Apuestas y Juegos / Gambling and Games (DCH)
 

No. 2025-04

English Abstract: 

This article explores the legal, moral, and theological frameworks that regulated games and gambling in the Spanish Empire during the early modern period. Drawing on sources from canon law, theology, moral thought, and imperial and local administrative regulations, it analyzes the various debates regarding types of games, the individuals allowed to participate, the conditions under which participation was considered licit, and the penalties imposed. The article focuses on the conception of gambling as a contract and addresses practices and customs, doctrinal regulations, and the role local conditions played in the creation of normativities and how such normativities evolved over time. It shows that gambling was not prohibited as a form of leisure and rest, but it was regulated in relation to concerns about social, moral, and economic order, as well as clerical discipline. The article also offers a historiographical approach to the topic, concluding with the need to consider the legal orders surrounding games and their various practices and local translations.