Chapter II: Moriscos.867 (3)

After the Germanía and the edict of 1525, some futile attempts were made at missionary work among the so-called converts, but the situation, in 1526, is correctly described by Navigero, the Venetian envoy, who says that there was so little care about teaching them, priestly gains being the main object, that they either were as much Moors as before or had no religion of any kind.[988] It was self-evident that to Christianize a large population, scattered over the land, for the most part in exclusive communities, would require a complete organization of parish churches with schools and all the necessary appliances. A basis for this existed in the property of the mosques, which Clement VII, in 1524, had ordered to be converted into churches, and in the tithes, which were now imposed as a fresh burden upon the converts. These were spoils which all, who saw a chance for gain, hastened to grasp. To recompense the lords for the expected loss of tribute from their vassals, who were promised to be treated in all things like Christians, the tithes were made over to them, in return for which they were to provide the churches with what was requisite for divine service, while the revenues of the mosques were expected to furnish foundations for benefices, the patronage of which was given to the lords. For this, as we have seen, the requisite papal authority was procured, but the measure was attacked in innumerable suits, some of which were carried up to the Roman Rota, with the consequent interminable delays.[989] In some fashion, two hundred and thirteen mosques were converted into churches in the archbishopric of Valencia, fourteen in the see of Tortosa, ten in Segorbe and fourteen in Orihuela, but the object kept in view was the revenues, and not the religious training of the Moriscos.[990]

[Sidenote: _VALENCIA_]

Nearly ten years passed away with nothing accomplished. A thorough reorganization was seen to be necessary, and papal faculties were obtained empowering Cardinal Manrique to provide persons to instruct the converts, to erect and unite churches, to appoint and dismiss priests, to regulate tithes and to decide summarily all the suits that were expected from archbishops, bishops, chapters, abbeys, priests and secular lords, thus rendering him and his delegates independent of the bishops who thus far had done nothing.[991] Under this, in 1534, Manrique despatched commissioners with detailed instructions, including provisions to be made for a college to be founded for the instruction of Morisco children, who should in turn instruct their parents.[992] The scheme, however, though well intended, was wrecked on the money-question which, to the end, proved an obstacle frustrating all intelligent work in conversion. The revenues of the mosques, the tithes and first-fruits seem to disappear--swallowed up by noble and prelate and, although they derived their incomes in great part from the labor of the Moriscos, it seemed impossible to wring from them what was necessary to support the new establishment. In 1544, St. Thomas of Vilanova, then Archbishop of Valencia, urged the emperor to place zealous and exemplary rectors in the Morisco villages, with ample salaries to enable them to distribute alms, but it does not seem to have occurred to him that this was part of his duty and that of the Church.[993]

Manrique's commissioners established a hundred and ninety rectories, endowed with the beggarly stipend of thirty crowns a year. It was impossible to find suitable priests for such livings, and the complaint was general that they were, for the most part, ignorant and depraved, creating repulsion rather than attraction to the religion which they assumed to teach. Many were non-resident and neglected their duties entirely, or found vicars at still lower salaries to replace them. There was no one to inspect them or keep them in order. A pension of two thousand ducats a year had been levied on the archbishopric of Valencia, to maintain the projected college for Morisco youths, but two-thirds of this was diverted to the support of the rectories and the rest was made up from various sources, not always adequate, for some holders of benefices refused to pay the moderate assessments made on them.[994]

It was in vain that one effort after another was made to remedy these deficiencies. The indifference of the ecclesiastical authorities, or their opposition when asked for funds, paralyzed every plan devised. In 1564, the Córtes of Monzon pointed out the failure of all attempts to instruct the converts, who were punished for their ignorance, and they made some remedial suggestions. Philip in response assembled a junta under the presidency of Valdés, the conclusions of which were embodied in a royal cédula. This confided the instruction of the Moriscos to the bishops in their several dioceses, who were to appoint proper persons and keep them under supervision, treating the neophytes with the utmost kindness, rewarding the good according to their deserts, and appointing the more prominent among them to familiarships. Archbishop Ayala, on his return from this junta, called a provincial council, but the bishops took no action to carry out the provisions of the cédula, contenting themselves with inflicting heavy fines on those who did not have their children baptized at birth in the best clothes that they could afford; on alfaquíes who visited the sick, and on secular officials who neglected to denounce Moorish observances. The pious hope was expressed that, by compelling them to attend mass on Ash Wednesday, Maundy Thursday, Good Friday and All Saints, they might be attracted to Christian worship, and their salvation was cared for by ordering them on the death-bed to give something for the benefit of their souls, in default of which the heirs must at least have three masses sung for them.[995]

[Sidenote: _VALENCIA_]

