Introduction
When the crypto-Jew Francisco Maldonado de Silva was arrested by the Inquisition in Concepción de Chile in 1627, on the accusation of judaizing, officials of the tribunal in Lima immediately sequestered and inventoried his possessions (at least those considered to be of value), a procedure that followed every arrest. The inventory they drew up, while not giving us a full account of the family’s household contents, offers considerable insight into the conditions of life of a distant descendant of forcibly baptized Portuguese Jews, a creole living in a frontier town in the Viceroyalty of Peru.
Maldonado de Silva was born in Tucumán province, located today in Argentina near the Chilean border, to a surgeon of Portuguese New Christian origin and an Old Christian mother. He followed in his father’s footsteps, becoming a surgeon, marrying an Old Christian woman, and struggling to achieve economic security. Although he lived modestly with his wife and child, the inventory of his belongings reflects the kind of effort Europeans and creoles in Spanish America made to maintain a European style of life. The household included four slaves, one with an infant. Two mules and a horse provided the family’s transportation, but the inventory mentions only one saddle, for a mule. The list of clothing and linen – ordinarily the greatest household investment for colonial Spaniards – reveals several items imported from Europe, including a number of articles manufactured in Rouen. The furnishings were quite spare. A number of the belongings are described by the inquisitorial notary as “worn,” “somewhat worn,” or “old.”
Given the extreme asceticism to which Maldonado de Silva subjected himself during the twelve years he spent in an inquisitorial prison, it is striking to note among the belongings found in his possession a hairshirt – evidence, perhaps, of a crypto-Jewish piety that borrowed from Spanish Catholic practices. The inventory notably fails to mention any explicitly Catholic object – a crucifix or a rosary; but such items may have been given to Maldonado’s wife along with her clothing.
What stands out in the inventory is Maldonado de Silva’s large library of books from Europe – many but not all of them on medical subjects. Unfortunately, the notary often lists the “title” as simply the author’s name – for example, “Plinio” (Pliny). The library contains both classics of medical science (Galen, Vesalius, Avicenna) and more recent medical works, as well as manuals on surgery, obstetrics, and pharmacology. At least some of the books were inherited from Maldonado’s father, including a copy of Paulo de Santa Maria’s Scrutinium Scripturarum – an important work in Maldonado de Silva’s crypto-judaizing career. The one work of belles-lettres that can be clearly identified is a collection of comedies by the popular Spanish playwright Lope de Vega, who at the time of Maldonado’s arrest was still active.
In 1638, Maldonado’s wife made the long journey to Lima to plead with the tribunal to recognize her great need and grant her compensation for her dowry, giving her the use of the sequestered house and land and having the slaves auctioned. The tribunal argued that she had already been compensated. After she provided the legal proof needed, the slaves were sold, and she received 200 pesos. However, she did not receive them until after Maldonado de Silva had been burned at the stake as a pertinacious judaizer in January, 1639.
Bibliography
Bauer, Arnold. Goods, Power, History: Latin America’s Material Culture. Cambridge 2001.
Bodian, Miriam. Dying in the Law of Moses: Crypto-Jewish Martyrdom in the Iberian World. Bloomington 2007. (See especially Chapter 5.)
Böhm, Günter. Historia de los judíos en Chile. Vol. 1, El Bachiller Francisco Maldonado de Silva, 1592-1639. Santiago de Chile 1984.
Lea, Henry Charles. A History of the Inquisition of Spain. 4 vols. New York 1906-1907. “Confiscation,” vol. 2, 315-387.
Van Young, Eric. “Material Life,” in Louisa Hoberman and Susan Socolaw, eds., The Countryside in Colonial Latin America (Albuquerque 1996), 49-74.
Source 1 Translation
Inventory of the possessions of the licentiate
Francisco Maldonado de Silva
Inventorio
1627
The city of Concepción [Chile], April 29, 1627.
