1. In this document, Señor,
is rendered as "Lord". It is the hereditary title assigned to the
head of a Señorio, a feudal expanse of land ceded by the king in
perpetuity in recognition of conquest, and passed in toto to the eldest son
(or daughter, if no male issue). A heiress of a Señorio is
referred to as a Señora, rendered in this document as
"Lady". In later centuries it was not unusual to hear of Señores
who inherited more than one Señorio. Titled nobility (e.g., counts)
especially often accumulated Señorios and apparently were able to
relax the rule of primogeniture and pass individual Señorios to
secondary sons and daughters as patrimony.
Because the Señorios of northern
By 1800, the Señores of northern
For a discussion of these topics, refer to
2. i.e., major players.
3 casa solar, i.e., the physical, principal house of
residence of a noble family, often referred to as their "palace".
4 A Memorial was a document tracing the geneology of an
individual. This kind of document was required when the individual in question
applied for membership in one of several institutions, for example, the Knights
of Santiago.
5 The term used here is antiquísimo, which can
also mean "most ancient"".
6 lit. "A este son comen los de Ron." Note
the irony: The Gallegos, or natives of
7 Academic degrees were
ordered in the following manner: Bachiller (in past centuries,
equivalent to the U.S. Bachelor's degree (from which the word derives); today
it is equivalent to the high school diploma); Licenciado , i.e.,
"licensed" in a particular area of knowledge (today, it is the first
university-level degree, and requires somewhat more study within an area than
the U.S. university Bachelor's degree); Magister , offered by some
institutions; and Doctorado, the terminal academic degree in a field.
8 Lit. Ricoshombres.
9 Fernando I, "The Great", king of
10 Also referred to as Soto Mayor in other texts, such as to
the "Solar de la Casa de Olloniego" of D. Felipe Bernaldo de
Quirós (1688). This trunk was apparently the originator of all the Soto
line (e.g., Soto,
11 Alfonso VI, king of Castille and Leon. He was the king who
had to swear in the presence of El Cid (and by El Cid's demand), that he did
not have any involvement in the death of his (Alfonso's) brother.
12 The term Adelantado is an ancient name for a
variety of positions, e.g., governor of a province on the frontier, Chief
Magistrate of the Kingdom, Captain General in times of war. Adelantado de
Mar was a ship captain who received in advance the governorship of whatever
lands he would discover.
13 In paragraph 22 number 21, according to to the "Solar
de la Casa de Olloniego" of D. Felipe Bernaldo de Quirós
(1688).
14 Fernando III, king of Castille and Leon reigned during the
years 1201 - 1252. He declared Castilian to be the official language of the
kingdom. He was canonized and is considered one of the patron saints of
engineers.
15 Alfonso XI, king of
16 Merino Mayor ancient title for chief magistrate.
17 Patermajor: roughly equivalent to the Latin Pater
Familia, or "head of the family".
18 lit. solar, i.e., the physical , principal house of
residence of a noble family, often referred to as their "palace".
19 lit. lugar de Ron, or "place of Ron".
This comment is hard to understand, as I am unfamiliar as to what the term RON
means. If it was an actual place name, or toponymn, the place appears not to
exists today. Don. Felipe Bernaldo de Quirós in his "Solar de la
Casa de Olloniego" of (1688) makes repeated mention of "the
Ancient House of Ron", calling it one of "the primary families of the
Asturian Principate". How ancient is hard to determine, but there
are families of the region which claim to have been prominent before the
Visigothic invasion in the late A. D. 400's. After his retirement and the death
of his wife of over 40 years, Don. Felipe Bernaldo de Quirós kept busy
by employing his extensive personal library (reputed to be the best in
20 The Catholic Kings (or monarchs) = Fernando and Isabel =
Ferdinand and Isabella.
21 Comendador was a title used to indicate a knight of
a military order which had an encomienda (i.e., a commission, high
office, or eminent title) and prelate of some religious orders. The former
connotation is implied here.
22 Enrique II, King of Castille from 1369 to 1379 (lived 1333
- 1379). Was called "the fraticide" because he personally killed his
brother King Pedro (known as "the cruel"), as described by the
contemporary Froissart in his Chronicles. (Penguin Books, Ltd., ed.
Geoffrey Brereton, Harmondsworth, Middlesex, England, 1981.)
