A History of the Inquisition of Spain; vol. 1

[453] See his brief of January 29, 1482, printed by Llorente, Historia Crítica, Append. n. 1.

[454] History of the Inquisition of the Middle Ages, I, 331.

[455] Archivo General de la Corona de Aragon, Reg. 3684, fol. 1. See Appendix.

[456] Fidel Fita, Boletin, XVI, 452.—Llorente, Hist. Crít. cap. V, art. ii.—Relacion histórica de la Judería de Sevilla, p. 22 (Sevilla, 1849).

[457] Boletin, XV, 453-7. This was fairly within the rules of the canon law but it did not put an end to the sheltering of fugitives from the Inquisition by nobles who doubtless found it profitable. In some instructions issued by Torquemada, December 6, 1484, there is one regulating the relations between such nobles and the receiver of confiscations.—Archivo de Simancas, Inquisicion, Libro 933.

[458] Bernaldez, cap. xliv. The castle of Triana continued to be the seat of the Inquisition of Seville until 1626, when it was threatened with ruin by the inundations of the Guadalquivir, and the tribunal was removed to the palace of the Caballeros Tellos Taveros in the Colacion de San Marcos. In 1639 it returned to the castle, which had been repaired and it remained there until 1789, when the continual encroachment of_the river caused its transfer to the Colegio known as las Becas.—Varflora, Compendio histórico-descriptivo de Sevilla, P. II, cap. 1 (Sevilla, 1789).—Zuñiga, Annales de Sevilla, año 1693, n. 1.

The Counts of San Lucar were hereditary alcaides of Triana; in return for surrendering the castle they received the office of alguazil mayor of the Inquisition, which continued to be held by their representatives the Marquises of Leganes—a bargain which was ratified by Philip IV, November 8, 1634. In 1707 the office was valued at 150,000 maravedís a year, out of which the holder provided a deputy.—Archivo de Simancas, Inquisicion, Legajo 1465, fol. 105.

[459] Amador de los Rios, III, 247-8.—Bernaldez, cap. xliii.—Fidel Fita, Boletin, XVI, 450 sqq., 557 sqq.

As the parricide committed by the Fermosa Fembra entailed poverty and disgrace on her, through the confiscation of her father’s property and the disabilities inflicted on his descendants, the Church interested itself in her fate. Rainaldo Romero, Bishop of Tiberias, secured for her entrance into a convent, but it can readily be understood that life there was not rendered pleasant to her and she quitted it, without taking the vows, to follow a career of shame. Her beauty disappeared and she died in want, leaving directions that her skull should be placed as a warning over the door of the house which had been the scene of her disorderly life. Her wishes were obeyed and it is still to be seen in the Calle del Artaud, near its entrance, hard by the Alcázar.—Amador de los Rios, III, 249.

[460] Bernaldez, cap. xliv. Rodrigo tells us (Hist. verdadera de la Inquisicion, II, 74-6) that only five were burnt who refused all offers of reconciliation and were impenitent to the last, but the contemporary Bernaldez says that Diego de Susan died as a good Christian in the second auto.

[461] Bernaldez, cap. xliv.—Amador de los Rios, III, 250.—Field’s Old Spain and New Spain, p. 279.

The remark of the good Cura de los Palacios in describing the quemadero is “en que los quemaban y fasta que haya heregía los quemarán.” The cost of the four statues was defrayed by a gentleman named Mesa, whose zeal won for him the position of familiar of the Holy Office and receiver of confiscations. He was, however, discovered to be a Judaizer and was himself burnt on the quemadero which he had adorned.—Rodrigo, II, 79-80.

[462] Bernaldez, cap. xliv.

[463] Llorente, Añales de la Inquisicion, I, 44.

[464] Amador de los Rios, III, 252. Rodrigo (Hist. Verdad. II, 76) states that the first act of the inquisitors was the issue of the proclamation of the Term of Grace on January 2d, but this is scarce consistent with the narrative of Bernaldez.

[465] Bernaldez, cap. xliv.

[466] Páramo, p. 136.—Boletin, XV, 462.

[466a]It is very questionable whether a tribunal was established at Segovia thus early. Colmenares (Hist. de Segovia, cap. xxxiv, § 18) asserts it positively, but the only tribunals represented in the assembly of organization, held in November, 1484, were Seville, Córdova, Jaen and Ciudad-Real. There was at first some resistance at Segovia on the part of the bishop, Juan Arias Dávila, who was of Jewish descent.—Bergenroth, Calendar of Spanish State Papers, I, xlv.

In Ciudad-Real, the earliest inquisitors, in 1483, were the Licentiate Pedro Díaz de la Costana and the Doctor Francisco de la Fuente (Archivo hist. nacional, Inquisicion de Toledo, Legajo 154, n. 375). Neither of these was a Dominican and the latter subsequently became an inquisitor-general and bishop successively of Avila and of Córdova.