The district chief Don Francisco de Avendaño, carrying out the orders of the illustrious inquisitors in Lima, with the assistance of Juan de Minaya, deputy to the chief treasurer of the Holy Office, has drawn up an inventory of the possessions of the licentiate Francisco Maldonado de Silva, who was arrested today at the order of the said inquisitors. He drew up the inventory at the residence of the aforementioned licentiate, as follows:
First, these houses, with all their structures and the plot of land.
A female mulatto slave named Catalina, about fifty years old.
A female negro named Isabel of Angolan origin, about twenty-four years old, with a daughter at her breast of about one year old, named Ana. A male negro named Simon of Angolan origin, about twenty years old.
A negro youth named Francisco of Angolan origin, about twelve years old
Four chairs from Lima with gilded nails, somewhat worn
A backless saddle [silla rasa] with a plain leather cover, with a mule harness, both somewhat worn.
A “hundred-weight chest” [i.e., capable of holding a hundred-weight] from Panama with a lock, and inside of it the following: Three quires of paper. A hairshirt [or belt?] of horsehair, to encircle the body. An old doublet of black fabric. A cape of old black fabric. Another cloak with black gorborán [gurbión? = piping], of worn and tattered silk.
A length and a half of black Castilian baize.
An old travel bag [or mattress cover?] of coarse gray cloth
An old mattress of _melinje
_A new white blanket with ribbon braiding [listada].
Two worn Rouen sheets.
A pillow and a small Rouen cushion, both stuffed and worn.
An old woolen bedspread.
Two worn Rouen shirts with two pairs of breeches.
A book titled Aguilera de medicina.
Another book, hand-written, titled Práctica de Silva.
Another, _Práctica Gordoni.
_Another called Filotrium.
Another, Second Part of Ventilis Superterci Avicenis. [1]
Another book titled Pronosticorum Hipócrates. [2]
Another book titled Escrutinium Escriturarum. [3]
Another titled Petri Andrei Matioli Medice Senensis. [4]
Another titled Medicorum Insipiensum Medicina.
Another titled Muñoz Zambrano.
Another, white, titled De mano antidotario general, reletuarios escripto en algunas partes.
Another titled Rosa Anglica Practica Medicini.
Another book titled Controversianum Francici Valesi Covarrubiani.[5]
Another book titled Diez Privilegios para mujeres preñadas compuesto por el doctor Juan Alonso. [6]
Another book titled Cien oraciones fúnebres.
Another book titled Sumulas de Toledo.
Another book titled De Medica Historia. [7]
Another titled Tesoro de la verdadera cirujía. [8]
Another book titled Pintus in Esequielem.
Another titled Historia de la composición del cuerpo humano by Juan de Valverde Amusco. [9]
Another titled Verdadera medicina cirujía y astrología.
Another titled Pereira médico de Medina del Campo. [10]
Another book titled Matu el Prima.
Another titled Cirujía de Guido con la glosa de Falcón.
Another titled Plinio.
Another titled Galeno.
Another titled Ambrosio Calepino. [11]
Another titled Galeno Sexta Clase.
Another titled Galeno Quinta Clase.
Another titled Práctica Sabornarum de Febribus. [12]
Another titled Pedacio dioscóridas. [13]
Another titled Galeni Prima Clase.
Another book titled Comedias de Lope de Vega.
Another titled Juanes Lupi medici de Remedica.
Another titled Manardus.
Another titled Secreto de Medicina.
Another titled Los nombres de Cristo in three volumes. [14]
Another titled Emblemas Morales de Don Juan de Orozco. [15]
Another book titled Pronosticorum Hipocratis. [already listed above]
Another titled De las drogas y medicinas de las Indias orientales.
Another book, hand-written, titled Antidotario.
Another titled Antidotario Generalis.
Another book titled Pascali Práctica.
Another titled Salmi Davidis. [16]
Another titled Tractatus de Lex Rebus.
