On February 20, 1665, the Inquisition of Lisbon arrested Maria
de Macedo, the wife of a midlevel official of the Portuguese
Treasury, after she revealed during a deposition that, since she
was ten years old, an enchanted Moor had frequently "taken" her to
a magical castle in the legendary land of wonders known as the
Hidden Isle. The island paradise was also the home of Sebastian,
the former king of Portugal (1557--1578), who had died in battle in
Morocco while on crusade in 1578. His body remained undiscovered,
however, and many people in seventeenth-century Portugal --
including Maria -- eagerly awaited his return in glory. In Judging
Maria de Macedo, Bryan Givens offers a microhistorical examination
of Maria's trial before the Inquisition in Lisbon in 1665--1666,
providing an intriguing glimpse into Portuguese culture at the
time.
Maria's trial record includes a unique piece of evidence: a
pamphlet she dictated to her husband fifteen years before her
arrest. In the pamphlet, reproduced in its entirety in the book,
Maria recounts in considerable detail her "journeys" to the Hidden
Isle and her discussions with the people there, King Sebastian in
particular. Not all of the components of Maria's vision were
messianic in nature or even Christian in origin; her beliefs
therefore represent a unique synthesis of disparate cultural
elements in play in seventeenth-century Portugal.
Because the pamphlet antedates the Inquisition's involvement in
Maria's case, it offers a rare example of a non-elite voice
preserved without any mediation from an elite institution such as
the Inquisition, as is the case with most early modern judicial
records. In addition to analyzing Maria de Macedo's vision, Givens
also uses the trial record to gain insight into the values,
concerns, and motives of the Inquisitors in their judgment of her
unusual case. He thus not only examines separately two important
subcultures in early modern Portugal, but also analyzes how they
interacted with each other.
Introducing a unique feminine voice from the early modern
period, Judging Maria de Macedo opens a singular window onto
seventeenth-century Portuguese culture.
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