This was the spirit in which the prelates conceived their duties towards those whom clerical pressure had made their spiritual children, and to whom they owed great part of their revenues. Juan de Ribera who, in 1568, succeeded to the archbishopric of Valencia was a man of different stamp. He preferred the radical cure of expulsion but, so long as the Moriscos remained, he recognized the duty of laboring for their conversion. In 1575 he held a conference with the Bishops of Tortosa and Orihuela (Segorbe being vacant), when it was agreed that the rectorial stipends were inadequate, as there were no offerings at the altar, which led many to abandon their cures, while those who would accept the position were mostly unfitted, through ignorance and character. It was therefore resolved to increase the stipends to a hundred crowns. The king made a contribution, and a sum of seven thousand ducats per annum (or 7350 libras) was assessed on the bishops and those who enjoyed the tithes of the Moriscos. Ribera's share of this was thirty-six hundred ducats, levied on the income of his "table," which was forty thousand ducats, so that the assessment was 9 per cent. The rest fell upon ecclesiastics, except a negligible amount to be paid by five laymen. A brief of June 16, 1576, was obtained from Gregory XIII confirming this arrangement, and Ribera punctually paid his portion into the _taula_ or bank of Valencia, but the other churchmen were recalcitrant. The share of his cathedral chapter was eight hundred libras a year, which it not only refused to pay but organized a league to contest the whole measure; the procrastinating resources of litigation were limitless and, in 1597, Philip sent to Valencia the Licentiate Covarrubias to settle the matter if possible. For three years he labored, and finally induced the chapter to obey the papal brief, but on some pretext it refused to abide by the agreement and the litigation continued. The chapter of Segorbe, although its portion was only seventy libras a year, threatened to raise a tumult if it was forced to pay, and sent its treasurer to Rome to work for the revocation of the brief; in 1604 it procured an inhibition on the execution of the brief, but finally, in 1606, the matter was decided against the chapters. By this time their arrearages amounted to a hundred and fifty thousand crowns, which Philip III forgave them and, for the few remaining years they paid their assessments. Meanwhile, Ribera's contribution had gone on accumulating with interest until it amounted to 157,482 libras 13 s., 11 d. Of this about thirty-two thousand libras had been expended on the rectories; in 1602, sixty thousand were devoted to the college for Morisco youths and, in 1606, thirty-one thousand were given to endow a girl's college; part went for expenses and, in 1607, a balance of over thirteen thousand was given to the Collegiate Seminary of Corpus Christi which he had founded.[996] Thus this well-intended plan came to naught, like all other attempts, through the covetousness and indifference of those whose duty and interests alike demanded their earnest co-operation.

What might have been accomplished by zealous Christian prelates can be gathered from the experience of Feliciano de Figueroa, Bishop of Segorbe. He had long been Ribera's secretary and was thoroughly familiar with the question. Promoted to the see of Segorbe, in 1599, he writes, in 1601, that there were twenty Morisco villages in his diocese; at his own cost he put resident rectors in them, with _doctrineros_, or religious teachers, and twelve preachers, supervising the whole work himself. Already he reports a notable reformation in the adults, while the children manifested affection and readiness to embrace the faith; moreover, during the past forty years, many Moorish ceremonies had fallen into disuse. Again, in 1604, he describes his continued labors without discouragement, although he complains of the obstacles thrown in his way by the secular authorities, who aided the alfaquíes in opposing his efforts.[997]

This alludes to a serious difficulty which aided in bringing about the catastrophe. The lords of Morisco vassals were actuated by the most purely selfish motives. Exploiting their dependents to the utmost, they feared that, if the latter became Christians in fact as well as in name, they would be unable to extort the imposts and tribute which they exacted almost at discretion, for the Moriscos were helpless and defenceless, and the pledges that they should be treated as Christians were forgotten. The lords therefore discouraged all missionary work and, as far as they could, protected their vassals against the Inquisition. When the latter obtained evidence of this interference with conversion, it did not hesitate to prosecute the highest nobles. In 1570 it condemned Don Sancho de Cardona, Admiral of Aragon, to abjure _de levi_, to a fine of two thousand ducats and to reclusion in a convent at the pleasure of the Suprema--reclusion which proved perpetual, for he died in the convent of his confinement. He deserved much more if the testimony was true which asserted that he advised his vassals to appeal to the king, to the pope, and finally to the Grand Turk to induce him to threaten to persecute the Christians in his dominions if the Moriscos were not left in peace, and further that he advised them to rise and promised to arm them if they would do so. This was not the only case for, in 1571 the Master of Montesa and two other nobles appeared in an auto for the same offence and, in 1578, two others were the subjects of investigation.[998] The lords further made themselves obnoxious by seeking to protect their vassals from the ceaseless exactions of the alguaziles set over them to see that they attended mass regularly, and to fine those who did not, or who worked on feast-days. These gentry were paid by a half or a third of their collections; their position was not enviable, threatened as they were both by the lords and the Moriscos in the remoter districts, and it was impossible to fill the position with men of fitting character.[999]

* * * * *

These spasmodic and fruitless efforts to convert the so-called converts were accompanied with frequent relaxations of the rigid canons against heresy, interesting because they infer a dim conception that toleration, after all, might be a more practical method of winning human souls than oppression and persecution. Unfortunately, this fluctuating policy was the most irrational that could be devised. The Moriscos had been so sedulously taught to abhor Christianity and to distrust their conquerors that leniency could be regarded only as dictated by fear, and as affording licence to follow more undisguisedly the practices of their ancient faith, while the alternations of severity only increased their hatred of the religion of their oppressors.

