A History of the Inquisition of Spain; vol. 2

by Henry Charles Lea

STRUGGLES WITH THE CURIA

In the kingdoms of Aragon, the Córtes of Monzon, in 1510, agreed that no one should appeal from the tribunals to the pope, but only to the inquisitor-general.[319] Possibly this may have led to the invention of a method of reprisals which was infinitely annoying and difficult to meet. A certain Baldiri Meteli procured from Rome a citation to appear addressed to Mossen Coda, the judge of confiscations in Barcelona, and some other officials. This completely nonplussed the tribunal and Ferdinand was driven to instructing, November 2, 1510, his Lieutenant-general of Catalonia to consult with Inquisitor-general Enguera as to the best mode of inducing Meteli to withdraw the citation. He was obstinate, especially as he had meanwhile procured citations on other officials, and Ferdinand could find no other remedy than notifying the diputados that the agreement of Monzon was a totality and that, if the clause respecting appeals was violated, Enguera would disregard the rest.[320] What was the result the documents fail to inform us, but an even more troublesome case occurred in Saragossa when Sánchez de Romeral on being prosecuted fled to Rome. March 11, 1511, Ferdinand wrote to his ambassador to request the pope to send him back to the inquisitor-general, but the pope declined and Ferdinand was moved to lively wrath, in 1513, on learning that Romeral, who had meanwhile been burnt in effigy, had procured citations on all the officials, from inquisitors down, including even the consultors who had acted in the consulta de fe, and that he had managed to get the citations published in Tudela and Cascante. Ferdinand wrote to Rome in terms of vigorous indignation and ordered the Archbishop of Saragossa, the Captain-general of Navarre and the inquisitors to consult with lawyers as to the best means of punishing this audacious attack on the Inquisition. Apparently there were no means of parrying such an attack save coming to terms with the other side, so long as the curia was willing to lend itself to this guerrilla warfare. This was seen in a somewhat similar case in Sicily, in 1511, when a certain Cola de Ayelo, condemned to perpetual imprisonment by Inquisitor Belorado, managed to escape; he took himself to Rome as a penitent and there commenced suit against Belorado and his colleague the Bishop of Cefalù. The bishop was obliged to obey a summons to Rome; the affair was protracted and gave so much trouble that, when Ayelo wanted to return to Sicily and offered to withdraw the suit, Ferdinand agreed to let him come back, pardoned his offences, including gaol-breaking, and gave him a safe-conduct against further prosecution. This method of fighting the Inquisition would probably have been more frequently adopted but for the risk to which were exposed the notaries and scriveners whose ministrations were essential. In the present case the one who sent the citation to the bishop was seized by the viceroy, tortured and probably punished severely.[321]

One or two cases will illustrate the chaotic condition produced by these contending elements, especially after the death of Ferdinand, January 23, 1516, had removed from the scene of action his resolute will and ceaseless activity. Miguel Vedreña, suspected of complicity in the murder of Bernardo Castelli, assessor of the tribunal of Balaguer, appealed to the pope from the prison of the tribunal of Barcelona. The Suprema of Aragon vainly instructed its Roman agent to make every effort to defeat the appeal. Leo X committed the case to the Bishop of Ascoli, who ordered the tribunal to release Vedreña on his giving security to constitute himself a prisoner in Rome. The inquisitors had lost all respect for papal letters and refused obedience, whereupon the bishop appointed certain local prelates as commissioners to prosecute them and inflict censures. The Suprema inhibited these commissioners from acting, but not before they had excommunicated the inquisitors, who applied to Leo for relief. Leo had already, at least in appearance, abandoned Vedreña, in a brief of May 5, 1517, addressed to Cardinal Adrian, then Inquisitor-general of Aragon, styling Vedreña “that son of iniquity,” evoking the case to himself and committing it to Adrian. But accompanying this brief and of the same date was another of private instructions, in which Vedreña was alluded to as his dearest son and Adrian was told that the case was committed to him in order that his dexterity might compound it; the evidence was doubtful and Vedreña had purged it sufficiently; it would seem that he should rather be acquitted than condemned but if Adrian thought otherwise he was to send a statement, when Leo would give final orders. Some three months later there was another brief to Adrian about the excommunicated inquisitors; if the censures were subsequent to the withdrawal of the case from the Bishop of Ascoli, they were invalid, but the whole matter was left to Adrian.[322] We have no means of knowing what was the final outcome of the case, but it sufficiently indicates the entanglements caused by the conflicting jurisdictions and the contradictory actions of the pope as his officials were bought by one side or the other.

STRUGGLES WITH THE CURIA

Another aspect of these affairs is exhibited in the case of the heirs of Juan Enríquez de Medina, whose bones were condemned, by the tribunal of Cuenca, to be exhumed and burnt. The heirs appealed to Ximenes, who commissioned judges to revise the sentence, but these refused to the heirs a copy of the proceedings, by which alone they could rebut the evidence. Then they appealed to Pope Leo, who appointed three commissioners to hear the case and communicate the proceedings to the heirs, on their giving security not to harm the witnesses. The parties appointed, doubtless fearing to incur the enmity of the Inquisition, declined to serve and the last we hear of the case is a brief of May 19, 1517, threatening them with excommunication for persistence.[323]

