The Heredity of the Milk - The Early Modern Ban on New Christian Wet Nurses

2.3 The Early Modern Ban on New Christian Wet Nurses

2.3.3 The Heredity of the Milk

But the milk could carry not only hatred and idolatry. There seemed to be almost no limits imposed on the authors in this regard. This applies both to those who are committed to compliance with the purity of blood statutes (e.g. Juan Martínez Siíceo and Diego Velázquez /Diego de Simancas)²⁹³or even the expulsion of the Conversos (e.g. Vicente da Costa Matos and his translator Diego Gavilán Vela), as well as to those who were concerned with advocating and justifying the expulsions of the Moriscos between 1609 and 1614 (e.g. Damian Fonseca and Pedro Aznar Cardona).

ThePapeles referentes al estatuto de limpieza de sangre,²⁹⁴which have been preserved as a manuscript and in which Juan Martínez Silíceo (1486 – 1557), Archbishop of Toledo, who defends and justifies the prevailing purity of blood statutes for his cathedral chapter, contain the following remarks, for example:

“[…] the best we will give to these people who descend from the dark lineage, and, yes, they also retain the milk – still fresh furthermore – from the parents with their depravity.”²⁹⁵

292 Ibidem, 221.

293 In regard to the writings of Juan Martínez Silíceo and Diego de Simancas, judge, bishop, and inquisitor, who published his work under the pseudonym Diego Velázquez, see Robert Aleksander MARYKS: The Jesuit Order as a Synagogue of Jews: Jesuits of Jewish Ancestry and Purity-of -Blood Laws in the Early Society of Jesus, Studies in medieval and Reformation traditions, Leiden and Berlin 2010, 29 –39.

294 Papers on the Purity of Blood Statutes.

295 “[…] de optimo dabimus eos homines qui generis sunt obscuri, quippe à Parentibus recens adhuc suae pravitatis retinent lac.” BNE: Silíceo (archbishop of Toledo) et al.: Papeles referentes al estatuto de limpieza de sangre de la Iglesia de Toledo, 134v.

The milk that is transferred to the children via the parents is described here as flawed, as depraved.

This depravity,pravitas, was considered to be still fresh since the conversions to Christianity, from the archbishop’s point of view, had taken place only recently. Thus, residues were to be expected that would be retained in the children, which is emphasized by the verbretinent.

When reviewing the texts defending and justifying the expulsion of the Moriscos, it can be seen that the ingredients of milk have been defined somewhat differently here. In his apology Justa expulsión de los moriscos de España,²⁹⁶ the Dominican Damian Fonseca (1573– 1627) discusses not hatred, but rather a learned grudge against Christians:

“They raised their children with a strange grudge against Christians, and when they wanted to scare them, they used to tell them in Arabic: Watch out, a Christian! As a result, the children hid, cried or fled when they heard this or saw us. And since they imbibed this milk, they always kept this aversion.”²⁹⁷

The image of feeding with breast milk,mamar la leche, serves in this case to describe in more detail how the aversion and also fear of Christians was instilled in the children of Morisco families.

How deeply this antipathy in the children remained even as adults, or how it was anchored in the body was supposed to be demonstrated to the reader with the help of the breast milk metaphor.

But the author went one step further and also tried to explain the Morisco uprisings in this way:

“[…] all in all it seems that they learn [the breaches of trust] through their caste and that they imbibe this rebellion and low loyalty to their kings with the milk.”²⁹⁸

In regard to the image of breast milk and caste,la casta,²⁹⁹as Fonseca suggested that the Moriscos had a natural, inherited tendency to be disloyal and rebel. This attribution served the strategy of his argumentation since if the tendency to resist was anchored naturally and thus unchangeably in the Moriscos, only the expulsion of the Moriscos from Spain would remain as an effective means of securing the kingdom. To look at it again from the flip side: If there were the possibility of re-educating the Moriscos to become loyal and devoted subjects, the expulsion of the Moriscos could no longer be presented as justified.

