[Spanish Inquisition] [Jurisprudence]:
Illuminated Manuscript In Spanish: Córdoba; 1712; one leaf, written recto only; 31 cm x 61 cm (12¼ inches by 23½ inches). Illuminated Appointmant Document In Spanish, conferring the title of
Comisario de la Inquisición upon Monsignor Francisco de Luque of the town of Montemayor, Córdoba, dated 29 October, 1712; written on one side of a single enormous vellum leaf in a Roman italic hand, in black ink with authorizing signatures in brown ink, the text set within three-sided painted border in colors and gold incorporating foliate decoration, with a miniature of Saint Peter the Martyr, pictured as usual, with a knife cleaving his skull horizontally, and his throat opened wide, as well as two smaller vignettes: the Seal of the Spanish Inquisition depicting the cross, the branch and the sword, and the Seal of the Town of Cordoba. The two-line heading, accomplished in gold, reads: "Nos Los Inquisidores | Apostolicos Contra" interlaced within elaborate strapwork, and with the paper Emissary Seal of the Spanish Inquisition, (also depicting the cross, the branch and the sword). Beside the Seal, are the signatures of Samuel Mendes de Sola, as
Comisario de la Inquisición, the Marquis del Saltillo, as
Familiar de la Inquisición, and by Miguel Cobo, as
Inquisidore, and representative of His Eminence, Cardinal Giulio Alberoni (1664 - 1752).
In Good antiquarian condition; paper seal worn and cracked; minor soiling and wear along edges. One of the largest Spanish Inquisition Elevation Documents still in private hands, and among the three or four most heavily decorated of such manuscripts we've seen outside of the major Spanish Inquisition Museums, including New World repositories, such as the Museo de la Inquisición at Lima, and the Museo de la Inquisidores at Cartagena, Colombia. The whole of the decoration is worked in the Spanish Late Renaissance style, with the acanthus foliate decoration in shades of viridian and bice green, the open strapwork and fill gilt headlines laid down on a deep scarlet ground, and with the miniature of Saint Peter The Martyr in natural tones, on a ground of cerulean blue with gilt ornamentation. Saint Peter of Verona, also known as Peter Martyr (1206 – April 6, 1252), was a 13th century Dominican preacher and Inquisitor in Italy. He was murdered on 6 April, 1252, when returning from Como to Milan by Cathars. According to legend, a man called Carino who with some other Cathars had designed the attack struck his head with an axe or huge knife, and then gave Peter's companion Dominic several fatal wounds. It is told that, rising to his knees, Peter recited the first article of the Symbol of the Apostles, and offering his blood as a sacrifice to God he dipped his fingers in it and wrote on the ground the words: "Credo in Unum Deum." He was canonized by Pope Innocent IV on March 9, 1253 after an interval of only 337 days, making him the most quickly Papally canonized Saint in history. In 1478, Saint Peter The Martyr was named the Patron Saint of the Inquisition.
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A genuinely better-than-museum quality artifact of the Spanish Inquisition, naming an important Comisario - not in the New World, but at the very heart of the Inquisicion, in Córdoba, under the auspices of Cardinal Giulio Alberoni himself.
The establishing of the Spanish Inquisition in 1478, under the direction of Catholic Monarchs Ferdinand and Isabella of Castile, was intended to reinforce Catholic orthodoxy in their Kingdoms; it remained under the control of the Spanish monarchy until the Inquisition itself was officially abolished, 356 years later, in 1834, by Queen Isabel II. While ostensibly, the Inquisicion acted as a ecclesiastical governing body, solely over the Catholic community, although as the Jews, in 1492, and the Muslim Moors, in 1502, had been banished from Spain, all those within the birders of the Spanish homeland and its colonies were, in fact, under the Inquisition's dominion - in some measure, being devoted to seeing after the orthodoxy of recent converts - conversos or marranos - but more assiduously, to ferreting out perceived heresy.
Comisarios such as Francisco de Luque, were typically priests who played an important ancillary role in the legal system of the Holy Office by performing judicial and non-judicial tasks on behalf of Inquisitors. Jaime Contreras, in El Santo Oficio de la Inquisicion de Galicia, that the Comisario, in reality, was by far the most important of the Inquisition's appointees, as he was endowed with the power to both recall and to remove from circulation, all prohibited printed books as proscribed by the Index Librorum Prohibitorum, and to adjudge handwritten manuscripts which might contravene the Papacy or the Church. Francisco de Luque, referred to by the moniker "Luque de Lupe" or Luque the Wolf, was later appointed Obispo de la Inquisición at Córdoba, but died before he fulfilled the Office. He is mentioned in Jose Antonio Escudero's Perfiles Jurídicos de la Inquisición Española (Madrid, 1989; Instituto de Historia de la Inquisición / Universidad Complutense de Madrid, publishers), as well as in Andrew W. Keitt's Inventing the Sacred: Imposture, Inquisition, and the Boundaries of the Supernatural in Golden Age Spain (New York; 2005; Brill Academic Publishers ). Francisco de Luque was decended directly from the Spanish expatriate Hernando de Luque, who travelled to the New World in the 16th century. He arrived in 1514 with the expedition of Pedrarias Dávila to Panama, where he met Francisco Pizarro. Luque financed a joint expedition by Pizarro and Diego de Almagro to Peru in 1526, and after the successful conquest of the Inca territory, named Bishop of Tumbes and "Protector of the Indians" in 1529.
