A History of the Inquisition of Spain; vol. 2

by Henry Charles Lea

DILAPIDATION

Charles’s Flemish favorites were growing impatient to share in the elusive spoils. He had granted to his chamberlain, M. de Beaurains, the rest of the composition, but it was not forthcoming, nor were the accounts of Villacis. In January, 1519, he wrote to Torquemada, one of the Seville inquisitors, to enforce on Villacis, with the utmost rigor of the law, the payment to Beaurains of any amounts collected and not paid over, while, if there was a balance uncollected, Villacis was to assess it afresh and account for it to Beaurains. This produced nothing and, on March 24th Charles emphatically repeated the order, granting full power to enforce it with penalties at discretion. Villacis, however, had experience in eluding such demands and Ferdinand had not left much to glean. In 1515 he had divided up the Córdova composition, giving twenty thousand to the Inquisition and reserving thirty thousand for himself. Of this he had received twenty thousand and the remaining ten he granted to the Marquis of Denia, but when the latter presented this order to Villacis, he was told that eight thousand was covered by previous grants and he could only have two thousand. Denia complained to Ferdinand, by that time mortally sick, who, on December 4th, assented to the transfer to him of the previous grants, but Ximenes, in transmitting this order to Villacis, made a condition that the twenty thousand for the Inquisition must first be paid and he subsequently suspended Denia’s grant altogether. The marquis complained of this to Charles, who from Ghent, May 22, 1517, ordered Ximenes to lift the suspension, but again Ximenes insisted with Villacis that the Inquisition must first be paid. The funds seemed to evaporate and vanish into thin air. It is probable that Denia got little or nothing and that Beaurains fared no better, for Charles’s prime favorite, Adrien de Croy, received as his share of the spoils only the seven hundred and fifty thousand maravedís, the penalties for delay, which had been assigned to the tribunal of Seville. The insatiable Calcena and Aguirre, however, secured a thousand ducats which, in 1515, Ferdinand granted them in recompense for their labors on the composition.[1054] Thus for ten years the New Christians of a large part of Spain had been harried and impoverished under delusive promises of exemption and, of the moneys thus extorted, but little reached either the crown or the Inquisition. The tribunal of Seville, indeed, can have received virtually nothing for, as we have seen, in 1556, its Archbishop Valdés asserted that, since the beginning of the century, it was so impoverished that it could support but a single inquisitor and pay only one-third of the ordinary salaries.[1055]

It would be impossible now to conjecture what was the amount of which the industrious and producing classes of Spain were thus despoiled, or what was the sum of misery thus inflicted, although we may estimate the retribution which followed in the disorganization of Spanish industries and the retardation of economic development. What reached the royal treasury and the money-chests of the Inquisition was but a portion of the values of which the owners were deprived. The assets taken melted in the hands of the spoilers. The expenses of the trials, which became inordinately prolonged, and the maintenance of the prisoners consumed a considerable part. Dilapidation and peculation, which even Ferdinand’s incessant vigilance could not prevent, were the source of constant loss. Even without these, the necessity for immediate realization, to supply the peremptory demands of the treasury and the tribunals, threw an enormous amount of property and goods of all kinds on the market, in forced sales which were inevitably sacrifices. It was the established rule, perpetually enunciated, that every thing, except money and securities, was to be sold at auction, the real estate on the thirtieth day after condemnation, in presence of the receiver and notary of sequestrations.[1056] Notwithstanding all precautions, collusion and fraud were perpetual. It was doubtless as an effort to check them that Valdés, in 1547, ordered that real estate or censos, or government securities should not be sold without consulting the Suprema, together with an attested statement of past income and probable proceeds, and this was followed, in 1553, with an order that property in litigation was not to be sold.[1057] Precautions however were unavailing. The memorial of 1623 to the Suprema remarks that there are many opportunities for human wickedness in the sequestration, valuation and sale of sequestrated property; the valuations are habitually too low and the sales are made at the lowest prices. Whenever possible, property should be brought to the city of the tribunal, be properly valued and the receiver be forbidden to sell it for less. When sales have to be made at the place of arrest, they should be by public auction, in the presence of the commissioner and of a familiar, to see that just prices are obtained.[1058] The Suprema seems to have mooned over this until 1635, when it called for reports as to the manner in which the auctions were held and whether just prices were obtained; if the property was in some small place it must be brought to a larger town to prevent fraud.[1059]

During the period of active confiscation, moreover, when the moneyed classes were either ruined or anticipating ruin, it was sometimes impossible to effect sales and, in the pressure and confusion, property was allowed to go to waste. A letter of March 20, 1512, to the receiver of Huesca and Lérida, speaks of the uninhabited houses and lands which had not been sold, because fair prices could not be had, and which were perishing in consequence, and he was told to see whether he could not sell them on ground-rent, redeemable or irredeemable.[1060] It is impossible not to see in this the commencement of the despoblados which were the despair of Spanish statesmen for more than two centuries. So, in 1531, the dwelling in Játiva of Juan Sanz, on whom it was confiscated, was allowed to fall into such disrepair that no one would take it subject to the incumbrances, and the rentals did not meet the ground-rents, so it was abandoned to the incumbrancers.[1061]

