Originally published in 1974. The close connection between universities and bureaucratic institutions such as church and state was perhaps first noticed by Max Weber. Such institutions, he observed, require a dependable source of cadres to run them. Thus, the size and composition of university enrollments are often a function of bureaucratic needs. Richard Kagan examines the dynamics of this relationship historically by racing the growth and decline of the university system in Castile, the heart of the Spanish monarchy, between 1500 and 1809. This period marked the emergence of a strong Habsburg state and a militant Catholic church, both of which looked to the universities for "educated" men. Accordingly, the universities grew rapidly, and by 1600 Castile was perhaps the best-educated kingdom in Europe. But this did not last. Jobs were increasingly filled through nepotism, causing students to abandon the universities in search of other careers. By 1700, the universities were small, backward institutions. Kagan begins by examining the nature and position of primary, secondary, and university institutions in Hapsburg Spain, concentrating on the extent and purpose of literacy. In Part II, Kagan discusses the growth and development of the ruling hierarchies in the bureaucratic world and gives special consideration to the criteria used to recruit officials. The author concludes with an assessment of the impact of bureaucratic changes in church and state on the universities of Castile. The data he collects on changes in the curriculum, the professorate, and the social and geographical backgrounds of the students are used to support hypotheses about the spectacular rise and collapse of university education in Spain, the process of modernization, the development of bureaucracies, and the crisis of the Spanish monarchy. Students and Society in Early Modern Spain demonstrates that institutions of higher learning often collapse when they become over-professionalized and fail to respond to changing conditions. Thus, Kagan provides a study of education and social change-of why educational institutions are central to a society in one century but only peripheral to it in the next. The author casts new light not only on the short lived educational revolution of the sixteenth century but also on education in other societies, both past and present.

On the first day of Francisco de San Antonio's trial before the Spanish Inquisition in Toledo in 1625, his interrogators asked him about his parentage. His real name, he stated, was Abram Ruben, and he had been born in Fez of Jewish parents. How then, Inquisitors wanted to know, had he become a Christian convert? Why had a Hebrew alphabet been found in his possession? And what was his business at the Court in Madrid? "He was asked," according to his dossier, "for the story of his life." His response, more than ten folios long, is one of the many involuntary autobiographies created by the logic of the Inquisition that today provide rich insights into both the personal lives of the persecuted and the social, cultural, and political realities of the age.

In the first edition of "Inquisitorial Inquiries," Richard L. Kagan and Abigail Dyer collected, translated, and annotated six of these autobiographies from a diverse group of prisoners. Now they add the fascinating life story of another victim of the Inquisition: Esteban Jamete, a French sculptor accused of being a Protestant. Each of the autobiographies has been selected to represent a particular political or social issue, while at the same time raising more intimate questions about the religious, sexual, political, or national identities of the prisoners. Among them are a politically incendiary prophet, a self-proclaimed hermaphrodite, and a "morisco," an Islamic convert to Catholicism.

In the late fifteenth century, many of the Jews expelled from Spain made their way to Morocco and established a dynamic community in Fez. A number of Jewish families became prominent in commerce and public life there. Among the Jews of Fez of Hispanic origin was Samuel Pallache, who served the Moroccan sultan as a commercial and diplomatic agent in Holland until Pallache's death in 1616. Before that, he had tried to return with his family to Spain, and to this end he tried to convert to Catholicism and worked as an informer, intermediary, and spy in Moroccan affairs for the Spanish court. Later he became a privateer against Spanish ships and was tried in London for that reason. His religious identity proved to be as mutable as his political allegiances: when in Amsterdam, he was devoutly Jewish; when in Spain, a loyal converso (a baptized Jew).

In A Man of Three Worlds, Mercedes GarcA-a-Arenal and Gerard Wiegers view Samuel Pallache's world as a microcosm of early modern society, one far more interconnected, cosmopolitan, and fluid than is often portrayed. Pallache's missions and misadventures took him from Islamic Fez and Catholic Spain to Protestant England and Holland. Through these travels, the authors explore the workings of the Moroccan sultanate and the Spanish court, the Jewish communities of Fez and Amsterdam, and details of the Atlantic-Mediterranean trade. At once a sweeping view of two continents, three faiths, and five nation-states and an intimate story of one man's remarkable life, A Man of Three Worlds is history at its most compelling.

