Conversion and Autobiography: Telling Tales before the Roman Inquisition

© Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, 2013 DOI: 10.1163/15700658-12342376

Journal of Early Modern History 17 (2013) 437-456 brill.com/jemh

Conversion and Autobiography: Telling Tales before the Roman Inquisition

Irene Fosi*Università di Chieti

AbstractThe goal of this article is to analyze the mechanisms used by Catholic Church authori-ties during the early modern period to control and repress heresies, as well as the ways in which foreign heretics were converted and eventually assimilated into local society when they came to Rome. Generally speaking, papal policies encouraged foreigners to hide their religious identity, with the aim of giving a superficial appearance of assimilation, in order to avoid any scandal. Although the guidelines established in papal bulls did allow for some exceptions, the high risk of being expelled or persecuted encouraged foreigners to present themselves before the Holy Office and disavow their religious beliefs. Their confessions before the tribunal were filed by the officials of the Inquisition according to stereotypes that filtered the memories of foreigners. How “genuine” were these stories? Do they simply respond to the expectations and manipulative tactics of the judges? The fragile boundary between true and false, between biography and autobiography, poses a question, one that always underlies any study on religious conversion: to what extent can we analyze the “real” motivations underlying any religious conversion?

KeywordsPapacy, foreigners, Inquisition, autobiography

Introduction

Early Modern Rome was a cosmopolitan city, the heart of the Counter-reformation and of Papal power, capable of attracting visitors on a scale

* I am very grateful to Simon Ditchfield and to Peter Mazur for revising the text and translating the sources. The following abbreviations are used throughout: Archivio della Congregazione per la Dottrina della Fede, Vatican City: ACDF; Archivio Storico del Vicar-iato di Roma, Vatican City: ASVR; Archivio del Venerabile Collegio Inglese, Rome: VEC; Trinity College, Dublin: TCD.

438 I. Fosi / Journal of Early Modern History 17 (2013) 437-456

that few other European cities could rival, especially during the jubilee years that occurred at regular intervals. And not all of these visitors were Catho-lics: there were many Protestants among the ultramontani—transalpine travelers, merchants, artists, university students—who came to the Eternal City despite the papal legislation designed to isolate, persecute, or convert foreign heretics. Some managed to escape notice, but many of them, after being denounced to the Holy Office, decided (or were forced) to become Catholics, and after being instructed in the Catholic faith presented them-selves to the inquisitors to abjure their errors. The conversions of heretics, especially of noblemen, men of letters, but also of common people, that occurred in Rome were always described by Catholic propaganda as the undoubted triumph of the true faith over heresy.1

During the seventeenth century a wave of conversions from Prot-estantism to Catholicism took place: noblemen and women, as well as common people became Catholics in increasing numbers. Their motiva conversionis were various, and sometimes described and made available to readers in autobiographies or in pamphlets. Yet the vast majority of con-version narratives recorded in Rome came in the form of tales told by the people, mostly common people, women and men, artisans, tailors, sailors, and soldiers, who came before the inquisition to be converted—the sponte comparentes—according to specific guidelines that indicated the various steps necessary to enter the true faith. These stories were recorded according to norms of procedure codified by the Church authorities and described by inquisitorial treatises, and while they are an essential source for understanding the processes of conversion at the center of the Catholic world, they present a number of interpretative problems. How can we read and use these documents of scarce literary appeal and uncertain author-ship? Is there any way to separate autobiographical subjectivity from the bureaucratic criteria of the court and the standards of legal discourse?2

The following essay attempts to respond to these questions by consid-ering these documents within the multiple contexts in which they were written and in view of the major shifts in policy toward foreign heretics in Rome. The most important of these occurred under Alexander VII (1655-

1 Irene Fosi, Convertire lo straniero: Forestieri e Inquisizione a Roma in età moderna (Rome, 2011).

2 Jane Wickersham, “Result of the Reformation: Ritual, Doctrine, and Religious Con-version,” The Seventeenth Century 18, no. 2 (2003): 266-289, analyzes the ritual meaning of the procedure as it appears in these conversion tales.

I. Fosi / Journal of Early Modern History 17 (2013) 437-456 439

1667), who had accumulated a profound understanding of the Protestant world as nuncio in Germany, and who more than any other pontiff faced the decline of the Papacy’s clout in European politics after the Peace of Westphalia. Rome underwent a physical transformation during his pon-tificate and the baroque city became a cultural icon, a theatre of the faith that attracted curious spectators from across Europe. Consequently, the conversion strategy adopted by the Roman Curia and the Papal Court started to change. This strategy was meant to shield newcomers from any kind of persecution, protecting their identities and allowing them to travel relatively undisturbed. Especially during the pontificate of Alexander VII the Roman Catholic Church strove to convert foreign heretics by means of persuasion and re-education, which began to be seen as a more effective tool than fear for producing lasting conversions. Secondly, conversions often took place within expatriate national communities that viewed the religious divide between Catholic and Protestant in slightly different terms than the Roman institutions. Foreigners who came to Italy and Rome often found assistance in a very strong network of national confraternities and hospices, founded during the Middle Ages. These charitable and devo-tional institutions gave hospitality to pilgrims, travelers, beggars without consideration of their confession. Of course the conversion of heretics was one of their goals, but it was subordinated to the guiding aim of charitable hospitality. The sources of the Venerable English College in Rome, and especially the two pilgrim books, which record the comings and goings of the college’s guests, clearly show the pre-eminence of the national identity over the confessional one.