In Córdova the Inquisition was established in 1482, with four inquisitors—the Bachilleres Anton Rúiz de Morales and Alvar González de Capillas, Doctor Pedro Martínez de Barrio, and Fray Martin Cazo, Guardian of the Franciscan convent. The first auto de fe was celebrated in 1483, when one of the victims was the concubine of the treasurer of the cathedral, Pedro Fernández de Alcaudete, who himself was burnt on February 28, 1484. His servants resisted his arrest and in the fray the alguazil of the Inquisition was killed.—Matute y Luquin, Autos de Fe de Córdova, pp. 1-2 (Córdova, 1839).

[467] “En publica forma e se avia fecho en esta dicha ciudad por el Doctor Thomás, juez delegado e inquisidor deputado por el reverendisimo señor Don Alfonso Carrillo, arzobispo que fué deste dicho arzobispado de Toledo.”—Arch. hist. nacional, Inq. de Toledo, Legajos 139, n. 145; 143, n. 196.

[468] Ibidem, Legajos 139, n. 145; 154, n. 356, 375.

[469] Archivo hist. nacional, Inquisicion de Toledo, Legajo 262.

[470] Páramo, p. 170.—Padre Fidel Fita has compiled a chronological list of the trials at Ciudad-Real preserved in the Archivo Hist. Nacional (Boletin, XI, 311 sqq.). These are included in the Catálogo de las Causas contra la Fe seguidas ante el Tribunal del Santo Oficio de Toledo, by D. Miguel Gómez del Campillo (Madrid, 1903).

[471] Relacion de la Inquisicion Toledana (Boletin, XI, 293).

[472] Relacion de la Inquisicion Toledana (Boletin, XI, 293-4).—Arch. Gen. de la Corona de Aragon, Reg. 3864, fol. 31.—Graetz, Geschichte der Juden, VIII, 323.—Pulgar, Crónica, P. III, cap. 100.

Legally, Jews were not allowed to testify against Christians and the prohibition to receive such evidence was emphatically included in the ferocious bull of Nicholas V, in 1447, but, as we shall see, in the Inquisition, all accusing witnesses, however infamous, were welcomed.

How distasteful Ferdinand knew would be the work prescribed to the Aragonese magistracy is seen by his imperious command that it must be done—“e por cosa del mundo no fagais lo contrario ni recusais de lo facer porque nos seria tan molesto que no lo podriamos con paciencia tolerar.”

[473] Relacion de la Inquisicion Toledana (Boletin, XI, 295-6).

In 1629 a well-informed writer tells us that many of those who came forward and thus accused themselves were in reality good Christians, who, in the time while Jews were yet tolerated, had associated with them in their synagogues and weddings and funerals and had bought meat of their butchers. Terrified at the proceedings of the Inquisition they came and confessed and were reconciled, thus casting an indelible stain on their posterity when the records of the tribunals were searched and their names were found.—Tratado de los Estatutos de Limpieza, cap. 10 (Bibl. Nac. Seccion de MSS. Q, 418).

[474] Relacion (Ibid. pp. 292 sqq., 297, 299, 301-2, 303).

In the closing years of the fifteenth century and the opening ones of the sixteenth there seems to have been a special raid made on Guadalajara. In a list of cases of that period I find 965 credited to that place.—Arch. Hist. Nacional, Inq. de Toledo, Leg. 262, n. 1.

[475] Páramo, pp. 138-9.—Fidel Fita in Boletin, XXIII, 284 sqq.—Archivo de Simancas, Inquisicion, Libro 939, fol. 108.

[476] Toledo, Cronicon de Valladolid (Coleccion de Documentos ineditos, XIII, 176, 179).—Pulgar, Chron. P. III, cap. 100.

[477] Archivo de Simancas, Inquisicion, Libro I. Unfortunately my copy of this important volume and also of Libro 933 are not folioed. The dates of the documents however will sufficiently guide the investigator desirous of verifying the references.

[478] A list of these, made in the last century, is printed by Padre Fidel Fita (Boletin, XV, 332). It is probably not wholly complete. Of later date than 1500 there are ten reconciliados—one each in 1509 and 1516 and eight in 1629—sent thither by the tribunals in which they were tried.

Further details as to the organization of the various tribunals will be found in the Appendix.

[479] Colmenares, Hist. de Segovia, cap. xxxv, § 18.—Garibay, Compendio Historial, Lib. XVIII, cap. 16.

[480] Páramo, p. 137.—Llorente, Añales, I, 73.—Zurita, Añales, Lib. XX, cap. xlix—Instruciones de Sevilla, 1484, Prólogo (Arguello, fol. 2).—Archivo de Alcalá, Estado, Legajo 2843.

In the conference of Seville in 1484, besides the inquisitors and the members of the Council there are mentioned as present Juan Gutiérrez de Lachaves, and Tristan de Medina, whom Llorente (Añales, I, 74) conjectures to have been assistants of Torquemada.