The Basque History of the World - Mark Kurlansky [53]
With the abolition in French Basqueland of the Fueros, or Fors, as they were called in French, Basques were suddenly required to abandon their traditional laws, codified more than 250 years earlier, and accept an entirely different system of law, eventually to be established in the Napoleonic Code of 1804. The ancient custom of collectively owned land would be abolished. The law of inheritance would be changed. Ancient Basque law distinguished between acquired goods, which could be willed, and inherited goods—the house, the etxea, and what belonged to the house—which had to be passed down, without distinction of sex, to the firstborn. Under the new legal code, each child had an equal claim to all property, which would result in ever smaller holdings. In time it would cause many etxea to disappear.
Revolutions are always easier to admire from across the border. The affluent commercial class of San Sebastián and Bilbao was not concerned about the dismantling of the French Basque provinces. Instead, with great excitement, they were following news of the establishment of parliamentary rule in an elected republic. Guipúzcoans greeted the dramatic events in Paris with such enthusiasm that the Spanish began censoring press coverage of the Revolution. This could not stop pamphlets and political tracts from flowing into Guipúzcoa, nor could it stop Basque businessmen who had regular contact with France from bringing back news.
The Basques got news of France faster than it arrived in Madrid. But in 1793, when the elected Convention, charged with creating a new democratic French state, declared a French republic and had Louis XVI executed, it took only thirteen days for the startling news to reach Madrid by mail. Spain, ruled by a related Bourbon monarch, marched 20,000 troops toward the Basque border.
As the French moved their troops toward the Pyrenees, the inevitable conflict was certain to endanger Spanish Basque independence. Ever since the Basque provinces were first tied to Castile, the policy in Madrid had always been to let the Basques be Basque, let them have their Fueros—their own laws, taxes, and import duties. Then Madrid could count on these warlike people to be on Spain’s troubled border, ready to defend it, because they would be defending their own liberty. Basques were not even required to serve in the Spanish military, just as long as they were ready to defend their own provinces, which happened to be the border.
It had been centuries since this defense clause had been invoked. Some towns and villages had at one time been divided into religious societies, and each society had been responsible for the defense of a specified section of the town wall. Once a year, this home guard would be reviewed. The day of the review had by now become the town festival, but its significance had been lost. Basques no longer trained in defense, nor did they have a draft capable of raising an army. When they finally did raise one, they had to deal with their own Foral issues. When Vizcaya sent an additional 500 men to the defense of Guipúzcoa, only 200 actually went, because the Fueros specified that Basques could only be required to fight in their own province.
The French crossed the passes of Basse Navarre and encountered little resistance as they marched through the deep Bidasoa Valley toward Guipúzcoa. Fuenterrabía, the fishing village with a hilltop cathedral, fell without a fight. In San Sebastián, the mayor turned over the city. The Junta General de Guipúzcoa even sent delegates