Alexander, bishop, servant of the servants of God: to the Catholic
sovereigns of Spain--Ferdinand the king, dearest son in Christ, and
to Elizabeth [Isabella] the queen, dearest daughter in Christ, health
and Apostolic blessing. The sincerity of your great devotion and the
unswerving faith with which you honor us and the Roman Church merit,
and not unworthily, that your wishes, especially those relating to
the spread of the Catholic faith, and the overthrow of infidel and
barbarous nations, should be freely and promptly granted. Indeed,
on your behalf, a petition recently laid before us set forth that,
impelled by pious devotion for the spread of the Catholic faith,
you greatly desire--inasmuch as quite recently, and not without
great expense and effort on your part, you began and from day to day
continue to do more toward the capture and recovery of the islands
and regions of the Indies, to the end that in those lands wherever
any accursed belief obtains, the Most High should be worshiped and
revered; and inasmuch as for the recovery of the islands and regions
aforesaid, it will be incumbent upon you to incur heavy expenses and
undergo great perils, it is expedient that for the conservation and
maintenance of the said islands, after their capture and recovery
by you, and for the defraying of the expenses necessary for the
conservation and maintenance of the same,--you should be empowered
to exact and levy tithes [200] on the inhabitants of the aforesaid
islands and dwellers therein for the time being. On this account
we have been humbly petitioned on your behalf to deign through our
apostolic graciousness to make in the premises suitable provision for
you and your state. Therefore yearning most eagerly for the spread
and increase of that same faith particularly in our own days, we
commend in the Lord your loving and praiseworthy purpose, and being
favorably disposed thereto we hereby through our apostolic power in
virtue of these presents do as a special favor grant to you and your
successors for the time being that in the aforesaid islands after their
capture and recovery (as observed) you may receive a tithe from the
inhabitants thereof and the dwellers therein for the time being, and
levy the same freely and lawfully, providing after dioceses shall there
be established (whereon we charge your consciences as well as your
successors'), you first from your own and their estate shall really
and effectively devise a sufficient revenue for the establishment of
churches in those islands through you and your aforesaid successors,
whereby the incumbents of the same and their administrators may
support themselves suitably, carry on the necessary work of those
churches for the time being, as well as celebrate rightly the divine
worship of Almighty God, and fulfil all diocesan requirements. The
Lateran Council, other apostolic constitutions and ordinances or other
decrees, to the contrary notwithstanding. Let no one then infringe this
our grant, nor dare with rashness to contravene its provisions. But
should any one presume to set it at naught, let him recognize that
he has thereby incurred the displeasure of Almighty God, and of the
Blessed Apostles Peter and Paul. Given at Rome at St. Peter's, in the
year of the incarnation of our Lord one thousand five hundred and one,
the sixteenth day of November, the tenth year of our Pontificate.
[The signatures and authorizations follow.]