Rome and Foreigners

Like other Italian cities, Rome had to deal with complications caused by the presence of foreigners within its walls.3 The city was the stable resi-dence of the Papal court and the center of its political, administrative, and artistic development, and it was also the capital of a monarchy, which was endowed with both spiritual and temporal power.4 For this reason, Roman institutions from the second half of the sixteenth century onwards

3 Irene Fosi, “Roma patria comune? Foreigners in Early Modern Rome,” in Art and Identity in Early Modern Rome, ed. Jill Burke and Michael Bury (Aldershot, 2008), 27-43.

4 Paolo Prodi, The Papal Prince. One Body and Two Souls: The Papal Monarchy in Early Modern Europe (Cambridge, 1987).


began to scrutinize the religious identity of foreigners in order to protect the city from the presence of enemies of the true faith by preventing them from entering Catholic territories. However, if the “poison” of heresy had already taken root in Catholic lands, devoted subjects had the duty of denouncing their presence to competent authorities: confessors, inquisi-tors, and bishops.

The tribunal of the Inquisition could excommunicate foreign heretics, who still remained under the jurisdiction the Catholic Church, because they had received the sacrament of baptism. Consequently, they could either be banished from the city or forced to abjure their heresies. If for-eigners continued to profess their religion in Catholic territories, they could be thrown into the prisons of the Inquisition: this was a rule established by canon law. Moreover, Italians were forbidden to travel in areas infected by heresies of any sort, and even to have any kind of relationship with inhabitants living in heretical territories.5 These strong guidelines issued by papal authorities were assimilated in inquisitorial treatises and laws.6

However, in reality the firm juridical barriers set up against the spread of the “disease of heresy” could be shattered by heretics who agreed (or were forced) to convert to Catholicism. Church authorities hoped that foreign heretics might convert after their stay in Rome. Under these circumstances were heretical foreigners, who apparently did not abjure their religious convictions, driven out of the city walls in order to demonstrate, even in symbolic terms, their expulsion from the community without any oppor-tunity for them to be readmitted in the future? The answer is definitely no, as several historical examples from throughout the early modern age attest. In Rome, as well as in other Italian cities, after the stormy tournant of the sixteenth century, heretics could continue to profess their own faith without creating any form of scandal. Scandal, or perhaps, the absence of scandal, was the weak borderline between orthodoxy and heresy, subject to various compromises tied to all sorts of political circumstances, religious conflicts, and personal relationships.

5 Carlo Carena, Tractatus de officio S.me Inquisitionis et modo procedendi in causis Fidei in tres partes divisus . . ., Bononiae MDCLXVIII, p. 2, tit. XVII, § 6, pp. 223-224. See also Rita Mazzei, “Itinera Mercatorum”: circolazione di uomini e beni nell’Europa centro-orientale 1550-1650 (Lucca, 1999).

6 These were the principles contra haereses applied in the sixteenth century, from the In Coena Domini (1568) and subsequently used in the Romani Pontificis constitution (1622): Bullarum, diplomatum et privilegiorum sanctorum romanorum pontificum, XII (Turim, 1867), 708-709.


Since the late Middle Ages, migratory movements entering and exiting Rome appear to have been common features of the city’s demography. At the end of the sixteenth century, Rome reached a population of around 100,000 inhabitants. These numbers did not change radically, even after the plague of 1656-57, which, by contrast, decimated the populations of both Naples and Genoa.7 It is still difficult to give concrete figures of the foreign presence in Italian cities and in Rome during the early modern times and to prove whether or not the Reformation actually interrupted migratory flows into Rome, at least in quantitative terms. The habit of attending Italy’s well-known universities, like Padua and Bologna, did not die out, and foreign students, men of letters and science, merchants, art-ists, and even casual travelers who ventured abroad out of simple curiosity all reached the home of the papists, regardless of religious divisions and strife. Because the extraordinary mobility between the countries of north-ern Europe and Italy, ecclesiastical and secular authorities were mostly concerned with stopping the spread of dangerous ideas and forbidden books, while curiosity was considered an especially negative characteristic, generally applied to unknown and consequently dangerous people.8 Parish priests and inquisitors, confraternities, hospitals, and tribunals, both in Rome and elsewhere in the Papal states, found it increasingly difficult to establish the true identity and religious beliefs of suspect foreigners.

As these problems emerged, the Cardinal Vicario (who officiated in the pope’s stead as the city’s bishop) of Rome periodically issued edicts for hosts and innkeepers, who belonged to the sector of urban society that was most economically dependent upon foreigners who arrived in the city and remained in close contact with them. Yet the innkeepers’ economic inter-est often made them unwilling to collaborate with ecclesiastical authori-ties. As a result, parish priests stood on the front lines, burdened with the immense responsibility of discerning, by any means necessary and in par-ticular through the interpretation of words, gestures, and objects, the real religious identities of those who arrived in the city from afar. On several occasions, certain members of the local clergy were required to provide the Cardinal Vicar with complete lists of taverns, rooms, and hostels that fell into the jurisdictions of their parishes. And in order to combat the

7 Eugenio Sonnino, Cronache della peste a Roma. Notizie dal ghetto e lettere di Girolamo Gastaldi (1656-1657), in La peste a Roma (1656-1657), edited by I. Fosi “Roma moderna e contemporanea,” (special issue) XIV (2006), 35-74.

8 Justin Stagl, A History of Curiosity: The Theory of Travel, 1550-1800 (Chur, 1995).


indifference and unreliability of landlords and innkeepers, Roman author-ities ordered them to display the edicts in their places of business and illustrate their contents to all of their guests.9 The persistent warnings from the Inquisition and the Vicario make it clear however that very few of them followed these instructions, and some even treated them with mockery and derision. At the end of the seventeenth century, the parish priests who were required to denounce heretics to the Inquisition, and to confess those “Nicodemites” on their deathbeds who were ready to convert, appeared to be resigned to the impossibility of keeping foreign heretics out of their communities.

