Wood has always been and will continue being a material used bay man in thousands of different ways, but it has barely received the attention it descrves from economic historians. This article aims to show the great variety of economic problems related to wood as well as to illustrate the need to carry out further research on this matter. Forest, industrial and commercial aspects of wood in Spain from mid-XIX to mid-XX century, taking into account the changes produced in wood use and in the evolution of international markets, are analysed. The most important conclusions of die study include die «lumbering» of Spanish forest production, the increase and spread of sawmills, the complementing of national production with imported timber and die self-sufficient descapitalisation of die autharchic years.

En esta ponencia nos proponemos trazar, a grandes rasgos, un esbozo de la evolución del sector agrario español durante la última década del siglo XIX y el primer tercio del actual. Queremos dejar claro, desde un comienzo, que no se trata de un mero ejercicio de estadística, sino de una investigación histórico-económica en el estricto sentido del término.