A History of the Inquisition of Spain; vol. 2

by Henry Charles Lea

Sickness was of frequent occurrence and was treated with creditable humanity. The Instructions of 1561 require that the sick shall have every care and that whatever the physician deems necessary for them shall be provided.[1540] Of course the fulfilment of this command must have varied with the temper of the tribunals, but nevertheless the spirit dictating it is in marked contrast with the conduct of the gaols of the period. When cases transcended the resources of the Inquisition, the ordinary course was to transfer the patient to a hospital, in disregard of the cherished secrecy of the prison. Instances of this are common enough in the records and a single case will suffice for its illustration. November 6, 1641, Juan de Valdés, on trial for bigamy in Valladolid, asked an audience to beg for despatch as he was very sick. This was confirmed by the alcaide and by the physician, who said that for nineteen days he had had a tercian and was too weak to be bled, and moreover he was suffering from stone and strangury; that he could not be cured in the prison and should be removed to a hospital. This was done, the hospital authorities being notified not to allow him to escape and to keep the tribunal advised of his condition. In January, 1642, he was reported as being still in mortal danger, but he recovered, was returned to the secret prison, and was sentenced on August 21st.[1541]

The care of female prisoners was naturally a subject of some perplexity, especially as the refinement of matrons and women assistants was unknown to the Inquisition. When the Instructions of 1498 order that the prison for men and for women shall be separate,[1542] it does not infer that previously they had been herded promiscuously together, but that in future distinct quarters should be provided for the sexes—a provision which was not observed, as it was deemed sufficient that women should be confined separately so that there could not be communication between them and the men. The condition of helpless women, virtually at the mercy of their male attendants, in the secrecy which shrouded everything within the prison walls, can readily be imagined, and there must have been outrages coming to the knowledge of Ximenes, in 1512, that aroused him to a sense of the dangerous opportunities existing, for in that year an order was issued threatening death to any attendant who should have intercourse with a female prisoner.[1543] The severity of the penalty measured the gravity of the necessity calling for it, but, like so many other salutary provisions, the tribunals were too merciful to enforce it on their subordinates. In 1590, Andrés de Castro, alcaide of the Valencia prison, was tried for seducing a female prisoner, kissing and soliciting others, allowing communications between prisoners and accepting bribes from their kindred. There were twenty-nine accusing witnesses; he denied the charges but virtually admitted their truth by breaking gaol. On his recapture, for this complicated series of offences he escaped with a hundred lashes, three years in the galleys, perpetual exile from Valencia, and disability for office in the Inquisition—a sentence which, when compared with the habitual severity of the tribunals, shows how lightly his sexual crime was regarded by his judges.[1544] It was not that the death-penalty had been abrogated, for we find it repeated, in 1652, in the Logroño instructions to alcaides.[1545] Doubtless the rule mentioned above, that women should be gathered together in their cells, was designed to afford them protection against their gaolers.

In the not unusual case of the arrest of pregnant women, due consideration was given to their condition, and suitable temporary accommodation was found for them, during confinement, outside of the prison. Thus, in the case of María Rodríguez, in the tribunal of Valladolid, who was arrested June 3, 1641, the delay in presenting the accusation, until September 16th, is explained on the record by her being pregnant and removed from the prison until she recovered.[1546] This was an improvement on the earlier practice, if we may believe the Llerena memorial of 1506, which states that women in the throes of child-birth were denied all assistance, even that of a midwife; they were abandoned to nature and many had perished in consequence.[1547]

HUMANE REGULATIONS

It was not only in the general prescriptions of the Instructions that regard for the welfare of the prisoners is manifested. Special orders issued from time to time as to details are animated by the same spirit. Thus, in 1517, Cardinal Adrian told the Sicilian inquisitors (in a letter probably addressed to all the tribunals) that they must pay particular attention to the qualities requisite in the gaoler; they must sedulously bear in mind that the prison is for detention and not for punishment; the prisoners are to be well treated and not be defrauded in their food, for which ample provision must be made; the prison must be inspected every Saturday, by one of the inquisitors, and not fortnightly as provided in the Instructions; those of the prisoners who have trades are to work and thus contribute to their support and, if the officials give the women sewing to do, they must be paid.[1548] An extract made, in 1645, from a book of instructions which was read annually in the tribunals, shows that this praiseworthy care for the welfare of the prisoners was the permanent policy of the Inquisition. It prescribes the utmost punctuality in inspecting the cells every fortnight and learning what the inmates desire, reporting this to the tribunal, which decided what each one should have and, if there was a surplus in the allowance for rations from which it could be procured, the alcaide was at once to be ordered to see that the purveyor bought it; if he neglected anything he was to be reproved for the wrong committed in his lack of punctuality. Special attention was called to serving the rations in the morning, so that the prisoners could prepare their midday meal. Meat was to be given daily, and only one day’s rations at a time in hot weather, lest it should spoil; in cool weather, two days’ supply; and this was so important for the health of the prisoners that it should be the special charge of some one, while an inquisitor ought occasionally to look to it.[1549]

