Persuasion, backed by threats, was first essayed. Instructions were sent

to the royal officials that the Mudéjares must adopt Christianity and,

when the corregidor of Córdova replied that force would be necessary,

the sovereigns replied, September 27, 1501, that this was inadmissible,

as it would scandalize them; they were to be told that it was for the

good of their souls and the service of the king and queen and, if this

proved insufficient, they could be informed that they would have to

leave the kingdom, for it was resolved that no infidels should

remain.[882] But four years had elapsed since the refugee Moors from

Portugal had been invited to settle in Castile, and this sudden change

of policy shows what influences had been brought to bear on Isabella

during that brief interval.

[Sidenote: _CONVERSION IN CASTILE_]

This tentative measure seems to have met with success so slender that

more stringent methods were recognized as necessary and, on February 12,

1502, a pragmática was issued, shrewdly framed to give at least the

appearance of voluntary action to the expected conversion. It alluded to

the scandal of permitting infidels to remain after the conversion of

Granada; to the gratitude due to God, which would fitly be shown by the

expulsion of his enemies, and to the protection of the New Christians

from contamination. All Moors were therefore ordered to leave the

kingdoms of Leon and Castile by the end of April, abandoning their

children, the males under fourteen and the females under twelve years of

age, who were to be detained. The exiles were allowed to carry with them

their property, except gold and silver and other prohibited articles.

There was nothing said as to an alternative of baptism, but the

conditions of departure rendered expatriation so difficult that it was

self-evident that there was no intention of losing so valuable a portion

of the population. Under pain of death and confiscation, the exiles were

to sail only from ports of Biscay; they were not allowed to go to

Navarre or the kingdoms of Aragon; as there was war with the Turks and

with the Moors of Africa, they were not to seek refuge with either, but

were told that they might go to Egypt or to any other land that they

might select. They were never to return, nor were Moors ever to be

admitted to the Castilian kingdoms, under penalty of death and

confiscation, and any one harboring them after April was threatened with

confiscation. One exception was made in favor of masters of Moorish

slaves, who were not deprived of them, but they were to be distinguished

by the perpetual wearing of fetters.[883]

The voluntary character of the conversion which ensued is revealed in

the fact that when zealous Moslems, in spite of almost insuperable

obstacles, preferred to risk the perils of emigration they were not

allowed to do so, but were forced to become Christians.[884] During the

brief interval allowed, there was some pretence of preaching and

instruction and, as it neared its end, the Mudéjares were baptized in

masses. A report from Avila, April 24th, to the sovereigns, says that

the whole aljama, consisting of two thousand souls, will be converted

and none will depart.[885] In Badajoz, we are told that the bishop,

Alfonso de Manrique--the future inquisitor-general--won them over by

kindness, so that they were all baptized and took his name of

Manrique.[886] Thus, externally at least, the kingdoms of the crown of

Castile enjoyed unity of faith, but this was not accompanied with the

desirable assimilation of the population. The new converts continued to

form a class apart and came to be known by the distinctive name of

Moriscos.

The nominal Christianity thus imposed upon those reared in the tenets of

Islam was only the beginning of the task assumed by the state. The more

difficult labor remained of rendering them true Christians, if the

advantage was to be secured of moulding discordant races into a

homogeneous community, which alone could justify the violent measures

adopted. The unity of faith, which was the ideal at the time of both

churchman and statesman, means more than mere outward conformity; it

means that all should form a united nation, animated with the same

aspirations and the same hopes, here and hereafter, and conscientiously

sharing a common belief. In a land like Spain, populated by diverse

races, this was an object worth many sacrifices; if it could not be

attained, the enforced baptism of a powerful minority only exaggerated

divergence and perpetuated discord.

[Sidenote: _LACK OF INSTRUCTION_]

To secure the desired result by the employment of force, through the

Inquisition, could not fail to intensify abhorrence of a religion which,

while professing universal love and charity, was known only as an excuse

for oppression and cruelty. Yet the only alternative was the slow and

laborious process of disarming the prejudices already aroused, and

winning over the reluctant convert by gentleness and persuasion, by

kindly instruction and demonstration that the truths of Christianity

were not mere theological abstractions, of no vitality in practical

life. We have seen the embodiment of the two methods in Ximenes and

Talavera, and it was the fatal error of those who ruled the destinies of

Spain that they had not patience and self-denial resolutely to follow

the latter. Haltingly and spasmodically they tried to do so, with only

persistence enough to put themselves in the wrong and deprive of

justification the concurrent employment of the easier process of

coercion. From one cause or another, as we shall have occasion to see,

the intermittent and ineffective attempts at persuasion failed

miserably, while the perpetual irritation of persecution led inevitably

to chronic exasperation.

Five years had elapsed since the coercive baptism which, under the

precepts of the church, should have been preceded by competent

understanding of the mysteries of the faith, when Ximenes attained, in

1507, the inquisitor-generalship. One of his earliest acts was a letter

to all the churches prescribing the deportment, in religious matters, of

the New Christians and their children, including regular attendance at

the mass, instruction in the rudiments of the faith, and avoidance of

Judaic and Mahometan rites.[887] Presumably this accomplished little

and, in 1510, Ferdinand addressed all his prelates, pointing out the

neglect of Christian observances by the Conversos, and ordering the

bishops to enforce their presence at mass and to provide for their

instruction, matters to which the parish priests must devote special

attention.[888] The council of Seville, in 1512, responded to this by

calling attention to the number of new converts who greatly needed

religious instruction. The prelates, who were responsible for the

salvation of souls, were ordered to depute for that purpose learned men,

who should specially investigate their manner of life and their

commission of sins pertaining to their old faith. All parish priests

were ordered to make out lists of the converts and see that they

conformed to the mandates of the church, and special lists were to be

compiled of those who had been reconciled by the Inquisition, with

orders to attend mass on Sundays and feast-days, so that their

fulfilment of their sentences could be enforced.[889] From what we know

of the failure of subsequent measures of this kind we may safely assume

that these received little attention from those who would have been

obliged to expend money and labor in their execution.

Simultaneously with his letters of 1510, Ferdinand had applied to Julius

II, representing that, since 1492, there had been converted many Jews

and Moors who, through insufficient instruction, had been led to commit

many heretical crimes; he had ordered their instruction, but it would

be inhuman to visit them with the full rigor of the canons, and he

therefore asked faculties to publish an Edict of Grace, under which

those coming in could be reconciled without confiscation and public

abjuration, so that, in case of relapse, they could escape

relaxation.[890] The conditions appended to Edicts of Grace so reduced

their effectiveness that this has importance only as an indication that

Ferdinand, as we shall see elsewhere, was rather disposed to check

inquisitorial ardor in the prosecution of Moriscos, but he atoned for

this on his death-bed, by a clause in his will commanding his grandson

Charles to appoint inquisitors zealous for the destruction of the sect

of Mahomet.[891] This was superfluous for, as the stock of Judaizers

became reduced, Moriscos supplied their place, and the Inquisition

required curbing rather than stimulation. That Charles recognized this

is seen in various Edicts of Grace issued in their favor, for certain

districts, between 1518 and 1521, edicts which relieved them from

confiscation and the sanbenito but did not protect from relapse or

exempt from denunciation of accomplices.[892]

[Sidenote: _PERSECUTION_]

There was little practical relief to be expected from such measures, but

at least they indicate the conviction of the rulers that it was both

unjust and impolitic to visit with the rigor of the canons those who had

been forced into the Church and had had no spiritual instruction. Still,

the canon law was a positive fact; an elaborate machinery had been

instituted for its enforcement, with no corresponding organization to

render the new religion attractive instead of odious, and a situation

had been created for which there was no radical cure. Alleviation was

the only resource, and this was attempted, although the fluctuating

policy adopted only intensified the evil for the future. In pursuance of

this Cardinal Adrian, August 5, 1521, issued orders that no arrests

should be made except on evidence directly conclusive of heresy, and

even then it must first be submitted to the Suprema. This seems to have

received so little obedience that Archbishop Manrique, April 28, 1524,

repeated it in more decisive fashion. He recited the conversion of the

Moriscos by Ferdinand and Isabella, who promised them graces and

liberties, in pursuance of which Cardinal Adrian had issued many

provisions in their favor, ordering the tribunals not to prosecute them

for trifling causes and, if any were so arrested, they were to be

discharged and their property be returned to them. In spite of this, the

inquisitors continued to arrest them on trivial charges, and on the

evidence of single witnesses. As they were ignorant persons, who could

not readily prove their innocence, these arrests had greatly scandalized

them, and they had petitioned for relief, wherefore the Suprema ordered

inquisitors not to arrest them without conclusive evidence of heresy,

and when there was doubt it was to be consulted. All who were held for

matters not plainly heretical were to have speedy justice, tempered with

such clemency as conscience might permit.[893]

How completely these instructions were ignored is manifest in the trials

of the Moriscos where, as in those of the Judaizers, any adherence to

customs, which for generations had formed part of daily life, was

sufficient for arrest and prosecution. It was not merely the fasting of

the Ramadan, the practice of circumcision, the Guadoc or bath

accompanied with a ritual, or the Taor, another kind of bath used prior

to the Zala, or certain prayers uttered with the face turned to the

East, at sunrise, noon, sunset and night. These were well-defined

religious ceremonies admitting of no explanation, but there were

numerous others, innocent in themselves, which implied suspicion of

heresy, and suspicion was in itself a crime. Under skilful management,

including the free use of torture, arrest for these simple observances

might lead to further confessions, and the opportunity was not to be

lost. Abstinence from pork and wine was amply sufficient to justify

prosecution, and we hear of cases in which staining the nails with

henna, refusal to eat of animals dying a natural death, killing fowls by

decollation, the _zambras_ and _leilas_, or songs and dances used at

merry-makings and nuptials, and even cleanliness, were gravely adduced

as evidences of apostasy.[894]

In pursuance of this policy, elaborate lists of all Moorish customs were

made out for the guidance of inquisitors; abstracts of these were

included in the Edicts of Faith, where every one who had seen or heard

of such things was required under pain of excommunication to denounce

them; the Moriscos were subjected to perpetual espionage, and any

unguarded utterance, which might be construed as inferring heretical

leaning, was liable to be reported and to lead to arrest and probable

punishment. It is true that from these slender indications the

inquisitorial process frequently led up to full confession, but this did

not render the position of the Morisco less intolerable, and constraint

and anxiety contributed largely to intensify his detestation of the

religion which he knew only as the cause of persecution. Bishop Pérez of

Segorbe, in 1595, when enumerating fifteen impediments to the conversion

of the Moriscos, included their fear of the Inquisition and its

punishments which made them hate Christianity.[895] At all events, it

secured outward conformity, at least in Castile, where they were

gradually assimilating themselves to the Old Christians; they had long

since abandoned their national dress and language; they were assiduous

in attendance at mass and vespers, the confessional and the sacrament of

the altar; they participated in processions and interments and were

commonly regarded as Christians, whatever might be the secrets of their

hearts.[896]

[Sidenote: _GRANADA_]

Doubtless, as time wore on, many were won over and became sincerely

attached to their new faith, but every now and then little communities

of apostates were brought to light. Thus, in 1538, Juan Yañés,

Inquisitor of Toledo, included Daimiel in a visitation. It had a Morisco

population, which had been baptized in 1502, and had apparently been

overlooked so long that it had grown somewhat careless. A woman reported

to Yañés that she had lived with Moriscos for twelve years and had

observed that they did not use pork or wine, on the plea that these

things disagreed with them. This sufficed to start an investigation

which so crowded the secret prison that we hear of nine women confined

in a single cell, and of the hall of the Inquisition being used as a

place of detention. Yet this vigorous work did not extirpate the evil

for, in 1597, the Toledo tribunal was busy with heretics from

Daimiel.[897] More shocking was a case in which María Páez, daughter of

Diego Páez Limpati of Almagro, figured, for she accused all her kindred

and friends. Her father was burnt in 1606, as an impenitent negativo;

her mother, who confessed, was reconciled and imprisoned, and in all

twenty-five Moriscos of Almagro suffered, of whom four were relaxed. In

the Toledo record, from 1575 to 1610, there are a hundred and ninety

cases of Moriscos as against a hundred and seventy-four of Judaizers,

and forty-seven of Protestants, showing that, notwithstanding the influx

of Portuguese, the Moriscos were the most numerous heretics with which

the tribunal had to deal.[898] The old Mudéjares of Castile had fallen

upon evil times, but worse were in store for them.

