March 15: Riots in Seville

An anti-Jewish riot broke out in Seville, Spain on this date in 1391, after years of incitement by Archdeacon Ferrand Martinez, the confessor to the queen. The riot was quickly repressed, but anti-Semitic unrest and lawlessness persisted until a full-scale pogrom broke out on June 6, with 4,000 Jews in Seville killed and the great majority of survivors submitting to baptism to avoid death. The violence spread from town to town, with thousands more Jews murdered or forcibly converted in Cordoba, Toledo, Aragon, Catalonia, Valencia, Marjorca, and many other centers. This was a turning point in the history of Spanish Jews, as the great majority sought safety in baptism and set in motion the conversos (marranos) phenomenon — which the Spanish Inquisition was established to monitor nine decades later, before the mass expulsion of Jews from Spain in 1492.

“There is only one crime of which I am guilty — being too merciful!” —Tomas de Torquemada, Grand Inquisitor