AUGUSTO Gómez Serrano - Bogotá (Colombia)
At the present time they are scarce prints of the Islamic right in the Latin society, but it is certain that some blocks of the Islamic right survived and they stayed, - with slight modifications for religious questions -, in the Iberian peninsula after the Christian conquest and later they were exported to the American continent.
This is the case from the relating laws to the markets, la/s persona/s encargada/s of to control and to watch over the merchandise and to the merchants, as well as the legislation with respect to their products. These are some of those that pervivieron until the XIX S.:
—They won't sell milk more than people of trusting, because if they won't add him and they will mix with water in detriment of the Muslims (this last coletilla of the Muslims will be suppressed after the Christian conquest).
—The measures for milk will be made of mud glaze, wooden, or of any material that is not the copper since this it raises verdigris that is harmful for the Muslims (this last coletilla of the Muslims will be suppressed after the Christian conquest).
—No fruit bowl will sustain the scale with the hand, if not that this must be hung.
—It should be prohibited to the salespersons that fixed places of sale are reserved in the positions of the market, because but it is completed a quasi-right of property it is believed that constantly engenders differences and disputes among them. That the one that arrives first, occupy place.
The almotacén will install the unions, placing each artisan with those of its occupation in fixed places (after the Christian conquest and in later centuries, already very entrance the modern age, the localization of the positions will be sold).
—The hueveros or salespersons of eggs, they will have before yes some pots full with water, to be able to distinguish among them the rotten eggs.
—The bread is not blindfolded more than to the weight and inspect you its cochura and examine you its crumb, because often it is disguised, I mean that the bakers take some good flour and with her "they disguise" the external aspect of the bread that inside is of bad flour.
—The sausages and the meatballs will be made with fresh meat and not meat of sick or dead animal without beheading, because this it is cheaper (that of or without beheading it will be suppressed after the Christian conquest.
The topic that it is beheaded he responds to the Islamic rites to kill animals since these they should die beheaded and looking toward the Meca. Today in day this continues being the habitual practice and the only way of sacrificing animals to sell their meat in the Islamic countries).
—Vinegar must buy more than to people of trusting, because this product tolerates to be blended with a lot of water, and it is a fraud.
—It will be ordered to the leather zurradores and silk dyers don't exercise their occupation more than outside (these occupations are taken to outside due to the bad scent that they remove the leather to be hardened, it is the same case for the elaboration of silk tints. They also originate a lot of noise and it is annoying for the near inhabitants to these shops).
—It won't be let that any salesperson outdoors gets up on his head his parasol, unless it is higher than a man to horse, because if it would not take out the eyes to the pedestrians.
—It should be prohibited to the merchants of the market of made clothes (marqatán, mercandal, names of the different professions in charge of such a trade) that hang the clothes and the rest that they have for habit to hang in the window, where he enters in the eyes of people, but rather they should make it under the roofs of their stores.
The person that will take charge to veil the execution of these laws, as well as it will sanction to the offenders it is the muhtasib and enter their daily attributions towards the market it will should:
—To check the pesos and measures used by the merchants and to give faith of their truthfulness.
—It will check that there are not deceits in products whose price is fixed ahead of time and they are vital for the town, case of the bread.
—It will fix the prices to avoid that they are exaggerated in the sale of products.
Origins of the Muhtasib: This he imagines it doesn't denominate this way from the beginning, since it will be recognized, in a first moment, as wilayat al-Shuq (Mister of the zoco).
The appearance of this figure corresponds at the end of the reign omeya and enter its functions they highlight the collection of the tithe, collection of rents of goods properties, control of weights and measures, fixation of the price of the products.
In the case of the Iberian peninsula the first testimony with respect to the wilayat al-Shuq he/she appears attested under the reign of Hisam I (796-822) and their functions are limited, almost exclusively, to the surveillance and control of the market. This adjudicatura depended on the cadi (Judge).
In this case the reference is to the maximum judge of each provincial demarcation or kura. The cadi is since a religious man the administration of justice it is a religious magistracy because the Islamic right is based on the Koran of each one of the kuras (counties).
With Abd al-Rahmän II (822-852) this figure goes as its attributions they increase and the gentleman of the zoco was the one in charge of maintaining the public order in the capitals, as well as of informing of the possible conspiracies of the low classes against the power.
At the end of the century X, soon after of the fall of the caliphate, it will be when the wilayat al-Shuq pass to be denominated Muhtasib, and it is among the S.XI - S.XII when they begin to be elaborated the legal theories and morals for this position.
According to the oriental jurist al-Mäwardi the conditions that were demanded for the execution of the position were: honesty, solid culture, religious puritanismo, perspicacity, zeal and excellent morality; not in vain we are before a religious magistracy.
It won't be until the grenade Nazarí when we find this figure in the Spanish Islam again, and their functions will be the surveillance of the markets as well as of all the bound professionals to this (bakers, glaziers, potters, butchers, etc.) and their pesos and measures, to put order among the diverse categories of occupations, to watch over for the health of the cities, to avoid that detritus and dead animals are thrown to the street, to supervise the health works (sewer system, conduction of water, etc.) and everything that related with the trade and the health.
The Almotacén: We don't have perseverance that in the pre-Islamic Hispania a figure in charge of to control and to watch over the markets exists and to the merchants, but yes that it conforms the Hispanic Christian Kingdom they go advancing in its conquest toward the south of the peninsula this figure it is respected, he is liberated of the load of surveillance and little by little he is gone conferring, exclusively, in market works.
It is not of missing that the relating laws to markets stay but if that it is necessary to say that the one in charge of making them complete will stop to be Islamic (unless in the zocos of the neighborhoods populated for Islamic in Christian cities) and these functions will pass a Christian.
The figure of the almotacén will be common in the markets until very entered in XIX century and in some cities they still conserve that figure, only at the present time including the imperium that represents, is chosen more as representative and spokesman of the decisions of the community of merchants that I eat judge or vigilant of the hygienic-sanitary norms.
The figure in charge of making complete this legislative code will be denominated, in the Christian territory Almotacén, and although in very few Islamic time they were under suspicion of corruption we cannot say the same thing of that happened in later times, since the power of which you enjoy favors the not very licit negotiations.
The religious factor also favors since the corruptela although under the Islam it should be a religious magistracy, under the Christianity, nr. can be from an elected person for the king until an elected merchant for its partners of the market, with what the zeal will always depend of if the almotacén wants or not to get rich.
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