* * * * *

Granada presented a more difficult and dangerous problem, requiring the

most sagacious statesmanship to reconcile political safety with the

demand for unity of faith, yet this delicate situation was treated with

a blundering disregard of common-sense characteristic of Philip II. The

population was almost wholly Morisco, and the country was rugged and

mountainous, offering abundant refuge for the despairing. The so-called

conversion of 1501 had worked no change in their belief. They were

hard-working, moral, honorable in their dealings, and charitable to

their poor, but they were Moslems at heart; if they went to mass, it was

to escape the fine; if they had their children baptized, they forthwith

washed off the chrism and circumcised the males; if they confessed

during Lent, it was merely to obtain the certificate; if they learned

the prayers of the Church, it was in order to get married, after which

they were forgotten with all convenient speed. They had been promised

forty years' exemption from the Inquisition, but they were rendered

disaffected by the abuses of judicial avarice and the insolent

domination of the officials, secular and ecclesiastical.[899]

In 1526 Charles V was in Granada, where, in the name of the Moriscos,

three descendants of the old Moorish kings, Fernando Vinegas, Miguel de

Aragon and Diego López Benexara, appealed to him for protection against

the ill-treatment by the priests, the judges, the alguaziles and other

officials, whereupon he appointed a commission to investigate and

report. Fray Antonio de Guevara, shortly to be Bishop of Guadix, was one

of the commissioners and, in a letter to a friend, he describes the

Moriscos as offering so much that required correction that it had better

be done in secret, rather than by public punishment; they had been so

ill-taught, and the magistrates had so winked at their errors, that

remedying it for the future would be enough without disturbing the

past.[900] This shows the spirit in which the commission performed its

work; the incriminated priests and officials had turned the tables on

their accusers, who were now defendants. The report of the commission

confirmed the complaints of ill-usage, but stated that among the

Moriscos there were not to be found more than seven true Christians.

This was submitted to a junta, presided over by Inquisitor-general

Manrique, and the result was an edict known as that of 1526. It granted

no relief from oppression, but concerned itself with the apostasy of the

Moriscos, which it sought to cure, not by instructing them, but by

rendering their condition still more intolerable. In violation of

promises, the Inquisition of Jaen was transferred to Granada. Amnesty

for past offences was granted, and a term of grace was provided for

those confessing voluntarily, after which the laws against heresy were

to be rigorously enforced, although for some years fines were

substituted for confiscation and time was allowed in which the penitents

could earn them.[901]

[Sidenote: _GRANADA_]

This was supplemented with a series of most vexatious regulations,

prohibiting the use of Arabic and of Moorish garments and of baths;

Christian midwives were to be present at all births; disarmament was

enforced by a rigid inspection of licences; the doors of Moriscos were

to be kept open on feast-days, Fridays, Saturdays and during weddings,

to prevent the use of Moorish ceremonies; schools to train children in

Castilian were to be established at Granada, Guadix and Almería: no

Moorish names were to be used and Moriscos were not to keep _gacis_ or

unbaptized Moors, whether free or slave.[902] This naturally caused

great agitation; the Moriscos held a general assembly and raised eighty

thousand ducats to be offered to Charles for a withdrawal of the edict.

His advisers were doubtless propitiated and, before leaving Granada, he

suspended it during his pleasure and permitted the carrying of a sword

and dagger in the towns and of a lance in the open country. A special

tax, known as _farda_, probably dates from about this period, under

which the use of Moorish garments and language was permitted and, in

1563, we chance to learn that this amounted to twenty thousand ducats

per annum.[903]

It would seem that, for awhile, the Inquisition troubled the Moriscos

but little for, in its first general auto, held in 1529, out of

eighty-nine culprits, while there were seventy-eight for Judaism there

were but three for Mahometanism, and one of these was in effigy.[904]

Still it provoked disquiet and, in 1532, Captain-general Mondéjar

suggested to Charles its suspension, since it had done nothing and could

find nothing against the Moriscos. This was unfortunate, for it

stimulated the tribunal to greater activity against them, leading to

numerous offers on their part to Charles and, after his abdication, to

Philip II, of liberal payments for relief. Charles's necessities

prompted him to listen to these propositions, but the Inquisition

managed to prevent their success, while Philip of course turned a deaf

ear to them. Even Inquisitor-general Valdés, in 1558, during his

disfavor at court, seems to have taken a hand in these negotiations, for

we find him promising a _subsidio_ of a hundred thousand ducats from the

Moriscos of Granada.[905]

The condition of the Moriscos was steadily growing worse, and the

situation in Granada was becoming dangerously explosive. The Inquisition

was more active than ever; all the old oppressions by the priests and

judicial officers continued unchecked, and a new source of intense

irritation was the progressive spoliation of their lands by "judges of

boundaries" who, in the name of the king, deprived them of properties

inherited or purchased--in short, they were _gente sin lengua y sin

fabor_--friendless and defenceless.[906] Then, in 1563, an old order to

present to the captain-general all licences to bear arms was revived

under a penalty of six years of galleys.[907] In 1565 a fresh source of

trouble was created by extending the royal jurisdiction over the lands

of the nobles, in which many Moriscos, who in years past had committed

crimes, had sought asylum. Eager for fees, the notaries and justices

searched the records and made arrests, until there was scarce a Morisco

who did not live in daily fear. Many took to the mountains, joining the

bands of _monfíes_, or outlaws, and committing outrages, while the

measures taken for their suppression only increased the disorder.[908]

The condition of Granada was one which required firmness and

conciliation, but infatuation prevailed in Philip's court, and the

occasion was seized to aggravate irritation beyond endurance. Guerrero,

Archbishop of Granada, in returning from Trent in 1563, had tarried in

Rome, where he lamented to Pius IV that his flock was Christian only in

name. Pius sent by him an urgent message to Philip, reinforced by orders

to his nuncio, the Bishop of Rossano, to the same purport. Guerrero, on

reaching home, assembled a provincial council in 1565, in which he

endeavored to restrain the oppression of the Moriscos by the

ecclesiastics, but his chapter appealed from the conciliar decrees and

the effort was nugatory. He had more success in inducing the bishops to

join in urging upon the king the adoption of measures to prevent the

Moriscos from concealing their apostasy, and he wrote to Philip, begging

him to purify the land from this filthy sect; it could readily, he said,

be found who were really Christians by prohibiting the things through

which their rites were kept from view.[909]

[Sidenote: _GRANADA_]

Philip referred Guerrero's memorial to a junta presided over by Diego de

Espinosa, recently made President of Castile and soon to be

inquisitor-general. It reported that, presuming the Moriscos to be

Christians by baptism, they must be compelled to be so in fact, to which

end they must be required to abandon the language, garments and customs

of Moors, by reviving the edict of 1526, and this was solemnly charged

upon the royal conscience. Philip thereupon consulted privately Dr.

Otadui, professor of theology at Salamanca, and shortly to be Bishop of

Avila, who, in his reply, told the king that, if any of the lords of the

Moriscos should cite the old Castilian proverb "The more Moors the more

profit" he should remember an older and truer one, "The fewer enemies

the better" and combine the two into "The more dead Moors the better,

for there will be fewer enemies"--advice which, we are told, greatly

pleased the monarch, in place of opening his eyes to the policy which

was converting his subjects into his enemies.[910]

A pragmática was speedily framed, embodying the most irritating features

of the edict of 1526, and Pedro de Deza, a member of the Suprema and of

Espinosa's junta, was appointed president of the chancellery of Granada

and sent there, May 4, 1566, under orders to publish and enforce it

without listening to remonstrances. It illustrates Philip's method of

government that Captain-general Mondéjar, although at the court, was not

even apprised of the measure, until an order was conveyed to him through

Espinosa to return to Granada and be present at the publication. He was

captain-general by inheritance, being grandson to the Tendilla placed

there at the conquest; he had lived in Granada from his boyhood, he had

been captain-general for thirty years and was thoroughly familiar with

the situation. He represented that Granada was destitute of troops and

of munitions, and he begged either that the measure be suspended or that

he be furnished with forces to suppress the revolt that he foresaw to be

inevitable. It was in vain; Espinosa curtly told him to go to his post

and mind his own business and, although the Council of War supported

him, he was given only three hundred men to guard the coast, where he

was ordered to reside during certain months and to visit

frequently.[911]

Deza reached Granada, May 25, 1566, where he at once assembled his court

and had the pragmática printed to be in readiness for publication on

January 1, 1567, the anniversary of the surrender of the city, as though

to create additional exasperation. Its provisions were sufficiently

exasperating in themselves. After three years the use of Arabic was

absolutely prohibited, in speech and writing; so were Moorish garments

after one year for silken and two years for woollen; house doors were to

be kept open on Friday afternoons, feast-days and marriage celebrations;

zambras and leilas, though not contrary to religion, were forbidden on

Fridays and feast-days; the use of henna for staining was to be

abandoned; Moorish names were not to be used; all artificial baths,

public and private, were to be destroyed, and no one in future was to

use them.[912] Provisions for instructing the Moriscos in the faith were

conspicuous by their absence.

All this could only seem to them a wanton interference with habits that

had become a second nature and when, on January 1, 1567, the edict was

published it created indescribable excitement. As an earnest of its

enforcement, all baths were forthwith destroyed, commencing with those

of the king. The aljamas throughout the kingdom consulted with the

leaders of the Albaycin, or Morisco quarter of the city, and it was

agreed that, if relief was not to be had by entreaty, resort must be had

to rebellion, for life was insupportable under such tyranny. Even Deza

recognized the threatening prospect and wrote to the court that

precautions should be taken against a rising; during 1567, he mitigated,

in some degree, the enforcement of the law and inflicted no punishment

under it. The Moriscos appealed to Philip, but, when he referred the

memorial to Espinosa, the latter replied that no suspension could be

considered; religious men had charged the king's conscience, telling him

that he was responsible for the souls of the apostates. In the Council

of State, the Duke of Alva and the Commendador of Alcántara were in

favor of suspension, and the Council suggested the gradual enforcement

of one article a year, but Espinosa and Deza had more influence than

soldiers and statesmen--it was a religious question with which the

latter had nothing to do.[913]

[Sidenote: _GRANADA_]

On January 1, 1568, orders were issued to abandon all Moorish silken

garments, and the priests were instructed to take all Morisco children,

between the ages of three and fifteen, and place them in schools, where

they should learn Castilian and Christian doctrine. This increased the

agitation and a deputation was sent to remonstrate with Deza, who gave

assurances that their children were not to be taken from them, but that

the king was resolved to save their souls and enforce the

pragmática.[914] The naked alternative was before them of submission or

rebellion.

Desperate as rebellion might seem, it was not wholly hopeless. The

Moriscos estimated that they could raise a hundred thousand fighting

men, lamentably deficient in arms, it is true, but hardy and enured to

privation. They counted largely on aid from Barbary, hoping that the

rulers there would not miss the opportunity of striking a deadly blow at

their traditional enemy. Their brethren, too, in Valencia, who were

equally oppressed, might reasonably be expected to rise and throw off

the Spanish yoke. They could not, moreover, be ignorant that the

imposing Spanish monarchy was in reality exhausted--that its internal

strength in no way corresponded with its external appearance. All the

Venetian envoys of the period, in fact, describe the absence of military

resources in Spain, the difficulty of raising troops and the

unfamiliarity with arms of those who made such splendid soldiers when

disciplined and trained. It was in this very year that Antonio Tiepolo,

when commenting on the strange neglect which exposed the southern coast

to the ravages of the Barbary corsairs, expresses apprehension that an

invasion from Africa, supported by the Moriscos, might expose Spain to

the fate which it experienced of old.[915] It had been bled to

exhaustion by Charles V and Philip was continuing the process. As with

men, so was it with money. Charles had left such an accumulation of debt

that Philip, on his accession, seriously contemplated repudiation, and

he staggered under an ever-increasing burden, from which the treasures

of the New World afforded no relief. His revenues were consumed in

advance, and during the rebellion it was with the utmost difficulty that

moderate sums could be furnished for the most pressing necessities. It

was most fortunate for the monarchy that the hopes of the insurgents as

to external aid were disappointed, for a united effort of the Crescent

against the Cross might have changed the destiny of the Peninsula. As it

was, the Moriscos of Valencia were kept quiet; the Sultan held aloof;

the Barbary princes only gave permission for adventurers to go as

volunteers, and some five or six hundred straggled in small bands across

the sea. Yet the resources of Spain were strained to the utmost in

subduing the isolated rebellion thus heedlessly provoked.

Arrangements were made for a rising on Holy Thursday (April 18, 1568),

but the secret was betrayed and the design was postponed. Even this

failed to induce the precaution of placing Granada in a state of defence

and, when the rebellion broke out, December 23d, it found the Christians

wholly unprepared. Mondéjar met the crisis with great vigor and ability.

Raising a hurried force of a few thousand men, he marched out of the

city on January 2, 1569 and, in a difficult winter campaign amid the

mountain snows, by the middle of February he had virtually crushed

resistance. Deza, however, backed by those who thirsted for rapine and

plunder, poisoned the mind of the king; Mondéjar's agreements for the

submission of the insurgents were set aside; Philip sent his

half-brother, Don John of Austria, then an inexperienced youth, to take

command, assisted by a council of war, each member of which had his own

plan of campaign, while no action was to be taken without the approval

of the king. This _opéra bouffe_ method of making war had its natural

result. The rebellion revived and grew stronger than ever, making raids

on the Vega, almost to the gates of the city, in which Don John and his

council were virtually beleaguered.

