The carob tree is typical of the dry regions on Mallorca island, it grows on land that isn’t particularly fertile and doesn’t need much looking after. Its wood has traditionally been used as firewood, and its fruit, the carob, was used as feed for draught animals. There was a significant increase in the consumption of carobs between the last third of the nineteenth century and the beginning of the twentieth, and this was linked to the consumption by animals. Large quantities of carobs were exported both abroad and to Spain, but the progressive decline in the use of draught animals reduced demand. However, other uses were found for the carob, such as in the industrial production of chocolate with carob substituting cocoa and in the extraction of sugars, alcohol and laxatives. The carob seed is used in the production of plastics, although synthetic materials have detracted from its importance in this field. During the period of the Spanish Civil War and the post-war years, in which Spain was internationally isolatad, the carob took on a special significance in the production of foodstuffs that could not be easily imported, such as coffee.

The large increase in demand for carob seeds that occurred in the mid-seventies, which was due to demand from the food, paper and textile industries, created false hopes with respect to the cultivation of this product. As with the majority of traditional cultivations, the carob tree is currently in recession.

Figs spread over wattle screens drying in the sun.

The fig tree is indigenous to Mallorca. The parcelling out of rural land in the nineteenth century created the conditions for a boom in its cultivation, and it became one of the most widely cultivated trees on the island, second only to the olive tree; it was especially prevalent on small and medium-sized plantations.

The fig season starts at the end of summer, and once they have been collected they are sold on for human or animal consumption, either as fresh or dried fruit. The drying process enriches the sugar content of the figs and helps preserve them at the same time. In the past, figs were spread over a sequer, which is a wattle screen, and left under the sun to dry. At night, they had to be brought inside or piled up so that the dew didn’t spoil them. This process was carried out over seven or eight days until they were completely dry. During the drying period, the figs were turned and flattened, and the best ones were selected and set apart. If the weather turned bad, the drying would be finished off in an oven.

Figs that were for human consumption were flattened down until they attained the desired round and flat form, and they were then stored in wooden boxes or clay recipients. For special occasions, such as the festival of the slaughter of pigs, figs were prepared with anisette and sugar inside glass or clay recipients. Fig bread was another product made on the island, this was made with ground figs, liquor and aniseed. These products can still be found, but they are no longer part of the everyday diet. The fall in daily consumption of fig products, together with a decline in the use of figs in animal feed, due to the excessive build up of fat in animals that live off this, has led to a recession in the cultivation of figs.

In the distant past, the land on Mallorca was held by the aristocracy, who generally lived in the city and lived from the proceeds of the land they owned. However, with the economic decline of this dominant social class, peasants were able to buy land and thus escape the almost feudal exploitation to which they had previously been subjected.

Nowadays, the land is mainly divided among small properties, which were traditionally small family agricultural concerns. This is a reflection of the social and economic transformations that have occurred in rural Mallorcan life over recent centuries. Between the second half of the nineteenth century and the first half of the twentieth century, great changes in the structure of rural land ownership came about, as the day labourers gained access to land possession, and as a consequence of this, a class of land-owning peasants came into being. The general system for the sale of parcels of land by the big landowners was the L’establiment a cens (settlement of ground rent), this involved the purchaser making an initial down payment, and the rest would be paid back off in instalments, with the cens functioning as an annual interest payment. This wasn’t just a mortgage loan though, because the original owner was reserved part ownership of the land of the property under what were known as alodial rights.