Don Francis d'Aragon, Duke de Villahermosa, Count de Ribagorza, did not escape the persecution, although he had the advantage of being of royal blood, being descended from John II. King of Aragon and Navarre, by his son Don Alphonso d'Aragon. In his trial before the Inquisition he was not accused of having opposed the measures of the tribunal during the insurrections, or of taking any part in them: but Don Francis Torralba, lieutenant to the chief justice (who had been deprived of his office in consequence of some serious complaints of Perez), pretended that the duke was, by the nature of his blood, an enemy to the holy tribunal, since he descended from Jews, who had been burnt and subjected to penances, by Estengua Conejo, a Jewess, who, on her baptism, took the name of Mary Sanchez, and afterwards became the wife or concubine of Don Alphonso d'Aragon, first Duke of Villahermosa, and grandfather to the present duke, whom he denounced. Torralba minutely detailed the proofs of what he asserted.
When the inhabitants of Saragossa resolved to oppose the entrance of the Castilian army in their city, the duke, according to the laws of the kingdom, offered his services to the chief justice. The royal commissioner, not satisfied with his trial before the Inquisition, arrested him on the 19th of December, and sent him into Castile, in contempt of another law of the Fuero. The duke was beheaded at Burgos, as convicted of treason; his property was confiscated, and the king bestowed the duchy on the next in succession.
The Count d'Aranda, Don Louis Ximenez de Urrea, was also arrested on the 19th of December, but died in the prison of Alaejos, on the 4th of August, 1592. It appears from his trial by the Inquisition, that when Perez was sent to the prison of the kingdom, he declared himself his protector, according to a promise he had given to the wife of Perez at Madrid; that he was one of the principal instigators of the popular commotions; that he had influenced the lawyers, who declared the act, by which Perez was consigned a second time to the Inquisition, to be illegal; and lastly, that he had assisted in the military arrangements for the resistance of the royal troops. It has been already stated, that Diego de Heredia accused the Count d'Aranda and Antonio Perez of having conspired against the life of the Marquis d'Almenara. This deposition is not found in the trial, but Don Diego declared he had already informed the senator Lanz, while he was imprisoned by that magistrate. But if the circumstances independent of this conspiracy may be considered as crimes, why did Philip after the first revolt write to request him to lend assistance to the authorities, and afterwards to thank him for having so well performed his mission? It must excite indignation, to see a powerful monarch deceiving his subjects, and punishing them by surprise.
The Count de Morata, Don Michael Martinez de Luna, Viceroy of Aragon, was denounced to the Inquisition, after the insurrection of Saragossa. It appears that he blamed the conduct of the tribunal and the civil authorities towards Perez. Some witnesses supposed that he was one of the principal instigators of the first insurrection; but that afterwards learning that Philip had said that Perez was an unfaithful minister, he ceased to defend him. This is certainly an historical error, for the declaration of the king concerning Perez was made in August, 1590, after the act by which the king abandoned the prosecution relating to the death of Escobedo, and the insurrections at Saragossa took place in May, 1591. The change in the opinions of Martinez de Luna must have had some other cause. Some circumstances in his trial lead to the belief that he was acquainted with the proceedings of the council appointed at Madrid to consider the affairs, and that he foresaw that the consequences would be serious, which induced him to change his system.
When he was made viceroy, the inquisitor suppressed the preparatory instruction of the trial, and the decree of arrest which had already been resolved upon. The tribunal had received another information against the Count in 1577, concerning some ill-sounding propositions, but they had not sufficient proof to proceed upon.
Although the inquisitors had been so indulgent to the count, he was not devoted to their party. His indifference induced the fiscal to bring a complaint against him in 1592, and to require that he should be arrested. He founded his requisition on the following allegation: the inquisitor-general Quiroga had published an edict of grace in favour of all the criminals who had not been arrested, that they might be absolved from all censures; and this edict having been communicated to the count before the publication, he declared that it was impertinent, useless, and ridiculous. The fiscal gave this as an instance of the contempt of the count for the censures under which he pretended that he had fallen, as the principal instigator of the first revolt. Some other expressions were construed into a sign of his hatred of the Inquisition.
It is certain that the count would not have escaped the vengeance of the Inquisitors, in his quality of viceroy. When he quitted his office they were fully occupied with other trials, and his affair was too unimportant, and too old, to attract the attention of their successors. The opinion of the count on the edict of grace was very just. This grace was not accorded until the inquisitors had celebrated a solemn auto-da-fé in which seventy-nine inhabitants of the town were relaxed, and a much greater number of honourable persons condemned to infamy, on pretence of publicly absolving them from censure; besides that, those already in prison were excluded from the pardon.
After the executions of the chief justice, the Duke de Villahermosa, and the Count d'Aranda, the king granted a general pardon on the 24th December, 1592, with the exception of many individuals who had excited and directed the sedition. This edict saved the lives of several thousand Aragonese; palliating circumstances afterwards caused the capital punishment to be remitted to all those who were excepted in the general pardon.
The Baron de Barboles, Don Diego Fernandez de Heredia, brother and presumptive heir to the Count de Fuentes, a grandee of Spain, was to have been arrested by the Inquisition; but he was taken by order of Vargas, claimed his privilege, and was taken to the prison of the Manifestados, and on the 9th of October, 1592, had his head struck off at the back of the neck as guilty of treason. He had made several depositions before the Senator Lanz, and all that concerned Antonio Perez was communicated to the inquisitors; he had already been examined twice on that subject as a witness of the fiscal, and deposed to a great number of facts which proved that he had excited the people, and kept up the rebellion with the Count d'Aranda and others, and that he was engaged in the plan to assassinate the Marquis d'Almenara, but that he repented and revoked the orders he had given concerning it; nevertheless some witnesses deposed that they had seen him in the road encouraging the assassins. The Baron de Barboles also declared that he was the principal author of the complaint brought by Antonio Perez before the ordinary judge of Saragossa, against the secretary, major-domo, and squire of the Marquis d'Almenara and several other persons, whom he accused of having, by order of the marquis, suborned several witnesses in 1591, to depose against Perez several facts required by the inquisitors; that he had directed and instigated the efforts which were made to find witnesses to confirm by their declarations the articles of their complaint, and that he had deposed as from himself what he had only heard from the agent of Perez.
Another inquest against Don Diego existed in the Inquisition, in which he was accused of having made use of necromancy to discover treasures, and sending horses to France. The Judge Torralba also deposed that he had heard it said that Don Diego had been arrested by the Inquisition of Valencia for having concealed a Moresco from an alguazil; he added that it was not surprising that Don Diego was an enemy to the holy office, because though the blood of his ancestors had not been sullied by that of the Jews, his children had not that advantage, since his wife, the Baroness d'Alcaraz, was of Jewish origin.