The Black Legend of the Spanish Inquisition is the hypothesised existence of a series of myths and fabrications about the Spanish Inquisition used as propaganda against the Spanish Empire in a time of strong military, commercial and political rivalry between European powers, starting in the 16th century. According to its advocates, Protestant propaganda depicted inquisitions of Catholic monarchs as the epitome of human barbarity with fantastic scenes of torture, witch hunting, and evil friars. Proponents of the theory see it as part of the Spanish Black Legend propaganda, as well as of anti-Catholic propaganda, and one of the most recurrent black legend themes.
Black legend
According to the black legend theory, the factual reality of the Spanish Inquisition was distorted, turning it into a phenomenon of religious intolerance in which torture was practised. The theory supposes that it was mixed with fabrications and blown out of proportion: the argument is that the number of victims claimed would account for one third of the population and impact the economy in ways that were not observed; moreover, the advocates of the theory point to the fantastic descriptions of torture devices and stories of sadism and the mutilation of millions of people, and claim they were fabricated in propaganda workshops.art by Theodor de Bry
Supporters of the theory argue that the context was ignored: both religious intolerance and torture were common practices all across Europe, and among the manifestations of it, the Spanish inquisition was among the most mellow ones according to the theory.Haliczer, Stephen, Inquisition and society in the kingdom of Valencia, 1478-1834, p. 79, University of California Press, 1990Peters, Edward, Inquisition, Dissent, Heterodoxy and the Medieval Inquisitional Office, pp. 92–93, University of California Press (1989), . It was the first judicial body in Europe that operated according to a system and not to judicial discretion: Torture was restricted to 15 minutes per session and only allowed on adults under very specific conditions for a set number of times.Bethencourt, Francisco. La Inquisition En La Época Moderna: España, Portugal E Italia, Silos Xv-xix. Madrid: Akal, 1997. Inquisitors couldn't draw blood, mutilate or cause any permanent harm to victims,Kamen, Henry (1998). The Spanish Inquisition: a Historical Revision. Yale University Press. . so waterboarding was the most common method, as opposed to the fantastic devices portrayed in propaganda.Scott, George Riley, The History of Torture Throughout the Ages, p. 172, Columbia University Press (2003) . A doctor had to be present. (most inquisitors didn't believe in witchcraft etc...)
In Kamen's view, the Black Legend turns a relatively regular or unremarkable event into something exceptional in scope and nature, attached to one nation alone. As such, the Black Legend of the Inquisition is created to demonize the other - Spain and/or Catholicism - and maintained as self-justification for those whose own deeds are overshadowed or ignored.
Origin
KamenKamen, Henry (1999). The Spanish Inquisition: A Historical Revision. Yale University Press, establishes two sources for the Black Legend of the Spanish Inquisition. Firstly, an Italian Catholic origin, and secondly, a Protestant background in Central and Northern Europe. Most historians place the bulk of the weight on the Protestant and Calvinist origin, since in the Italian propaganda Spaniards were more often portrayed as atheists or Jews than as fanatics.Elvira, Roca Barea María, and Arcadi Espada. Imperiofobia Y Leyenda Negra: Roma, Rusia, Estados Unidos Y El Imperio Español. Madrid: Siruela, 2017
Italy The increasing influence during the sixteenth century of the Aragonese Crown and later of the Spanish one on the Italian Peninsula led public opinion, and the Papacy, to see the Spaniards as a threat. An unfavorable image of Spain grew that ended up involving a negative view of the Inquisition. Revolts against the Inquisition in Spanish Crown territories in Sicily occurred in 1511 and 1526 and mere rumors of the future establishment of tribunals caused riots in Naples in 1547 and 1564.
According to the theory of the Black Legend, ambassadors of the independent Italian governments promoted the image of an impoverished Spain dominated by a tyrannical Inquisition. In 1525, Venetian ambassador Contarini said that all people trembled before the Inquisition. Another ambassador, Tiepolo, wrote in 1563 that everyone was afraid of its authority, which had absolute power over property, life, honor and even the souls of men. He also commented that the King favored it as a way to control the population. Ambassador Soranzo asserted in 1565 that the Inquisition had greater authority than the King. Francesco Guicciardini, Florentine ambassador at the court of Charles I, stated that Spaniards were "in appearance religious, but not in reality", almost the same words by Tiepolo in 1536.
In general, Italians considered the Inquisition as a necessary evil for the Spaniards, whose religion the Italians viewed as questionable if not false, after centuries of mixing with Jews and moriscos.Arnoldsson (1960), p.20-22, 95; Peters (1989), p.132; García Cárcel (1997), p.27-29; Kamen (1999), p. 309 In fact, after 1492, the word marrano became synonymous with Spaniard and Pope Alexander VI was called the "circumcised marrano". In contrast, Italians viewed placing an Inquisition in Italy as unnecessary, because they felt Spaniards were by nature more prone to heresy than pious Italians. In addition, the Papal Inquisition had been operating in Naples as a way of controlling the territory since the Middle Ages. One of the reasons why Spain wanted to introduce the Spanish Inquisition was precisely to counter or reduce that "foreign" influence in Spanish territory, and as such the Pope and powers rival to Spain encouraged disobedience to try and preserve their power in Naples.The Papacy and the Levant, 1204-1571. Setton, Kenneth Meyer. American Philosophical Society, 1984
However, Italian sources can hardly be considered as part of the construction legend, since their deformation of the facts is not systematic and sustained through time, but a temporary reaction to having a foreign institution imposed upon them; however, they may have been used out of context once the legend was established.
