Burning of Heretics and Autos-da-fé

Las Palmas de Gran Canaria · Category: Memory · Subcategory: Memory spaces · Year: 1526

An auto-da-fé was a public act organised by the Tribunal of the Inquisition in which the condemned abjured their sins and showed repentance, serving as a lesson to all those gathered there. In the most serious cases, the accused were sentenced to death by the ecclesiastical court and handed over to the secular arm, that is, delivered to the civil authority to carry out the execution of the sentence. In such cases, the condemned were led to the stake, strangled beforehand if penitent, and burned alive if impenitent, that is, if they did not repent.

The Inquisition was established in Las Palmas de Gran Canaria very early, at the end of the 15th century, although it was not until 1505 that the first inquisitor was appointed in the person of Bartolomé López de Tribaldos. Under his remit was the intellectual control, both religious and political, of the Catholic orthodoxy imposed by the Crown on the nascent population of all the islands. In these early years the foundations of the inquisitorial tribunal in the Canaries were consolidated: commissariats, investigations with visits to other islands, and the establishment of autos-da-fé.

In 1524 a new and strict inquisitor, the bachelor Martín Ximénez, arrived in Las Palmas from Seville. Under his command a rigorous investigation was carried out throughout the Archipelago in search of “sinners, Judaizers and heretics.” Such investigations resulted in the most ruthless heresy trials held in the Canaries throughout its history.

In 1526 the city of Las Palmas was suffering a tremendous plague epidemic. Perhaps to appease the wrath of God, acts of faith were held on 26 February and 4 March in the Plaza de Santa Ana, the main square of the town. Seven Judaizers, mostly residents of the islands of La Palma and Tenerife, were condemned to die at the stake. Once the sentences were read, the condemned were handed over to the governor to carry out the punishment, a penalty that was executed “ in La Vegueta near the monastery of Señor Santodomingo where there was later a garden ”. The stake was lit in the presence of the authorities “ and many people who went with them ”.

Another auto-da-fé of which we have news took place in 1530. This time six cardboard statues of as many slaves who had fled to Barbary were burned. Luis de Padilla was inquisitor at that time.

In 1614 the Dutchman surnamed Claysen was burned in person and the following year a Flemish merchant suffered the same fate, both for heresy. They were the last of the 10 defendants who were taken to the pyres by the Inquisition in the Canaries. It is estimated that more than 2,300 people suffered persecution to varying degrees by the institution until its total abolition in 1820.

28.097783, -15.41585