DILAPIDATION

The manner in which property melted away is seen in the settlement, made in 1519, of the estate of Mayor de Monzon, burnt for heresy. It was appraised at 110,197 maravedís, but against this were the expenses of the woman and her children while in prison, amounting to 41,100, and the widower, Diego de Adrade, finally agreed to take the estate for 17,000 maravedís, subject to whatever claims there might be against it.[1062] Everybody concerned grasped at what he could. In 1532, the Valencia tribunal sent Rafael Diego to Majorca to arrest and fetch Leonor Juan, wife of Ramon Martin who was blind. She was reconciled with confiscation and Charles V made a grant to the husband of a hundred libras from the estate, but when the account was made up the expenses did not leave enough to pay him. One item against which he protested was twenty-five ducats to Diego for twenty days’ work, when his salary was only eighty ducats a year; the Suprema consequently suspended the item but, in 1545, Inquisitor-general Tavera ordered it to be paid.[1063]

It is perhaps superfluous to insist upon what was inevitable in an age when integrity was exceptional in public affairs, and in a business affording peculiar temptations to malversation, through the fluctuating uncertainty of receipts and the difficulty of effecting competent supervision. Ferdinand did his best to establish accountability, and his incessant activity exhibits itself in his minute criticisms on his auditor’s reports of the accounts of receivers, but even his vigilance could not prevent frauds and peculation, nor was it possible for him to penetrate the mysteries lurking behind statements of receipts and expenditures, when the receivers were apt to use the funds as their own. When Juan Denbin, the receiver of Saragossa, died and his accounts were balanced, after all possible allowances were made, he was found, in 1500, to owe 9367 sueldos, which Ferdinand vainly endeavored to collect from his heir, the Abbot of Veruela. Denbin’s deputy at Calatayud improved on his example and was found, in 1499, to be short 24,000 sueldos, of which he paid 8000 and promised the rest at the rate of 4000 a year; the installment of 1500 was obtained after some delay and, when we last hear of him, Ferdinand was endeavoring to secure that of 1501.[1064]

It is easy to understand the chronic reluctance of such officials to render statements, and Ferdinand’s correspondence shows how difficult it was to force them to do so. There is much suggestiveness in a letter of October 15, 1498, to the Maestre Racional or Auditor-general of Catalonia, telling him that, as Jayme de la Ram, the former receiver, and Pedro de Badia, the present one, refuse under various pretexts to hand over their books so that their accounts can be settled, he is to take legal steps to compel it; they can have until March 1, 1499, to obey and, if they still refuse, their salaries are to be stopped. When the books are obtained no time is to be lost in striking a balance, and especial care is to be taken that they do not give themselves fraudulent credits. Juan de Montaña, receiver of Huesca and Lérida was another whose accounts were chronically in arrear.[1065] This continued to the end of Ferdinand’s reign. In 1515 we find him writing to a receiver, who had flatly refused to obey an order of Ximenes to go to Valencia with his books and papers and render an account of his collections, for persistence in which the king threatened him with prosecution.[1066] After his death Ximenes labored energetically to evoke order out of disorder. He appointed a receiver-general, with power to collect by levy, execution and sale, all moneys due by the receivers, and all fines, penances, commutations and rehabilitations; moreover, to a new auditor-general Hernando de Villa, he addressed a cédula, February 21, 1517, reciting that the receivers had collected from the confiscations and other sources large sums of which for a long time they had rendered no account, wherefore he was instructed to visit every tribunal, to demand an accounting from the receiver, to examine all papers and vouchers and ascertain the balances due, while all notaries were instructed to furnish whatever documents he might call for, and he was empowered to enforce his orders with punishment at discretion.[1067]

PRODUCTIVENESS

Possibly this may have produced improvement, but if so it was but temporary. We have just seen how recalcitrant about his accounts was Pedro de Badia, the receiver of Barcelona; he did not improve and when he died, in 1513, he left his office in bad condition. He was replaced by Martin de Marrano, transferred from Majorca, who proved to be no better. In 1520 Cardinal Adrian, to punish him, reduced his salary to 2880 sueldos and then, April 16, 1521, wrote a long and indignant letter to the inquisitors, principally devoted to Marrano’s misdeeds, among which was refusal to settle his accounts and alleging claims for which he had no vouchers. Yet, to all appearances, with the inexplicable tenderness shown to official culprits, he was retained in office.[1068] The tribunal of Sicily, where the confiscations were large, was in even worse hands. Diego de Obregon, who served as receiver from 1500 to 1514, left its affairs in lamentable confusion. He was succeeded by Garcí Cid, who was sent to reduce it to order. How he accomplished this is seen in a report of Benito Mercader, sent as inspector, describing the financial management as characterized by every vice, while peculation was rife among all the officials. Garcí Cid returned to Spain in 1520 and it was not until 1542 that the Suprema ordered him to pay the 1420 ducats, which he was found to owe, as well as what he had collected of 9300 more which were charged against him.[1069] Things did not mend for, as we have seen, Zurita, who became Auditor-general for Aragon in 1548, describes his untangling of the Sicilian accounts, which had not been received for twenty years and were in the utmost disorder.[1070]