[Sidenote: _GRANADA_]

The details of the war that ensued do not concern us here except to say

that it was carried on with ferocious greed and cruelty. Military

expeditions were frequently mere slave-hunts, in which the men were

massacred, while women and children were brought in thousands to the

auction-block and were sold to the highest bidders. Nor were the

Moriscos the only sufferers, for the Córtes of 1570 complained bitterly

of the rapine and excesses of the troops on their way to the scene of

action.[916] Hostilities were prolonged until the opening months of 1571

and, when resistance was finally suppressed, Spain was well-nigh

exhausted. The pacification was as ruthless as the prosecution of the

war. In advance, it had been proposed at the court to remove the whole

population to the mountains of Northern Spain, and Deza, the evil genius

of Granada, never lost sight of the suggestion.[917] At his earnest

solicitation it was commenced with the Albaycin, as early as June, 1569.

No distinction was made between loyalists and rebels. The men were shut

up in the churches and then transferred to the great Hospital Real, a

gunshot from the city, where they were divided into gangs, with their

hands tied to ropes like galley-slaves, and were marched off to their

destinations under guard. The women were left for a time in their

houses, to sell their effects and follow. Some seven or eight thousand

were thus disposed of, and even the chroniclers are moved to compassion

in describing the misery and despair of those thus torn from their homes

without warning and hurried off to the unknown. Many died on the road of

weariness, of despair or of starvation, or were slain or robbed and sold

as slaves by those set to protect them. It relieved the Christians of

fear, we are told, but it was deplorable to see the destruction of

prosperity and the vacancy left where had been so much life and

industry.[918]

This policy was carried out everywhere, as one district after another

was reduced. Final instructions from Philip to Don John, October 25,

1570, ordered the deportation of all and designated the provinces to

which they were to be taken, some of them as far as Leon and Galicia.

Families were not to be separated; they were to move in bands of fifteen

hundred men, with their women and children, under escort of two hundred

foot and twenty horse, with a commissioner who made lists of those under

his charge, provided them with food and distributed them in their

respective destinations. These orders were carried out. Don John writes,

November 5th, from Guadix to Ruy Gómez, that the number removed from

that district had been large; the last party had been sent off that day

and it was the most unfortunate thing in the world, for there was such a

tempest of wind, rain and snow that the mother would lose her daughter

on the road, the wife her husband and the widow her infant. It cannot be

denied, he added, that the depopulation of a kingdom is the most pitiful

thing that can be imagined. It was more than pitiful in some districts,

where the undisciplined soldiery, entrusted with the task, converted it

into pillage, massacre and the enslavement of the women and

children.[919] Such was the outcome of the pledges given, eighty years

before, by Ferdinand and Isabella, but the object of clearing Granada of

its Morisco population was measurably accomplished. In an auto de fe

celebrated there, in 1593, there appeared eighty-one delinquents

convicted of Judaism and only one charged with Mahometanism.[920]

The sufferings of the exiles did not end with deportation. Leonardo

Donate, the Venetian envoy, who was an eye-witness, tells us that many

perished through miseries and afflictions, which, in fact, was

inevitable under the conditions.[921] Their distribution was entrusted

to a special _Concejo de Poblaciones_, and an elaborate edict, in

twenty-three sections, issued October 6, 1572, specified the regulations

under which they were permitted to exist. These scattered them among

Christians, kept them under close and perpetual surveillance, and

reduced them almost to the status of predial serfs, bound to the soil.

No weapons were permitted, save a pointless knife, and savage

punishments were provided for the enforcement of the prescriptions.

Children were to be brought up, as far as possible, in Christian

families, and were to be taught reading, writing and Christian doctrine.

The pragmática of 1566 was declared to be in force, with added penalties

for the use of Arabic; any one writing or speaking it, even in his own

house, incurred, for a first offence, thirty days' prison in chains, for

a second double, for a third a hundred lashes and four years of

galleys.[922] The severity of this latter provision shocked even the

town-council of Córdova, which had shown itself by no means favorable to

the exiles. It represented to the alcalde that God alone could enable

them to speak a language of which they were ignorant, especially as the

alguaziles were constantly arresting and punishing them, and it begged

that action should be suspended until schools could be organized for

their instruction, but the alcalde replied that he had no choice and

must execute the edict.[923]

[Sidenote: _THE GRANADAN EXILES_]

In spite of these restrictions on exiles suddenly cast adrift, penniless

in strange places, their indomitable industry and thrift soon carved

out careers which aroused the envious hostility of the indolent

populations among whom they were thrown. Cervantes, in his _Colloquio de

los perros_, stigmatizing them as a slow fever which slew as certainly

as a violent one, gives expression to the feelings with which the

Spaniard, whose only ambition was a position in the army, the Church or

the service of the State, and who was a consumer, looked upon the

producer and grudged him the product of his toil.[924] Already, in 1573,

the Córtes took the alarm and petitioned Philip that they should not be

allowed to act as architects or builders, or to hold public office or

judicial positions.[925] In truth, only ten years after the exile, an

official report complains that the numbers of the deported Moriscos are

increasing, because none go to war or enter religion, and they are so

hard-working that, after coming to Castile ten years before, without

owning a handsbreadth of land, they are now well off and many are rich,

so that, if it continues at the same rate for twenty years, the natives

will be their servants. This grievance only increased with time. In

1587, Martin de Salvatierra, Bishop of Segorbe, in an enumeration of the

evil deeds of the Moriscos, includes the fact that the exiles from

Granada had already become farmers of the royal revenues in Castile,

depositing cash as security in place of giving bondsmen; that there were

individuals worth more than a hundred thousand ducats in Pastrana,

Guadalajara, Salamanca and other places and that, if the king did not

devise some remedy, they would soon greatly surpass the Old Christians

in both numbers and wealth.[926] This jealousy found official utterance

in the Córtes of 1592, which represented to Philip that previous ones

had asked him to remedy the evils of the Granadan exiles scattered

through Castile. Those evils were constantly increasing; they had

obtained possession of trade, and were becoming so rich and powerful

that they controlled the secular and ecclesiastical tribunals and lived

openly in disregard of religion. The response to this was an edict

ordering all magistrates to enforce rigidly the restrictive legislation

of 1572.[927] This effected nothing for, in 1595, the Venetian envoy

describes them as constantly increasing in numbers and wealth, as they

never went to the wars and devoted themselves exclusively to trade.[928]

In 1602, Archbishop Ribera bears the same testimony; they were

hard-working and thrifty, and as they spent little on food or drink or

clothing, they worked for what would not support an Old Christian, so

that they were preferred by employers and consumers; they monopolized

the mechanic arts and commerce, as well as daily labor.[929] The envious

prejudices which thus found expression were a factor not unimportant

among the causes leading to the expulsion.

All the exiles however were not thus peacefully laborious. About 1577,

there arose complaints of seven or eight bands of Moriscos who lived by

robbery and murder and terrorized the districts in which they operated.

There was also a noted centre of lawlessness in Hornachos, near Badajos,

populated by Moriscos. For thirty thousand ducats they bought from

Philip the privilege of bearing arms; they had a regular organization

and a treasury and a mint employing thirteen operatives for the coinage

of counterfeit money, while, by judicious bribery of the courts, they

protected their criminals when caught. In 1586 the Llerena tribunal made

a raid on them with such success that it was obliged to hire houses to

accommodate its prisoners, but the effect of this was temporary and, in

October 1608, an alcalde of the court, Gregorio López Madera, was sent

there to investigate and punish. Alcaldes of the court were noted for

unsparing justice, and Madera did not belie this reputation. His inquest

resulted in finding eighty-three dead bodies in the vicinity; he hanged

ten members of the town-council and its executioner; he sent a hundred

and seventy men to the galleys, scourged a large number, and left the

place peaceful for the short interval before it was depopulated by the

expulsion.[930]

* * * * *

[Sidenote: _ARAGON_]

In the kingdoms of the crown of Aragon the position of the Moriscos was

different from that in Castile. They were mostly vassals of the nobles,

settled on lands of which they held the _dominium utile_, while their

lords owned the _dominium directum_. For these lands they paid tribute

in money, in kind, or in service, and we are told that these imposts

amounted to the double of what could be exacted from Christians.[931] It

is easy to appreciate the old proverb "The more Moors the more profits,"

and also that the nobles were vitally interested in protecting their

vassals from external interference. Their ability to do this was largely

owing to the sturdy independence with which the ancient fueros and

privileges were maintained.

Alarm was taken early for, in 1495, the Córtes of Tortosa obtained from

Ferdinand a fuero that he would never expel or consent to the expulsion

of the Moors of Catalonia and, after the occurrences in Castile, the

Córtes of Barcelona, in 1503, represented the destruction which it would

cause and obtained a repetition of the pledge.[932] At the Córtes of

Monzon, in 1510, he renewed this, with the addition that he would make

no attempt to convert them by force, nor throw any impediment in the way

of their free intercourse with Christians and, to the observance of

this, he took a solemn oath, a repetition of which was exacted of

Charles V, on his accession in 1518.[933] Under these guarantees, both

the Moors and their lords might well imagine themselves secure.

As we have seen, the jurisdiction of the Inquisition did not extend to

the unbaptized, so long as they committed no offences against religion.

It had little scruple however in disregarding its limitations and, in

Valencia as early as 1497, it undertook to prevent the wearing of

Moorish costume and sent officials to Serra to arrest some women for

disobedience. They were not recognized and were maltreated, while the

women were conveyed away. We have seen how the tribunal arbitrarily

avenged itself by arresting all residents of Serra who chanced to come

to Valencia and that, when appeal was made to Ferdinand, he expressed

his displeasure and ordered greater moderation in future--yet the

leaders in the resistance at Serra were imprisoned for three years and

suffered confiscation and banishment, leading to considerable

correspondence in which Ferdinand sought to mitigate the harshness of

the tribunal. He showed the same disposition towards the Moorish aljama

of Fraga, which was concerned in the confiscation of a certain Galceran

de Abella, and also towards the Moors of Saragossa, when involved in

trouble with that tribunal by reason of harboring a female slave who had

escaped from Borja.[934]

After the enforced conversion of the Castilian Moors, the tribunal of

Aragon overstepped its powers by endeavoring, indirectly if not

directly, to compel submission to baptism. The Duke and Duchess of

Cardona, the Count of Ribagorza and other magnates complained, in 1508,

to Ferdinand, who reprimanded the inquisitors sharply for exceeding

their jurisdiction, with much scandal to the Moors and damage to their

lords. No one, he said, should be converted or baptized by force, for

God is served only when confession is heartfelt, nor should any one be

imprisoned for simply telling others not to turn Christian. In future,

no Moor was to be baptized unless he applied for it; any who were

imprisoned for counselling against conversion were to be released at

once, and the papers were to be sent to Inquisitor-general Enguera for

instructions, nor were arrests to be made without his orders. As it was

reported that others had fled in fear of forcible conversion or

imprisonment, steps must be taken to bring them home with full assurance

against violence.[935] In the same spirit, in 1510, when some Moors in

Aragon had been converted, and had consequently been abandoned by their

wives and children, Ferdinand ordered the inquisitors to permit them to

return, and not to exert pressure on them or to baptize them

forcibly.[936] Ferdinand understood his Aragonese subjects and had

learned when to respect their fueros.

[Sidenote: _VALENCIA_]

These incidents indicate that there was a movement on foot which

sometimes overstepped the limits of persuasion. There was, in fact, a

process of voluntary conversion, affording hope that in time the

wished-for unity of faith might be accomplished without coercion. A

Catalan alfaquí, named Jacob Tellez, was baptized and brought several

aljamas to embrace Christianity, when Ferdinand to aid him granted him

licence to travel everywhere and to have entrance into all aljamas,

whose members were required to assemble and listen to him.[937] The

Moors of Caspe sought baptism in 1499; in the district of Teruel and

Albarracin, in 1493, a mosque was converted into the church of the

Trinity and, in 1502, the whole population embraced Christianity.[938]

Wholesale conversions such as these were apt to furnish backsliders and,

when the Inquisition undertook to punish those of Teruel and Albarracin,

Charles V interposed, in 1519; he understood, he said, that many of the

children of the Conversos, who had lapsed, desired to return to the

faith, but were deterred through fear of punishment, wherefore he

granted them a term of grace for a year, during which they could come

forward and confess without incurring confiscation, and similar

concessions were made in Tortosa and other cities.[939]

Valencia, which had the largest and densest Moorish population, was also

the scene of considerable proselyting and of vigorous inquisitorial

action. An influential alfaquí, named Abdallah, was converted, took

orders as a priest, under the title of Maestro Mossen Andrés, and

devoted himself to winning over his brethren. He wrote a work

controverting the Koran chapter by chapter, which was printed and

circulated.[940] The little town of Manices must have been converted

almost in mass, for we happen to have a sentence uttered in the church

there, by the inquisitors of Valencia, April 8, 1519, on two hundred and

thirty Moriscos, then present, who had come in under an Edict of Grace,

confessing and abjuring the errors into which they had relapsed. They

were received to reconciliation, apparently without confiscation, and

the penances prescribed were purely spiritual, although in addition they

were subjected to the customary severe disabilities. There must have

been not a little cruel preliminary work for, in the list of these

penitents, no less than thirty-two women are described as the wives or

daughters of men who had been burnt.[941] It is easy for us now to

recognize how powerful an impediment was this method of preserving the

purity of the faith by obstructing the wished-for conversion, for the

Mudéjares who refused baptism could congratulate themselves that they

were not subject to a jurisdiction which visited with such severity the

adherence to ancestral habits that had become a second nature.