[Sidenote: _VALENCIA_]

Edicts of Grace were the favorite resort when there was a disposition to show moderation, but these, as we have seen, were, for the most part, nugatory, because they were contingent on recorded confessions and the obligation to denounce accomplices. The recorded confession rendered the penitent liable to the terrible penalties of relapse and, as the latter was sure to occur, the Morisco naturally hesitated to incur the liability. To obviate this objection, the unprecedented concession was made of suspending the canons concerning relapse. This could be done only by papal authority and it was repeatedly tried. The earliest instance seems to be a brief of Clement VII, December 5, 1530, empowering Manrique to appoint confessors with faculties to absolve penitents, even if they had relapsed repeatedly, with secret absolution and penance, and to release them and their descendants from all penalties, disabilities and confiscation, the reason alleged for this liberal condonation of apostasy being the lack of priests in the Morisco districts to instruct the converts in the faith. It was not, however, until 1535 that Manrique transmitted this to the Valencia tribunal with orders to execute it, and even then it does not seem to have exercised much influence on the number of trials, though if honestly put into operation it would have superseded them.[1000] This policy continued to be followed spasmodically and grants exonerating from the penalties of relapse were repeatedly made during the rest of the century.[1001]

There was also, in the Edicts of Grace, the necessity of denouncing accomplices, which the Moriscos, to their credit, could rarely persuade themselves to do. Bishop Figueroa of Segorbe pointed this out to Philip III as a matter of supreme importance, as it required them to accuse their parents, their wives and their children, which even the secular laws pretermitted as a matter so horrible to human nature.[1002] Still it was required by the canon law, and could not be omitted without special papal authority. Philip II was so convinced of its impolicy that, when a crucial effort was to be made to test whether the Moriscos could be converted, as an alternative to expulsion, by an Edict of Grace on the most favorable terms, he endeavored to have this condition removed, but Clement VIII, as we have seen (Vol. II, p. 462) while granting, in 1597, an edict covering relapse and conceding that confession could be made to the episcopal Ordinaries, insisted that confession must include full denunciation of the apostasy of others.[1003]

Various causes delayed the publication of the edict until 1599, after Philip III had succeeded to the throne. Great preparations were made for it as for a final experiment; rectors, preachers and commissioners were sent through the land, under detailed instructions from Ribera, who told them that the work was difficult but not impossible; Ribera's fund was drawn upon for the colleges; the barons were to found schools for the instruction of young children, and a _hermandad_ was organized to place girls in convents or in the families of Old Christians.[1004] The edict was duly published in Valencia, August 22, 1599; its term was for only one year, but it was extended to eighteen months. Philip III eagerly awaited the result, which was conveyed to him in a report of August 22, 1601, by the tribunal. During the eighteen months of the edict, the inquisitors said, only thirteen persons had come forward to take advantage of it and these had made such fictitious confessions, and had so protected their accomplices, that they deserved condemnation rather than absolution; some of them, indeed, had already been denounced to the Inquisition, so that they had evidently been impelled by fear rather than by the desire of conversion. The inquisitors went on to describe the Moriscos as Moors who would always be Moors and, if the Inquisition did not convert them, it at least compelled them to sin with less publicity and thus diminished their evil example.[1005] This failure may be regarded as virtually deciding the fate of the Moriscos. Archbishop Ribera emphasized it in two strong memorials addressed to Philip III, and expulsion came to be recognized as the only solution of the situation, although the vacillation and irresolution of the court postponed for some years the execution of the measure.

[Sidenote: _VALENCIA_]

A glance at the tables in the Appendix will show how little influence the successive Edicts of Grace had on the operations of the Inquisition, which reaped its harvests irrespective of them. Yet those tables reveal that, between 1540 and 1563, there were periods during which the tribunal was idle, at least as to cases of heresy. These intervals represent some remarkable efforts to try the effect of moderation, which, although neutralized by lack of coöperative work in winning over the converts, merit examination as measures without example in the career of the Spanish Holy Office.

The nobles of Valencia complained forcibly of the disquiet caused among their vassals by the operations of the Inquisition, and the Córtes petitioned that thirty or forty years might be allowed for their instruction during which they should be exempt from prosecution. Charles assembled a junta of prelates and theologians, which suggested various plans of moderation and conciliation, from among which he selected that of granting a term of grace for past offences, allowing them to confess sacramentally to confessors, and that a period should be provided for their instruction, during which the Inquisition should not prosecute them. This period was liberally fixed at twenty-six years, with the warning that, as they should use or abuse it, it would be extended or shortened. We have seen the failure to provide them with churches and instructors, and it is scarce surprising that they commenced to live openly as Moors, saying that, as they had thirty years in which to do as they pleased, they would take full advantage of it.[1006] This could not be permitted, and the effort to convert by toleration came to a speedy end. The tribunal which had no cases in 1541, 1542 and 1543 resumed operations and had 79, 37 and 49 in 1544, 1545 and 1546--a portion of which, however were undoubtedly the Judaizers prosecuted for revoking confessions (Vol. II, p. 584).

Then, in 1547, came a reversion to a milder policy. A brief dated August 2, 1546, was obtained from Paul III, of so liberal a character that it virtually superseded the Inquisition, by granting faculties to appoint confessors with full power to absolve _in utroque foro_--both sacramentally and judicially--even those who had been condemned by the Inquisition, and to relieve them and their descendants from all disabilities.[1007] Unfortunately the faculty to appoint confessors was conferred on Antonio Ramírez de Haro, who had for some years been acting as "apostolic commissioner" in Valencia, with extensive powers over everything relating to the Moriscos, but he had, in 1545, left Valencia, on a summons, as Bishop of Segovia, to attend the Council of Trent--from which summons he succeeded in getting himself excused--and had not subdelegated his authority. According to the Archbishop St. Thomas of Vilanova, this made little difference, because the brief was ineffective, inasmuch as it required abjuration _de vehementi_, entailing relaxation for relapse, to which none of the converts would expose themselves. He, therefore, suggested that more extensive faculties should be obtained, to absolve and pardon without legal forms, seeing that these people had been forcibly converted, that they had never been instructed, and that their intercourse with Barbary indisposed them to Christianity.[1008]

