This persecution of the Jews and Moors at Seville, was followed in every other province of the kingdom of Spain. Encouraged by Ferdinand and Isabella, the Inquisitors daily dragged several miserable victims before their tribunal; and summarily consigned to the rack all whom they suspected, and to the flames those whom they pretended to have convicted, of still adhering to the Jewish faith. But even this was not enough. In 1482, the Inquisitors appointed a particular time for all the Jews to appear before them, and make confession of their errors. Alarmed for their safety, seventeen thousand appeared on the day appointed, who having pretended to embrace the Christian religion, were pardoned. But many others refusing to act in the same hypocritical manner, were seized and lodged in prison. Having been put to the most excruciating tortures, numbers of these unhappy persons abjured Judaism, and were consigned to the flames, some of them acknowledging Christ, and others calling on the name of Moses! Such indeed was the satanic zeal which animated the Inquisitors, that in the short space of forty years after the Inquisition had been established in Seville, four thousand persons were burnt in that bishopric alone! A hundred thousand were reconciled and banished in Andalusia;[7] and the bones of multitudes, which were dug out of their graves, were burnt, their property confiscated, and their children disinherited.
In 1483 the famous, or rather infamous, Thomas de Torquemada was appointed Inquisitor-general of Arragon,—a man every way fitted for increasing the prerogatives and revenues of the holy office. He first created four inferior tribunals—at Seville, Cordova, Jaen, and Villa Real; and then persuaded Ferdinand to create a royal council of Inquisition, at the head of which was placed Torquemada himself, who was assisted by two eminent counsellors. In order to arrange laws for the new council, Torquemada convoked a junta, composed of the Inquisitors of the four tribunals above mentioned, the two assistants, and the members of the royal council. This assembly was held at Seville in 1484, and published a code of laws consisting of twenty-eight articles,[8] which were the first laws of the Spanish Inquisition. The tyranny, extortion, and cruelty of the various tribunals, excited the indignation of the Jews, and plans were formed, in Arragon especially, to assassinate the Inquisitors, and free the country from their iniquitous yoke. These plans, however, being frustrated, still greater cruelties were inflicted on that unhappy people. From time to time additional laws were made, all tending to abridge the liberty of the people, and to advance the authority, and increase the revenues of the Inquisition. The severity of these laws obliged more than a hundred thousand families to emigrate to other kingdoms.