[Sidenote: _VALENCIA_]

The missionary work thus impeded received an unlooked for impulse from

the insurrection known as the Germanía or Brotherhood, which suddenly

broke out in 1520. This was a revolt of the people against the

oppression of the nobles which, in its peaceful beginning, won the

approval of Charles and of his representative, Cardinal Adrian. It

speedily developed into civil war, in which the nobles had the aid of

their Moorish vassals; these formed a large portion of the forces with

which the Duke of Segorbe won the victories of Oropesa and Almenara,

early in July, 1521, and they constituted a third of the infantry, under

the Viceroy Mendoza, in the disastrous rout of Gandía, July 25. To

cripple the nobles, the leaders of the Germanía conceived the idea of

baptizing by force the Moors, thus giving them the status of Christians

and releasing them from vassalage.[942] Urgelles, the chief captain,

mortally wounded at the siege of Játiva, which surrendered July 14th,

was already busily engaged in compelling the baptism of the Moors in the

places under his control; and his successor, Vicente Peris, who won the

decisive victory of Gandía, adopted the same policy. Full particulars as

to proceedings in the different towns and villages were obtained by a

commission, formed in 1524 to ascertain whether the baptisms were

voluntary or coerced, and the evidence in its report shows that bands of

_Agermanados_ traversed the territory between Valencia and Oliva,

terrorizing the Moors and offering them the alternative of baptism or

death. A few homicides punctuated their commands, and the helpless

infidels flocked to the baptismal font for safety. Of course there was

no pretence of instruction or of ascertaining what the neophytes knew of

the religion thus imposed upon them; they were baptized by sprinkling

them in batches and squads and, when holy water was not at hand, that

from running streams was employed. The only redeeming feature in the

evidence is the frequent allusion to friendly relations between

Christians and Moors and to the refuge and protection willingly given to

the terrified victims, showing how the antagonism of race was gradually

subsiding and how its extinction might have been hopefully anticipated

if matters had been allowed to develop naturally.[943]

Attempts were also made to convert the mosques into churches. In a few

places they were consecrated; in some others only a paper picture of

Christ or the Virgin was hung up, or attached to the door. Occasionally

divine service was performed, which the neophytes attended with more or

less regularity, but their adhesion to their new faith lasted only while

the impression of terror continued. In some places they felt safe to

recur to their old religion in three weeks, in others they remained

nominally Christian for a few months, but everywhere, as soon as they

felt the danger to be passed, they resumed their Moslem rites and

worshipped in their mosques as before. In this, for the most part, they

were encouraged by their lords, who assured them that the coercive

baptism was invalid, and that they were free to revert to their faith.

Others more prudently seized the opportunity to escape to Africa, and it

was estimated that no less than five thousand houses were left vacant,

inferring an emigration of some twenty-five thousand souls.[944]

The suppression of the Germanía, in 1522, enabled the Inquisition to

commence action against those who had been brought under its

jurisdiction by baptism. Inquisitor Churrucca of Valencia entertained no

scruple as to the validity of the sacrament, but there was difficulty in

the fact that the hurried proceedings had precluded the making of

records that would identify individuals. When the officiating priests

had made lists he demanded their surrender and, towards the close of

1523, he was busy in obtaining evidence from eye-witnesses. Some

fragmentary documents show that he was partially successful, and that he

was prosecuting those whom he could prove to be apostates, but there was

no disposition to treat them harshly. It would appear, indeed, that

Cardinal Adrian adopted a policy of toleration which, after his

elevation to the papacy, enabled the advocates of the Moriscos to claim

that they had the benefit of a dispensation.[945]

The situation, in fact, was perplexing. In Castile, enforced conversion

had been universal, under threat of expulsion; all were constructively

baptized and could legally be held to the consequences. In Valencia,

however, the Germanía had occupied but a portion of the territory, and

even there the work had been partial, and so irregularly executed that

identification was impossible save in isolated cases. As soon as the

pressure was removed all had reverted to their pristine belief, and the

sovereign was under a solemn oath that no compulsion should be employed.

The simplest solution that offered was to complete the work and to

convert the whole Moorish population, after securing the assent of the

nobles by conceding that their rights should not be affected, and that

converts should not be permitted to change their domicile.[946]

Missionaries were therefore sent to try the effect of persuasion,

prominent among whom was Fray Antonio de Guevara. In a letter of May 22,

1524, he says that for three years he had labored at the task, doing

nothing but dispute in the aljamas, preach in the Morerías and baptize

in the houses.[947] Well-meant as was this effort, its success was not

commensurate with its merits; the question refused to be solved, and the

claims of the Inquisition to exercise jurisdiction over the so-called

apostates inevitably provoked discussion as to the validity of enforced

baptism, the degree of coercion by the Agermanados, and the sufficiency

of the rite so irregularly performed.

[Sidenote: _VALENCIA_]

We have seen above (Vol. I, p. 41) that, when the Goths coerced their

Jewish subjects to baptism, the fourth Council of Toledo enunciated the

principle that, while the act was wrong, the baptism was indelible and

the baptized must be forced to remain in the Church, a principle which

became embodied in the canon law. Still there was a question as to the

degree of coercion and Boniface VIII, while assuming to exempt those

whose coercion was absolute, took care to define that the fear of death

was not such coercion.[948] In the refinement of scholastic theology,

two kinds of coercion were distinguished--conditional or interpretative

and absolute; it was decided that coerced volition is still volition,

and absolute coercion was reduced to the proposition that, if a man tied

hand and foot were baptized while uttering protests, the rite would be

invalid.[949] Such was the received practice of the Church, although a

few schoolmen of high repute denied the validity of the sacrament under

coercion, rather as an academical question, for the Church assumes

consent and compels the so-called convert to the observance of the faith

imposed on him.[950]

It was inevitable that the converts of the Germanía were to be held to

their responsibilities as Christians. Charles V had already resolved on

his policy and had applied to Clement VII to be released from his oath

not to impose Christianity on the Moors, but the proceedings of

Inquisitor Churrucca were exciting murmurs, and a decent show of

preliminary investigation was advisable. Charles at first ordered this

to be done by the Governor of Valencia in conjunction with the

inquisitors and some theologians and jurists, but this was not a

sufficiently authoritative body to justify the far-reaching measures in

contemplation and Manrique suggested, January 23, 1524, the formation of

a junta under his presidency, in view of the opposition of the nobles

and gentry, who dreaded the loss accruing to them from the

Christianization of their vassals.[951] That this was merely to save

appearances is evident from the fact that, when Charles, on February

11th, gave orders for the assembling of the junta, he wrote on the same

day to Germaine, Vice-queen of Valencia, instructing the inquisitors and

vicar-general to take due action with the apostate Moriscos.[952] Nine

days later, Manrique issued a commission to Churrucca and his assessor

Andrés Palacio to make a complete investigation into all the

circumstances of the conversion and backsliding of the Moriscos--a

selection which indicates the foregone conclusion, as they had already

committed themselves on all the questions involved. Two other

commissioners--Martin Sánchez and Juan de Bas--were added to them when,

in November, they started on their work, and meanwhile the inquisitors

had been taking testimony on their own account.[953]

The investigation lasted only from November 4th to the 24th, as the

commission moved from place to place, in the little district between

Alcira and Denia. A hundred and twenty-eight witnesses were interrogated

on a series of questions drawn up by Manrique and their evidence

established beyond doubt that submission to baptism was under the

influence of mortal terror. The report of the commission consisted

simply of the testimony, as taken down by the secretary, but it was

supplemented by a learned argument in scholastic form by the fiscal of

the tribunal, Fernando Loazes, the future Archbishop of Valencia. In

this he made no pretence that the baptism was voluntary. The violence he

admitted to be a crime, for which the actors should be punished, but the

effect was good and should be maintained; it was the way in which God

evokes good out of evil. The Moors had been saved from perdition and

from slavery to the demon and, as this was a public benefit, the

converts must be compelled to adhere to the Catholic faith, and those

who upheld them in apostasy must be prosecuted as fautors and defenders

of heresy. All doctors agree that, when there is danger of infecting the

faith, the prince can compel uniformity or can expel the

unbelievers.[954]

[Sidenote: _VALENCIA_]

It was an imposing assemblage to which the report was submitted,

consisting of a reunion of the Councils of Castile, of Aragon, of the

Inquisition, of Military Orders and of Indies, together with eminent

theologians, and it was under the presidency of Manrique.

There evidently was not unanimity, for the discussion occupied

twenty-two days, and some of the theologians, with Jaime Benet, the most

eminent canonist of Spain at their head, denied the validity of the

baptisms. Still, the inevitable conclusion was that, as the neophytes

had made no resistance or complaint, they must adhere to the faith,

willingly or unwillingly. On March 23, 1525, the emperor attended a

meeting, in which Manrique announced to him the decision, which he

confirmed and ordered measures to be taken for its enforcement. In

pursuance of this a royal cédula on April 4th, after reciting the care

bestowed on the question, and the unanimous conclusion reached, declared

the baptized Moors to be Christians, and ordered their children to be

baptized, while churches in which mass had been celebrated were not to

be used as mosques.[955]

It would be difficult to exaggerate the importance of this action on the

fate of the Moriscos, for all that followed was its necessary

consequence. Without loss of time an imposing inquisitorial commission

was organized, with Gaspar de Avalos, Bishop of Guadix, at its head, and

a retinue of counsellors and familiars. On May 10th they arrived at

Valencia and, on Sunday the 14th, the bishop in a sermon ordered the

publication of the royal cédula, with an edict granting thirty days

within which apostates could return with security for life and property,

after which they would forfeit both.[956] It could scarce have been

intended to execute this atrocious threat, and no attempt seems to have

been made to do so. The apostates were not easily distinguishable among

their unbaptized brethren, among whom they constituted perhaps ten per

cent., but the commissioners endeavored to identify them, travelling

through the land, making out lists, and confirming all whom they could

discover, as a preliminary to prosecuting the backsliders.[957] Their

numbers suggested moderation, for which papal authority was requisite.

It was obtained, for a brief of Clement VII, June 16, 1525, recites that

Charles had applied to him for a remedy; the multitude of delinquents

called for gentleness and clemency, wherefore they were to be prosecuted

with a benignant asperity; those who should return to the light of

truth, publicly abjure their errors and swear never to relapse, could be

absolved without incurring the customary infamy and disabilities.[958]

Threats and promises availed little. The ten or fifteen thousand

Moriscos, who had passed through the hands of the Agermanados, did not

wait to experience the benignant asperity of the commission, but took

refuge in the Sierra de Bernia, and the nobles, so far from attempting

to dislodge them, favored them, in hopes that their resistance might

lead Charles to abandon his purpose. He had been moved to indignation on

hearing that the magistrates of Valencia had begged the commission not

to ill-treat the Alfaquíes, as the prosperity of the land depended on

the Moors, and he now rebuked the nobles, ordering them to go to their

estates and teach their vassals to be good Christians. Preparations at

length were made to attack the refugees of Bernia, who had held out from

April until August; they surrendered under promise of immunity and were

taken to Murla where they were absolved and kindly treated.[959]

The commission, wearied with its fruitless labors, was about to abandon

the field, when it received a letter from Charles, stating that, as God

had granted him the victory of Pavia, he could evince his gratitude in

no way more effective than by compelling all the infidels in his

dominions to submit to baptism; they were therefore ordered to remain

and to undertake this new conversion, in conjunction with a fresh

colleague, Fray Calcena, afterwards Bishop of Tortosa.[960] We have seen

that, in preparation for this, he had, near the end of 1523 or in the

early part of 1524, applied to Clement VII to absolve him from the oath

taken in 1518 not to expel or make forced conversions, and Clement is

said to have at first refused the request, declaring it to be

scandalous.[961] The persistence of the ambassador, the Duke of Sesa,

however prevailed over Clement's scruples and the brief was issued, May

12, 1524, though for a time it was kept secret.

