Many Muslims and Jews converted to Christianity in medieval Spain and Portugal to avoid the dangerous wrath of the Inquisition. But Christian converts – called New Christians or conversos – tragically discovered that being baptised was no guarantee of saving their lives.
A converso is a person who converted to Christianity from Judaism during the 14th and 15th centuries. The word comes from the Spanish word convertir, which means “to convert”. Many Jews became conversos to save their lives because the Catholic Church did not tolerate heretics. The term “Morisco” is used to describe Muslims who converted to Christianity in large numbers in late Medieval Spain.
The southern half of the Iberian peninsula (modern Spain and Portugal) had been under Muslim rule for over 700 years. In 711 CE, an Arab and Berber Muslim army had invaded from Morocco bringing the entire Iberian Peninsula into the Islamic caliphate. But gradually, Christian kingdoms had formed in the northern half of the peninsula driving the Muslim ‘Moors’ southwards by slow degrees. However, in the Muslim-controlled half of what would become Spain and Portugal, many converted to Islam and a large Jewish community prospered.
There had been a large Jewish presence across the peninsula since the Roman Empire. Some sources argue that after the destruction of the Second Temple in Jerusalem by the Roman emperor Vespasian, there was an influx of Jews into this westernmost part of the empire.
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An amphora found in Ibiza with Hebrew letters in relief, indicating possible trade with Judaea. Rabbinic literature from the Amoraic era references Spain as a distant land with a Jewish presence and in the New Testament, the Epistle to the Romans mentions Saint Paul’s intention to visit Spain.
But gradually, crusader armies – with the Knights Templar in the vanguard – pushed the Muslim rulers back, in a process termed the ‘Reconquista’. The Reconquista was a series of military campaigns waged by Christian kingdoms in medieval Spain and Portugal to reclaim territory from the ‘Moors’.
It culminated, in 1492, with the final expulsion of the Islamic rulers of the emirate of Granada, marking the unification of Spain under the Catholic Monarchs: Ferdinand of Aragon and Isabella of Castile. This newly created country decided to be a kingdom of one faith only. Muslims and Jews had to convert, leave, or die.
The Alhambra Decree of 1492, mandated that all Jews either convert or leave the country, leading to mass conversions often considered not sincere and monitored by the Inquisition for potential “crypto-Judaism” practices; essentially, people were forced to outwardly embrace Christianity while secretly adhering to their original faith. Edicts and decrees issued by the Spanish monarchy, often under pressure from the Church, forcing individuals to publicly renounce their original faith and be baptised as Christians.
Threatened with being burnt at the stake as a heretic if they refused, Muslims and Jews either fled abroad or quietly converted. But being a Christian convert still left you under the suspicious gaze of both the Inquisition and your neighbours.
Christian converts killed in a grim massacre
In Lisbon last year, I chanced upon a grim memorial in the Portuguese capital. Outside a church called São Domingos is a plaque with a star of David. It’s a reminder of a massacre of Jewish people that broke out at Easter in 1506. Below are images of the memorial and the nearby church which played a very important role in the story.
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A plague was ravaging Lisbon. The King and the court had left the city. People prayed frantically for salvation from the pandemic. And suddenly, a man in the São Domingos church claimed to have seen the face of Jesus flickering on an altar rail. But a doctor praying nearby scoffed. That was just a reflection of the candle, he said. A trick of the light.
Unfortunately, the sceptic was a Christian convert from Judaism. The mood among the congregation was so ugly and visceral that they beat the convert to death. But worse was to come. The church was under the control of the Dominican friars – an order set up in the 13th century to spearhead the Catholic Inquisition. Their first target had been the Cathar heretics in France.
Now they offered the people of Lisbon a dreadful promise – if they killed hundreds of Jews during the Easter period, their sins would be absolved. The mob killed all the Christian converts in the church and then moved to the streets outside. Joined by sailors from the port, they massacred an estimated one to four thousand Jewish residents of Lisbon.
Christian converts hated by all sides
From the year 711 AD into the 1200s, Muslim emirs had ruled the richest parts of Spain and Portugal. By the 11th century, it’s thought by some historians that the majority of people on the Iberian peninsula may have been Muslim or at least passively converted. Anything to get on in the world!
The Jews of Spain and Portugal had been a very visible presence in cities like Toledo, Cordoba and Seville. They often played the role of broker between Christian and Muslim forces on the peninsula. But by the 15th century, they found themselves fleeing the Spanish Inquisition into Portugal – where they thought their safety was assured. Some became Christian converts. And they were hated by many of their fellow Jews for giving in to pressure.
But conversion was no guarantee of avoiding the mob’s wrath. As the 1506 Lisbon massacre and countless other incidents showed, the Inquisition would not be so easily convinced.
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