23 The term Gentilhombre was used to describe a man of
good family who served in the house of the king in one of a variety of tasks.
24 Pagador Mayor = head paymaster.
25 According to the "Solar de la Casa de Olloniego"
of D. Felipe Bernaldo de Quirós (1688), this Diego Fernandez de Ron was
also Señor of Ibias and a grandson of the house of the Marqueses
de Astorga. See
"Biblioteca Historico-Genealogica Asturiana, ed. Senén Alvarez de
la Rivera M.., vol. II, "Solar de la Casa de Olloniego", Impresa
Cervantes, Santiago de Chile, 1925, p. 121.
26 Juan II (1405 - 1454),
King of Castille.
27 Cabo (from the Latin caput,. head). Military term
for squadron leader. Equivalent to corporal (?).
28 Ayuntamiento, the corporation which administers a
municipality.
29 Note that this implies that this link between Lope
Nuñez de Ron and doña Aldonza de Ibias y Quirós brought
together three Señorios: that belonging to the Ron, the
Quirós and the Ibias.
30 In contrast to a Señorio, which included
only land, real estate, and the rents they provided, a Mayorazgo was a
later legal entity which could include Señorios plus
"movable" property (jewels, coinage, etc.). Like the Señorio,
it was intended to be passed to the eldest (Mayor = eldest, or
oldest).
31
32 vinculos, lit. links. Can mean the link of a farm
to the perpetual dominion of a family. Also, entailments.
33 This don Antonio de Ron y Valcárcel died in Cecos,
in 20 June, 1648, requesting in his will to have 400 masses sung for his soul.
He was buried in the main chapel of the parochial church of Santa Maria de
Cecos, where the Rones were buried since antiquity ("Solar de la Casa
de Olloniego" of D. Felipe Bernaldo de Quirós (1688), op. cit.,
pp. 184-185.)
34 Note that in this document, the surnames Valcárcel
and Valcarce are used apparently interchangeably.
35 Presumably, a relative of Conquistador Vasco
Nuñez de Balboa, conqueror of
36 According to the "Solar de la Casa de Olloniego"
of D. Felipe Bernaldo de Quirós (1688), op. cit., pp. 185-186, this don
Antonio was actually the third son. The second son (omitted in this
document) was Francisco de Ron y Valcárcel, who became Lord of Ron after
his father's death (Lope Nuñez de Ron y Valcarce is stated to have died
before his father, and although formally recognized as the successor, never became
Lord of Ron). Francisco de Ron y Valcárcel however, became insane
between the years 1650 and 1656, so the Señorio passed to his
brother Antonio. Antonio was actually legally ineligible to become Lord of Ron
because a clause in the Mayorazgo documents excluded clerics from
inheriting the Mayorazgo. To avoid legal entaglements, his younger
brother Alonso allowed Antonio to become Lord of Ron, and Alonso (recorded in
documents as the "immediate successor") assumed the title upon his
brother's death. Alonso is referred in documents as the "very magnificent
Lord" ("el muy magnifico Señor") of the House of
Ron. Alonso was born in Cecos and baptised in the parochial
37 Canons are priests who do not have a parish and instead
are assigned to a cathedral.
38 Calificador, Censor of the Inquisition.
39 They were married in
40 Colegial, belonging
to a chapter of Canons.
41 Regidor, member of a group which administers a
municipality.
42 Note that Lope Benito de Ron Queipo
Note also that Lope Benito bypassed his father's first surname (before adopting
the surname Ron, i.e., Valcarce) possibly because his mother's surname was more
prestigious.
43 Bracing myself to spend what I expected to be a couple of
hundred dollars, I wrote to the records office of the Cortes and requested
photocopies of all the speeches made by this individual during his tenure. A
few weeks later, to my surprise, I received a letter from the head of the
records office. She indicated with a tone indicating confusion that don
Estanislao de Ron y Caballero apparently did not make a single speech on the
floor during the three terms that he served. His name was brought up during
some speeches, however, and she included copies of those instances. Although he
was elected to this post three times (and thus apparently served his district
satisfactorily), he seems to have been a behind-the-scenes player. This
punctuates the taciturn demeanor of many Ron men that I have met.
After the Señorios were dissolved, Estanislao de Ron y Caballero
quite possibly became an extremely wealthy man. He was able to raise rents and
subdivide his holdings (probably in