[Sidenote: _VALENCIA_]

It commenced by reciting the papal grief on learning that, in Valencia,

Catalonia and Aragon, Charles had many Moorish subjects, with whom the

faithful could not hold intercourse without danger, and who served as

spies for their brethren in Africa. He was therefore exhorted to order

the inquisitors to preach to them and, in case of obstinacy, he was to

designate a term after which they should be expelled, under pain of

perpetual slavery, to be rigorously enforced. The tithes, which they had

never paid, should in future accrue to their lords, in recompense for

the damage caused by the expulsion, under condition that the lords

should supply the churches with what was requisite for divine service,

while the revenues of the mosques should provide endowments for

benefices. The fateful brief concluded by formally releasing Charles

from his oath of 1518, absolving him from all penalties and censures for

perjury, and granting him whatever dispensation was necessary for the

due execution of the foregoing, and it further conferred on the

inquisitors ample faculties to suppress opposition, notwithstanding all

apostolical constitutions and all laws of the land.[962]

Charles was thus set free to work his will, in despite of oaths and of

laws. Yet for eighteen months he held the brief without using it,

waiting perhaps for the settlement of the question of baptism and for

the agitation in Valencia to subside. At length, on September 13, 1525,

he addressed letters to the nobles, informing them of his irrevocable

resolve not to allow a Moor or an infidel to dwell in his dominions

except as a slave; he recognized that expulsion would affect their

interests, and consequently he urged them to go to their estates and

co-operate with the commissioners in procuring the conversion and

instruction of their vassals. Accompanying this was a brief letter to

the Moors, informing them of the determination to which he had been

inspired by Almighty God that His law should prevail throughout the

land, and of his desire for their salvation, wherefore he exhorted and

commanded them to submit to baptism; if they did so, they should have

the liberties of Christians and good treatment; if they refused, he

would find other means. The next day a proclamation was addressed to the

Moors, emphatically repeating these threats and promises, and forbidding

any interference with conversion or insults to converts, under penalty

of five thousand florins and the royal wrath. The same day a letter to

Queen Germaine tacitly admitted the futility of depriving the Moriscos

of their religion without providing a substitute. He had learned, he

said, that in many villages of the converts there were no priests to

give instruction or to celebrate mass, and he ordered her to see that

they were instructed and ministered to, thriftily adding that, in lands

of royal jurisdiction, care must be taken to reserve the patronage of

the new churches to the crown.[963]

The commissioners, armed with full powers as inquisitors, lost no time

in announcing to the Moors the irrevocable resolve of the emperor, with

a term of grace of eight days, after which they would execute the

decrees. The frightened aljamas deputed twelve alfaquíes to supplicate

of Charles the revocation of the edict. Queen Germaine granted them a

safe-conduct, and they were received at court, carrying with them fifty

thousand ducats to propitiate persons of importance and, although at the

moment they accomplished nothing, eventually, as we shall see, they

secured a Concordia which, as usual, was granted only to be

violated.[964]

[Sidenote: _VALENCIA_]

Meanwhile, on November 3d, Charles enclosed the papal brief to the

inquisitors, with instructions to enforce it without delay. At the same

time he notified the authorities, secular and ecclesiastical, that it

invalidated all the fueros, privileges and constitutions to which he had

sworn; that he had instructed the Inquisition to enforce it, and that

the local magistrates, under pain of ten thousand florins, must execute

whatever the inquisitors might decree.[965] Having thus made the Moors

understand the fate in store for them, on November 25th he issued a

general decree of expulsion. All those of Valencia were to be out of

Spain by December 31st, and those of Catalonia and Aragon by January 31,

1526. As in 1502, there was no exemption promised for conversion, but

similarly the obstacles thrown in the way of expatriation showed the

real intent of the edict. The Valencians were ordered to register and

obtain passports at Sieteaguas, on the Cuenca frontier, and then plod

their weary way to Coruña, where they were to embark, under pain of

confiscation and slavery, while the nobles were threatened with a fine

of five thousand ducats for each one whom they might retain. At the same

time was published a papal brief ordering, under pain of

excommunication, all Christians to aid in enforcing the imperial

decrees, and all Moors to listen without replying to the teachings of

the Gospel. Still another edict, which ordered that all Moors must be

baptized by December 8th, or be prepared to leave the country, showed by

implication that conversion would relieve from exile. Then the

Inquisition gave notice that it was prepared to act, and it published

tremendous censures, with a penalty of a thousand florins, against all

failing to aid it against those who obstinately resisted the sweetness

of the gospel and the benignant plans of the emperor.[966]

When the alfaquíes reported the failure of their mission, the great bulk

of the Valencian Moors submitted to baptism. Fray Antonio de Guevara,

who was foremost in the work, boasts that he baptized twenty thousand

families, but the Moriscos subsequently asserted that this wholesale

conversion was accomplished by corraling them in pens and scattering

water over them, when some would seek to hide themselves and others

would shout "No water has touched me!" They endured it, they said,

because their alfaquíes assured them that deceit was permissible, and

that they need not believe the religion which they were compelled to

profess.[967] Many hid themselves; some took refuge in Benaguacil which

surrendered, March 27th, after a five weeks' siege, but the Sierra de

Espadan was the scene of a more formidable revolt, which was not subdued

until September 19th, with considerable slaughter. Others again betook

themselves to the Sierra de Bernia, to Guadalete and Confridas, but

these mostly succeeded in escaping to Africa. Thus was Valencia

converted and pacified; the Moriscos, we as may now call them, were

disarmed, the pulpits of their alfaquíes were torn down, their Korans

were burnt, and orders were given to instruct them competently in the

faith--orders, as we shall see, perpetually reissued and never

executed.[968]

[Sidenote: _VALENCIA_]

In Aragon, before the edicts, premonitions of the future had aroused

much agitation. The Moors ceased to labor in the fields and shops,

causing great anxiety as to impending famine. The Diputados were called

upon to act and, while preparing to send envoys to Charles, they gave to

the Count of Ribagorza, who chanced to be at the court, a memorial

addressed to him. This appealed to the solemn oaths taken by him and

Ferdinand; it represented that the whole industry and prosperity of the

land rested upon the Moors, who raised the harvests and produced the

manufactures, while the incomes of churches and convents, of benefices

and the gentry, of widows and orphans, were derived from their censos or

loans. They were practically the slaves of their feudal lords, to whom

they were obedient, and they had never been known to pervert a Christian

or cause scandal; they lived at a distance from the coast, so that they

could hold no intercourse with Barbary, and the law punished by

enslavement all attempts to leave the kingdom; their expulsion would

cause ruin while, if converted, they would be enfranchised and enabled

to go abroad. As they had ceased to sow their lands, immediate relief of

their fears was necessary to avert a famine. Ribagorza's influence

procured a brief delay, but Charles's practical reply was a

proclamation, published in Saragossa December 22d, forbidding any Moor

to leave the kingdom, prohibiting all purchases of property from them,

closing their mosques and abolishing their public shambles.[969] This

increased the alarm, and risings occurred in some places, followed by

others after the publication of the edict of expulsion, but they were

not serious. The date of expulsion was postponed until March 15, 1526,

and, as it approached, there were other risings, but they were readily

suppressed; the Moors were disarmed and, as a whole, they submitted to

baptism.[970]

The whole Morisco population was now at the mercy of the Inquisition,

but every consideration, both of policy and of charity, dictated a

tolerant exercise of power, until they could be instructed and won over

to their new faith. This the Suprema recognized by ordering that they

should be treated with great moderation.[971] Possibly this may explain

the absence of trials for heresy by the Valencia tribunal in 1525 and

1527, but, in the intermediate and subsequent years, there is no

abatement in its activity, which was not only in disobedience of the

commands of the Suprema, but a direct violation of the Concordia, agreed

to January 6, 1526, although not published until 1528.

This Concordia was the result of the labors of the alfaquíes sent to the

court in 1525. It was granted with the consent of Inquisitor-general

Manrique; it was solemnly confirmed by Charles in the Córtes of Monzon,

in 1528, when it was declared to comprehend all the kingdoms of the

crown of Aragon, but when it was published by the Bayle-general of

Valencia, under orders from Charles, Manrique rebuked him for so doing.

Its main provisions are worth reciting if only to show the questions

arising and as an instance of the faithlessness habitually shown to the

Moriscos, for scarce one of the articles favorable to them was observed.

It set forth that the new converts could not at once abandon the Moorish

ceremonies, which they observed rather through habit than with

intention, and that prosecution by the Inquisition would be their total

destruction, wherefore the Inquisition should not proceed against them

for forty years, as had been granted to the Moors of Granada. As for

their garments, they might wear out those existing, but new ones must be

made in the Christian fashion. As most of the men and all the women

could speak only Arabic, they could use it for ten years, during which

time they must learn Castilian or Valencian. New cemeteries were to be

consecrated for them, near the mosques now converted into churches.

Dispensations were to be granted by the legate or the pope for all

existing marriages and betrothals within the prohibited degrees, but

future ones must conform to the canons. To the request that their arms

should be restored to them, the answer was that they should be treated

like other Christians. To the argument that they could not pay the old

tributes and imposts, if they were forbidden to work on feast-days, nor

was it reasonable that they should be prevented from changing domicile,

the equivocal reply was that they should be treated like other

Christians, but without prejudice to third parties. There was also

permission to continue as corporations the old Morerías in royal

territory. All this Charles guaranteed for himself and for Prince

Philip, and ordered its strict observance by all officials, from the

highest to the lowest, under pain of the royal wrath and a fine of three

thousand ducats.[972]

[Sidenote: _VALENCIA_]

The Inquisition, however, was a law unto itself and was bound by no

compacts. In a few months after the promulgation of the Concordia, the

Suprema published everywhere a declaration that it referred only to

trivial customs and did not condone the use of Moorish rites and

ceremonies, and that those who performed them or lapsed from the faith

were to be duly prosecuted, to all of which it stated that the emperor

acceded.[973] When, therefore, the Aragonese nobles, in 1529, presented

remonstrances to Charles and to Manrique, the latter replied that it was

their salvation and not their injury that was sought, and that he hoped

that God might lay his hands upon them, so that all would eventuate

well.[974] The hand of God, as laid upon them through the Inquisition,

was not merciful for, in 1531, the Valencia tribunal had fifty-eight

trials for heresy, with some thirty-seven burnings in person, most of

whom presumably were Moriscos. Saragossa was somewhat milder for, in

1530, it reported that in the last auto it had reconciled a number of

Moriscos, commuting confiscation and prison into fines and, in some

cases, to scourging; that the fines had been assigned to a cleric who

should instruct the penitents, but the receiver had refused to surrender

the money, whereupon the Suprema suggested a separate collection of

fines and their payment to instructors.[975] Thus the Inquisition went

imperturbably on its way and, when the Córtes of the three kingdoms

complained that it was notorious that there had been no attempt to

instruct the Moriscos, or to provide churches for them, and that it was

a great abuse to prosecute them as heretics, Cardinal Manrique

unctuously replied that they had been treated with all moderation and

benignity and that, for the future, provision would be made, with the

assent of the emperor, as best comported with the service of God and the

salvation of their souls.[976]

Even more defiantly self-willed was the conduct of the Inquisition with

regard to confiscations. We have seen that these were the property of

the crown and that, when the Inquisition was allowed to retain the

proceeds, it was a concession dependent upon the will of the sovereign.

Yet it sturdily set aside the laws of the land and the commands of the

emperor, and persisted in confiscating the property of its penitents.

The earliest fuero of Valencia, granted by Jaime I after the conquest,

provided that, in capital cases of heresy and treason, allodial lands

and personal property should accrue to the king, while feudal lands and

those held under rent-charge or other service, should revert to the

lord. The new Inquisition disregarded this and, in 1488, the Córtes of

Orihuela demanded its observance, to which Ferdinand assented. Still the

Inquisition persisted and he agreed to the demands of the Córtes of

1510, that he should compound for all lands thus illegally obtained.

This was equally fruitless and, in 1533, the Córtes of Monzon repeated

the complaint; it was the lords and churches that suffered by the

confiscations inflicted on their vassals, and some compromise should be

reached as to past infractions of the fuero. To this the answer was

equivocal; there was no confiscation and, please God, with the efforts

on foot for the instruction of the converts, there would be no necessity

for it in the future but, if there should be, provision would be made to

protect the lords, and meanwhile a commission could decide as to what

would be just for the past.[977]

Charles, in fact, the next year, at Saragossa, issued a pragmática

ordering that, when the new converts incurred confiscation, the property

should be made over to the legal Catholic heirs, without prejudice to

the lords of the delinquents. The Inquisition, however, was equal to the

occasion; it obeyed the law in the letter but not in the spirit, for, in

1547, the Córtes complained to the inquisitor-general that, in lieu of

confiscation, the Saragossa tribunal imposed fines greater than the

wealth of the penitents who, to meet them, were obliged to sell all

their property and impoverish their kindred. To this the contemptuous

answer was returned that if any one was aggrieved he could apply to the

inquisitors or to the Suprema.[978]

In Valencia the contest was more prolonged. The Córtes of 1537

reiterated the old complaints and asked Charles to order the tribunals

to obey the law, which he promised to do. The Suprema rejoined, in a

consulta, that confiscation was the most efficient penalty for the

suppression of heresy; the culprit could escape burning by

reconciliation and, without confiscation, heresy would be unpunished.