With the appointment of Cardinal Adrian, as inquisitor-general of Castile as well as of Aragon, Leo, in 1518, confirmed the decrees of Innocent VIII and Alexander VI, granting to him exclusive appellate jurisdiction and Adrian, when pope, repeated this in 1523, in favor of Manrique.[324] Yet this in no way interfered with the reception in Rome of the multitudinous applications, both appellate and in first instance, which Charles V, in a letter of October 29, 1518, to Cardinal Santiquatro, broadly hinted was accomplished by the free use of money.[325] How recklessly, indeed, the papal jurisdiction was prostituted at the service of the first comer, is evidenced in the case of a mill in Paterna, purchased by Juan Claver from the confiscated estate of Jufre Rinsech. The Infante Enrique laid claim to it; the tribunal of Valencia decided in favor of Claver and imposed perpetual silence on Enrique. On the death of Claver, Enrique brought suit against his heir before a judge of his own selection, whom the tribunal promptly inhibited. Enrique then procured a papal brief inhibiting the tribunal and committing the case to this judge. Then Charles V intervened, October 29, 1518, ordering Enrique to bring his suit before the tribunal.[326] Papal letters issued after such fashion had no moral weight and were lightly disregarded. The contempt felt for them was increased by Leo’s perpetual vacillations. A brief of September 9, 1518, to Adrian states that, in view of the iniquity and injustice of the tribunal of Palermo and some others, he had placed all such matters in the hands of his vicar, the Cardinal of S. Bartolommeo in Insula, with faculties to decide them and coerce the inquisitors with censures and fines, but now he thinks it better that these affairs shall be confided to Adrian, to whom he commits them with full powers.[327]

STRUGGLES WITH THE CURIA

A contemporary case, which attracted much attention at the time, shows Leo in a more favorable light. Blanquina Díaz was an octogenarian widow of Valencia, whose orthodoxy had never been suspected, but in 1517 she was denounced for Judaism and thrown into the secret prison. An appeal to the pope brought orders that she be released on good security, be allowed defence and the case be speedily tried. This brief never reached the tribunal, being apparently suppressed by the Suprema, whereupon Leo issued a second one, March 4, 1518, evoking the case to himself and committing it to two ecclesiastics of Valencia, Blanquina being meanwhile placed in a convent and Cardinal Adrian being especially prohibited from intervening, anything that he might do being declared invalid. It was probably before this was received that the tribunal submitted the case to Adrian, who assembled a consulta de fe and condemned Blanquina to perpetual imprisonment and confiscation. The papal intervention seems to have aroused much feeling; Charles was ready to sign anything drawn up for him by Adrian, and, in two letters, of May 18th and June 18th to his Roman agent Luis Carroz, he ordered the latter to disregard all other business in the effort to procure the withdrawal of the two briefs. If the safety of all his dominions had been at stake he could not have been more emphatic; such interference with the Inquisition was unexampled; unless the pope would revoke the briefs and promise never to issue similar ones, the Holy Office would be totally destroyed, and heresy would flourish unpunished, for every one would seek relief at the curia and the service of God would become impossible. He also wrote to the pope and the cardinals, while Adrian and the Suprema sent pressing letters. Leo, however, was firm in substance, though he yielded in form. In briefs of July 5th and 7th to Adrian he ordered that everything done since his letters of March 4th should be annulled, Blanquina being restored to her good fame, her sanbenito being removed and she being placed, under bail, in a convent or in the house of a kinsman. As the evidence against her consisted of trifles committed in childhood, he again evoked the case to himself and committed it to Adrian. There had been active work on both sides in Rome, for the brief of July 5th gave Adrian full power to decide the case while that of the 7th limited him to sending the results to Leo and awaiting instructions as to the sentence. Leo thus kept Blanquina’s fate in his hands; Adrian was only his mouthpiece and the sentence pronounced her to be lightly suspect of heresy and discharged her without imprisonment or confiscation.[328]

A further instance of Leo’s vacillation is the coincidence that the brief of March 4th in Blanquina’s favor was dated the same day as Adrian’s commission as inquisitor-general of Castile, in which Leo evoked to himself all pending cases, whether in the tribunals or the curia, and committed them to Adrian with full power to inhibit all persons from assuming cognizance of them.[329] With this before him it is scarce a subject of surprise that Charles V on April 30th instructed his ambassador to tell the pope that no letters prejudicial to the Inquisition would be admitted.[330] This threat he carried out in a contemporaneous case which for some years embroiled the Inquisition with the curia. Bernardino Díaz had been tried and discharged by the tribunal of Toledo, after which he had a quarrel with Bartolomé Martínez, whom he accused of perjury in his case, and killed him. Díaz fled to Rome, while the tribunal not only burnt him in effigy but seized his wife and mother and some of his friends as accomplices in his escape. In Rome he secured pardon in both the interior and exterior forum on condition of satisfying the kindred of Martínez, to the great indignation of Charles, who complained, not without reason, of this invasion of jurisdiction. Díaz also procured a brief ordering the liberation of the prisoners and the release of their property, but when the executors named in it endeavored to enforce it, the Toledo tribunal seized their procurator and compelled its surrender. This realization of Charles’s threat exasperated the curia and the auditor-general of the Camera summoned the inquisitors to obey the brief or answer personally in Rome for their contumacy; they did neither and were duly excommunicated. Charles wrote repeatedly and bitterly about this unexampled persecution of those who had merely administered justice; the case dragged on for some three years and its ultimate outcome does not appear, but the family of Díaz were probably released for, in 1520, we hear of the removal of the excommunication in connection with the revocation by the inquisitors of their proceedings against Juan de Salazar, a canon of Toledo, residing in Rome in the papal service, whom they had deprived of citizenship and temporalities for some action of his in prejudice of the Inquisition.[331]