Expelled Moriscos could only convert assets into goods, never cash

Evidence

I grant that during this time they may dispose of their goods, chattels, and livestock but not their real estate, and they may take away the proceeds, not in coin, gold, silver, jewels, nor letters of exchange, but in the form of merchandise purchased from native inhabitants of these kingdoms, and from no others, and also in fruit and produce from them. … What is conceded by the document proper is little enough: whereas the Valencian expulsion proclamation gave only three days, here the Moriscos have a month during which they were not confined to their home villages: they could travel about freely to realize their assets. The ban on export of money or bills of exchange was, of course, very harsh to our modern minds, but it was a provision that stemmed from the mercantilist economic theory of the times. — L. P. Harvey, Muslims in Spain, 1500 to 1614, 1499

Categorization

• XREF: Connects to mercantilist economic regulation of the same era as the Spanish Armada naval economy and English trade monopolies.
• DEFINE: Illustrates mercantilism’s concrete mechanism: prohibiting the export of specie while permitting commodity export.