What followed is strikingly illustrative of the procrastination and neglect that rendered Spanish administration so ineffective. The commission of the Bishop of Segovia superseded both the inquisitorial and the episcopal jurisdiction, and his absence left everything in confusion. Archbishop Thomas wrote, April 12, 1547, to Prince Philip that, since the bishop had gone, the Moriscos had daily become bolder in performing their Moorish ceremonies, as there was no one to restrain them; the bishop had left no one to represent him, and no time should be lost in getting him to subdelegate some one who could come at once. Promises were made that a person should shortly be sent, but the habitual mañana postponed it indefinitely. On November 10th, the archbishop again represented the complete liberty enjoyed by the Conversos, with no one empowered to correct them, but his representations were neglected and, in 1551 and 1552, he was still calling for some one authorized to keep the Moriscos in order. Even when, in 1551, the Bishop of Segovia, who still retained his commission, appointed the Inquisitor Gregorio de Miranda as a delegated commissioner, he granted him no inquisitorial power, and the Valencia Moriscos remained, for ten years longer, free from persecution.[1009]

[Sidenote: _OPPRESSION_]

This anomalous condition explains why the tables show only a few cases in 1547, 1548 and 1549, and then an entire cessation up to and including 1562, the former being probably the unfinished work of previous years. In 1561, Paul IV empowered Valdés to grant faculties to the Archbishop of Valencia and his Ordinary to reconcile secretly the New Christians: in those cases which could be judicially proved, the confessions were to be made before a notary and delivered to the tribunal, where they remained of record against both the penitent and his accomplices, while in cases that could not be proved, the penances were to be purely spiritual.[1010] This fresh experiment indicates a revival of interest in the Morisco question, to be necessarily followed by a return to the old methods. In 1562, accordingly, the tribunal began to act in Teruel, where the town of Xea had the reputation of an asylum for malefactors; it was exclusively Morisco, no Old Christian being permitted to reside there. Finally, all restrictions were removed and, in 1563, the Inquisition was vigorously at work, with sixty-two cases, and held two autos, in which appeared nine cases from Xea.[1011] After that there was no further interference with its functions, and it continued to the end to contribute its share to rendering Christianity odious. What Archbishop Ayala thought of its influence in this direction is indicated by his offer, in 1564, to undertake the instruction of the Moriscos at his own expense, but only on condition that the Inquisition should have nothing to do with them, except in cases of open and defiant sin.[1012]

* * * * *

Even without the aggravation of the Inquisition, the condition of the Moriscos was deplorable. They had been promised, in return for baptism, that they should have all the privileges of Christians, but this, like all other pledges, was made only to be broken. Enforced conversion had added to their burdens and had brought no compensatory relief--they were Christians as regards duties and responsibilities, but they remained Moors in respect to liabilities and inequality before the law. In 1525 the syndics of the aljamas pointed out that, in order to enjoy their religion, they had been subjected by their lords to many imposts and servitudes which they could not render as Christians, for they would not be allowed to work on Sundays and feast-days, wherefore they asked to be taxed only as Christians. To this it was replied, in the Concordia of 1528, that they should be treated as Christians and that, to avoid injury to parties, investigation should be made to prevent injustice. Their lords, however, did not admit this and, in the same year, the Córtes of Valencia declared that they retained all their rights over their vassals, who were forbidden to change their domiciles.[1013] The lords accepted the tithes and the first-fruits as a compensation, but merely added these fresh burdens on their vassals, who were powerless to resist.

[Sidenote: _EXACTIONS_]

Charles recognized this injustice and his responsibility for it, but he dared not raise a conflict with the nobles, and he sought to shield himself behind the awful authority of the Inquisition. He therefore procured from Clement VII, July 15, 1531, a remarkable brief reciting that, when the Saracens were converted, the barons and knights, in compensation for the loss inflicted on them, were empowered to exact from their vassals the tithes and first-fruits, but they have not only enjoyed these new imposts but have continued to extort the personal services and _açofras_[1014] and other demands of the ante-conversion period. Thus the converts, unable to endure these accumulated burdens, allege them as justifying their retaining their old customs and disregarding the Christian feasts and ceremonies. As Charles had asked him for a remedy, and as he knew nothing of the matter, he committed it to Manrique with power to hear complaints and render justice, enforcing his decisions with censures.[1015] The rôle of protector of the Moriscos was novel for the Inquisition and Manrique kept the brief until January, 1534, when, in sending Fray Antonio de Calcena and Antonio Ramírez de Haro as commissioners to organize the Morisco churches, he informed them that the king ordered the Concordia to be enforced; the New Christians were in all things to be treated like the Old; they were to investigate secretly and report whether this was the case.[1016] Apparently the Inquisition shrank from the unaccustomed task; there is no trace of its intervention in behalf of the oppressed Moriscos, and its only prosecutions of the nobles were for favoring their vassals against its persecution. As for the Córtes, their sole efforts were directed to increase the burdens of the vassals and, in case of their condemnation, to profit by the confiscations.