In addition to hostels and taverns, foreign travelers often rented rooms from families, workers, and often from single women, including widows. Domestic walls could better protect foreigners than inns and hostelries, where the spies of the Inquisition could easily obtain information. As a result, private houses might become alcoves for dangerous relationships and indoctrination in unorthodox concepts and ideas, which might pass between landowners and tenants. Often ordinary people were keen to seize on and appropriate statements made by supposedly acculturated foreign-ers with the support of books clandestinely carried in their luggage. The persistent requests of the Cardinal Vicario to parish priests, asking them to verify the possible presence of heretics in their communities, aimed to respond to a wide range of difficulties, including the negligent attitude of many low-ranking curates, which made it impracticable to observe the movements of foreigners within the city walls.

Even before the Grand Tour developed into a widespread educational experience for young European aristocrats, many foreigners, men and women, came to live permanently in Rome.10 How were they integrated into Roman society and what kind of relationships did they establish with other foreign nationals already living in the Papal court and in the city, as well as with the rest of Rome’s inhabitants? Did their process of inte-gration include an obligatory conversion to Roman Catholicism? If the foreigner had a good local network of neighbors and friends, and lived quietly without creating scandals, then he often was not forced to convert. These positive networks provided protection for foreigners, helping them to integrate with the social fabric. When no such network existed, or when

9 ASVR, Bannimenta 1674-1680, c. 12rv, December 15, 1674.10 Grand Tour. Adeliges Reisen und europäische Kultur vom 14. bis zum 18. Jahrhundert,

hg. Rainer Babel u. Werner Paravicini (Ostfinldern, 2005).


foreigners violated social norms and taboos, they were more vulnerable to accusations from the neighborhood and could be persecuted as heretics. In this respect, ordinary people would rarely be aware of confessional dif-ferences, because they were both unconcerned and ignorant about them. Roman neighbors generally took notice of other aspects of heretic new-comers, like their personalities and behaviors: this eventually laid the basis for a pattern of relationships between locals and foreigners. Both sponta-neous and forced religious conversions did not therefore fully integrate foreigners—especially common and poor people—into Roman society, and to some extent they continued to live a marginal existence fraught with danger even after conversion.

Thus, in the second half of the seventeenth century, the new strategies which aimed at the integration of foreigners did not entirely replace the traditional and often clumsy attempts at law enforcement by the tribu-nal of the Inquisition. The Holy Office still attempted to monitor all the possible activities taking place in drawing-rooms and houses, in order to prevent or contain the circulation of “pestiferous” books and irreverent discourses, which eventually might stimulate the development of opinions and attitudes, such as libertinism and other unreligious doctrines, which were contrary to Catholic morality. The fear came with the growing num-ber of travelers, including artists, who were attracted into the city by their interest with regard to classical antiquity and particularly to the ceremo-nies and the magnificence of the Roman court.

Tales of Self before the Roman Inquisition

Generally speaking, papal policies encouraged foreigners to hide their reli-gious identity, with the aim of giving a superficial appearance of assimila-tion, in order to avoid any form of scandal. This eventually made it possible for many immigrants to be accepted into the papal city, even in periods when the eye of the Inquisition was particularly vigilant. Newcomers might seek superficial forms of religious conversion based upon opportunism and prudence, which enabled them to disguise both their genuine religious beliefs and their cultural identities. Nevertheless, for most foreigners deter-mined to remain in Rome, confronting the inquisitorial tribunal was an almost inevitable step, which could determine their future, either through a sentence or through abjuration. Much of the time, abjuring one’s faith was simply a necessary compromise in order to be accepted as a resident


of the papal city, as well as in other parts of Italy, where the vicars of the tribunals of faith were ever present and watchful.

Although the guidelines established in papal bulls did make room for some exceptions, the high risk of being expelled or persecuted encouraged foreigners to present themselves to the Holy Office on their own initia-tive (spontanea comparizione, i.e. “spontaneous appearance”) and disavow their religious beliefs. The sponte comparentes were judged according to the procedure of the processo sommario (summary procedure): a trial shorter than the processo formale (formal procedure), whose aim was to receive the confession of the convert and to give him lighter penalties that often included special devotions.11 The abjuration was guided by the inquisitor, registered by a notary, and was the final act of what was sometimes a long process of persuasion, instruction, and pressure performed by the ecclesi-astical authorities and the inquisitorial court, usually within the walls of confraternities or hospices devoted to converted heretics.12 These confes-sions were filed by the officials of the Inquisition according to a ritual and well-worn formula was employed to filter and organize the statements of the penitent heretics. After taking an oath in front of the notary, whose role was to draw up the deposition, the convert had to make an anamnesis of his life and sentiments. He had to provide the name of his father, and of his country, the sect or religion of his relatives—that is, if they have been or are at present heretics or Catholics—his education and instruction in heresy, specifically explaining the principal parts he remembers and the cause or occasion of his conversion to the Holy Catholic Faith, and chang-ing only the things that need to change according to the different cases, and the quality of people. The steps included admitting religious errors, breaking with the past, with their family, with their social and cultural milieu, and recognizing that their adherence to heresy had offended God, the Virgin, and all the Saints. Finally, converts could return penitently to the welcoming arms of the Catholic Church after swearing that they would remain in the “true faith.” The notary of the Holy Office guaranteed that the converts’ formal renunciation of the past, with all its mistakes, was

11 See Christopher Black, The Italian Inquisition (New Haven-London, 2009), 60-64. Black points out how “The idea of spontaneity was hypocritical conditioned by the church’s desire for control and the fear of public delation,” 62.