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The Spanish Inquisition has conjured visions of torture and execution from its inception to the modern day, and is seldom discussed dispassionately. Of the Spanish Inquisition,
The Encyclopedia Britannica (London; 1911; Encyclopedia Britannica Limited, publishers) notes (in part):
"With its large Muslim and Jewish populations, medieval Spain was the only multiracial and multireligious country in western Europe, and much of the development of Spanish civilization in religion, literature, art, and architecture during the later Middle Ages stemmed from this fact. The Jews had served Spain and its monarchs well, providing an active commercial class and an educated elite for many administrative posts.
By the late 14th century, however, the status of the Jews in Christian Spain began to change. Their former protectors, the monarchs in Spain, began to restrict the rights and privileges of the Jews, and the devastation caused by the Black Death led to increased popular hostility, as many believed that the plague was a plot devised by Jews to destroy Christianity. Animosity toward the Jews was stimulated further by Jewish converts to Christianity who issued polemics against their former coreligionists. Calls for the expulsion or persecution of the Jews were answered by anti-Jewish riots in 1348 and 1391. The pogroms of 1391 were especially significant because of the subsequent mass conversion of Jews to Christianity in response to the violence perpetrated against them.
The conversos and Marranos—the "new Christians"—became a highly controversial group throughout Spain. Many of these converted Jews and their descendants assumed important positions in government and society and associated themselves with powerful noble families. They also achieved economic power and prosperity, which inspired increasing hatred of them by the "old Christians," who already questioned the sincerity of their conversions. Indeed, although there were many devout Christians among the conversos, there were also those who were at most agnostic converts, and the Marranos secretly continued to practice Judaism.
The wealth of the conversos created jealousy and their uncertain conversions hatred in a population that traditionally saw itself as the defender of Christianity against the infidel. The Catholic Monarchs, ever good tacticians, profited from this feeling. In 1478 they first obtained a papal bull from Sixtus IV setting up the Inquisition to deal with the conversos whose conversions were thought to be insincere. Since the Spanish Inquisition was constituted as a royal court, all appointments were made by the crown. Sixtus IV realized too late the enormous ecclesiastical powers that he had given away and the moral dangers inherent in an institution the proceedings of which were secret and that did not allow appeals to Rome.
With its army of lay familiars, who were exempt from normal jurisdiction and who acted both as bodyguards and as informers for the inquisitors, and with its combination of civil and ecclesiastical powers, the Spanish Inquisition became a formidable weapon in the armory of royal absolutism. The Supreme Council of the Inquisition (or Suprema) was the only formal institution established by the Catholic Monarchs for all their kingdoms together. Nevertheless, they thought of it primarily in religious and not in political terms. The Inquisition's secret procedures, its eagerness to accept denunciations, its use of torture, the absence of counsel for the accused, the lack of any right to confront hostile witnesses, and the practice of confiscating the property of those who were condemned and sharing it between the Inquisition, the crown, and the accusers—all this inspired great terror, as indeed it was meant to do. The number of those condemned for heresy was never very large and has often been exaggerated by Protestant writers. But during the reign of the Catholic Monarchs several thousand conversos were condemned and burned for Judaizing practices. The whole family of the philosopher and humanist Juan Luis Vives was wiped out in this way. Many more thousands of conversos escaped similar fates only by fleeing the country. Many Roman Catholics in Spain opposed the introduction of the Inquisition, and the Neapolitans and Milanese (who prided themselves on their Catholicism and who were supported by the popes) later successfully resisted the attempts by their Spanish rulers to impose the Spanish Inquisition on them. Even in Spain itself, it was the sumptuous autos-da-fé, the ceremonial sentencings and executions of heretics, rather than the institution and its members, that seem to have been popular. But most Spaniards seem never to have understood the horror and revulsion that this institution aroused in the rest of Europe."
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Offered here, one of the finest Spanish Inquisition documents extant, either in private or institutional collections. The importance of the Appointment and the unsurpassed decoration should exceed the standards of the most fastidious private collector or investor, or the most meticulous public repository curator.
We are pleased to present this outstanding vellum manuscript for consideration with no reserve, and to ship this item anywhere in the world, via insured and bonded carrier, at no additional cost. Residents of New York State are responsible for 8% Sales Tax.
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