Insert: Carta ejecutoria de hidalguía for the Ortega y Vilches family (Granada, 1725)

Though its articulations changed with time and location, ancestry proved a remarkably durable way of demarcating identity, social privilege, and even time in the Iberian world. This eighteenth-century manuscript recognizes the hidalguía, or noble status, of members of the Ortega y Vilches family of Aziarcollar, near Seville. Known as a carta ejecutoria, the text commemorates two decades of litigation during which the Ortegas produced documents and witnesses to attest to their hidalguía being recognized in their city for at least two generations. The origins of such cartas and the legal proceedings that produced them trace back to the late Middle