The Conversos and Socio-Religious Non- Conformism in the Spanish Golden Age

UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, SAN DIEGO Secret Lives, Public Lies: The Conversos and Socio-Religious Non- Conformism in the Spanish Golden Age A Dissertation submitted in partial satisfaction of the requirement for the degree of Doctory of Philosophy in History by Kevin Ingram Committee in charge: Professor David Ringrose, Chair Professor John Marino Professor Jorge Mariscal Professor Pamela Radcliff Professor Eric Van Young 2006 The Dissertation of Kevin Ingram is approved, and it is acceptable in quality and form for publication on microfilm: Chair University of California, San Diego 2006 iii TABLE OF CONTENTS Signature Page………………………………………………………………………. iii Table of Contents……………………………………………………………………. iv Vita…………………………………………………………………………………... v Abstract……………………………………………………………………………… vi Introduction: The Conversos and Golden-Age Duplicity…………………………... 1 Chapter 1: Spanish Historiography and the Conversos…………………………. 19 Chapter 2: From Toledo to Alcalá: Converso Humanism and Reform in the Fifteenth and Sixteenth Centuries……………………………….……43 Chapter 3: From Alcalá to Seville: Converso Non-Conformism in Pre-Tridentine Seville…………………………………………………………...….. 104 Chapter 4: ConversoVoices in Post-Tridentine Spain………………………….. 156 Chapter 5: Converso Humanism in Post-Tridentine Seville: Five Case Studies..182 Chapter 6: Diego Velázquez’s Secret History…………………………………...256 Bibliography………………………………………………………………………... 307 iv VITA 1978 Bachelor of Arts, University of Sussex, England 1997 Master of Arts, University of California, San Diego 2006 Doctor of Philosophy, University of California, San Diego v ABSTRACT OF THE DISSERTATION Secret Lives, Public Lies: The Conversos and Socio-Religious Non-Conformism in the Spanish Golden Age by Kevin Ingram Doctor of Philosophy in History University of California, San Diego, 2006 Professor David Ringrose, Chair The dissertation examines the conversos (men and women whose recent ancestors had converted from Judaism to Christianity) as socio-religious non- conformists in early modern Spain. My contention is that converso middle-sort vi professionals were at the forefront of sixteenth-century Spain’s socio-religious reform movement. Humanism was particularly appealing to this group. As adherents to a humanist credo conversos could attack the unacceptable face of Catholic Spain without making obvious their backgrounds. Nevertheless, for many converso humanists this was not sufficient. For these intellectuals there was also a deep-seated psychological need to defend the converso against accusations of inferior blood; to attack Old-Christian Spain’s illiteracy and ignorance; and to celebrate a Sephardic cultural inheritance. It is these elements, subtly woven into the Spanish humanist tapestry, that are so often overlooked in our examination of Golden-Age Spain. The Introduction to the dissertation expands upon the argument I have adumbrated above. Chapter 1 examines the conversos in Spanish historiography and in particular the Spanish academy’s reluctance to countenance the conversos as important members of the Golden Age pantheon of writers and artists. Chapter 2 charts the converso involvement in an incipient humanist movement in the late fifteenth century and their connection with a Christian reform movement that formed around the figure of Erasmus. Chapter 3 examines the converso reformers during the period before the Tridentine reforms, in an atmosphere of tension and oppression created by the growth of Protestantism in northern Europe. Chapter 4 follows the converso humanists’ fortunes in a Counter-Reformation environment and looks at the strategies used by this group to present their non-conformist message. Chapter 5 presents five case studies of humanists in Counter-Reformation Seville. These humanists, heretofore presented as men of orthodox views, were, I contend, vii antagonistic to an orthodox Catholic religion. Chapter 6 examines the background and works of the painter Diego Velázquez. I argue that Velázquez was nurtured in Seville’s converso-humanist environment and that his works display the same non- conformist characteristics found in an earlier generation of converso-humanist writers. viii INTRODUCTION THE CONVERSOS AND GOLDEN-AGE DUPLICITY “Mas si yo no me engaño y el ojo no me miente, otras gracias tiene vuesa merced secretas, y no las quiere manifestar.” “Si tengo,” respondió el pequeño; “Pero no son para el público, como vuesa merced ha muy bien apuntado.” Miguel Cervantes, “Rinconete y Cortadillo” “Aunque pusieron silencio a las lenguas, no le pudieron poner a las plumas, las cuales, con más libertad que las lenguas, suelen dar a entender a quien quieren lo que en el alma esta encerrado.” Miguel Cervantes, Don Quijote Converso Problems The first problem we