12 Irene Fosi, “Roma e gli ‘ultramontani’: conversioni, viaggi, identità,” Quellen und Forschungen aus italienischen Archiven und Bibliotheken 81 (2001): 351-396; Ricarda Matheus, Konversionen in Rom in der frühen Neuzeit. Das Ospizio dei Convertendi 1673-1750 (Berlin-New York, 2013).


correctly documented and certified, along with their sincere entry into a new way of life.13 The norms applied to receiving and writing these stories are defined, for example, by Eliseo Masini in his Sacro Arsenale, the most widely used textbook for inquisitors in the seventeenth century. Masini then added examples of the procedure that would be faithfully imitated by the Inquisition for centuries.14

Remembering the past, one’s home and family, was supposed by the judges to signify a painful and definitive abandonment of a mistaken faith. The goodwill and courtesy of the inquisitors, however, was tinged with a subtle punishment, inflicted through the memory of abandoned loved-ones, to be repudiated in favor of a new life, which was not without uncertainty, but made more attractive by the certainty of faith and by the Church’s maternal acceptance. To what extent do these tales reflect the questions and manipulations of the judges? And beyond this, another question always underlies any study on the conversion process: to what extent can we recognize the individual, deep motivations behind any con-version? We can assume that these tales mirrored rhetorical models, which the prospective convert would have considered necessary for obtaining absolution from the Roman judges. These models would therefore have been orally transmitted and circulated, along with other necessary infor-mation, to foreign heretics who ventured into Italy and Rome.

These tales describe personal adventure and the intense migratory and commercial flows throughout Europe, showing travelers crossing between the two shores of the Mediterranean Sea and overcoming dangerous reli-gious barriers.15 For instance, in the late sixteenth century, inquisitorial documents showed how most of the spontaneous conversions back to Catholicism came from former prisoners of the Turks. Often, they told

13 The crucial role of the notaries in the inquisitorial procedure is underlined by Black, The Italian Inquisition, 65-68.

14 As to the manner for receiving the deposition of a spontaneously appearing heretic the Dominican wrote that “for sure anyone voluntarily appearing before the Inquisitor, must freely confess the errors and heresies, in which he was raised, and instructed, should only be received graciously by the examining judge, treated pleasantly and paternally released, without any penalty or prison sentence, without charge, torture, or punishment of any sort.” Eliseo Masini, Sacro Arsenale overo pratica dell’Officio della S. Inquisitione . . . (Rome, 1693), 174.

15 Many documents of these conversions can be found in Trinity College Library, Dublin, Mss. 1227; 1228. Unfortunately the documentation is incomplete and it is impos-sible to calculate how many conversions the Holy Office registered every year.


inquisitors of their collective or solitary escapes from Turkish prisons, flee-ing by sea or land, in order to appear voluntarily before the tribunals of the Holy Office. Converts were given clear penitential obligations, which included a pilgrimage to the Seven Churches in Rome and fasting every Friday for three years, meaning that they could only have water and bread on that day. They also had to say the Rosary twice a week and go to confes-sion and communion at least on Christmas, Easter, and All Saints’ Day. In all of their stories, these new Catholics continued to stress how their former conversion to Islam had been merely formal and superficial, based on fear and the desire to survive in their precarious condition as slaves.

Converts who had been imprisoned by the Turks and more or less will-ingly crossed over to Islam told terrible stories about their imprisonment: violence, deprivation, and death threats, which had forced them to accept conversion to Islam, albeit only externally, in order to save their lives. For example, here is the story that precedes the abjuration and absolution of thirty-five year-old Stefano, from the diocese of Belgrade, who denounced himself to Fr. Tommaso Mazza da Forlì, Commissioner General of the Inquisition:

Seeing as you, Stefano son of the late Nicolò Scocchi da Giabaonizza [?] in the diocese of Belgrade, approximately 35 years of age (as you say) came before this tribunal of the Supreme and Universal Inquisition of your own will, and testified against yourself that in September of 1678, after having killed a Turk, you were brought to prison in Egar [Eger], a city of the Turks, and that after a year and a half in prison were sentenced by the Bassà to have your hands cut off unless you were willing to turn Turk; and as you assert, out of fear you consented to turn Turk externally. And in fact you said that you were brought by the Turks to one of their mosques, where at their instruction you raised the index finger of your right hand and proferred externally the following words: escedun allà la illallà Mehemet resululà (i.e.: ašhadu anna lā ilāha illa Allāh wa Muhammadan rasūlu-llāh) which are (as you assert) the words that the Turks make those who apostasize from the Christian faith to their impious sect recite. After which, you said that you were circumcised, and that for a year and a half you lived in the aforementioned city of Egar, during which time you lived externally in the manner of the Turks, but on the inside remained a Christian. And when the opportunity arose, you fled to Christendom, and having come before this supreme tribunal, you humbly asked for pardon and absolution.16

16 ACDF, S.O., Stanza Storica M 4-g, c. 26rv: “Essendo tu Stefano figliuolo del q. Nicolò Scocchi da Giabaonizza Diocesi di Belgrado, di sua età d’anni 35 incirca (come dicesti) comparso spontaneamente in questa Suprema et Universale Inquisitione contro te stesso deponesti che di settembre 1678 havendo tu ucciso un Turco, fosti condotto carcerato in Egar, città de’ Turchi e dopo un anno e mezzo di carcere fosti da quel Bassà


These kinds of testimony generally include the standard image of a cruel, unfaithful Turk, a stock character in the cultural repertoire of Western Europe in the early modern age and afterward. This contrast between the external practice of a false religion and the inner preservation of an undying faith was emphasized in stereotyped biographies. They describe the anxiety of foreigners who were being judged by a tribunal that could either punish or forgive them. Abjuration eventually paved the way for the beginning of a new life for those who intended to be reintegrated in soci-ety, cutting off their ties with the past. In this respect, the act of painfully recalling previous life experiences, described as full of violence and hard-ship, underscored the hope to be forgiven by means of compulsory ritual schemes leading towards forms of catharsis, which could cancel one’s past and prepare the ground for the future.