Another titled Antonio Juan Manuel.
Another titled propiedades de piedras.
Another titled Aforismos de Valles.
Another titled Proposición cirúgica.
Another titled Práctica de Bolerio.
Another titled Andrés Vesali. [17]
Another titled el Doctor Monardes. [18]
Another titled El doctor Farfán.
Another titled Predictorio de Lemus.
An old desk with an old table cloth.
Two old brass candlesticks.
And aside from all the abovementioned items, inventoried by the district chief, the deputy to the chief treasurer of the Holy Office, Juan de Minaya, searched the abovementioned house to see if there were any other possessions, in addition to those inventoried, in order to sequester and inventory them. Having searched the house and its rooms, he said he had found nothing but some pots and baskets in which there seemed to be some wheat. And immediately the district chief, to verify this inventory, administered an oath in the prescribed manner from Antonio Yañez de Zurita, the brother-in-law of Francisco Maldonado, who declared that he did not know of any possessions in this house or outside of it aside from those that had been inventoried, and affirmed that the licenciado [Maldonado de Silva] had in the royal pasture two mules and a horse in the care of the potrerizo, and that this was the truth by the oath he had taken; and he signed the oath. All the abovementioned possessions were placed in the charge of Francisco Arias, a resident of this city, who was present during the inventorying and sequestration. This deposit was done to the satisfaction of Juan de Minaya, deputy of the chief treasurer. And the two men, both of them separately in solidum [jointly], promised to take responsibility for these possessions, and to be able to account for them whenever so requested by the illustrious inquisitors, and guaranteed them with their own persons and possessions, present and future, and the transfer was authorized as required. And they signed, and a witness who was present, el sargento Juan Delgado y Juan Ruiz de León, signed for Francisco Arias.
[signatures:] Don Francisco de Avendaño. Juan de Minaya. Por Francisco Arias, Juan Ruiz de León. Antonio Yañez Zurita.
Done before me, Marcos Antonio de Aguilar, Notario del Santo Oficio.
Pza. 1a. Archivo de Fondos Varios, vol. 268, Archivo Nacional, Santiago, Chile.
Published in Günter Böhm, Historia de los judíos en Chile. Vol. 1, El Bachiller Francisco Maldonado de Silva, 1592-1639 (Santiago de Chile 1984), 231-233.
Endnotes
[1] . A Latin translation of a medical work by the eleventh-century Persian physician and scholar Avicenna?
[2]This is a medical work attributed to Hippocrates.
[3]Scrutinium scripturarum, a polemical anti-Jewish work by the fourteenth-century baptized Jew Pablo de Santa Maria, which Maldonado de Silva read for insights into Judaism.
[4]A work by the sixteenth-century physician Pietro Andrea Mattioli.
[5]Francisco Vallés de Covarrubias, Controverisarium medicarum et philosophicarum (1556).
[6]Juan Alonso de los Ruyzes de Fontecha, Diez privilegios para mujeres preñadas (Alcalá de Henares 1606).
[7]Marcello Donati, De medica historia mirabilis libri sex (Mantua 1586).
[8]Bartolomé Agüero, Thesoro de la verdadera cirugía y via particular contra la comun (Barcelona 1624).
[9]A work on human anatomy printed in Rome in 1556.
[10]Presumably a work by Gómez Pereira, a sixteenth-century Spanish philosopher, physician, and humanist.
[11]Ambrogio Calepino compiled a dictionary of Latin and several other languages, published in 1502. Many subsequent editions were published. The Basle edition of 1590 had eleven languages.
[12]A work by the fifteenth-century Italian physician and humanist Michele Savonarola, Práctica Savonarola de Febribus.
[13] . Pedacius Dioscorides, _Pedacio Dioscorides Anazarbeo, acerca de la material medicinal y de los venenos mortiferos…_translated from Greek to Castilian by Andres de Laguna (Antwerp 1555; Salamanca 1563). This was a translation by Andrés Laguna de Segovia, the sixteenth-century Spanish converso physician and humanist, of De Materia Medica by the first-century Greek physician and pharmacologist Dioscorides.
