Chapter 6 - The Library of Iberian Resources Online

nobles as patrons. When the Duke of Medina Sidonia died in 1558, his body was taken there. When
Philip II visited Seville in 1570, he stayed there. (39)
Despite its wealth and fame, the monastery was also known as a refuge for criminals and heretics. In
the fifteenth century its patron, the Count of Niebla, wrote of cleaning out the monastery: [133] "well,
the cave of thieves has been turned into a house of prayer, in which our Lord is now served." (40) In the
sixteenth century the monastery became the refuge for a group of Protestants. Its prior and several
members, as well as several nuns of the nearby Jeronomite convent of Santa Paula, were secure in this
monastery until the late 1550's, when they had to flee the Inquisition. The Inquisition found that the
monastery was one of the major centers of Spanish Protestantism, and that it had been used as one of
the depositories for New Testaments printed in the Castilian language and smuggled into the country by
Protestants. (41) In 1567 Philip II ordered the reduction of this monastery and six others. "The causes
that moved the king to this decision (which time has borne out)," wrote one chronicler, "were the small
amount of conformity in the superiors of these houses that disrupted in them the religious observance."
(42) One year later the hermit monks of San Jerónimo, who had occupied the monastery, were
incorporated into the larger Order of the Monks of San Jerónimo by order of the Crown, undoubtedly a
move to bring the monastery under stricter control.
The Crown wanted to curb the monastery of San Isidro del Campo because its wealth and fame and
physical separation from Seville were increasing its independence. Philip II seemed less interested in
the scriptural hair-splitting of heresy than in the political threat of a religious group who questioned the
religious conformity buttressing his throne. He welcomed monasteries in his kingdom, but only if they
supported this conformity. In Hapsburg Spain the Church could continue as a refuge only for people
who did not threaten the teachings of the Church or the power of the secular order.
THE CHURCH AS CARICATURE
Underworld people used the Church as a butt for jokes and tricks. Tipsy prisoners dressed up as priests
and held raucous [134] religious "services." Ruffians broke into city brothels and hooted as priests
preached and tried to convert prostitutes there. False beggars posed as monks collecting money to buy
oil for church lamps. Street children hid their stolen loot behind altar pieces. Criminals masqueraded as
priests and escaped prison in pious dignity. (43) What is the significance of these jokes and tricks at the
expense of the Church?
Much underworld humor can be regarded as a strategy for survival. The false beggar posing as an almsgathering
monk took hard-earned maravedís from a pious widow in order to have money for food,
drink, and gambling. He also played this trick in order to laugh at the absurdity and misery of the world
around him. If he could not occasionally laugh at some poor wretch, he would probably disintegrate
under the burdens of his own miseries. His joke got bread for him, and it also preserved his mental
health.
Underworld jokes were often expressions of bravado. Prisoners who presented a religious "service" in
the prison were making fun of the priest's performance before an altar, but they were also crying out
against impotence. Tomorrow the priest might be able to lead them as lambs to the gallows, but tonight
they could show how ridiculous he was as he bowed and chanted and mouthed words that he might not
understand. Ridiculing the Church helped these prisoners to feel less impotent in the clutches of
authority.
Bravado can bluster away fears. Prisoners who dressed up in white penitential robes to accompany two
condemned highwaymen to the gallows turned this religious ritual into a blasphemous carnival. They
put on false moustaches, squabbled over rosaries, and proudly preened themselves to the dismay of the