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I don't think it was "rightous anger", but the hate against jews were commonplace in Medieval Ages. That also involves Spain of course. Until recently, most peo
by happy_path 5y ago
I don't think it was "rightous anger", but the hate against jews were commonplace in Medieval Ages. That also involves Spain of course. Until recently, most people were extremely racist/prejudiced against "the other" (hate against jews included).
However, I'm afraid that the popularization of the Spanish Inquisition [1] is due to propaganda. It is called Black Legend in academic circles and the publication in England and The Netherlands (and their orbits) of exagerated stories about the atrocities of the Spanish Crown, Spaniards and the Spanish Inquisition is because of that.
Most of the sufferers of the Spanish Inquisiton were Spaniards, and the Holy Office had the aim of control (with an iron fist) the population, not exterminate them. In fact, during its 4 centuries of life, the Inquisition executed around 6,000 people [2] (according to Henry Kamen). For example, you can compare to the 57,000 - 70,000 people killed during the reign of Henry VIII (only 40 years)[3][4]
- [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_Legend_(Spain)
- [2] https://strangenotions.com/spanish-inquisition/
- [3] https://www.history.co.uk/article/the-killer-king-how-many-people-did-henry-viii-execute
- [4] https://www.bbc.co.uk/teach/how-could-you-survive-in-tudor-england/znvmkmn
- AnimalMuppet 5y agoControl with an iron fist is better than extermination, but it's a pretty low bar...
- happy_path 5y agoWe are talking about XV-XIX centuries. Most countries had different levels of "iron fist" population control for a segment of their population. It could be control of women, poor people, people of different ethnicity, jews, etc. What I want to highlight, is that the behavior of the Spanish Inquisition, while abhorrent to our XXI eyes, were not uncommon during those times. Note please that I'm not justifying anything, I'm making a point that Human History has been horrible during almost of its existence: discrimination, wars, slavery, segregation, etc. Human Rights are a "new thing".