encounter in studying the conversos, is the term itself—a misnomer. The conversos, at least most of the ones who are the subjects of this study, were not converts at all. They were the descendents of those Jews who had converted to Christianity in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, usually under pressure. The first major wave of conversion occurred directly after the infamous 1391 pogrom, when as many as fifty percent of Spain’s Jewish population (that is to say fifty percent of the Jewish population that had survived the violence) converted to Christianity. These newcomers to the Christian religion were, quite reasonably, called converts; but 1 2 so too were their children and grandchildren, who had been born, ostensibly, into Christian families. Obviously, as far as Spain’s Old-Christian population was concerned, the term “converso" was not a mere reference to neophytic religious status but to a much more profound problem that neither time nor religious assimilation was capable of erasing. In the Old-Christians’ eyes the converts and their heirs were aliens. There were a number of reasons for their holding this opinion. First, Old-Christian society regarded the Jews not only as a religious group, but as a race, whose malevolence and perversity—demonstrated in their rejection of the messiah—were congenital; in other words they carried a taint that would not wash clean in a baptismal font. Second, the converted Jews and their descendents remained isolated from the Old-Christian community, in their own neighbourhoods, associating with other conversos or, very often, with Jews, thus confirming the Old Christians in their belief that they had remained essentially Jewish. Third, the conversos were often wealthier than most of their Old-Christian neighbors; some, indeed, became immensely affluent and politically powerful, reinforcing the Old Christians’ view that they had merely adopted Christianity to control or subvert society. The limpieza de sangre (clean blood) laws, starting with the 1449 Sentencia- Estatuto of Toledo, formalized what Old-Christian society had long felt: the converts and their heirs were not authentic co-religionists and thus should not be allowed to become bona fide members of Christian society. These statutes forbade the conversos access to positions in religious, civic and educational institutions on the grounds that 3 they were inherently untrustworthy. Under the terms of the statutes all candidates applying for entry into the above institutions were submitted to an official inquiry into their family backgrounds (usually up to four generations past). If Jewish blood was detected in the candidate’s background, then he would be automatically disqualified from entry into the institution. In this way Old-Christian society aimed to bridle the social ambitions of the converts and their heirs. However, many conversos had also married into important noble families. Under the conditions of the limpieza statutes the heirs of these families would also be considered conversos, that is to say second class citizens. Thus it soon became obvious that the limpieza legislation not only affected the target group but potentially a large section of the Spanish population. Indeed, few could be absolutely certain that they were not, so to speak, contaminated. This uncertainty soon gave rise to an obsession with clean blood, which no one could actually demonstrate they possessed with any degree of certainty. Everyone could, however, make a demonstrative exhibition of their Christian piety; they could also display (or at least) feign Old-Christian cultural attributes—a delight in pork, for example—while rejecting Jewish, or converso, ones— bodily cleanliness, industry, frugality, intellectual activity. According to Americo Castro, it was in its rejection of certain characteristics associated with Jewish culture that Spain sowed the seeds of its own decline. While this argument would seem to be somewhat facile, there can be little doubt that in promulgating the limpieza de sangre statutes Old-Christian Spain hoist itself with its own petard.1 1 Cervantes makes this point very clearly in his interlude, El retablo de las maravillas, in which two rogues persuade the dignitaries of a small town that they possess a machine capable of reproducing 4 Ironically, however, what was designed to demoralize and oppress the conversos promoted a greater self-consciousness among them.2 This was particularly evident among a converso intellectual/professional class, the group most affected by the limpieza statutes. The present study focuses on this group, its confrontation with an Old-Christian moral majority, and its efforts to create a new socio-religious environment while dissimulating its Jewish roots and non-conformist vision. The Converso as

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