Thus they were mercilessly pillaged. Besides the division of the crops, of which one-third or one-half went to the lord, and besides the tithes and first-fruits, there were innumerable imposts of all kinds and forced loans or benevolences. In 1561, one of the numerous consultas on the Morisco question alludes to the hardship of forcing them to live like Christians and pay like Moors. The king, it added, ought to relieve them from these unjust impositions, but it would throw the whole kingdom into confusion and impede the work of conversion, so the commissioners ought to see how it could be brought about that they should pay no more than the Christians. This continued to the end. In 1608, Padre Antonio Sobrino, S. J., argued that one of the chief obstacles to conversion was the tyranny of the lords and, in addition to the exactions in money and kind, he alludes to the forced labors imposed on them, on meagre wages and still more meagre food, or frequently with no wages.[1017] In fact, they were virtually _taillables et corvéables à miséricorde_, and their oppression was tempered only by the ever-present apprehension of rebellion and, in the coast districts, by the facilities of escape to Africa. Even their ecclesiastical persecutors were almost moved to pity by the hopeless misery of their lot, but we are told that there was no compassion felt for this, as it was generally deemed advisable to keep them impoverished and in subjection.[1018]

The control of the lords over their vassals was further safe-guarded by a pragmática of Charles V, in 1541, forbidding the Moriscos of Valencia, under pain of death and confiscation, from changing either domicile or lord, and any one accepting them as vassals, without special royal licence, was fined five hundred florins, or was scourged in default of the money. Granadan and Castilian Moriscos were threatened with death for entering Valencia and this, in 1545, was extended to those of Aragon. This ferocious legislation was repeated in 1563 and 1586.[1019]

Akin to this was the suicidal policy of forbidding the emigration of those who were recognized as dangerous domestic enemies. This, as we have seen, was begun by Ferdinand and Isabella and was rigidly persisted in--partly, no doubt, from a pious scruple of allowing the baptized to apostatize in Barbary, and partly to protect the lords from the loss of their vassals. In time this was enforced in Aragon by the Inquisition, which published edicts to that effect, including the guidance over the mountains of emigrants by Christians. In the auto of June 6, 1585, the tribunal punished two who were seeking to leave the country and two who served as guides, with scourging and the galleys for three men and scourging and imprisonment for a woman.[1020] Not only was this a grievous hardship, by depriving the oppressed of all hope of relief, but it was a fatal error for, if the discontented had been allowed to expatriate themselves, the remainder could have commanded better treatment, and the Morisco question which, for half a century, distracted Spanish statesmanship, might have settled itself without the desperate expedient of expulsion.

Disarmament was another precaution entailing a grievance which was keenly felt. We have seen it in Granada, and that in Valencia it was a prudent preliminary to enforced baptism in 1525. In the Concordia of 1528, the Moriscos asked that their arms be restored to them, and were told that they would be treated as Old Christians. This promise, like the rest, was broken. The pragmática of 1541, among its other restrictions, included that of bearing arms. This was not enforced and, in 1545, orders were sent to carry it into effect, but the methods suggested show that it was regarded as a dangerous business, and the purpose was abandoned. In 1552, St. Thomas of Vilanova urged that it should be done, and so did Inquisitor Miranda in 1561. Finally, in 1563, the work was done by a sudden simultaneous action of the lords, when the inventories compiled show that, in 16,377 Morisco houses, there were seized 14,930 swords, 3,454 cross-bows and a long list of other weapons, indicating how industriously the Moriscos had provided themselves.[1021]

[Sidenote: _DISARMAMENT--LIMPIEZA_]

In Aragon, the matter was confided to the Inquisition. The tribunal of Saragossa issued a decree, November 4, 1559, forbidding the Moriscos from carrying arms, but the nobles appealed to the Suprema and procured its indefinite suspension.[1022] The question was revived, in 1590, but a quarrel with the archbishop on a point of precedence delayed its consideration, and then the troubles of Antonio Pérez distracted attention. Finally, in 1593, Philip II ordered the disarmament, the execution of which was entrusted to the tribunal. Two inquisitors traversed the land and collected 7,076 swords, 3,783 arquebuses, 489 cross-bows, 1,356 pikes, lances and halberds and large numbers of other weapons. Knives were permitted, but these increased in size until they became formidable; after two or three officials of the Inquisition had been killed with them when making arrests, a royal edict of 1603 limited them to a third of an ell in length and required them to be pointless.[1023] The result of these precautions was seen when the edict of expulsion was enforced and the desperate wretches who essayed a hopeless resistance were slaughtered.

The growth of the absurd cult of limpieza brought another hardship of no little moment. At first there was a disposition to exempt Moriscos from its exclusiveness. When, in 1565, Philip II was trying conciliation he ordered that leading and influential Moriscos should be appointed as familiars, and we have seen that Inquisitor Miranda gave commissions to the brothers Abenamir. Paul IV forbade admission to holy orders to the descendants of Jews to the fourth generation and, in 1573, Gregory XIII extended this to the Moriscos, but the Córtes of Monzon, in 1564, had decreed that those trained in the Morisco college of Valencia should be allowed to hold benefices and the cure of souls among their people, and we are told that it graduated some good priests and preachers and doctors of theology.[1024] Yet in time the exclusion became general, and throughout Spain no distinction was made between descendants of Jews and Mudéjares. In a land where a career in office, secular or ecclesiastical, was the ambition of every man who had a smattering of education, this barrier condemned to obscurity able men who naturally devoted their energies to stimulating disaffection and provoking revolt. Navarrete, as we have seen, even thinks that the necessity of the expulsion would have been averted but for this; that the Moriscos could have been Christianized, if they had had the opportunity to identify themselves with the nation and to share in its public life, in place of being driven to desperation and to hatred of religion by the indelible stigma imposed upon them.[1025]

