Italian Cameralism Under Habsburg Rule And Assessments Of Land And Farm (1748-1859)

Abstract

Professionalized administrators princely states under Habsburg domination in North and Central Italy, -aided by technical staff (quantity surveyors, surveyors and accountants), to allow the reconstruction of the state, tax system and economy after a half century of wars-, develop and standardize the principles, practice and instruments of a new science of value and costs in the second half of the eighteenth century after the Restoration of European Peace in 1748. First, they decide with the reform of agricultural land management ducal (Camera ducale) the evaluation and the reimbursement of the land improvement (migliorie) since 1748. Then, they force between 1754 and 1768 to the establishment of inventories (consegna e riconsegna) with values (operare a misura con valore) in the property management secularized of land of the monastic orders (Camera ecclesiale). Finally, with the Camera dei conti, they reform (1786-1791) the criterion for determining cadastral tax by abandoning the traditional tax on the value of possessions (entrata reale) and adopting a new tax based on the value from annual crops (entrate ordinarie annue) without taking into account revenues from agricultural activities as farming, viniculture industry or lumber. It is, therefore, in the heart of the state with the use of evaluation (Estimo) under the control of the central administration of accounts that is gradually evolving from Milan to Florence via Reggio Emilia, to the heritage conservation and to the measure of rent stable (rendita fondiaria stabile) to research calculation of farm income (reddito agricolo) defined, again, as a fluctuating result of the agricultural activity because it depends of the investment of the owner and peasant labour. This development practice begun under the Enlightenment sees its completion and its theorisation in the Restoration : it enabled, by taxing only the most common crops, between mid-eighteenth and mid-nineteenth century, the rural modernization.