The Inquisition accordingly went on confiscating and, in 1542, under

urgent complaints by the Córtes, Charles assented to a law that the

_dominium utile_ of the culprit should revert to the _dominium directum_

of the lord and that the royal officials, under pain of a thousand

florins, should put the lord in possession. The pope seems to have been

appealed to, to make the Inquisition obey, for in a brief of August 2,

1546, which virtually suspended it, he decreed that for ten years, and

during the pleasure of the Holy See, there should be neither fines nor

confiscation in the case of Moriscos.[979]

Royal and papal utterances were alike in vain. In 1547, the Córtes

renewed the complaint of the persistence of the Inquisition and

introduced the new feature of asking that the inquisitor-general should

join in signing the fuero, thus recognizing him as an independent power

in the state. Prince Philip promised to obtain his signature, but it was

not done. Again in 1552 and 1564 the same comedy was acted, but Philip's

promise in the latter year was neutralized by specific instructions of

the Suprema, to the Valencia tribunal, to confiscate Morisco property,

without regarding what the people might say about having a privilege

against confiscation.[980]

[Sidenote: _VALENCIA_]

At length a compromise was reached. In 1537 the Córtes had suggested a

payment to the Inquisition of four hundred ducats per annum in return

for Morisco impunity from pecuniary penance, but the Suprema had refused

the proposition as inadequate and as a disservice to God.[981] In 1571,

negotiations were renewed, resulting in a royal cédula of October 12th,

reciting that Inquisitor-general Espinosa had condescended to grant to

the Moriscos of Valencia the articles presented by them. These provided

that, in consideration of an annual payment of fifty thousand sueldos,

or twenty-five hundred ducats, to the tribunal, the property of those

contributing to it should be exempt from confiscation. Warning,

moreover, was taken from the experience of Aragon, and fines were

limited to ten ducats, but the aljamas of the culprits were responsible

for their payment. It rested with the aljamas whether or not to come

into the arrangement, but so many of them did so that thenceforth it was

spoken of commonly as in force throughout Valencia.[982]

This suited the Inquisition as assuring it a settled income; it relieved

the Moriscos from the ever-present dread of pauperism and the miseries

of sequestration, and it gratified the nobles and churches by securing

them from the alienation of their lands and the impoverishment of their

vassals. To the rigid churchman, however, it was a compact with evil and

an encouragement of heresy. Archbishop Ribera of Valencia protested

against it, and Bishop Pérez of Segorbe, in 1595, advocated its

revocation, but Philip II resolved that it should continue during the

period agreed upon for the instruction of the Moriscos.[983]

The tribunal naturally took care to increase its assured income by

exploiting to the fullest its remaining power of inflicting fines, and

it did so with little regard to the limitation. In 1595, the aljamas

complained of these infractions.[984] That such complaint continued to

be justified would appear from the auto de fe of January 7, 1607,

alluded to above (Vol. II, p. 395) where there were twenty fines of ten

ducats each on Moriscos, of whom only eight were reconciled, besides

other fines, one of twenty, one of thirty and one of fifty.

The table in the Appendix shows that, while the activity of the

Inquisition seemed to diminish somewhat after the Concordia, towards the

close of the century it increased greatly, there being two hundred and

ninety-one cases in 1591 and a hundred and seventeen in 1592. The record

furnishing these figures ends with 1592 and we have no means of

ascertaining the work in the years which immediately follow, but the

rigor of persecution continued. In the auto of September 5, 1604, there

were twenty-eight abjurations _de levi_, forty-nine _de vehementi_,

eight reconciliations and two relaxations--all Moriscos, except a

Frenchman penanced for blasphemy. In that of January 7, 1607, there

appeared thirty-three Moriscos, of whom one was relaxed, besides six

whose cases were suspended, and in the trials torture was employed

fifteen times.[985] The fluctuations in the number of cases can be

accounted for by evidence occasionally enabling the tribunal to make a

raid on some Morisco village when, as they were all Moors at heart, the

whole community would be gathered in. Thus, in 1589 and 1590 the little

settlement of Mislata, near Valencia, furnished a hundred cases and we

are told that in the town of Carlet there were two hundred and forty

households that observed the fast of Ramadan.[986]

In fact, as the Moorish faith of the Moriscos was notorious, the whole

population was at the mercy of the Inquisition, and the comparative

moderation shown by the records may perhaps be explained by a system of

secret bribery or compositions whereby immunity was purchased. The

possibility of this is suggested by a case which throws considerable

light upon the manner in which the inquisitorial power was exercised.

[Sidenote: _VALENCIA_]

The family of Don Cosme, Don Juan and Don Hernando Abenamir of

Benaguacil ranked among the first of the old Moors of Valencia; the

brothers were rich and influential; they held licences to bear arms, and

Inquisitor Miranda had appointed them familiars--a position which they

resigned at the instance of the Duke of Segorbe, on whose lands they

dwelt, for he said that they had no need of such protection, as they had

only to appeal to him if aggrieved. In May, 1567, during the absence of

Inquisitor Miranda, the fiscal presented to the other inquisitor,

Gerónimo Manrique, a _clamosa_ against the brothers. Their arrest was

voted but, in view of the importance of the case, the Suprema was

consulted, which confirmed the vote and, on July 1st, the warrants were

issued. The accused could not be found; edicts summoning them were

published and, on January 12, 1568, Don Cosme presented himself. It is

his trial that has been preserved, but presumably the others took the

same course, except that Don Hernando's name disappears towards the end,

probably in consequence of death.

At the first audience Don Cosme said that he presumed he had been

baptized when a child, yet he did not consider himself a Christian but a

Moor; he had through life performed Moorish rites and had gone to

confession only to conform with the edicts, but in future he desired to

be a Christian and to do whatever the inquisitors might require. He

offered no defence in the various stages of his trial, but on July 15th,

in consequence of the crowded condition of the secret prison, he was

given the city as a prison on furnishing security in two thousand

ducats.

Notwithstanding this he visited Madrid where, for seven thousand ducats,

he purchased for himself and his brothers a pardon from the king, the

inquisitor-general and the Suprema, and he also exercised important

influence in securing the Concordia of 1571. His stay in the capital was

prolonged when, after an interval of nearly three years, the tribunal

suddenly revived his case, May 25, 1571 and, on June 6th, it summoned

his bondsmen to produce him within nine days, a term extended to twelve

days on their protesting that it was notorious that he was in Madrid, on

business with the Suprema. This action brought from the Suprema a curt

letter stating that Don Cosme complained that, after compounding his

case, it had been revived, and ordering the tribunal to drop the matter

and explain its motives. This it did and received from the Suprema a

second order to do nothing, but to send the papers and await

instructions. Subsequently Don Cosme returned to Valencia and exhibited

certificates of the pardons for himself and his brothers to Juan de

Rojas, then inquisitor, who told him to go _enhorabuena_, for they were

pardoned and the Inquisition had nothing further to do with them.

Six years passed away when suddenly, without further evidence being

sought for, on September 3, 1577, the Suprema returned to the tribunal

the papers in the cases of Don Cosme and Don Juan, and ordered it to

summon them, examine them, vote on them and report to the Suprema for

its decision. Don Cosme by that time seems to have been impoverished,

and was supporting himself by farming the revenues at Genoves; after

some delay he was brought to the prison, December 24th and his trial was

resumed. At first he refused to be examined, alleging his pardon, but it

was elaborately explained to him that it was not intended to interfere

with it but to render it operative, for which it was necessary for him

to abjure his errors and be reconciled, to which end he must make full

confession as to himself and his accomplices; if he refused, it would

show that he desired to remain in his old errors and under

excommunication. After some fencing, he submitted and described how,

about the age of twelve, his mother had taught him to perform the zala

and fast the Ramadan and to believe in one God; that Santa María was a

virgin and holy, but not the Mother of God; that the Lord Jesus Christ

was a son of God and prophet of God, who had ever spoken truth, and it

was a sin not to believe in what he had uttered, but that Mahomet was

also a prophet of God, whose utterances were to be believed; he had also

been taught to commit no murder, not to covet his neighbor's daughter

and not to bear false witness--all of which would seem to indicate that

there was developing among the Moriscos an intermediate faith which in

time would have become Christian had opportunity been allowed. Don Cosme

further declared that, since his first arrest, he had always been a

Christian and desired to live and die in the faith of Christ; he

repeated all the Christian prayers accurately, in both Latin and

Romance, and wished that he had been born among Christians, as it would

have been better for him, both in body and in soul. This went on, until

February 21, 1578, when he was allowed the city as a prison, under bail,

and on March 26th he was permitted to return home, keeping himself

subject to summons.

[Sidenote: _VALENCIA_]

Then fifteen months elapsed, until July 17, 1579, his case was voted

upon _in discordia_, requiring its reference to the Suprema which,

October 2d, ordered torture at discretion for Don Cosme and Don Juan.

Preliminary audiences, however, were prescribed in order that they might

discharge their consciences and satisfy the evidence, especially as to

accomplices, giving them to understand that this was necessary to enable

them to enjoy the pardon of 1571. Under this the trial was resumed, but

the record ends before the stage of torture was reached, and the

archivist, Don Julio Melgares Marin, who copied it, assumes that the

case remained suspended. Probably either the two brothers had succeeded

in raising a sum sufficient to satisfy the Suprema, or they were

recognized as too poor to be worth further prosecution.[987]

* * * * *

From such a case as this, it can readily be conceived how efficient an

instrument was the Inquisition in exciting and perpetuating among the

Moriscos an abhorrence of the religion imposed on them by force, and

scarce known to them save as an excuse for cruelty and exaction. To some

extent this was recognized by the governing powers. After the wise

toleration had been discarded, which had rendered the Mudéjares

contented subjects, the apostasy of the neophytes was the source of

grave concern in the spiritual field, and their known hostility was the

cause of even greater disquiet in the sphere of statesmanship. For more

than three-quarters of a century it was the subject of a constant series

of efforts and experiments, alternating between moderation and severity.

With an efficient and honest administration, something might have been

accomplished by a consistent policy, but vacillation, incompetence and

greed resulted only in increasing exasperation. The story is long and

intricate and the barest summary must suffice here to indicate its

leading features and the causes of the failure to assimilate the races,

on which depended the peace and prosperity of Spain. We have seen the

mistaken policy adopted in Granada; in Valencia it was less unreasonable

in spirit, but failed miserably in execution.

After the Germanía and the edict of 1525, some futile attempts were made

at missionary work among the so-called converts, but the situation, in

1526, is correctly described by Navigero, the Venetian envoy, who says

that there was so little care about teaching them, priestly gains being

the main object, that they either were as much Moors as before or had no

religion of any kind.[988] It was self-evident that to Christianize a

large population, scattered over the land, for the most part in

exclusive communities, would require a complete organization of parish

churches with schools and all the necessary appliances. A basis for this

existed in the property of the mosques, which Clement VII, in 1524, had

ordered to be converted into churches, and in the tithes, which were

now imposed as a fresh burden upon the converts. These were spoils which

all, who saw a chance for gain, hastened to grasp. To recompense the

lords for the expected loss of tribute from their vassals, who were

promised to be treated in all things like Christians, the tithes were

made over to them, in return for which they were to provide the churches

with what was requisite for divine service, while the revenues of the

mosques were expected to furnish foundations for benefices, the

patronage of which was given to the lords. For this, as we have seen,

the requisite papal authority was procured, but the measure was attacked

in innumerable suits, some of which were carried up to the Roman Rota,

with the consequent interminable delays.[989] In some fashion, two

hundred and thirteen mosques were converted into churches in the

archbishopric of Valencia, fourteen in the see of Tortosa, ten in

Segorbe and fourteen in Orihuela, but the object kept in view was the

revenues, and not the religious training of the Moriscos.[990]

[Sidenote: _VALENCIA_]

Nearly ten years passed away with nothing accomplished. A thorough

reorganization was seen to be necessary, and papal faculties were

obtained empowering Cardinal Manrique to provide persons to instruct the

converts, to erect and unite churches, to appoint and dismiss priests,

to regulate tithes and to decide summarily all the suits that were

expected from archbishops, bishops, chapters, abbeys, priests and

secular lords, thus rendering him and his delegates independent of the

bishops who thus far had done nothing.[991] Under this, in 1534,

Manrique despatched commissioners with detailed instructions, including

provisions to be made for a college to be founded for the instruction of

Morisco children, who should in turn instruct their parents.[992] The

scheme, however, though well intended, was wrecked on the money-question

which, to the end, proved an obstacle frustrating all intelligent work

in conversion. The revenues of the mosques, the tithes and first-fruits

seem to disappear--swallowed up by noble and prelate and, although they

derived their incomes in great part from the labor of the Moriscos, it

seemed impossible to wring from them what was necessary to support the

new establishment. In 1544, St. Thomas of Vilanova, then Archbishop of

Valencia, urged the emperor to place zealous and exemplary rectors in

the Morisco villages, with ample salaries to enable them to distribute

alms, but it does not seem to have occurred to him that this was part of

his duty and that of the Church.[993]