[14]A sixteenth-century theological work by the controversial converso Fray Luis de León.
[15]A popular sixteenth-century emblem book by Juan de Horozco y Covarrubias. [16]Almost certainly Gilbert Genebrard, Psalmi Davidis vulgate editione, calendario Hebreaeo, Syro, Graeco, Latino… (Paris 1577). Genebrard was a Christian Hebraist, whose book contained a Hebrew calendar and a commentary on Psalms that made use of rabbinic commentaries.
[17]A work by the sixteenth-century medical scientist Andreas Vesalius – perhaps the abridged version of his great seven-volume work De humani corporus fabrica.
[18]A work by the sixteenth-century Spanish physician and botanist Nicolás Monardes.
Source 1 Original Text
Primeramente estas casas con lo edificado en ellas y solar.
Item una mulata esclava llamada Catalina de edad de cincuenta años poco más o menos. Item una negra llamada Isabel de casta Angola de edad de veinte y cuatro años poco más o menos con una hija a los pechos de edad de un año poco más o menos llamada Ana. Item un negro llamado Simón de casta Angola de edad de veinte años poco más o menos.
Item un negrito llamado Francisco de casta Angola de doce años poco más o menos. Item cuatro sillas de sentar de Lima con sus clavos dorados a medio traer.
Una silla rasa con una coraza llana de cordobán y su freno de mula todo a medio traer. Una caja quintaleña de Panamá con su cerradura y dentro de ella lo siguiente. Tres manos de papel. Un silicio para ceñir el cuerpo de cerdas. Una ropilla vieja de paño negro. Una capa de paño negro vieja.
Item otra capa de gorbarán negro de seda traída y rota.
Vara y media de bayeta negra de Castilla.
Un almofrez viejo de jerga parda.
Un colchón viejo de melinje.
Una frazada nueva blanca listada.
Dos sábanas de ruan traídas.
Una almohada y acerico y ruan llenas y traídas.
Una sobrecama de lana vieja
Dos camisas de ruan traídas con dos pares de calzones.
Item un libro intitulado Aguilera de medicina.
Otro libro escrito de mano intitulado Práctica de Silva.
Otra Práctica Gordoni.
Otro llamado Filotrium.
Otro Segunda parte Ventilis Superterci Avicenis.
Otro libro titulado Pronosticorum Hipócrates.
Otro libro intitulado Escrutinium Escriturarum.
Otro intitulado Petri Andrei Matioli Medice Senensis.
Otro intitulado Medicorum Insipiensum Medicina.
Otro libro intitulado Muñoz Zambrano.
Otro blanco intitulado De mano antidotario general, reletuarios escripto en algunas partes.
Otro intitulado Rosa Anglica Practica Medicini.
Otro libro intitulado Controversianum Francici Valesi Covarrubiani.
Otro libro intitulado Diez Privilegios para mujeres preñadas compuesto por el doctor Juan Alonso.
Otro libro intitulado de Cien oraciones fúnebres.
Otro libro intitulado Sumulas de Toledo.
Otro libro intitulado De Medica Historia.
Otro intitulado Tesoro de la verdadera cirujía.
Otro libro intitulado Pintus in Esequielem.
Otro intitulado Historia de la composición del cuerpo humano por Juan de Valverde Amusco.
Otro intitulado Verdadera medicina cirujía y astrología.
Otro intitulado Pereira médico de Medina del Campo.
Otro libro intitulado Matu el Prima.
Otro intitulado Cirujía de Guido con la glosa de Falcón.
Otro intitulado Plinio.
Otro intitulado Galeno.
Otro intitulado Ambrosio Calepino.
Otro intitulado Galeno Sexta Clase.
Otro intitulado Galeno Quinta Clase.