The idea of a dialogue--sometimes harmonious, sometimes divisive--between the center and periphery of the early modern European state stands at the heart of much of John Elliott's historical writing. This collection of essays by a group of Elliott's former students examines different aspects of this important theme and develops them. Taken together with the "personal appreciation" of Elliott (now Regius Professor of Modern History at Oxford), it forms an important examination of the work of the greatest living historian of Spain as well as being a major contribution to early modern European history.

A visually stunning examination of El Greco's work that considers the artist's constant reinvention and professional drive Renowned for a singular artistic vision, Domenikos Theotokopoulos, known as El Greco (1541-1614), developed his distinctive painting style as he assiduously pursued professional success. This fresh and engaging survey of El Greco's work explores varied aspects of the artist's career-his aesthetic education in Italy, the mixed reception of his mature works in Spain, his uncompromising approach to business, and the baroque logistics of his Toledo workshop-and reveals the depth of El Greco's astounding ambition. The impressive volume focuses in particular on his 1577-79 altarpiece paintings for the Church of Santo Domingo el Antiguo in Toledo-among them the magnificent Assumption of the Virgin-which heralded the artist's arrival in Spain after productive periods of formation and re-formation in Crete, Venice, and Rome. Lavishly illustrated and clothbound with gilded edges, this publication features reproductions and scholarly discussions of more than 60 works ranging from large-scale canvases to intimate panels, with essays that elucidate the motives and meanings behind the artist's constantly changing and inventive approach. Distributed for the Art Institute of Chicago Exhibition Schedule: Reunion des musees nationaux-Grand Palais, Paris (October 14, 2019-February 10, 2020) The Art Institute of Chicago (Spring-Fall 2020)

The Spanish Craze is the compelling story of the centuries-long U.S. fascination with the history, literature, art, culture, and architecture of Spain. Richard L. Kagan offers a stunningly revisionist understanding of the origins of hispanidad in America, tracing its origins from the early republic to the New Deal. As Spanish power and influence waned in the Atlantic World by the eighteenth century, her rivals created the "Black Legend," which promoted an image of Spain as a dead and lost civilization rife with innate cruelty and cultural and religious backwardness. The Black Legend and its ambivalences influenced Americans throughout the nineteenth century, reaching a high pitch in the Spanish-American War of 1898. However, the Black Legend retreated soon thereafter, and Spanish culture and heritage became attractive to Americans for its perceived authenticity and antimodernism. Although the Spanish craze infected regions where the Spanish New World presence was most felt-California, the American Southwest, Texas, and Florida-there were also early, quite serious flare-ups of the craze in Chicago, New York, and New England. Kagan revisits early interest in Hispanism among elites such as the Boston book dealer Obadiah Rich, a specialist in the early history of the Americas, and the writers Washington Irving and Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. He also considers later enthusiasts such as Angeleno Charles Lummis and the many writers, artists, and architects of the modern Spanish Colonial Revival in the United States in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Spain's political and cultural elites understood that the promotion of Spanish culture in the United States and the Western Hemisphere in general would help overcome imperial defeats while uniting Spaniards and those of Spanish descent into a singular raza whose shared characteristics and interests transcended national boundaries. With elegant prose and verve, The Spanish Craze spans centuries and provides a captivating glimpse into distinct facets of Hispanism in monuments, buildings, and private homes; the visual, performing, and cinematic arts; and the literature, travel journals, and letters of its enthusiasts in the United States.

Monarchs throughout the ages have commissioned official histories that cast their reigns in a favorable light for future generations. These accounts, sanctioned and supported by the ruling government, often gloss over the more controversial aspects of a king's or queen's time on the throne. Instead, they present highly selective and positive readings of a monarch's contribution to national identity and global affairs.

In "Clio and the Crown," Richard L. Kagan examines the official histories of Spanish monarchs from medieval times to the middle of the 18th century. He expertly guides readers through the different kinds of official histories commissioned: those whose primary focus was the monarch; those that centered on the Spanish kingdom as a whole; and those that celebrated Spain's conquest of the New World. In doing so, Kagan also documents the life and work of individual court chroniclers, examines changes in the practice of official history, and highlights the political machinations that influenced the redaction of such histories.

Just as world leaders today rely on fast-talking press officers to explain their sometimes questionable actions to the public, so too did the kings and queens of medieval and early modern Spain. Monarchs often went to great lengths to exert complete control over the official history of their reign, physically intimidating historians, destroying and seizing manuscripts and books, rewriting past histories, and restricting history writing to authorized persons.