Habsburg Spain
The Spanish Inquisition was one of the administrative and judicial arms of the Spanish Crown. It was created, among other things, to keep powerful noble families and the Roman Catholic Church in check. These sectors of society had the power to dispute, or dodge, the authority of the king at a local level, and were among the demographic groups with higher literacy rates, higher wealth, and more amicable international relations. The main role of the Inquisition was to prevent internal division in the empire, and the fragmentation of power and local coalitions to dispute royal power were an important part of this cohesion as well. It investigated nobles who were suspected of putting their own local interests over the interests of the crown, as well as the Pope's desires to intervene and gain control over the Empire, usually with the aid of foreign powers, which were usually Protestant. As an independent body from the Pope, the Spanish Inquisition also had the ability to judge clergy for both corruption and treason without the interference of the Pope, allowing the king to hold clergy accountable in his realm and limit Papal influence in it. As a consequence, the Inquisition systematically ruffled the feathers of powerful people within the Spanish Empire and the Vatican.
The Spanish Inquisition's trial records show that the vast majority of persons it investigated and prosecuted by itself were nobles and clerics. Investigations against middle- and lower-class people were usually the result of denunciation by neighbors and were rarely initiated by the institution itself. Compared to other classes of people put on trial, nobility and clergy were also far more likely to be found guilty and convicted. The Inquisition was more lenient on uneducated lay Spaniards than civil tribunals or royal prisons—where inmates were subject to food deprivation and unrestricted torture—and less favorable to powerful people than civil courts, which would not have held such people accountable at all. The sectors the Spanish Inquisition was designed to address and control also had the education and resources to write and spread criticism of it and sought to benefit from doing so. Either by accident or design, the unfavorable accounts from Spain's international nobility constituted a large number of the total accounts of the Inquisition produced.Elvira, Roca Barea María, and Arcadi Espada. Imperiofobia Y Leyenda Negra: Roma, Rusia, Estados Unidos Y El Imperio Español. Madrid: Siruela, 201
Protestantism In Northern Europe, the religious confrontation and the threat of Spanish imperial power gave birth to the Black Legend, as the small number of Protestants who were executed by the Inquisition would not have justified such a campaign. Protestants, who had successfully used the press to disseminate their ideas, tried to win with propaganda the war they could not win by force of arms.Madden, Thomas F. (2004). "The Real Inquisition: Investigating the popular myth.", National Review
On one hand, Catholic theologians criticized the Protestants as newcomers, who, unlike the Catholic Church could not prove a continuity from the time of Christ. On the other hand, Protestants theologians reasoned that this was not true and that theirs was the true Church which had been oppressed and persecuted by the Catholic Church throughout history. This reasoning, which was only outlined by Luther and Calvin, was fleshed out by later Protestant historiography identified with Wycliffe of the Lollards, the Hussites of Bohemia and the Waldensians of France. All this despite the fact that in the 16th century heretics were persecuted in both Catholic and Protestant countries.. The Protestant Inquisition . By the end of the 16th century the Protestant denominations had identified with the heretics of previous times and defined them as martyrs. The Protestant Inquisition .
When the persecution of Protestants started in Spain the hostility felt towards the Pope was immediately extended to include the King of Spain, on whom the Inquisition depended, and the Dominicans who carried it out. After all, the greatest defeat suffered by the Protestants had been at the hands of Charles I of Spain in the battle of Mühlberg in 1547. An image of Spain as the champion of Catholicism spread throughout Europe. This image was in part promoted by the Spanish crown.
This identification by the Protestants with heretics from the time of the conversion of Imperial Rome until the 15th century lad to the creation of martyrologies in Protestant countries, description of the lives of martyrs in morbid detail, usually heavily illustrated, that circulated among the poorer classes and which incited indignation against the Catholic Church. One of the most famous and influential was the Book of Martyrs by John Foxe (1516–1587). Foxe dedicated an entire chapter to the Spanish Inquisition: The execrable Inquisition of Spayne.The execrable Inquisition of Spayne on John Foxe's Book of Martyrs Extract:
Many of the themes that are repeated later on are to be found in this text: anyone can be tried for any triviality; the Inquisition is infallible; people are usually accused to gain money, because of jealousy, or to hide the actions of the Inquisition; if proof is not found it is invented; the prisoners are isolated with no contact with the outside world in dark dungeons where they suffer horrible torture etc. Foxe warned that this sinister organization could be introduced into any country that accepted the Catholic faith.