Another sentence in his apology also suggests that Damian Fonseca deliberately wanted to use the metaphor of breast milk to tie in with generally known medical knowledge:

296 Just Expulsion of the Moriscos from Spain.

297 “Criavan sus hijos con una estraña ogeriza contra los Christianos, y quando los querian espantar, les solian dezir en su Algaravia;guarda Christiano, por lo qual oyrnos nombrar, ò en vernos, se escondian, lloravan, y huian, y como mamavan esta leche, siempre conservavan aquella antipatia.” Damian FONSECA: Justa expulsión de los moriscos de España: Con la instrucción, apostasia, y trayción dellos. Y respuesta à las dudas que se ofrecieron acerca desta materia, Rom: Por Iacomo Mascardo, 1612, 127.

298 “[…] con todo parece que les venia de casta, y que con la leche mamavan esta rebelion, y poca fidelidad a sus Reyes […].” Ibidem, 152.

299 The word is used as an equivalent for concepts such aslinajeandraza, thereby referring to descent. In research, Américo Castro (1885 – 1972), who spoke of a caste system in light of Spanish premodern society, took up the concept, which led to some misunderstandings.

“Such children had to be born from such parents – traitors like them, who used to imbibe with the milk the good and bad customs of their progenitors.”³⁰⁰

The transmission of character through breast milk, as described in the medical treatises, serves here once again to confirm the naturally inherent, treacherous character of the Moriscos in general. If one continues this thought, it means that the descendants of the Moriscos are classified by the author as guiltlessly guilty, as traitors against their will, condemned to this behavior by their inherited nature. The author also used this classification to absolve himself and his motives from any self -harbored grudge since he would not be driven by hatred himself, but solely by the realization that the Moriscos could never be loyal subjects due to their natural heredity and thus would have to be represented as a danger for the kingdom and be expelled.

It should be noted at this point that various ingredients could be added to the milk. Hatred, grudge, idolatry, depravity, infidelity and rebellion can be found in the texts. It is also important to remember that the focus is always on the transmission or heredity of these character weaknesses and emotions through the vehicle of the breast milk. If one goes a step further, it is necessary to examine how this illustrated issue of heredity, which one could not escape, led to warnings against New Christian wet nurses.

2.3. 4 Warnings against New Christian Wet Nurses

Now it is necessary to address the following questions: In what form were the warnings against New Christian wet nurses made in various texts of the time and how were they justified? In theTractatus de officialibus reipublicaeby Antonio Fernández de Otero, he starts by citing the statement that no New Christian wet nurses “or descending from unclean blood”³⁰¹ were permitted for royal children.

Here, too, there is a strong similarity to Vicente da Costa Matos’ remarks in the translation by Diego Gavilán Vela. Following this statement, however, he cites as confirmation great physicians such as Avicenna and Luis Lobera de Ávila as well as the lawyer Ignacio del Villar Maldonado. Fernández de Otero at this point leaves out the fact that Luis Lobera de Ávila, like Avicenna, generally talks about the importance of the character of the wet nurse or mother for the child and by no means about New Christian wet nurses. The text by the lawyer Villar Maldonado will be discussed in more detail below. Fernández de Otero connects his passage about the ban on New Christian wet nurses for the royal descendants,filiorum Regis, with a more detailed explanation in Castilian, which was written in italics in the treatise and probably represents an almost literal quotation from theSiete Partidas:

“[…] this means giving them intelligent, well-mannered wet nurses of good descent. Just as the child is instructed and raised in the mother’s body until it is born, so it is instructed and raised by the wet nurse from the moment it receives the breast until the time it is weaned.

300 “De tales padres, tales hijos avian de nacer, traydores como ellos, que de ordinario suelen estos con la leche mamar las buenas, y malas costumbres de sus progenitores.” FONSECA: Justa expulsión de los moriscos de España: Con la instrucción, apostasia, y trayción dellos. Y respuesta à las dudas que se ofrecieron acerca desta materia (see n. 297), 153.

301 “[V]el immundo sanguine procedentem”; FERNÁNDEZ DE OTERO: Tractatus de officialibus reipublicae (see n. 44), 17.

And since the time of this rearing lasts longer than that of the mother: therefore, it cannot be that the child does not receive much from the wet nurse’s temperament and character.