The baptism of Morisco children furnished a perpetual source of irritation. Rigid regulations were prescribed to ensure the administration of the sacrament, as it was essential to their salvation and to rendering them subject to inquisitorial jurisdiction. No Morisco woman was allowed to act as midwife, but in every village there was a Christian midwife, carefully selected and instructed. She kept watch on all pregnant women, under a fine of a hundred reales for every case she missed. After putting the infant to the breast, her first duty was to notify the priest and alguazil, after which she was not to leave the bed-side save for indispensable household duties. The baptism was performed the same day or the next, and careful registers were kept, so that identification could be secured. There is doubtless truth in the universal assertion that, on returning home, the father scraped and washed the spots touched by the chrism, in the belief that he thereby effaced the sacrament.[1026]

[Sidenote: _PROHIBITED MARRIAGES_]

Marriage was the source of infinite trouble. The Church had prohibited unions within the fourth degree of kinship and, by inventing spiritual affinity, it had complicated and enlarged the incestuous area while, by assuming for the pope the profitable power of selling dispensations, it admitted that the restriction was purely artificial. Among the Moors, marriage between first cousins was permitted and, as the Moriscos dwelt confined in their Morerías, or in small, isolated villages, without power to change domicile, intermarriage throughout generations had created such complexity of relationship that unions lawful under the canon law must have been exceptional. We have seen the question raised in the Concordia of 1528, with the result that existing marriages and betrothals were dispensed for, but that future ones must conform to the canons. This was a virtual impossibility; the rectors sought to make their subjects purchase dispensations, but we are told that they rarely did so; that, in some places, they merely told the lord that the parties were of kin and that, if he made no objection, the marriage would take place--an indifference for which more than one noble was prosecuted and publicly penanced.[1027] Under such circumstances, there could have been no Christian marriage-rites, and the union was legally pure concubinage, or at best clandestine marriage, which the Council of Trent, in 1563, pronounced invalid.[1028] It was probably the conciliar definitions that induced the Córtes of Monzon, in 1564, to petition that facilities should be afforded for obtaining dispensations from the Commissioner of the Santa Cruzada, who possessed the requisite faculties, and further that the offspring of such unions should be legally legitimate. To this not unreasonable request the bishops of the Council of Valencia, in 1565, replied by threatening excommunication and other penalties on all marrying within the prohibited degrees, and on all concerned in evasions of the canons.[1029]

The matter was universally admitted to be of supreme importance, but it was treated with the customary negligence and procrastination. At length, in 1587, Philip II represented it to Sixtus V, but he only obtained a brief, January 25, 1588, granting to the Valencia bishops, for six months only, faculties to validate such marriages, legitimate the children and absolve the parents _in utroque foro_, with salutary penance, for all of which no fees were to be exacted. It is not likely that the officials took much interest in performing this gratuitous labor, or that the Moriscos, even if they chanced to hear of the brief, exposed themselves to the annoyances which it entailed. The last recorded action in the matter is that Philip, in 1595, resolved to apply for another brief of the same nature. He doubtless obtained it with the same nugatory result.[1030]

The Moorish rule, to eat no meat slaughtered by the uncircumcised, was made the pretext for some troublesome intermeddling. In the Granada decree of 1526, Charles V forbade all slaughtering by Moriscos, in places where there was an Old Christian; where there was none, the priest was to designate a person to perform the office.[1031] Little attention appears to have been paid to the matter, until Archbishop Ribera issued an edict prohibiting Moriscos from eating meat that had not been slaughtered by an Old Christian. This was trespassing on the jurisdiction of the Inquisition and, in 1579, the Suprema called upon the Valencia tribunal for a report, including what Bishop Gallo of Orihuela had done with regard to the same matter. The tribunal replied that the edict was obeyed, but that the Moriscos would eat no meat slaughtered by Old Christians, except in a few places, under compulsion by their lords. The edict ought to be perpetuated, for the refusal to eat the meat of a Christian butcher was proof of suspicion, requiring prosecution by the Inquisition. In Orihuela there was doubt whether a cow killed at Aspe had been properly slaughtered; the Moriscos refused to eat of it, for which the Murcia tribunal punished a number of them, leading Bishop Gallo to order that, at Aspe and Nobelda, the butchering should be done by Old Christians. It was probably this which led to general legislation forbidding Moriscos to follow the trade of butchers, or even to kill a fowl for a sick man, a law repeated as late as 1595.[1032]

* * * * *

[Sidenote: _RAVAGES ON THE COAST_]

Subjected to the perpetual exasperation of interference with their habits and customs, to the oppression of their lords and the persecution of the Inquisition, denied all opportunity to rise in the social scale, forbidden to enjoy the faith of their ancestors, while sedulously trained to hate the religion imposed on them, and despairing of relief in the future, it is no wonder that the Moriscos were discontented subjects, eager to throw off the insupportable yoke and to rise against their oppressors. They were, however, but little more than half a million of souls, weaponless and untrained, in a population of eight or ten millions--a negligible quantity in the vigorous days of Ferdinand and even in the earlier years of Charles V. The Spanish monarchy, however, had squandered its strength on distant enterprises; even before the fearful drain in the Netherlands, the exhaustive effort required to crush the Moriscos of Granada showed that it was already bankrupt in resources. That episode was a warning which Spanish statesmanship might well take to heart, and, year by year, the fear grew greater of what might be the fate of Spain if internal enemies should unite with external.

