A History of the Inquisition of Spain; vol. 1

[481] Folch de Cardona, in the Consulta of the Suprema to Philip V, July 18, 1703, states that the earliest bull in the archives was one of Sixtus IV in 1483 appointing Torquemada inquisitor-general with power to deputize inquisitors and to hear cases in the first instance. It was not till 1486 that Innocent VIII granted him appellate jurisdiction.—Bibl. Nacional, Seccion de MSS., G, 61, fol. 199.

The title of Inquisitor-general was not immediately invented. In a sentence pronounced at Ciudad-Real, March 15, 1485, Torquemada is styled simply “juez principal ynquisidor.”—Arch. Hist. Nac. Inq. de Toledo, Legajo 165, n. 551.

[482] Ripoll Bullar. Ord. FF. Prædic. III, 630; IV, 125. Yet modern apologists do not hesitate to argue that the papacy sought to mitigate the severity of the Spanish Inquisition (Gams, Zur Geschichte der spanischen Staatsinquisition, pp. 20-1; Hefele, Der Cardinal Ximenes, p. 269; Pastor, Geschichte der Päpste, II, 582), basing their assertions on the eagerness of the curia to entertain appeals, of which more hereafter.

[483] Archivo de Simancas, Patronato Real, Inquisicion, Legajo único, fol. 28.

[484] Páramo, pp. 156-7.

[485] Ripoll, IV, 126.

[486] Páramo, p. 156.

[487] Arch. Gen. de la Corona de Aragon, Reg. 3486, fol. 45.—Páramo, p. 137.

[488] Bulario de la Orden de Santiago, Lib. I de copias, fol. 6, 8.—“ad nostrum et dictæ sedis beneplacitum.”

The original appointments of Miguel de Morillo and Juan de San Martin were similarly ad beneplacitum (Ibid. fol. 10), which may perhaps explain their assertion of independence of Torquemada.

[489] Ibid. fol. 3, 11, 13, 15, 20; Lib. IV, fol. 91, 118, 137; Lib. V, fol. 117, 136, 138, 151, 199, 200, 251, 264, 295.—Archivo de Alcalá, Hacienda, Leg. 1049.

[490] Instruciones de Sevilla (Arguello, Copilacion de las Instruciones, fol. 2, Madrid, 1630).

[491] Páramo, p. 156.

[492] Bulario de la Orden de Santiago, Lib. I de copias, fol. 8, 10.—Monteiro, Historia da Inquisiçaõ, II, 415.—Boletin, XV, 490.—Ripoll IV, 5, 6.

Somewhat similar was the question which arose, in 1507, on the retirement of Diego Deza and the appointment of Ximenes as inquisitor-general of Castile. His commission as usual contained the power of appointing and removing or punishing all subordinates, but those who derived their commissions from Deza seem to have claimed that they were not amenable to Ximenes and it required a special brief from Julius II, August 18, 1509, to establish his authority over them.—Bulario, Lib. III, fol. 68; Lib. I de copias, fol. 30.

[493] Llorente, Añales, I, 214.—Francisco de la Fuente, as we have seen was inquisitor of Ciudad-Real as early as 1483. Alonso de Fuentelsaz in 1487 was one of the inquisitors of Toledo and was then merely a doctor.—Arch. hist. nacional, Inq. de Toledo, Leg. 176, n. 673.

[494] Archivo de Simancas, Inquisicion, Libro 933.—“Inquisitores generales in omnibus regnis et dominiis serenissimorum regis et reginæ dominorum nostrorum subdelegati a reverendissimo patre nostro fratre Thoma de Torquemada ... inquisitore generali.”

Yet we have the commission of Martin of Messina, in 1494, issued directly by the pope.—Bulario, Lib. I de copias, fol. 3.

[495] Archivo de Simancas, Inquisicion, Lib. I.—Arguello, fol. 12.—Marieta, Hist. Ecles. Lib. XII, cap. xcii.