Only conversions from other Christian religions to Catholicism used baptism as a solemn rite of passage, the explicit beginning of a new life with the assumption of a new name. Few Protestants who converted had to undergo baptism. Those who did were re-baptised sub conditione (pro-visionally) if the judges of the Roman faith tribunal did not consider the sacrament of baptism valid when it was imparted by heretical pastors, but this was relatively uncommon. For Protestants baptism was not therefore a rite of purification in this process of changing religious identity, the transi-tion from error to the true faith, according to the rituals used when Jews and Muslims converted to Christianity.17 Heretics who returned to the Catholic faith were for the Catholic authorities like the Prodigal Son, wel-comed and nourished in the Father’s house. In any case, the conversion was for them a complex process and a significant rite of passage, not only

sententiato ad esserti tagliate le mani in caso non havessi voluto farti Turco; laonde tu per timore come asserisci, acconsentisti esternamente di farti Turco. E di fatto dicesti che condotto dai Turchi ad una loro Moschea, quivi ad insegnamento de’ medesimi, alzasti il dito indice della mano destra e proferisti esteriormente le parole = escedun allà la illallà Mehemet resululà che sono (come asseristi) parole protestative che fanno recitare i Turchi a quelli che apostatano dalla fede Christiana alla loro empia setta. Dopo di che dicesti che fosti circonciso e, per un anno e mezzo, poi che dimorasti nella sudetta città d’Egar, vivesti nell’esterno all’uso de’Turchi, ma nell’interno da Christiano. E venutati finalmente l’occasione, te ne fuggisti in Christianità, e comparso in questo supremo Tribunale, ne domandasti humilmente perdono e l’assolutione.”

17 Paolo Broggio, Charlotte de Castelnau-L’Estoile, and Giovanni Pizzorusso, eds., “Administrer les sacrements en Europe et au nouveau monde: la curie romaine et les Dubia circa sacramenta,” Mélanges de l’Ecole française de Rome. Italie et Méditerranée 121, no. 1 (2009): 5-217.


for the inner life of the convert, but for his or her social future and self-presentation in the catholic milieu.

For the period between the late sixteenth century and the beginning of the seventeenth century, the records of the Holy Office contain increas-ingly frequent references the presence in Rome of English, German, and Dutch nationals. For instance, documents related to abjurations by sub-jects of the Queen Elizabeth I of England, who appeared before the Inqui-sition as sponte comparentes, recalled personal experiences of shock and unrest within their extended family, due to the government’s persecution of Catholics. Most of these new English Catholics were born from mixed marriages between Catholics and Protestants, and in most cases were edu-cated as Protestants for reasons of convenience, but they had the oppor-tunity, through friends and teachers, to read books written by Catholics that could still be found in Catholic homes and in the shops of artisans and merchants. The Inquisition documents offer a glimpse of the journeys of these individuals throughout Europe, journeys that lead them under diverse and sometimes unclear circumstances to Rome for various reasons ranging from generic “curiosity” and interest in Roman Antiquities to the aim of changing their personal lives by becoming soldiers, merchants, or sailors. Most of these foreigners had already converted back to Catholi-cism in their homelands or during their journeys, after having obtained refuge or asylum in Catholic convents. They would then embark on their journeys towards salvation in Rome.18 Their travels took on the character of a definitive choice in terms of faith and the hopes for a new life either in Rome or elsewhere.

Appearances before the Inquisition, whether on a voluntary basis or as a result of being apprehended in Rome or elsewhere, gave newcomers the possibility of narrating their experiences and manifesting their aim of breaking any connection with their former upbringing in “heretic” lands and families. Among the many examples we can consider, for instance, the version that fra’ Tommaso Mazza O.P., Commissario of the Holy Office, transcribed of the spiritual journey that brought Simon Pietro Hein, a Dutchman, to conversion. His parents were Catholics, but after their death he had been brought up by an uncle, who was a “Calvinist heretic” and had educated his nephew in this religion. Hein’s conversion meant returning to the faith of his parents:

18 TCD, ms. 1228, c. 29rv; c. 81rv.


Ten months ago (as you assert), after going to serve as a sailor on a Dutch ship, the ship’s owner, who you said was a Catholic, tried to persuade you many times to return to the Catholic faith, and on this occasion, you considered the fact that you were born Catholic and that you had been raised in the Catholic faith . . . therefore you determined to embrace the Catholic faith and to this end, having brought yourself to Rome where you were received in the Ospizio de’ Convertendi, you then came before this supreme tribunal, begging to be reconciled to the Holy Roman Catholic Church, in the bosom of which you promised that you wanted to live and die.19

For some converts the enlightenment of the “true faith” derived from read-ing Catholic books given to them by friends or zealous clerics, whom they encountered while travelling or in wars, or during Catholic ceremonies or sermons. The following story was told by a thirty year-old tailor, Samuel Hope of Coventry, who had been educated by Protestant parents. It was reported by the Commissioner of the Inquisition:

Since you had worked for many years in your profession as a tailor with a Catholic master in England, and in those circumstances had read several Catholic books that the aforementioned master of yours had with him, you began to grow fond of our holy Catholic faith, but you still desired to have a better understanding of whether it was true or not, and finally when you had the opportunity to come to Livorno, you went from there to Rome, where after you were sent to the Ospizio de’ Convertendi you said that you had received sufficient knowledge of the things of our holy faith. . . .20

