabization during the period comprising the 8th to the 10th century. Beginning in the 10th century, and specially in the 12th, feudalization took place, due to both indigenous social evolution and external lordship pressure. This gave rise to a marginal area, an area based on livestock-raising in the hands of the aristocracy and politically dependent on Zamora.