All this is admirable in tone and spirit; unfortunately its execution depended on its enforcement by the inquisitors, on their regular performance of inspection, and on holding the gaolers responsible by rigorous punishment for derelictions. The duty of inspection by inquisitors had been prescribed as indispensable by the Instructions of 1488, but it was impossible to make them obey and complaints of their negligence are frequent. In 1632 it was found necessary to reissue the Instructions of 1488; in 1644 we have the testimony of a contemporary that, in some places at least, it was regularly, if perfunctorily, performed and the Logroño instructions of 1652 make it the duty of the alcaide to remind the inquisitors of it every fortnight, because it is customarily forgotten.[1550] The other requisite, severity of punishment for derelictions, was also lacking, through the customary tenderness shown to delinquent officials.

It would be manifestly unjust to condemn as a whole the management of the prisons: it would be equally unwarranted to praise them indiscriminately. Everything depended on the conscientious discharge of duty by the inquisitors and no general judgement can be formed as to the condition of so many prisons, during three centuries, except that their average standard was considerably higher than that in other jurisdictions and that, if there were abodes of horror, such as have been described by imaginative writers, they were wholly exceptional. There were good and there were bad. The memorials of Llerena and Jaen, in 1506 describe them as horrible dens, overrun with rats, snakes and other vermin, where the wretched captives sickened in despair and were starved by the embezzlement of a large portion of the moneys allowed for their support, while no physician was permitted to attend the sick and the attendants maltreated them like dogs.[1551] Making allowance for rhetorical exaggeration we can imagine that this description was applicable to Córdova under Lucero. Matters seem to have been not much better at Seville in 1560, where the oppression of the alcaide, Gaspar de Benavides, provoked a despairing revolt in which his assistant was mortally wounded. Vengeance was wreaked on the participators in the fray, of whom one was burnt alive and another, a boy of fourteen, had four hundred lashes and was sent to the galleys for life, while Gaspar, who had provoked it, was let off with appearing in an auto de fe, forfeiture of wages and perpetual banishment from Seville.[1552]

VARIABLE TREATMENT

When malfeasance in office escaped with such ill-judged leniency, it was impossible to maintain discipline and the prisoners suffered accordingly. As the result of an inspection of Barcelona by Doctor Alonso Perez, the alcaide Monserrat Pastor is scolded, in 1544, for keeping a mistress in his house, for placing a kinsman in charge of the prison and absenting himself, for receiving presents from discharged prisoners, for frequent absence, leaving the prison unguarded, for combining the incompatible positions of gaoler and dispensero, and of making the women prisoners work and taking their earnings, but Pastor was only reprimanded and ordered to restore the presents and the women’s earnings. Virtual immunity invited continuance of abuses and, in 1550, after another inspection, we find the Suprema again adverting to the evil results of combining the functions of gaoler and dispensero and ordering the inquisitors to fill the latter position.[1553]

The prison of the Canary tribunal at times seems to have been equally mismanaged. An Englishman named John Hill was brought there from Ferro, June 23, 1574, with nothing but his clothes and no money. For nine months his complaints were loud and frequent; a day’s ration was insufficient for a single meal; he begged for more bread and water, also for a mat to lie on, as he had to sleep on the ground and he could not rest for the lice and fleas; for more than two months he prayed for a shirt to cover his nakedness and, though an order was issued, January 22nd to give him one, it had to be repeated February 18th. Even as late as 1792, Don Juan Perdomo complained that for fourteen months the alcaide had kept him on a diet of salt fish, that he would allow him to change his linen but once a fortnight, and that he caused him to suffer such torment from thirst that he would go into the court-yard and cry aloud, hoping that some passer-by would summon the alcaide.[1554]