TAX EVASION AND TAX AVOIDANCE IN THE TOWNS OF THE KINGDOM OF NAPLES (XV-XVIII CENTURIES)

The phenomenon of tax fraud was rooted in the tax system of the old regime. The main reasons were: the magnitude of the number of the privileged, the negotiatory nature of fiscal relations between the Sovereign and his subjects, the decentralised management of taxation where a leading role was played in this by the intermediary bodies throughout the territory. Another factor was the autonomy enjoyed at local level, which was also a source of particularism, heterogeneity and excessive power on the part of the urban élite (Fortea Pérez). Many of these characteristics, relating specifically to sixteenth and seventeenth-century Castile, were also common to other areas of Europe as a result of jurisdictional fragmentation (Epstein,Dincecco). In order to describe the peculiar physiognomy of the Kingdom in the field of tax evasion, I shall try to answer questions on whether and how this phenomenon followed the above-mentioned centuries-old patterns.