Los interrogatorios de la Edad Moderna, fuentes geohistóricas para el conocimiento del paisaje

Abstract

The XVI century marks a milestone in the understanding of the world and in the collection of geographical knowledge, where Spain and Portugal are two pioneers. In Spain, Philip II, "the king among the geographers", as Richard Kagan called him, is fundamental. Under his rule several interrogatories are designed, completed, and sent to the different Spanish and American territories, the peninsular one generically denoted as "Relaciones Topográficas". These interrogatories are meant to gather information of the territories and the people of the vast empire in which the Sun did not set. The XVIII century turns its eyes to the XVI and reformulates the Interrogatories with a more practical and economic vision, since the territory and the people are synonymous with resource and good government. From the State, two interrogatories are designed for the Spanish textual catalogs: Patiño and Ensenada. In this century, others also use this method to collect geographical information: well‐known are Tomás López's Interrogatories and the Real Audiencia of Extremadura. In this work we perform a comparative study of the information contained in these questionnaires as geohistorical source, in such a way as to reveal the differences and similarities between them at the time of reporting on the different elements of the landscape, geography and territory.