Otro intitulado Práctica Sabornarum de Febribus.
Otro intitulado Pedacio dioscóridas.
Otro intitulado Galeni Prima Clase.
Otro libro intitulado Comedias de Lope de Vega.
Otro intitulado Juanes Lupi medici de Remedica.
Otro intitulado Manardus.
Otro intitulado Secreto de Medicina.
Otro intitulado Los nombres de Cristo en tres libros.
Otro intitulado Emblemas Morales de Don Juan de Orozco.
Otro libro intitulado Pronosticorum Hipocratis.
Otro intitulado De las drogas y medicinas de las Indias orientales.
Otro libro de mano intitulado Antidotario.
Otro intitulado Antidotario Generalis.
Otro libro intitulado Pascali Práctica.
Otro intitulado Salmi Davidis.
Otro intitulado Tractatus de Lex Rebus. Otro intitulado Antonio Juan Manuel. Otro intitulado propiedades de piedras. Otro intitulado Aforismos de Valles. Otro intitulado Proposición cirúgica. Otro intitulado Práctica de Bolerio.
Otro intitulado Andrés Vesali.
Otro intitulado el Doctor Monardes. Otro intitulado El doctor Farfán.
Otro intitulado Predictorio de Lemus. Un bufete viejo con una sobremesa vieja. Oten dos candeleros viejos de azófar.
Y demas de todos los dichos bienes que de suso van inventariados por el dicho maestre de campo dijo al dicho Juan de Minaya teniente de receptor general del Santo Oficio buscase y mirase toda la dicha casa y viese si en ella había más bienes más de los inventariados para que hallados se pongan en el dicho secuestro e inventario el que dijo habiendo visto toda la dicha casa y aposentos de ella que no ha visto ni hallado otro más algunos de los inventarios excepto algunas ollas y chiguas en que parece ha habido harina y luego incontinente y el dicho maestre de campo por más justificación de este dicho inventario recibió juramento en forma de derecho a Antonio Yañez de Zurita cuñado del dicho licenciado don Francisco Maldonado para que debajo del dicho juramento declare si sabe tiene el dicho licenciado más bienes en esta su casa o fuera de ella, el cual dijo que debajo de dicho juramento no sabe si tiene más bienes que los que están inventariados y que se acuerda tiene en el potrero del Rey el dicho licenciado dos mulas y un caballo a cargo del potrerizo lo que es la verdad para el juramento que ha hecho y lo firmó y de todos los dichos bienes suso referidos hizo depósito en forma en Francisco Arias vecino de esta dicha ciudad que estuvo presente a este dicho inventario y secuestro y a satisfacción del dicho Juan de Minaya teniente de receptor general se hizo este dicho depósito en el dicho Francisco Arias y ambos a dos de mancomun y cada uno de por sí insolidum se obligaron de tener los dichos bienes de sus referidos para dar cuenta de ellos siempre que se les pida por los muy ilustres señores inquisidores y a ello obligaron sus personas y bienes habidos y por haber y otorgaron depósito en forma y lo firmaron de sus nombres y por el dicho Francisco Arias un testigo que se hallaron presentes el sargento Juan Delgado y Juan Ruiz de León. (Fdo.) Don Francisco de Avendaño. Juan de Minaya. Por Francisco Arias. Juan Ruiz de León, Antonio Yañez Zurita. Ante mí. Marcos Antonio de Aguilar, Notario del Santo Oficio.
Pza. 1a. Archivo de Fondos Varios, vol. 268, Archivo Nacional, Santiago, Chile. Published in Günter Böhm, Historia de los judíos en Chile. Vol. 1, El Bachiller Francisco
Maldonado de Silva, 1592-1639 (Santiago de Chile 1984), 231-233.
Publisher: Editorial Andres Bello, Santiago de Chile, 1984. See notes/comments for details of text.
Archive: original document in the Archivo Historico Nacional, Madrid