Letter to Sixtus IV on the Inquisition (13 May 1482)

The letter answers the bull of 18 April 1482 in Letters of 1482 on the Inquisition in Castile and Aragon. Ferdinand II of Aragon writes that he has been told that the pope has granted the New Christians a general pardon, ordered that the names of witnesses be revealed to the accused, allowed appeals to Rome and removed two inquisitors. He gives the report no credit, he says, because such things ought never to have been granted; and if they have been granted through the persistent and cunning persuasions of the New Christians, he does not intend ever to let them take effect. He asks the pope to grant nothing that would hinder the Inquisition and to revoke anything already granted, and says that inquisitors in his kingdoms must be appointed according to his own pleasure and will. He blames the spread of heresy on earlier inquisitors, who, he says, were bribed into doing nothing.

It is the king’s side of the dispute, in his own words. The letter is dated at Córdoba and signed as king of Castile and of Aragon. Lea prints it from a register of the Archivo General de la Corona de Aragón (Reg. 3684, fol. 7). See the Spanish Inquisition and the Expulsion of the Jews.