The Catalonia of the 10th to 12th centuries and the historiographic definition of feudalism

Abstract

The historiographic evolution of the concept of feudalism, from its formulation in the 17th century until today, has affected Catalonia differently. In the last quarter of the 20th century, it reached a prominent position as a paradigm of the mutationist model. The numerous sources still conserved, coupled with the enrichment of interpretative perspectives, facilitate a revision. However, it should be undertaken cautiously in light of the pitfalls of the documentation itself and the hermeneutic difficulties. Nonetheless, revision is a challenge that cannot be neglected given that the events that took place in the northeast of the Iberian Peninsula between the 10th and 12th centuries heavily conditioned the subsequent history.