Torquemada was buried in a chapel of the church of his convent of Santo Tomás in Avila. In 1572 the body was removed to another chapel to make room for the interment of Francisco de Soto de Salazar, Bishop of Salamanca, when it gave forth a supernatural odor of delicious sweetness, greatly confusing to those engaged in the sacrilegious task. The Dominican provincial punished the authors of the translation and the historian Garibay petitioned the Inquisitor-general Quiroga to have the remains restored to their original resting-place, which was done in 1586.—Memorias de Garibay, Tit. X (Mem. hist. esp. VII, 393).

An anonymous biographer, writing in 1655, tells us that he retired to the convent of Avila two years before his death, Sept. 26, 1498 and that he has always there been reputed as a saint.—Biblioteca Nacional, Seccion de MSS., Ii, 16.

[496] Arch. de Simancas, Patronato Real, Inquisicion, Legajo único, fol. 22.—Bulario de la Orden de Santiago, Lib. I, fol. 136.

[497] Bulario de la Orden de Santiago, Lib. I de copias, fol. 11, 12.

[498] Archivo de Simancas, Inquisicion, Lib. I.

[499] Ibid. Lib. I; Lib. II, fol. 35.

[500] Correspondence of Francisco de Rojas (Boletin, XXVIII, 462).

[501] Bulario de la Orden de Santiago, Lib. I de copias, fol. 13, 15.

[502] Ibid. fol. 20, 72.—Gachard, Correspondance de Charles-Quint et d’Adrien VI, p. 235.

[503] Páramo, p. 137.

[504] Pulgar, Crónica, P. III, cap. c.—Archivo General de Simancas, Inquisicion, Libro 933.

[505] Inquisitor-general Manrique caused the Instruciones Antiguas to be printed collectively, with a supplement classifying the several articles under the head of the officials whose duties they defined. This was issued in Seville in 1537 and a copy is preserved in the Bodleian Library, Arch. Seld. A. Subt. 15. Another edition was issued in Madrid in 1576, a copy of which is in the Biblioteca Nacional of Madrid, Seccion de MSS. S, 299, fol. 1. It was reprinted again in Madrid, in 1627 and 1630, together with the Instruciones Nuevas, by Caspar Isidro de Arguello. It is to this last edition that my references will be made. All these texts vary in some particulars from the originals preserved in the Simancas Archives, Inquisicion, Libro 933. Where such deviations are of importance they will be noted hereafter. Professor Ernst Schäfer has performed the service of reprinting the Arguello edition, with a German translation, in the Archiv für Reformationsgeschichte,1904.

Llorente (Hist. Crít. cap. VI, art. 1) has given an abstract of the Instruciones Antiguas. Curiously enough, in none of the official collections are included the instructions issued by Torquemada in December, 1484, and January, 1485, except in a few extracts. As they have never been printed I give them in the Appendix, together with the 1500 Instructions of Seville, which are likewise for the most part inedited. What Llorente printed as Torquemada’s additions (Añales, I, 388) are merely the extracts gathered from Arguello’s compilation, where they are credited to El prior en Sevilla, 1485.

[506] See the oath taken, July 20, 1487, by the officials of Catalonia and Barcelona to the inquisitor Alonso de Spina in Carbonell’s De Gestis Hæreticorum (Coleccion de Documentos de la Corona de Aragon, XXVIII, 6).

The decretals in question were issued by Lucius III, Innocent III, Clement IV and Boniface VIII, and are embodied in the canon law as Cap. 9 and 13 Extra, Lib. V, Tit. vii and Cap. 11 and 18 in Sexto Lib. V, Tit. ii.

When, in 1510, the jurats of Palermo made difficulties in taking the canonical oath, Ferdinand indignantly wrote that he would take it himself if required.—Arch. de Simancas, Inquisicion, Lib. III, fol. 134.

[507] Instruciones de Sevilla, § 1 (Arguello, fol. 3).

[508] Páramo, p. 170.

[509] Carbonell de Gestis Hæreticorum (Coleccion de Documentos de la Corona de Aragon, XXVIII, 12-17, 29, 40-49, 54-61). In these latter cases there is no distinction recorded between the fugitive and the dead, which would modify somewhat the proportions.

[510] Manuel de Novells Ardits, vulgarment appelat Dietari del Antich Consell Barceloni, III, 58 (Barcelona, 1894).

[511] Archivo de Simancas, Inquisicion, Libro 933.