The Underground World of Secret Jews and Africans: Two Tales of Sex, Magic, and Survival in Colonial Cartagena and Mexico City

Spanish colonial society was divided into a caste system based on race and religion. Slaves comprised the lowest caste, leading some to seek power through African magic, while children of Jewish fathers and African women tried to gain social status by embracing Judaism-but in the process they risked retribution from the Spanish Inquisition, whose tribunals zealously prosecuted the perceived threat to the colonies from multicultural witchcraft and from alleged secret Jews.

These two tales illustrate the perils tied to religious identity and practice in the colonies. One, set in 17th-century Cartagena des Índias, features a biracial surgeon who was famed for his magic powers. His lover, jealous of the other women in his life, reported him to the Inquisition. To bargain for his freedom, he denounced his wealthier colleague for secretly practicing Judaism. The colleague was arrested, confessed under torture, and died in prison from his wounds.

The second story involves Esperanza Rodríguez, a biracial Mexican woman tried by the Inquisition in the 1640s for secretly practicing Judaism. In Seville, Rodríguez had been a slave of a New Christian (converted Jewish) woman, who introduced her to Judaism before freeing her. Rodríguez accepted Judaism in order to close the social gap that separated her from her former owner. But she was eventually tortured into confessing her religion, and she died in prison.

Jonathan Schorsch, University of Potsdam, is the author of Jews and Blacks in the Early Modern World and other books.