Chris

Many thanks. I have the work by Michael Broers on my “to read” list. I have read, with much interest, a short and thought provoking article in History Today, The Empire Behind the Lines, History Today, (1998 Jan.) 48 : 1, pp. 20-26
I have been considering myself the imposition of the 6 military governorships in northern Spain as one of the features of French rule in this “outer empire: it seems the French incorporated some aspects of the existing Spanish judicial and administrative systems within a super-imposed form of military governance to extract taxes and other resources from the indigenous population, police the areas and maintain “law and order”.
I'll look out also for the work by Woolf you mention.

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