Manrique's commissioners established a hundred and ninety rectories,

endowed with the beggarly stipend of thirty crowns a year. It was

impossible to find suitable priests for such livings, and the complaint

was general that they were, for the most part, ignorant and depraved,

creating repulsion rather than attraction to the religion which they

assumed to teach. Many were non-resident and neglected their duties

entirely, or found vicars at still lower salaries to replace them. There

was no one to inspect them or keep them in order. A pension of two

thousand ducats a year had been levied on the archbishopric of Valencia,

to maintain the projected college for Morisco youths, but two-thirds of

this was diverted to the support of the rectories and the rest was made

up from various sources, not always adequate, for some holders of

benefices refused to pay the moderate assessments made on them.[994]

It was in vain that one effort after another was made to remedy these

deficiencies. The indifference of the ecclesiastical authorities, or

their opposition when asked for funds, paralyzed every plan devised. In

1564, the Córtes of Monzon pointed out the failure of all attempts to

instruct the converts, who were punished for their ignorance, and they

made some remedial suggestions. Philip in response assembled a junta

under the presidency of Valdés, the conclusions of which were embodied

in a royal cédula. This confided the instruction of the Moriscos to the

bishops in their several dioceses, who were to appoint proper persons

and keep them under supervision, treating the neophytes with the utmost

kindness, rewarding the good according to their deserts, and appointing

the more prominent among them to familiarships. Archbishop Ayala, on his

return from this junta, called a provincial council, but the bishops

took no action to carry out the provisions of the cédula, contenting

themselves with inflicting heavy fines on those who did not have their

children baptized at birth in the best clothes that they could afford;

on alfaquíes who visited the sick, and on secular officials who

neglected to denounce Moorish observances. The pious hope was expressed

that, by compelling them to attend mass on Ash Wednesday, Maundy

Thursday, Good Friday and All Saints, they might be attracted to

Christian worship, and their salvation was cared for by ordering them on

the death-bed to give something for the benefit of their souls, in

default of which the heirs must at least have three masses sung for

them.[995]

[Sidenote: _VALENCIA_]

This was the spirit in which the prelates conceived their duties towards

those whom clerical pressure had made their spiritual children, and to

whom they owed great part of their revenues. Juan de Ribera who, in

1568, succeeded to the archbishopric of Valencia was a man of different

stamp. He preferred the radical cure of expulsion but, so long as the

Moriscos remained, he recognized the duty of laboring for their

conversion. In 1575 he held a conference with the Bishops of Tortosa and

Orihuela (Segorbe being vacant), when it was agreed that the rectorial

stipends were inadequate, as there were no offerings at the altar, which

led many to abandon their cures, while those who would accept the

position were mostly unfitted, through ignorance and character. It was

therefore resolved to increase the stipends to a hundred crowns. The

king made a contribution, and a sum of seven thousand ducats per annum

(or 7350 libras) was assessed on the bishops and those who enjoyed the

tithes of the Moriscos. Ribera's share of this was thirty-six hundred

ducats, levied on the income of his "table," which was forty thousand

ducats, so that the assessment was 9 per cent. The rest fell upon

ecclesiastics, except a negligible amount to be paid by five laymen. A

brief of June 16, 1576, was obtained from Gregory XIII confirming this

arrangement, and Ribera punctually paid his portion into the _taula_ or

bank of Valencia, but the other churchmen were recalcitrant. The share

of his cathedral chapter was eight hundred libras a year, which it not

only refused to pay but organized a league to contest the whole measure;

the procrastinating resources of litigation were limitless and, in 1597,

Philip sent to Valencia the Licentiate Covarrubias to settle the matter

if possible. For three years he labored, and finally induced the chapter

to obey the papal brief, but on some pretext it refused to abide by the

agreement and the litigation continued. The chapter of Segorbe, although

its portion was only seventy libras a year, threatened to raise a tumult

if it was forced to pay, and sent its treasurer to Rome to work for the

revocation of the brief; in 1604 it procured an inhibition on the

execution of the brief, but finally, in 1606, the matter was decided

against the chapters. By this time their arrearages amounted to a

hundred and fifty thousand crowns, which Philip III forgave them and,

for the few remaining years they paid their assessments. Meanwhile,

Ribera's contribution had gone on accumulating with interest until it

amounted to 157,482 libras 13 s., 11 d. Of this about thirty-two

thousand libras had been expended on the rectories; in 1602, sixty

thousand were devoted to the college for Morisco youths and, in 1606,

thirty-one thousand were given to endow a girl's college; part went for

expenses and, in 1607, a balance of over thirteen thousand was given to

the Collegiate Seminary of Corpus Christi which he had founded.[996]

Thus this well-intended plan came to naught, like all other attempts,

through the covetousness and indifference of those whose duty and

interests alike demanded their earnest co-operation.

What might have been accomplished by zealous Christian prelates can be

gathered from the experience of Feliciano de Figueroa, Bishop of

Segorbe. He had long been Ribera's secretary and was thoroughly familiar

with the question. Promoted to the see of Segorbe, in 1599, he writes,

in 1601, that there were twenty Morisco villages in his diocese; at his

own cost he put resident rectors in them, with _doctrineros_, or

religious teachers, and twelve preachers, supervising the whole work

himself. Already he reports a notable reformation in the adults, while

the children manifested affection and readiness to embrace the faith;

moreover, during the past forty years, many Moorish ceremonies had

fallen into disuse. Again, in 1604, he describes his continued labors

without discouragement, although he complains of the obstacles thrown in

his way by the secular authorities, who aided the alfaquíes in opposing

his efforts.[997]

This alludes to a serious difficulty which aided in bringing about the

catastrophe. The lords of Morisco vassals were actuated by the most

purely selfish motives. Exploiting their dependents to the utmost, they

feared that, if the latter became Christians in fact as well as in name,

they would be unable to extort the imposts and tribute which they

exacted almost at discretion, for the Moriscos were helpless and

defenceless, and the pledges that they should be treated as Christians

were forgotten. The lords therefore discouraged all missionary work and,

as far as they could, protected their vassals against the Inquisition.

When the latter obtained evidence of this interference with conversion,

it did not hesitate to prosecute the highest nobles. In 1570 it

condemned Don Sancho de Cardona, Admiral of Aragon, to abjure _de levi_,

to a fine of two thousand ducats and to reclusion in a convent at the

pleasure of the Suprema--reclusion which proved perpetual, for he died

in the convent of his confinement. He deserved much more if the

testimony was true which asserted that he advised his vassals to appeal

to the king, to the pope, and finally to the Grand Turk to induce him to

threaten to persecute the Christians in his dominions if the Moriscos

were not left in peace, and further that he advised them to rise and

promised to arm them if they would do so. This was not the only case

for, in 1571 the Master of Montesa and two other nobles appeared in an

auto for the same offence and, in 1578, two others were the subjects of

investigation.[998] The lords further made themselves obnoxious by

seeking to protect their vassals from the ceaseless exactions of the

alguaziles set over them to see that they attended mass regularly, and

to fine those who did not, or who worked on feast-days. These gentry

were paid by a half or a third of their collections; their position was

not enviable, threatened as they were both by the lords and the Moriscos

in the remoter districts, and it was impossible to fill the position

with men of fitting character.[999]

* * * * *

These spasmodic and fruitless efforts to convert the so-called converts

were accompanied with frequent relaxations of the rigid canons against

heresy, interesting because they infer a dim conception that toleration,

after all, might be a more practical method of winning human souls than

oppression and persecution. Unfortunately, this fluctuating policy was

the most irrational that could be devised. The Moriscos had been so

sedulously taught to abhor Christianity and to distrust their conquerors

that leniency could be regarded only as dictated by fear, and as

affording licence to follow more undisguisedly the practices of their

ancient faith, while the alternations of severity only increased their

hatred of the religion of their oppressors.

[Sidenote: _VALENCIA_]

Edicts of Grace were the favorite resort when there was a disposition to

show moderation, but these, as we have seen, were, for the most part,

nugatory, because they were contingent on recorded confessions and the

obligation to denounce accomplices. The recorded confession rendered the

penitent liable to the terrible penalties of relapse and, as the latter

was sure to occur, the Morisco naturally hesitated to incur the

liability. To obviate this objection, the unprecedented concession was

made of suspending the canons concerning relapse. This could be done

only by papal authority and it was repeatedly tried. The earliest

instance seems to be a brief of Clement VII, December 5, 1530,

empowering Manrique to appoint confessors with faculties to absolve

penitents, even if they had relapsed repeatedly, with secret absolution

and penance, and to release them and their descendants from all

penalties, disabilities and confiscation, the reason alleged for this

liberal condonation of apostasy being the lack of priests in the Morisco

districts to instruct the converts in the faith. It was not, however,

until 1535 that Manrique transmitted this to the Valencia tribunal with

orders to execute it, and even then it does not seem to have exercised

much influence on the number of trials, though if honestly put into

operation it would have superseded them.[1000] This policy continued to

be followed spasmodically and grants exonerating from the penalties of

relapse were repeatedly made during the rest of the century.[1001]

There was also, in the Edicts of Grace, the necessity of denouncing

accomplices, which the Moriscos, to their credit, could rarely persuade

themselves to do. Bishop Figueroa of Segorbe pointed this out to Philip

III as a matter of supreme importance, as it required them to accuse

their parents, their wives and their children, which even the secular

laws pretermitted as a matter so horrible to human nature.[1002] Still

it was required by the canon law, and could not be omitted without

special papal authority. Philip II was so convinced of its impolicy

that, when a crucial effort was to be made to test whether the Moriscos

could be converted, as an alternative to expulsion, by an Edict of Grace

on the most favorable terms, he endeavored to have this condition

removed, but Clement VIII, as we have seen (Vol. II, p. 462) while

granting, in 1597, an edict covering relapse and conceding that

confession could be made to the episcopal Ordinaries, insisted that

confession must include full denunciation of the apostasy of

others.[1003]

Various causes delayed the publication of the edict until 1599, after

Philip III had succeeded to the throne. Great preparations were made for

it as for a final experiment; rectors, preachers and commissioners were

sent through the land, under detailed instructions from Ribera, who told

them that the work was difficult but not impossible; Ribera's fund was

drawn upon for the colleges; the barons were to found schools for the

instruction of young children, and a _hermandad_ was organized to place

girls in convents or in the families of Old Christians.[1004] The edict

was duly published in Valencia, August 22, 1599; its term was for only

one year, but it was extended to eighteen months. Philip III eagerly

awaited the result, which was conveyed to him in a report of August 22,

1601, by the tribunal. During the eighteen months of the edict, the

inquisitors said, only thirteen persons had come forward to take

advantage of it and these had made such fictitious confessions, and had

so protected their accomplices, that they deserved condemnation rather

than absolution; some of them, indeed, had already been denounced to the

Inquisition, so that they had evidently been impelled by fear rather

than by the desire of conversion. The inquisitors went on to describe

the Moriscos as Moors who would always be Moors and, if the Inquisition

did not convert them, it at least compelled them to sin with less

publicity and thus diminished their evil example.[1005] This failure may

be regarded as virtually deciding the fate of the Moriscos. Archbishop

Ribera emphasized it in two strong memorials addressed to Philip III,

and expulsion came to be recognized as the only solution of the

situation, although the vacillation and irresolution of the court

postponed for some years the execution of the measure.

[Sidenote: _VALENCIA_]

A glance at the tables in the Appendix will show how little influence

the successive Edicts of Grace had on the operations of the Inquisition,

which reaped its harvests irrespective of them. Yet those tables reveal

that, between 1540 and 1563, there were periods during which the

tribunal was idle, at least as to cases of heresy. These intervals

represent some remarkable efforts to try the effect of moderation,

which, although neutralized by lack of coöperative work in winning over

the converts, merit examination as measures without example in the

career of the Spanish Holy Office.

The nobles of Valencia complained forcibly of the disquiet caused among

their vassals by the operations of the Inquisition, and the Córtes

petitioned that thirty or forty years might be allowed for their

instruction during which they should be exempt from prosecution. Charles

assembled a junta of prelates and theologians, which suggested various

plans of moderation and conciliation, from among which he selected that

of granting a term of grace for past offences, allowing them to confess

sacramentally to confessors, and that a period should be provided for

their instruction, during which the Inquisition should not prosecute

them. This period was liberally fixed at twenty-six years, with the

warning that, as they should use or abuse it, it would be extended or

shortened. We have seen the failure to provide them with churches and

instructors, and it is scarce surprising that they commenced to live

openly as Moors, saying that, as they had thirty years in which to do as

they pleased, they would take full advantage of it.[1006] This could not

be permitted, and the effort to convert by toleration came to a speedy

end. The tribunal which had no cases in 1541, 1542 and 1543 resumed

operations and had 79, 37 and 49 in 1544, 1545 and 1546--a portion of

which, however were undoubtedly the Judaizers prosecuted for revoking

confessions (Vol. II, p. 584).