There had long been a source of humiliation and annoyance, though not in itself of danger, in the ravages of Moorish corsairs along the southern coast, for which the Moriscos were held responsible. Undoubtedly they aided by conveying information, maintaining relations with Barbary, and availing themselves of the razzias to escape thither when they could, but the primary fault lay in the incredible fatuity of a policy, so preoccupied with foreign ambitions and the fatal Burgundian inheritance, that it neglected the protection of the Spanish shores, until it became a proverb that these were the Indies of the Turkish and Moorish sea-rovers.

Complaints of these ravages commence with the Christianization of Granada and continue uninterruptedly for more than a century, while the measures to guard against these attacks were spasmodic and miserably insufficient. Boronat gives a list of thirty-three descents, between 1528 and 1584, but this cannot include the innumerable landings from small vessels to carry away bands of Moriscos and such pillage as could hastily be gathered--little raids such as that picturesquely described by Cervantes, with its characteristic feature of the fortified church, in which the Christians of the sea-coast village defended themselves, while the Moriscos eagerly hurried to embark.[1033] In the larger expeditions, the Moriscos sometimes escaped in considerable numbers. In 1559, Dragut carried off twenty-five hundred; in 1570, all those of Palmera were taken; in 1584, an Algerine fleet removed twenty-three hundred, and the next year another fleet took away the whole population of Callosa, all of which was exceedingly damaging to the lords who lost their vassals.[1034]

These raids were practically unresisted and unavenged, for the coasts were unguarded by land or sea. Occasionally, as in 1519, we hear of a few hundred troops sent, when news was received of an expected hostile fleet: sometimes there were negotiations between the central government and the exposed provinces to maintain a force on the water, but the inadequacy of these precautions is illustrated by the bargaining in 1547, when the Catalan Córtes complained of the irreparable damage inflicted by the Moorish corsairs and asked that six of the Castilian galleys be sent to winter there. Prince Philip would only promise that he would do what was suitable, which brought an offer that Catalonia would equip and man one galley while Valencia promised one or two, and Philip acceded to the request that the Castilian galleys should coöperate with them.[1035] Another expedient was based on the assumed collusion of the Moriscos with the corsairs, and it seemed easier to exclude them wholly from the coast than to guard it effectually. As early as 1507 Ferdinand undertook to depopulate it from Gibraltar to Almería, but the experiment proved a failure.[1036] It was tried again repeatedly, in various savage laws to prevent Moriscos from travelling within prescribed distances from the sea, and from holding communication with the corsairs, but this naturally effected nothing.[1037] In 1604, the Córtes of Valencia even proposed to enlist the coöperation of the Moriscos, by suggesting that they should redeem all Christians captured and enslaved on the Valencian coast, in return for which the rigor of the Inquisition should be relaxed and their evidence against each other should not be required, but it is needless to say that the plan was rejected.[1038]

While this matter of the corsairs was comparatively trivial in itself, it bore a disproportionately large share in the discussions on the Morisco question, and undoubtedly had its influence on the final decision. The result, indeed, showed that there was a connection between the Moriscos and the corsairs, for one of the benefits derived from the expulsion was relief to the coasts.[1039] Vastly greater, however, in the eyes of statesmen, was the impending danger of rebellion, coincident with attack from Barbary or from the Turk or, in later years, from France.

[Sidenote: _CONSPIRACIES_]

Even as early as 1512, Peter Martyr, in describing the disturbed condition of Granada, declared that if some daring pirate leader should march into the interior, the population would rise and, as Ferdinand was occupied with the conquest of Navarre, all would go to ruin.[1040] In 1519, there was a scare in Valencia over a report that the Moors of Algiers were coming to seize the kingdom, in concert with the Moriscos.[1041] It is somewhat remarkable that, when a conspiracy was discovered in 1528, the eagerness of the Valencia tribunal to defend its jurisdiction actually led it to protect the conspirators. The authorities had arrested Pere de Alba and his mother-in-law Isabel, as the leaders of the plot. The tribunal claimed them as apostates and, when they were sent to it for examination, it threw them into its prison and refused to surrender them, although the viceroy demanded them as essential to unravelling the details of the conspiracy. Cardinal Manrique was obliged to despatch a special courier with a letter expressing his surprise, as the safety of the state was the first consideration, but even then the tribunal only gave them up with a warning that they must not be made to suffer in life or limb.[1042]