Still, the larger practice of history writing--as conducted by nonroyalist historians, various scholars and writers, and even church historians--provided a corrective to official histories. Kagan concludes that despite its blemishes, the writing of official histories contributed, however imperfectly, to the practice of historiography itself.

Branded by the Spanish Inquisition as an "evil dreamer," a "notorious mother of prophets," the teenager Lucrecia de Leon had hundreds of bleak but richly imaginative dreams of Spain's future that became the stuff of political controversy and scandal. Based upon surviving transcripts of her dreams and on the voluminous records of her trial before the Inquisition, "Lucrecia's Dreams" traces the complex personal and political ramifications of Lucrecia's prophetic career. This hitherto unexamined episode in Spanish history sheds new light on the history of women as well as on the history of dream interpretation.
Charlatan or clairvoyant, sinner or saint, Lucrecia was transformed by her dreams into a "cause celebre," the rebellious counterpart to that other extraordinary woman of Golden Age Spain, St. Theresa of Jesus. Her supporters viewed her as a divinely inspired seer who exposed the personal and political shortcomings of Philip II of Spain. In examining the relation of dreams and prophecy to politics, Richard Kagan pays particular attention to the activities of the streetcorner prophets and female seers who formed the political underworld of sixteenth-century Spain.

On the first day of Francisco de San Antonio's trial before the Spanish Inquisition in Toledo in 1625, his interrogators asked him about his parentage. His real name, he stated, was Abram Ruben, and he had been born in Fez of Jewish parents. How then, Inquisitors wanted to know, had he become a Christian convert? Why had a Hebrew alphabet been found in his possession? And what was his business at the Court in Madrid? "He was asked," according to his dossier, "for the story of his life." His response, more than ten folios long, is one of the many involuntary autobiographies created by the logic of the Inquisition that today provide rich insights into both the personal lives of the persecuted and the social, cultural, and political realities of the age.

In the first edition of "Inquisitorial Inquiries," Richard L. Kagan and Abigail Dyer collected, translated, and annotated six of these autobiographies from a diverse group of prisoners. Now they add the fascinating life story of another victim of the Inquisition: Esteban Jamete, a French sculptor accused of being a Protestant. Each of the autobiographies has been selected to represent a particular political or social issue, while at the same time raising more intimate questions about the religious, sexual, political, or national identities of the prisoners. Among them are a politically incendiary prophet, a self-proclaimed hermaphrodite, and a "morisco," an Islamic convert to Catholicism.

The first comprehensive account in English of Renaissance Spain's preeminent sculptor Alonso Berruguete (c. 1488-1561) revolutionized the arts of Renaissance Spain with a dramatic style of sculpture that reflected the decade or more he had spent in Italy while young. Trained as a painter, he traveled to Italy around 1506, where he interacted with Michelangelo and other leading artists. In 1518, he returned to Spain and was appointed court painter to the new king, Charles I. Eventually, he made his way to Valladolid, where he shifted his focus to sculpture, opening a large workshop that produced breathtaking multistory altarpieces (retablos) decorated with sculptures in painted wood. This handsomely illustrated catalogue is the first in English to treat Berruguete's art and career comprehensively. It follows his career from his beginnings in Castile to his final years in Toledo, where he produced his last great work, the marble tomb of Cardinal Juan de Tavera. Enriching the chronological narrative are discussions of important aspects of Berruguete's life and practice: his complicated relationship with social status and wealth; his activity as a draftsman and use of prints; how he worked with his many assistants to create his wood sculptures; and his legacy as an artist. Published in association with the National Gallery of Art, Washington Exhibition Schedule: National Gallery of Art, Washington (October 13, 2019-February 17, 2020) Meadows Museum, SMU, Dallas (March 29-July 26, 2020)

In September 2015, Junipero Serra was canonized by Pope Francis in Washington DC against the protest of many Californian Native Americans who criticized his brutal treatment of their ancestors and destruction of their culture. Like most complex historical figures, Junipero Serra has been interpreted in countless ways, often contextualized mainly in California. This book situates Serra in the context of the three major places that he lived, learned, and proselytized: Mallorca, Mexico, and Alta California and uses scholars from all three countries to create a rare glimpse into the life of the saint in three cultural dimensions. Essays on his use of music and art, and his representation in popular culture chart the life and impact of Serra, his education, and ideology, Franciscan influence, the plans and building of the missions, Native people and other important topics revolving around his life and history of Serra and the Catholic church in Mexico and California.