Then, in 1547, came a reversion to a milder policy. A brief dated August

2, 1546, was obtained from Paul III, of so liberal a character that it

virtually superseded the Inquisition, by granting faculties to appoint

confessors with full power to absolve _in utroque foro_--both

sacramentally and judicially--even those who had been condemned by the

Inquisition, and to relieve them and their descendants from all

disabilities.[1007] Unfortunately the faculty to appoint confessors was

conferred on Antonio Ramírez de Haro, who had for some years been acting

as "apostolic commissioner" in Valencia, with extensive powers over

everything relating to the Moriscos, but he had, in 1545, left Valencia,

on a summons, as Bishop of Segovia, to attend the Council of Trent--from

which summons he succeeded in getting himself excused--and had not

subdelegated his authority. According to the Archbishop St. Thomas of

Vilanova, this made little difference, because the brief was

ineffective, inasmuch as it required abjuration _de vehementi_,

entailing relaxation for relapse, to which none of the converts would

expose themselves. He, therefore, suggested that more extensive

faculties should be obtained, to absolve and pardon without legal forms,

seeing that these people had been forcibly converted, that they had

never been instructed, and that their intercourse with Barbary

indisposed them to Christianity.[1008]

What followed is strikingly illustrative of the procrastination and

neglect that rendered Spanish administration so ineffective. The

commission of the Bishop of Segovia superseded both the inquisitorial

and the episcopal jurisdiction, and his absence left everything in

confusion. Archbishop Thomas wrote, April 12, 1547, to Prince Philip

that, since the bishop had gone, the Moriscos had daily become bolder in

performing their Moorish ceremonies, as there was no one to restrain

them; the bishop had left no one to represent him, and no time should be

lost in getting him to subdelegate some one who could come at once.

Promises were made that a person should shortly be sent, but the

habitual mañana postponed it indefinitely. On November 10th, the

archbishop again represented the complete liberty enjoyed by the

Conversos, with no one empowered to correct them, but his

representations were neglected and, in 1551 and 1552, he was still

calling for some one authorized to keep the Moriscos in order. Even

when, in 1551, the Bishop of Segovia, who still retained his commission,

appointed the Inquisitor Gregorio de Miranda as a delegated

commissioner, he granted him no inquisitorial power, and the Valencia

Moriscos remained, for ten years longer, free from persecution.[1009]

[Sidenote: _OPPRESSION_]

This anomalous condition explains why the tables show only a few cases

in 1547, 1548 and 1549, and then an entire cessation up to and including

1562, the former being probably the unfinished work of previous years.

In 1561, Paul IV empowered Valdés to grant faculties to the Archbishop

of Valencia and his Ordinary to reconcile secretly the New Christians:

in those cases which could be judicially proved, the confessions were to

be made before a notary and delivered to the tribunal, where they

remained of record against both the penitent and his accomplices, while

in cases that could not be proved, the penances were to be purely

spiritual.[1010] This fresh experiment indicates a revival of interest

in the Morisco question, to be necessarily followed by a return to the

old methods. In 1562, accordingly, the tribunal began to act in Teruel,

where the town of Xea had the reputation of an asylum for malefactors;

it was exclusively Morisco, no Old Christian being permitted to reside

there. Finally, all restrictions were removed and, in 1563, the

Inquisition was vigorously at work, with sixty-two cases, and held two

autos, in which appeared nine cases from Xea.[1011] After that there was

no further interference with its functions, and it continued to the end

to contribute its share to rendering Christianity odious. What

Archbishop Ayala thought of its influence in this direction is indicated

by his offer, in 1564, to undertake the instruction of the Moriscos at

his own expense, but only on condition that the Inquisition should have

nothing to do with them, except in cases of open and defiant sin.[1012]

* * * * *

Even without the aggravation of the Inquisition, the condition of the

Moriscos was deplorable. They had been promised, in return for baptism,

that they should have all the privileges of Christians, but this, like

all other pledges, was made only to be broken. Enforced conversion had

added to their burdens and had brought no compensatory relief--they were

Christians as regards duties and responsibilities, but they remained

Moors in respect to liabilities and inequality before the law. In 1525

the syndics of the aljamas pointed out that, in order to enjoy their

religion, they had been subjected by their lords to many imposts and

servitudes which they could not render as Christians, for they would not

be allowed to work on Sundays and feast-days, wherefore they asked to be

taxed only as Christians. To this it was replied, in the Concordia of

1528, that they should be treated as Christians and that, to avoid

injury to parties, investigation should be made to prevent injustice.

Their lords, however, did not admit this and, in the same year, the

Córtes of Valencia declared that they retained all their rights over

their vassals, who were forbidden to change their domiciles.[1013] The

lords accepted the tithes and the first-fruits as a compensation, but

merely added these fresh burdens on their vassals, who were powerless to

resist.

[Sidenote: _EXACTIONS_]

Charles recognized this injustice and his responsibility for it, but he

dared not raise a conflict with the nobles, and he sought to shield

himself behind the awful authority of the Inquisition. He therefore

procured from Clement VII, July 15, 1531, a remarkable brief reciting

that, when the Saracens were converted, the barons and knights, in

compensation for the loss inflicted on them, were empowered to exact

from their vassals the tithes and first-fruits, but they have not only

enjoyed these new imposts but have continued to extort the personal

services and _açofras_[1014] and other demands of the ante-conversion

period. Thus the converts, unable to endure these accumulated burdens,

allege them as justifying their retaining their old customs and

disregarding the Christian feasts and ceremonies. As Charles had asked

him for a remedy, and as he knew nothing of the matter, he committed it

to Manrique with power to hear complaints and render justice, enforcing

his decisions with censures.[1015] The rôle of protector of the Moriscos

was novel for the Inquisition and Manrique kept the brief until January,

1534, when, in sending Fray Antonio de Calcena and Antonio Ramírez de

Haro as commissioners to organize the Morisco churches, he informed them

that the king ordered the Concordia to be enforced; the New Christians

were in all things to be treated like the Old; they were to investigate

secretly and report whether this was the case.[1016] Apparently the

Inquisition shrank from the unaccustomed task; there is no trace of its

intervention in behalf of the oppressed Moriscos, and its only

prosecutions of the nobles were for favoring their vassals against its

persecution. As for the Córtes, their sole efforts were directed to

increase the burdens of the vassals and, in case of their condemnation,

to profit by the confiscations.

Thus they were mercilessly pillaged. Besides the division of the crops,

of which one-third or one-half went to the lord, and besides the tithes

and first-fruits, there were innumerable imposts of all kinds and forced

loans or benevolences. In 1561, one of the numerous consultas on the

Morisco question alludes to the hardship of forcing them to live like

Christians and pay like Moors. The king, it added, ought to relieve them

from these unjust impositions, but it would throw the whole kingdom into

confusion and impede the work of conversion, so the commissioners ought

to see how it could be brought about that they should pay no more than

the Christians. This continued to the end. In 1608, Padre Antonio

Sobrino, S. J., argued that one of the chief obstacles to conversion was

the tyranny of the lords and, in addition to the exactions in money and

kind, he alludes to the forced labors imposed on them, on meagre wages

and still more meagre food, or frequently with no wages.[1017] In fact,

they were virtually _taillables et corvéables à miséricorde_, and their

oppression was tempered only by the ever-present apprehension of

rebellion and, in the coast districts, by the facilities of escape to

Africa. Even their ecclesiastical persecutors were almost moved to pity

by the hopeless misery of their lot, but we are told that there was no

compassion felt for this, as it was generally deemed advisable to keep

them impoverished and in subjection.[1018]

The control of the lords over their vassals was further safe-guarded by

a pragmática of Charles V, in 1541, forbidding the Moriscos of Valencia,

under pain of death and confiscation, from changing either domicile or

lord, and any one accepting them as vassals, without special royal

licence, was fined five hundred florins, or was scourged in default of

the money. Granadan and Castilian Moriscos were threatened with death

for entering Valencia and this, in 1545, was extended to those of

Aragon. This ferocious legislation was repeated in 1563 and 1586.[1019]

Akin to this was the suicidal policy of forbidding the emigration of

those who were recognized as dangerous domestic enemies. This, as we

have seen, was begun by Ferdinand and Isabella and was rigidly persisted

in--partly, no doubt, from a pious scruple of allowing the baptized to

apostatize in Barbary, and partly to protect the lords from the loss of

their vassals. In time this was enforced in Aragon by the Inquisition,

which published edicts to that effect, including the guidance over the

mountains of emigrants by Christians. In the auto of June 6, 1585, the

tribunal punished two who were seeking to leave the country and two who

served as guides, with scourging and the galleys for three men and

scourging and imprisonment for a woman.[1020] Not only was this a

grievous hardship, by depriving the oppressed of all hope of relief, but

it was a fatal error for, if the discontented had been allowed to

expatriate themselves, the remainder could have commanded better

treatment, and the Morisco question which, for half a century,

distracted Spanish statesmanship, might have settled itself without the

desperate expedient of expulsion.

Disarmament was another precaution entailing a grievance which was

keenly felt. We have seen it in Granada, and that in Valencia it was a

prudent preliminary to enforced baptism in 1525. In the Concordia of

1528, the Moriscos asked that their arms be restored to them, and were

told that they would be treated as Old Christians. This promise, like

the rest, was broken. The pragmática of 1541, among its other

restrictions, included that of bearing arms. This was not enforced and,

in 1545, orders were sent to carry it into effect, but the methods

suggested show that it was regarded as a dangerous business, and the

purpose was abandoned. In 1552, St. Thomas of Vilanova urged that it

should be done, and so did Inquisitor Miranda in 1561. Finally, in 1563,

the work was done by a sudden simultaneous action of the lords, when the

inventories compiled show that, in 16,377 Morisco houses, there were

seized 14,930 swords, 3,454 cross-bows and a long list of other weapons,

indicating how industriously the Moriscos had provided

themselves.[1021]

[Sidenote: _DISARMAMENT--LIMPIEZA_]

In Aragon, the matter was confided to the Inquisition. The tribunal of

Saragossa issued a decree, November 4, 1559, forbidding the Moriscos

from carrying arms, but the nobles appealed to the Suprema and procured

its indefinite suspension.[1022] The question was revived, in 1590, but

a quarrel with the archbishop on a point of precedence delayed its

consideration, and then the troubles of Antonio Pérez distracted

attention. Finally, in 1593, Philip II ordered the disarmament, the

execution of which was entrusted to the tribunal. Two inquisitors

traversed the land and collected 7,076 swords, 3,783 arquebuses, 489

cross-bows, 1,356 pikes, lances and halberds and large numbers of other

weapons. Knives were permitted, but these increased in size until they

became formidable; after two or three officials of the Inquisition had

been killed with them when making arrests, a royal edict of 1603 limited

them to a third of an ell in length and required them to be

pointless.[1023] The result of these precautions was seen when the edict

of expulsion was enforced and the desperate wretches who essayed a

hopeless resistance were slaughtered.

The growth of the absurd cult of limpieza brought another hardship of no

little moment. At first there was a disposition to exempt Moriscos from

its exclusiveness. When, in 1565, Philip II was trying conciliation he

ordered that leading and influential Moriscos should be appointed as

familiars, and we have seen that Inquisitor Miranda gave commissions to

the brothers Abenamir. Paul IV forbade admission to holy orders to the

descendants of Jews to the fourth generation and, in 1573, Gregory XIII

extended this to the Moriscos, but the Córtes of Monzon, in 1564, had

decreed that those trained in the Morisco college of Valencia should be

allowed to hold benefices and the cure of souls among their people, and

we are told that it graduated some good priests and preachers and

doctors of theology.[1024] Yet in time the exclusion became general, and

throughout Spain no distinction was made between descendants of Jews and

Mudéjares. In a land where a career in office, secular or

ecclesiastical, was the ambition of every man who had a smattering of

education, this barrier condemned to obscurity able men who naturally

devoted their energies to stimulating disaffection and provoking revolt.

Navarrete, as we have seen, even thinks that the necessity of the

expulsion would have been averted but for this; that the Moriscos could

have been Christianized, if they had had the opportunity to identify

themselves with the nation and to share in its public life, in place of

being driven to desperation and to hatred of religion by the indelible

stigma imposed upon them.[1025]

The baptism of Morisco children furnished a perpetual source of

irritation. Rigid regulations were prescribed to ensure the

administration of the sacrament, as it was essential to their salvation

and to rendering them subject to inquisitorial jurisdiction. No Morisco

woman was allowed to act as midwife, but in every village there was a

Christian midwife, carefully selected and instructed. She kept watch on

all pregnant women, under a fine of a hundred reales for every case she

missed. After putting the infant to the breast, her first duty was to

notify the priest and alguazil, after which she was not to leave the

bed-side save for indispensable household duties. The baptism was

performed the same day or the next, and careful registers were kept, so

that identification could be secured. There is doubtless truth in the

universal assertion that, on returning home, the father scraped and

washed the spots touched by the chrism, in the belief that he thereby

effaced the sacrament.[1026]

[Sidenote: _PROHIBITED MARRIAGES_]