Women in the Inquisition: Spain and the New World

by Professor Mary E. Giles PhD (Editor)

Ana Domenge, who later founded the Dominican convent in Perpignán, composed a written account of her spiritual intimacies with God while being held in terrible conditions in a secret prison in Barcelona. Inés of Herrera del Duque, a leather tanner's twelve-year-old daughter whose messianic prophesies captivated both children and adults, was burned at the stake along with many of her followers. Nine years after the death of Catarina de San Juan, the Inquisition banned copies of her image and biography, fearing that a cult was forming around this popular holy woman in Puebla, New Spain. Inquisitors enlisted the assistance of Mari Sánchez's daughter to prove that this Jewish converso was guilty of practicing Judaism in secret, an accusation that led to her death. In Women in the Inquisition, Mary E. Giles brings together scholars from literature, history, and religious studies to explore women's experiences under the Inquisition in both Spain and the New World. Based on fresh archival work, the essays provide a broader perspective on the Inquisition than has previously been available. Examining the stories of fifteen women in the context of this fearful Catholic institution in both Spain and the New World, the contributors chronicle a broad range of "crimes" against the Catholic Church, including sexual transgressions, the practice of crypto-Judaism, and the writing and preaching by alumbradas that undermined Catholic orthodoxy. The accounts, representing the experiences of girls and women from different classes and geographical regions, also include the trials' vastly divergent outcomes ranging from burning at the stake to exoneration.

416 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1999

Reviews

[Alana Cash · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a very interesting book about the experiences of conversos [Jews converted to Catholicism] and alumbrados [those who sought direct contact with God - similar to Martin Luther's new religion at the time]. Men and women were arrested and tried. There is no indepth description of torture thankfully, but a lot of information about people defending themselves. It was interesting to learn tat St. Teresa of Avila was tried by the Inquisition.

Each chapter is an essay by a different female author and is about a different district in Spain.

Some of the essays are a bit laborious- too long, a bit repetitive - leading me to believe these are academic papers. And an annoying aspect in a few of the essays is that the author quoted in English a portion of the transcript from the Inquisition archives, then in parenthesis repeated the statement in Spanish, breaking the train of thought most particularly if these were long quotations.

The Spanish Inquisition was not interested in witchcraft as was so true of the rest of Europe, most particularly Germany, but did seem to be about the inversion of gender power which the Holy Office intended to stop.