For a brief few years in the sixteenth century, Pedro Moya de
Contreras was the most powerful man in the New World. A church
official and loyal royalist, he came to Mexico in 1571 to establish
the Inquisition and later became archbishop and viceroy for the
region. This new edition of Stafford Poole's definitive portrait of
Moya de Contreras, first published in 1971, now offers an expanded
understanding of this enigmatic figure's influence on the
development of New Spain.
In tracing the career of a sixteenth-century church official and
administrator who was more notable for what he did than for who he
was, Poole offers a rich source of information about Spanish rule
in colonial Mexico and the evolving relationship between the
Spanish monarchy and the Catholic Church. For this second edition,
Poole draws on newly available sources to fill in gaps regarding
Moya de Contreras's shadowy early career and final years in Spain.
He also explores in greater depth the churchman's influence as
Grand Inquisitor in light of the plethora of new research and
recent publications on the Spanish Inquisition.
Poole shows that Moya de Contreras was as diligent at carrying
out the tortures of the Inquisition as he was at exposing
government and church corruption. His reforming zeal reached its
culmination in his leadership of the Third Mexican Provincial
Council of 1585, which enacted a legal code for the Mexican Church
that lasted more than three hundred years.
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