Portuguese Inquisition

A tribunal established in Portugal in 1536 to investigate heresy, especially among New Christians. It operated through religious courts, royal authority, censorship, imprisonment, and public sentences.

New Christian: A Jewish convert to Christianity, or a descendant of converts, in Iberia. New Christians were the tribunal’s principal targets, often suspected of secretly practicing Judaism.
Manuel I of Portugal: King of Portugal from 1495 to 1521, whose reign included the forced conversion of Portuguese Jews. His policies created the New Christian population later subjected to inquisitorial scrutiny.
Cardinal Henrique of Portugal: A Portuguese cardinal who served as inquisitor general and later king from 1578 to 1580. As inquisitor general, he helped consolidate the institution during its early decades.
Portuguese Jewish diaspora: Communities formed by Portuguese Jews and New Christians who migrated across Europe and the Atlantic. Inquisitorial pressure contributed to migrations that established Portuguese Jewish communities abroad.
Lisbon massacre of 1506: A massacre of suspected New Christians in Lisbon that killed thousands in April 1506. This predated the tribunal but exposed the anti-New Christian hostility it later claimed to regulate.
Auto-da-fé: A public ceremony in which sentences of the Inquisition were announced and carried out. These ceremonies made the tribunal’s judgments visible, though executions were performed by secular authorities.
Forced conversion of Jews in Portugal: The mass conversion of Portugal’s Jewish population to Christianity, ordered by Manuel I in 1497. The conversions preceded the tribunal and shaped its suspicion of crypto-Judaism.
Damião de Góis: A Portuguese humanist, diplomat, and royal chronicler imprisoned and tried by the Inquisition. His prosecution illustrates the tribunal’s reach beyond suspected crypto-Judaism.
Portuguese New Christians in Amsterdam: A community of Portuguese-born Jews and descendants of converts that developed in Amsterdam. Some migrants from Portugal openly returned to Judaism in a city beyond inquisitorial jurisdiction.
Trial of Damião de Góis: The Inquisition’s prosecution of the Portuguese humanist Damião de Góis in the 1570s. The case shows inquisitorial scrutiny of humanist networks and religious opinions.

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