Such events might have induced religious doubts within the minds of her-etics formed by their previous religion. For others, the desire to convert emerged from ambiguous and wavering choices, based more on difficulties

19 ACDF, S.O., Stanza Storica M 4-g, c. 46r: “dieci mesi sono (come asseristi) essendo andato a servire di marinaro sopra un vascello ollandese, il Padrone di questo, che dicesti esser cattolico, più volte t’essortò a ritornare alla fede Cattolica e con tal occasione, facendo tu anche riflessione ch’eri nato cattolico et eri stato allevato nella fede cattolica . . . determi-nasti perciò d’abbracciare la fede cattolica et a questo fine portatoti a Roma e quivi ricevuto all’Ospizio de’ Convertendi ti sei poi presentato a questo supremo tribunale, supplicando d’esser riconciliato alla S.ta Chiesa Cattolica Romana, nel grembo della quale promettesti di voler vivere e morire.”

20 ACDF, S.O., Stanza Storica M 4-g, c. 234r: “coll’occasione d’haver anni lavorato della tua professione di sarto con un maestro cattolico in Inghilterra e con tal congiontura hav-endo letto alcuni libri cattolici che detto tuo maestro aveva appresso di se’, cominciasti ad affettionarti alla nostra S. fede Cattolica, ma però sempre desideravi d’haver meglio infor-matione della verità d’essa, e finalmente havuta congiontura di venire in Livorno, d’indi ti portasti in Roma, dove essendo stato inviato all’Ospizio de’ Convertendi quivi dicesti d’haver ricevuta informatione sufficiente sopra le cose della nostra S.ta fede . . .”


in recognizing the differences between religious dogmas rather than an opportunistic concealment of their true faith. Others moved towards reli-gious changes when co-workers or fellow villagers stressed the necessity of seeking protection from one or more saints during illnesses or in any other circumstance of need. The conversion of Captain Giovanni Bauer from Frankfurt was one such case. As the commissioner writes:

When, as you said, you found yourself aboard a vessel in the Red Sea in Persia and this vessel began to sink, you called out to God and promised him that if he freed you from danger you would become a Catholic; for this reason after you obtained this blessing and were removed from danger, and since you had also reflected on the diversity of Luther’s religion and that it has no substance and that the Catholic faith is the oldest, for this reason you said that you came to Rome to make good on this desire . . .21

In this respect, if the trip to Rome succeeded in healing both the soul and the body of former heretics, their testimonies before the Inquisition cast light on the ephemeral boundaries between different confessions existing in many parts of Europe.22 These boundaries were marked, in many cases, by simple and folk-based perceptions rather than by the steady interpre-tations of theologians, controversialists, and the inquisitorial tribunal in Rome. Frequently, renegades and other marginal figures would convert simply for opportunistic reasons and most of them crossed confessional borders more than once. A widespread ignorance of the theological con-trasts between religious beliefs is clear in these narratives. In this respect, the most recurrent motiva conversionis ended up including a wide range of reasons, such as the influence of Catholic friends, a direct observation of the Catholic lifestyle, the unity of the Catholic Church in comparison

21 ACDF, S.O., Stanza Storica M 4-g, c. 285r: “coll’occasione, come dicesti, che tre anni fa ti ritrovasti sopra uno vascello nel Mar Rosso in Persia et essendo questo andato di traverso e tu essendoti raccomandato a Dio e promessoli che ti liberava da tal pericolo ti volevi far cattolico, perciò havendo ottenuto tale grazia e sottratto a tal pericolo, et havendo anco fatto riflessione alla diversità della religione di Lutero e che non ha alcuna sussistenza e che la fede cattolica è la più antica, perciò dicesti esser venuto in Roma per porre in essere il tuo desiderio . . .” Another tale of conversion after being saved from a shipwreck is told in the testimony of Michele Steinfes, a soldier from Hamburg: ACDF, S.O., Stanza Storica M 4-g, c. 294r.

22 Regarding the concept of religious boundaries and how they were perceived, see Keith Luria, Sacred Boundaries: Religious Coexistence and Conflict in Early Modern France (Wash-ington, 2005); Beniamin J. Kaplan, Divided by Faith: Religions Conflicts and Practice of Toleration in Early Modern Europe (Cambridge, Mass., 2007).


with the fragmented reality of the reformed confessions. This disproved local stereotypes, examples of others who had already accepted to be con-verted, such as Catholic mothers, who had the opportunity to educate their children to Catholicism against the will of fathers. As can be seen from the cited examples, both the confession and the abjuration of those who appeared before the Inquisition were strictly filtered and coded by inquisitorial officials. Therefore, the system did not leave space to any form of spontaneity, either for the speaker or for the receiver of the testimony. On these premises, inquisitors worked on the memories of penitents con-cerning their kinship and homeland, in order to highlight the painful, but effective break with the mistakes of the past. It was a thin and cruel punishment built on the memory of loved ones, who had to be abandoned and rescinded by those who searched for a new, but still undetermined life based only on the certainty of the “true faith” and their reception by their Mother Church.

