But he isn’t what this lesson is about.
THIS IS ABOUT THE SPANISH INQUISITION.
What was the Spanish Inquisition? It was a court for ratting out Heretics. Gee, haven’t heard that one before.
So the Spanish Inquisition was not a fun place.
At this time in history, Spain was not all nice and unified. It was kinda like Italy, but it was different. If that makes sense. It had royal family rules instead of rich peeps.
Well Ferdinand was prince of Aragon, and Isabella was princess of Castile. Isabella went to church and was good and went on Sunday morning and nights and Wednesday night and al that jayazz.
SO FERDINAND AND ISABELLA GOT MARRIED. Now it was political and arranged and all, but it was still sweet. They really loved each other, and it was good and nice and sweet.
Aragon and Castile were already the largest kingdoms in Spain. Now they were, together, LIKE A MEGA ULTRA KINGDOM THING. Spain was in it’s golden age anyhoos, so Arstile was amazing.
...
Uhm.
Casgon?
Aragoncastile?
Castagon.
There.
That sounds good.
Ok.
But so Spain is great. It has scholars and painters and all that. Woop woop.
SO.
Suddely THE RECONQUISTA.
Which means all the Christians drove the Mooselums down to the south of Spain
So Ferdinand and Isabella were raising money to fight them. However, they were getting a little extreme. They drove out anyone who opposed Christianity, which was not just Mooselums.
So that’s what started the Spanish Inquisition.
So it wasn’t really a thing, it was... Uh... A... Thing. A process, if you will.
The inquisition was how they drove the people out.
What they did was put people on trial. They would have to prove their guilt or innocence with crimes against the church. The idea goes wayyy back, but still.
The system was modeled after a court that the Dominicans used. They carried banners that said “Mercy” and “Justice”. They got a little carried away with the Justice bit though. They used. Very. Harsh. Measures.
As did Ferdinand and Isabella. They put their court in the hands of Tomas De Torquemada. We’ll name him Tom. He was Isabella’s childhood priest and a Dominican Friar who thought there wasn’t a thing wrong with the court system.
Oh! Also!
He thought there was nothing wrong with torturing people to make them confess their sins against the church.
So you’re pretty much gonna die either way.
On his behalf though, someone said that he thought he was saving people from eternal punishment by punishing them on earth.
So there were a lotta Jews in Spain. These Jews had a few choices when it came to faith: Convert to Islam and die. Convert to Christianity and live. Don’t convert and die.
So a lot of them decided that they’d convert to Christianity. Well, some didn’t convert fo realz, and they just practiced Judaism underground. Most of them were arrested, put on trial, and put to death, but others went on about their way.
Soon, Ferdinand and Isabella made Persecution even worse. They signed what is called the Edict of Expulsion. Expulsion does not sound like a fun word, does it? No. No it does not. Explusion means to be expelled. The Jews had 3 months to Leave Spain or be baptized.
So a lot of people decided to leave. As in, 800,000 people. Now I don’t know how many people were in ancient Spain, but when 800,000 people up and leave, that effects a country. All of these people took their businesses, left a ton of jobs, they spent some money to get out of the country, and Spain was hurt really bad.
So despite all of this, Ferdinand and Isabella were pretty great people. They sponsored Christopher Columbus, they were great rulers, and they had some pretty good ideas about the futtturee~!
So uhm.
Yeah.
The end~!
No comments:
Post a Comment