When Philip II returned to Spain, in 1559, he called for a report on the Moriscos, and the information submitted to him comprised an account of a plot with the Turks for an invasion.[1043] In 1565, a number of arrests were made on charges of treasonable correspondence with the Turk, and it was public rumor that thirty thousand Moriscos were enrolled, awaiting only the capture of Malta to rise in aid of an invasion. The French ambassador, who reported this, subsequently added that the story of the conspiracy was contradicted, but the Moriscos were so badly treated by the Inquisition that despair might readily lead them to rise in arms to aid the Turk.[1044] In 1567, the trial of Gerónimo Roldan, by the Valencia tribunal, revealed evidence of envoys from the ruler of Algiers with a letter urging the Moriscos to rise, together with plans to organize and arm them.[1045] It is true that the rebellion of Granada showed that there was no such eagerness to invade Spain as was apprehended, but, on the other hand if, with the aid of five or six hundred Moors and Turks, the insurgents had taxed to the utmost the power of the kingdom, what was the prospect if a powerful fleet, holding command of the sea, should land a heavy force of trained and well-armed fighting men? During the rebellion, the Venetian envoy, Sigismondo Cavalli, pointed out that assistance from Barbary would involve the kingdom in the greatest straits, for there were about six hundred thousand Moriscos to help an invader. So, in 1575, Lorenzo Priuli, estimating them at four hundred thousand, described them as the source of perpetual danger.[1046] The peril constantly increased with time. It was universally recognized that, through the drain to the colonies, the external wars, and the growth of the celibate clergy, the Old Christians were constantly diminishing in numbers, while the Moriscos were rapidly increasing; the material and especially the military resources of Spain were becoming gradually exhausted, and Spanish statesmen looked forward anxiously to the time when, as Fray Bleda tells us, the Moriscos hoped eventually, to reconquer the land with the aid of the Moors and Turks.[1047]

[Sidenote: _CONSPIRACIES_]

Nor was this all for, with the pacification of France under the able control of Henry IV, there loomed before them a new and more dangerous enemy. Henry had a long debt of vengeance to pay, and was but awaiting his opportunity. He was in alliance with the Turk and had no conscientious scruple as to Moslem aid. Even as early as 1583, while as yet he was only King of Navarre, there was a scare over an asserted combination between him and the Turk, for an invasion in combination with the Moriscos, which led the Suprema, in January, 1584, to order from the Saragossa tribunal a report on all the evidence in the records as to plots for rebellion.[1048] This was furnished in detail and shows the incessant vigilance and constant anxieties, since 1565, to which the disaffection of the Moriscos had given rise, and their correspondence not only with the Barbary States and the Turk, but with the French Huguenots. A portion of the evidence was undoubtedly manufactured by the spies in the pay of the Inquisition, but there was enough of genuine to show that plots and intrigues were constantly on foot among the Moriscos. Henry IV was quite ready to utilize their disaffection in furtherance of his plans for the overthrow of the Spanish monarchy and, in 1602, he entered into negotiations with them, through the Marshal Duke de la Force, his governor in Béarn and Navarre. They promised to raise eighty thousand men and to deliver three cities, one of them a seaport and, as an earnest of their resolve, they paid to la Force, at Pau, in 1604 or 1605, a hundred and twenty thousand ducats, but Henry decided that the moment was not favorable and the plan was postponed.[1049]

Then, in 1608, there came a fresh alarm through negotiations of the Valencian Moriscos with Muley Cidan, a pretender to the throne of Morocco, to whom they promised two hundred thousand men, if he would bring twenty thousand and seize a seaport, while certain Hollanders agreed to furnish transportation. Philip III was so impressed with this that, in sending the report to the Royal Council, he ordered it to consider the matter to the exclusion of everything else. He admitted the defenceless condition of Spain; Muley Cidan was its declared enemy; Sultan Ahmed I had his hands free from the war with Persia and had suppressed his own rebels; Spain's Italian possessions were exhausted and ripe for revolt, while at home the Moriscos were impatient for liberation. The Council was therefore ordered to consider the means of preserving peace, short of butchering them all.[1050]

This scare passed away; Muley Cidan rejected the Morisco overtures, and Ahmed sent his fleet against the coasts of Italy. The impression remained, however; the final impulsion had been given, and thenceforth the expulsion of the Moriscos was only a question of means and opportunity. Its execution can scarce be said to have been premature for, although those of Valencia were deported in the autumn of 1609 and those of Aragon in the spring of 1610, Henry IV still relied on those who were left to aid him in his plans for the destruction of Spain. A part of his design was an invasion by la Force with ten thousand men, trusting to the coöperation of the Moriscos, with whom negotiations had been resumed. La Force was in consultation with him, and was in his carriage on May 14, 1610, when, in the Rue de la Ferronerie, the knife of Ravaillac gave Spain a respite.[1051] It was evidently supposed that the expulsion had been imperfect and that Spain was still an easy prey. The Baron de Salignac, French Ambassador at Constantinople, wrote to Henry, May 2, 1610, that no matter how many Moriscos had been banished, enough remained to give the Spaniards trouble; war that elsewhere could cost a crown would not there cost a maravedí, and when it should begin Spain would find it more difficult to raise a maravedí than it would be to raise a doubloon elsewhere.[1052] As events turned out, these were vain speculations, but they have interest as showing how, in the estimation of her enemies, Spain had fatally crippled herself by the mismanagement of her Morisco subjects. To the Spanish statesmen of the time the situation had become one from which extrication was imperative at whatever cost.

* * * * *

It can readily be believed that the matter had long before awakened the earnest solicitude of Philip II and his counsellors. As early as 1581, when in Lisbon consolidating his rule over Portugal, he formed a junta of his chief advisers to formulate a definite conclusion. That which they reached was the merciful one of sending to sea all the Moriscos who would not be catechised or did not desire to remain, embarking them on worthless ships which were to be scuttled, for it was deemed unwise to add to the population of Africa; it was resolved that, when the fleet returned from the Azores, the plan should be executed by Antonio de Leyva but, when the fleet arrived, it was wanted in Flanders, and the project was abandoned. When, in 1602, Philip III was informed of this, he expressed his pleasure because it justified what was then in contemplation.[1053]

[Sidenote: _DELIBERATIONS_]