These documents became, in most cases, biographical files that often had a pre-printed, mass-produced format that was filled out by inquisitors when single abjurations took place. The repetition of these bureaucratic clichés was the way that the identities of all converted people were illus-trated with extremely limited personal variations. Conversion files rep-resented the official abjuration of new Catholics, and they immediately evaluated the characters of new confessional identities by means of a cleverly constructed series of questions that aimed to investigate the memories of the examinees, whose responses were genuinely reported according to a range of different parameters, including the discretion of the official who interrogated him or her. The expression “as you said” (“come asseristi” or “come dicesti”) that judges used to question examinees was symptomatic of the whole inquisitorial process. These expressions, on the one hand, made the aspiring convert responsible for his statements and their verac-ity, and at the same time showed the basic skepticism of the officials, who dutifully recorded these adventurous autobiographies but were probably somewhat suspicious of their authenticity. As a result, most of these biog-raphies of reformed heretics, which were maneuvered by inquisitors and notaries, focused on conversions as essential life transformations occurring as a result of either solemn or tragic events.

However, conversions represented critical events in an individual’s life, even for common people, who possessed no traces of their past except for the stereotyped files collected by the tribunal of faith. What happened afterwards? How did conversions really affect personal lives, not just in


spiritual terms? It is certainly not easy to follow the “footprints” of each person who abjured. Usually the names of people who had recently con-verted appeared a few times on the charity lists of a congregation that was founded in 1600 to financially support converts, preventing them from becoming beggars; then they disappeared. In these fascinating sources we can read about people’s life-stories, names, and adventures, which are sometimes surprising and sometimes tragic. But can we really know the deep and true motivations of a religious conversion?

A National “Island” in Baroque Rome: The Venerable English College

As a matter of fact, the Holy Office did not receive all the conversions of foreigners present in Rome. Language barriers could prevent many newcomers from appearing before the tribunal. Some of them eventually sought help through their national institutions, in so far as they came to be regarded as the most immediate and safe gateways into the city. In this respect, the archives of the English College in Rome show clearly how this national institution attracted several types of English-speaking for-eigners in Rome.23 College authorities had the responsibility of discerning between aristocrats (who travelled alone or in groups), sailors (who reached Rome through Naples or other cities), and young men (who stopped by the Eternal City in search of entertainment or in order to study some form of painting or sculpture). The few existing records, written in Latin or in English, related to people who stayed at the College up to the middle of the seventeenth century show a wide social range. The large majority of travelers needed to be identified either by means of letters of recom-mendation or through well-known and trusted witnesses who could guar-antee help and hospitality to newcomers in the College. In this respect, personal clothes, plausible tales, and linguistic idioms represented further important elements for the identification and admission of foreigners into the institute. At the beginning of the seventeenth century, College offi-cials did not pay particular attention to the authenticity of the confes-sions from famous travelers, whether aristocrats or common people, who stayed in Rome and visited the well-known institution. Over the course of the seventeenth century, the number of English travelers and heretics

23 See the two pilgrim books: VEC, Liber 282 and Liber 283. For an overview on the history of the college, Michael E. Williams, The Venerable English College Rome (Gateshead, 2008).


in Rome increased, especially during the Revolution, and many of those who wished to convert back to Catholicism chose to abjure their heresies at the College.24 One of the reasons for this choice was the lack of lan-guage barriers, which made it possible for neo-Catholics to narrate their confessions without filters or intermediaries. Consequently, in such cases, the Holy Office registered and confirmed their conversions, followed by solemn masses celebrated in St. Peter’s Basilica. For example, this is how College documents recorded one conversion:

Samuel Flaune of Leistershire come to Rome with an intention only to bee satisfied concerning our Religion and upon ys account was entertained in the Colledge for the space of 19 days and was converted to the Catholikee Church, confessed first in our Church and afterwards in the Church of St. Peter where hee communicated, receaved in all partly by popes Almoner, partly by the french priest.25

As a result, the conversion process initially tended to move through a “national” stage, supported by individual and personal relationships, and concluded with public and formal ceremonies. These confessional changes were clearly marked by significant steps, such as illnesses, basic instruction in the Catholic faith, abjuration and ceremonies where converted heretics received new clothes donated by the College. Some of the converts found employment in the papal service:

Gabriel the sonne of Sigmund Wage of Bedfant in the country of Middlesex and Thomas the sonne of George Bielfad of Excester in Devonshire, both mariners here converted in the College and admitted by the Holy Inquisition on fryday the 22 octo-ber [1655] as above during the time they were entertained by the College as pilgrims which was for the space of eight days. They had almes from ye french priest. They undertook to be gunner in the gallies att Civitavecchia.26

The Cardinal Protector, the rector of the College, and prominent mem-bers of the Curia lavished alms and financial help on the converts. The second book for registering pilgrims in the English College archives covers the years 1650-1735. It reflects a bright picture of the lives and move-ments of English foreigners present at that time in the city.27 This period

24 Edward Chaney, The Grand Tour and the Great Rebellion. Richard Lassel and “The Voy-age of Italy” in the Seventeenth Century (Genève, 1985).

25 VEC, Liber 283, p. 6.26 VEC, Liber 283, p. 2.27 VEC, Liber 283.


coincided with a greater awareness among ecclesiastical authorities that there was a need to have some control over the increasing number of for-eigners in Rome, a result of the growing popularity of the Grand Tour, though in practice this proved to be a nearly impossible task. Records of these experiences, usually described later in the pilgrim books—often after the convert had left the College and Rome—highlight how abjura-tions, considered as crucial moments in the transition to a new life, ini-tially took place within the College and were subsequently solemnized in public. On September 17, 1665 the pilgrim book related the adventurous life and conversion of twenty-six year old Cuthbert Simpson:

