Torquemada and the Spanish Inquisition: A HistorySabatini, Rafael
History
Torquemada and the Spanish Inquisition: A History
Sabatini, Rafael
Inquisition -- Spain; Torquemada, Tomás, de, 1420-1498
“When they saw that the said experiment did not operate nor had the
result they hoped, they assembled again elsewhere, and having treated
of all that they desired to effect, by common consent one of them was
sent with the heart of the said child and the consecrated Host to the
Aljama of Zamora, which they accounted the principal Aljama in Castile,
to the end that certain Jews there, known to be wise men, should with
the said heart and Host perform the said experiment and sorcery that
the Christians might enrage and die, and thus accomplish what they so
ardently desired.
“And for the greater ascertaining of the crime and demonstration of the
truth, the said inquisitors having arrested some of the said offenders,
New-Christians and Jews, they set the accused face to face, so that
in the confession of their crimes there was conformity, and these
confessions consisted of what has been here set down. In addition other
further steps were taken to verify the places where the crimes were
committed and the place where the child was buried; and they took one
of the principal accused to the place where the child was buried, and
there they found signs and demonstration of the truth of all.[167] Some
of the said accused, and some already deceased, being prosecuted, they
were sentenced and abandoned to the secular arm, all that we have set
down being in accordance with the records of the proceedings to which
we refer.
“The said ‘Testimonio’ written upon three sheets bearing our rubrics,
we the said secretaries deliver by request of the Procurator-General of
the village of La Guardia, by order of the Very Illustrious Señores of
His Majesty’s Council of the Holy Inquisition in the City of Madrid in
the Diocese of Toledo, on the 19th day of September of the year of the
birth of our Lord Jesus Christ, 1569.
“ALONSO DE DORIGA = Nec auro frangenda fides.
MATHEO VAZQUEZ = In cujus fide fœdera consistunt.
PEDRO DE TAPIA.”
* * * * *
This “Testimonio” does not afford us the name of any one of the
offenders--presumably that the holy place in which the tablets were
exposed should not be desecrated. When it is compared with the account
left by Moreno and the discrepancies between the two become apparent,
when, further, the extravagances of Moreno’s story are considered, it
is not surprising that the conclusion should have been reached that the
whole affair was trumped up to forward that campaign against the Jews
to which Torquemada was employing his enormous energies.
But the records of the trial of Yucé Franco discovered by Fidel Fita
throw a very different light upon the matter. And whilst we know that
Torquemada did avail himself to the utmost of this affair of the Santo
Niño to encompass the banishment of the Jews from Spain, we must
consider all notion that he himself simply invented the story to that
end as completely dispelled by the evidence that is now to be examined.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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