Retroceso forestal, desamortizaciones y atraso tecnológico en la industria guipuzcoana del hierro durante el Antiguo Régimen

Abstract

This article deals with two main subjects. On the one hand, its makes a diachronic study about the evolution of gipuzkoan woodland between the 18th and the 19th centuries. The forest was a disputed source of resources during the Ancien Regime, and some interests around it would define its future, over all since the period mentioned. On the other hand, the article tries to find the reasons of what historiography has defined as traditional technological backward of foundries from the 16th to the 19th centuries. Even if blast furnaces suffered a great development in Europe from the 16th onwards, Gipuzkoa kept its hydraulic forges without almost technological improvements. Finally, it tries to demonstrate that both are related to each other. The monopoly and control that local and regional authorities exerted over woodresources, most of which had important interests and investments in forges, allowed them to have a cheap and a high-quality fuel, which gave them the chance to keep the costs of production in profitable levels and to allow the gipuzkoan traditional iron industry became a
competitive activity until almost the middle of the 19th century.