That is why the ancient scholars who talked about these things in a natural way said that the children of kings should have wet nurses who had enough milk and were well-mannered, healthy, beautiful, of good lineage and good customs.”³⁰²

Although this excerpt resembles the legal text to an almost astonishing degree, some changes in meaning can be seen nonetheless. On the one hand, Fernández de Otero gives a prominent place to

“good lineage,”buen linaje, and connects it with the question of blood purity, thereby reinterpreting it consciously. On the other, he reinforces the idea of character transmission through milk with the concept of temperament,temperamento, instead of demeanor,contenente.

That the question of descent was not limited to women, however, follows from the textSylva responsorum iurisby the already mentioned lawyer Villar Maldonado. His date of birth and death are not known. It can be said on the basis of his work that hisForest of Legal Answersappeared in Madrid in 1614, and Villar Maldonado completed a work begun by his father. In the twelfth answer in which the legal status of both the neophytes³⁰³ and the children of heretics are treated, the ban on New Christian wet nurse’s in the royal house is also addressed. The lawyer continues:

“[…] each of the spouses is thoroughly examined and questioned and if, in any way, one of the two spouses descends from a family of Jewish origin, she may under no circumstances be admitted to this office […].”³⁰⁴

According to Villar Maldonado, not only the wife and potential wet nurse should be examined and questioned, but also her husband. If one of the two spouses, be it the wife or husband, had Jewish ancestors in their family tree, the wife was unsuitable for the office of wet nurse for theinfantesin the royal house.

This raises the question of why the lawyer took both spouses into consideration. One might assume that the greater importance of the legal component is seen here, as it was already mentioned in the medieval code of laws in theSiete Partidas, i.e., the desire to strictly separate the Jewish and Christian worlds. Perhaps, however, the statements already go beyond this level and involve the fact that if the husband had Jewish ancestors, the potential wet nurse would have born and possibly

302 “[…] esto es en darles amas savias y bien acostumbradas y de buen linage. Bien ansi como el niño se govierna y se cria en el cuerpo de la madre asta que nace otro si se govierna y cria de la ama desde que le da la teta asta destetarle y porque el tiempo de esta crianza es mas largo que el de la madre porende no puede ser que no reciva mucho del tenperamento [sic] y de las costumbres del ama. Onde los savios antiguos que ablaron en estas cosas naturalmente dixeron que los hijos de los Reies deven tener a tales amas que tengan leche asat y sean vien acostumbradas y sanas y hermosas y de buen linaje, y de buenas costumbres.” FERNÁNDEZ DE OTERO: Tractatus de officialibus reipublicae (see n. 44), 17.

303 Villar Maldonado included the Conversos under the neophytes, i.e., the freshly baptized.

304 “[…] utriusque coniugis exactissima fit examinatio, & inquisitio: & si fortè quovis modo alteruter coniux à genere Iudæorum originem trahat, neutiquam in id munus admitti solet […].” VILLAR MALDONADO: Sylva responsorum iuris, in duos libros divisa (see n. 25), 131r.

nursed a child with partially Jewish roots. This would mean that the medical ideas of the time also played an increasing role in the legal texts.

Against the backdrop of the image of women, which Vicente da Costa Matos draws in his text to justify the expulsion of Conversos from Portugal,³⁰⁵and his statement that women are at more risk and more susceptible to heresy, among other things because they have to follow their husbands in religion, one could assume that Villar Maldonado might have thought of this potential danger.

From this perspective, her marriage vow would have harmed the wet nurse’s customs and made her unsuitable for the rearing of theinfantes.

Which of these three assumptions is more correct or whether it is even a mixture of several or all, must be left open since Villar Maldonado does not explain the reasons for this. Instead, he discusses afterwards why such a wet nurse should not be permitted, and cites Avicenna and Luis Lobera de Ávila, who are already familiar authorities, at this point. The latter could lead to the conclusion that the second assumption is indeed most likely to be true so that medicine also played a role in this aspect that both spouses are taken into consideration.

How popular this topic of New Christian wet nurses also was in a more general context can be seen in theDiálogos familiares de la agricultura cristiana³⁰⁶ by Juan de Pineda. He wanted to give his readers the broadest possible knowledge of Christian life through entertaining conversations.

Accordingly, in dialog XV, chapter XXI, Filótimo and Policronio talk about a Christian upbringing and New Christian wet nurses:

“Filótimo. – It is a worthy matter that those who rule the state should be concerned that neither a Morisca nor a woman of Jewish blood raise the children of Old Christians since their blood still tastes of and is tainted with the sticky beliefs of their ancestors. And without any guilt of their own, the children could gain an aftertaste of it, which would be bad for them later as adults. And often I heard a man, equipped with a good mind and rhetorical skills, say that half the quarter he got from his Jewish side never stopped scaring him that he would turn back into a Jew.