. . . by trade an apothecary and partly surgeon, who travelling by sea into ye Indies and other forrein countreys at last from Tangiers homeward bound, the ship was taken by some Holland men of warre; wherein he lost whatere he had gaind by those last voyages toghether with all utensils belonging to his profession ye wich he had with him then on board; in lieu whereof God’s name be prayyed, within few dayes hee did embrace ye holy faith, upon good motives as seemed planely by ye many lyes and forgeries concerning ye Catholik Religion, hee sawe himself deceivd with whilst yet remaining in his heresie: after his conversion he stayd in town most part of winter, confirming himself against ye hereticks deceits meanwhile earning his livelyhood by service now and then donne to ye College by practizing his trade. Hee confessed and communicated severall tymes and did non [sic] onely receive th’accustomed almes, but gott two pistoles more by order of ye Congregation belonging to the ye Holy Office, lately instituted for that end of helping Convertits impoverishd by such accidents as these of his before related.28

The College officials produced short biographies of a small number of converts, drawn up either when they entered the institution or after they left, and sometimes even much later, as can be seen by examining the documents.29 In these books the biographies took the form of exempla vitae, to be further elaborated and disseminated. The entries in the second book of pilgrims highlighted how the College was a point of attraction for Eng-lish foreigners who intended to be converted and eventually complete their education in the Catholic religion. As a matter of fact, national institutions present in the city gathered and protected fellow nationals, even heretics.

28 VEC, Liber 283, p. 9.29 For example in 1679 an annotation, clearly written later, relates that “Charles

Waymour and Wilhelm of Warftorshire both catholyes and this later a suffer for his reli-gion in ye persecution in England. They were admitted to ye ordinary Charity,” after eight days “hy was admitted into ye service of his Em. ce Card. Howard, the later into ye Pope Guards”: VEC, Liber 283, p. 32.


This inevitably required the recruitment of experts in foreign languages in order to keep track of the conversion of heretics who arrived in Rome in the periods before and after the jubilee years. One of these experts seems to have been Philip Howard (1629-1694), Cardinal of Norfolk, who was appointed Protector of England and Scotland (1679) and was well known for his commitment to renovating the college building and for his support for English Catholics.30 Many of them migrated to Rome as a result of the Catholic diaspora from England, which was accelerated by new waves of religious persecution following the Popish Plot (1678). Howard worked systematically to mediate between the Papal court, the College, and the other Roman congregations. This activity enabled him to set up a suffi-cient stream of alms for English migrants and also to allow a number of converted fellow nationals to be accommodated into the various colleges in Rome. Others were recruited into the Papal Guards, given places in his personal court, or eventually trained in a particular skill or profession in the courts of cardinals or aristocrats.

From the beginning of the eighteenth century, the exiled court of the Stuart kings, after relocating several times, settled in Rome. This brought an increasing number of English people to the city and to the College: travelers, artists, merchants, antique dealers and spies. They attempted to build their fortunes on the exiled court, favored by the support of the pope for James Stuart, the defeated Old Pretender (1688-1766). The court itself exercised a certain degree of autonomy, as we can see in a letter from an English traveler to his father expressing surprise at the fact that it was pos-sible to celebrate “an Anglican Easter service” inside the residency of the Old Pretender in Rome.31 As a matter of fact, by this time a widespread sense of disenchantment had set in among local authorities regarding the practicality of identifying the religious affiliations of foreigners present in both the College and in the city. Many travelers found this astonish-ing, because they were used to hearing the frightening legend broadcast around Europe of the terrible repressions and cruelties perpetrated by the Inquisition.

30 Murphy O’Connor et al., eds., The Church of the English College in Rome: Its History, its Restoration (Rome, 2009).

31 Daniel Szechi, “The Image of the Court: Idealism, Politics and the Evolution of the Stuart Court, 1689-1730,” in The Stuart Court in Rome: The Legacy of Exile, ed. Edward T. Corp (Aldershot, 2003), 49-64.


During the eighteenth century, religious conversions to the Catholic Church continued to have a strong symbolic importance, and they were employed for propaganda and political purposes. This fact is testified to by a vast body of contemporary literature, from récits de conversion to collec-tions of writings on famous converts. Strategies for bringing heretics back to their “Common Father” changed during the second half of the century as a result of the increased mobility of travelers, scientists, artists, and ordi-nary people. Repression and control had proved difficult to impose and even pointless, since most measures were incapable of stemming the flow of men, merchants, books, and ideas over the Alps and into the Mediterra-nean. The political decline of the papacy within Europe, which had started looking elsewhere for its points of reference, was compensated by Rome’s cultural vitality in foreign eyes. From all over Europe, artists, antiquarians, scholars, spies, forgers, and all sorts of individuals seeking their fortune came to the city, enjoying the lavish ceremonies of the papal court, the luxurious parties of the nobility, the theatres, and the academies. Even in the eighteenth century large foreign communities continued to exist and provide hospitality to artists and artisans who had no intention of convert-ing and no longer needed to fear persecution from the Inquisition. It was still possible to be called before the Holy Office for scandalous behavior, which served as a convenient means for personal vendettas, and for remov-ing troublemakers from the community. The attitude of judges towards this type of complaint varied: sometimes they were tolerant, other times they responded more harshly. In any case, they maintained their inquisito-rial role, although the cultural atmosphere in Rome was changing, in spite of censorship and repression. Foreigners had been, and continued to be, harbingers of worrisome changes. They would arrive in Rome with their followers, with their servants, with fellow workers, or with other travelers met along their journey. Or they might arrive alone, but wanting to share their life experiences in different, remote social realities. They brought “highly pernicious” (“perniciosissimi”) books with them, and shared the books’ content through words, images, and frequent, uncontrollable dis-cussions. These discussions were followed attentively by many people, sur-rounded by the indifference of most of the city’s inhabitants, under the vigilant but increasingly ineffective eye of Rome’s guardians of the faith.

Conversion and Autobiography: Telling Tales before the Roman Inquisition

Documents

Transcript of Conversion and Autobiography: Telling Tales before the Roman Inquisition