Policronio. – This is similar to what my Moriscos say when I correct some mutterings that smell stagnant of Moorish heresy,natura revertura– nature returns.”³⁰⁷

What is striking about this conversation is the demand addressed to government officials to extend the ban on New Christian wet nurses to Old Christian households in general instead of imposing

305 See chapter2.3.2 The New Christian Wet Nurse Issue and its Context.

306 Familiar Dialogues about Christian Agriculture.

307 “Filótimo. – Cosa es muy digna de ser provista por los que gobiernan las repúblicas, que mujer morisca ni de sangre de judíos criase a hijos de cristianos viejos, porque aún les sabe la sangre a la pega de las creencias de sus antepasados, y sin culpa suya podrían los niños cobrar algún resabio que para después de hombres les supiese mal; y muchas veces oí decir a un hombre de buen seso y conversación, que medio cuarto, que tenía de judío, nunca dejaba de le importunar, que se tornase judío.

Policronio. – Eso me parece lo que dicen mis moriscos, cuando los reprehendo de algunos sonsonetes que oliscan a moraizar,natura revertura.”

Juan de PINEDA: Diálogos familiares de la agricultura cristiana III, vol. 163, Biblioteca de autores españoles, Madrid 1963, 103.

this ban only on the royal house as before. Interestingly, in Filótimo’s speech, the author uses the image of taste or aftertaste,resabio, and stickiness,pegar, to illustrate how heresy influences the blood and thus both the wet nurse and – in a second step – the child to be nursed. The sinful, heretical character of the ancestors does not only remain attached to the New Christians like a stain, but at this point it is symbolized by a bad aftertaste that a reasonable, rhetorically confident man fears.

The second speaker, Policronio, also mentions another sensory experience – smell. According to him, some of the Moriscos’ utterances “smell stagnant,”oliscar, of heresy and apostasy, that is, of leaving Christianity and returning to Islam. Accordingly, it is the sensory perceptions of taste and smell that are supposed to allegorically reveal the heresy attached to the Conversos and Moriscos.

In addition, both speakers underline the inevitability of the attachment of this stain by having it confirmed by those affected. Filótimo cites the man who is one-eighth Jewish and who feels that he cannot escape this eighth. In Policronio, it is “his Moriscos” who, according to their own statements, would always revert to their nature.

The last statement about reverting to their nature, natura revertura, could refer to a proverb:

“Natura revertura, el gato á la asadura.”³⁰⁸In terms of the structure of the reasoning, there are strong similarities to the passage in Vicente da Costa Matos, as translated into Spanish by Gavilán Vela, which Francisco de Torrejoncillo also replicated almost literally because here, too, the argumentation ended with a proverb. And at least in Costa Matos, the story of the Neapolitan nobleman was mentioned before, which is not dissimilar to the fears of the one-eighth Converso in Pineda.

One can assume that a hierarchy lies behind this structure of reasoning, which can often be found with minor changes. After a general statement of the facts, the scholars are cited first in the argumentation, then this is frequently followed by an exemplary narrative in which everyday experiences are preferably related orally by the affected people, and the whole reasoning culminates in a well-known proverb, which is to reaffirm the general truth of the previously cited arguments.

Viewed in this way, the proverb is considered to be the final irrefutable proof since it usually has the function of proclaiming a social truth that is already universally acknowledged and has been solidified through diverse experiences. If one considers the importance of rhetoric for the Early Modern Age,³⁰⁹ it seems plausible that even if there were no rules, certain practices had also established themselves for the structure of reasoning, thedispositio.

For the previously mentioned dialog in the work by Juan de Pineda – apart from the structure of reasoning – three special features can be noted: the demand for an extension of the ban on New Christian wet nurses, the visualization of the stain via the senses of taste and smell attached to the New Christians, and the inevitability of this naturally given stain, which was supposed to be

Im Dokument (Foreign) Bodies Stigmatizing New Christians in Early Modern Spain Julia Gebke (Seite 91-99)