Tomás de Torquemada

Tomás de Torquemada
Tomás de Torquemada
Born	1420 Torquemada or Valladolid, Kingdom of Castile
Died	September 16, 1498 (aged 77–78) Ávila, Kingdom of Castile
Occupation	Grand Inquisitor
Parent(s)	Don Pedro Ferdinando, lord of Torquemada (father)
Relatives	Juan de Torquemada (cardinal) (uncle)

Tomás de Torquemada (Thomas of Torquemada), O.P. (/ˌtɔːrkəˈmɑːdə/ Spanish: [toɾkeˈmaða]; 1420 – September 16, 1498) was a Castilian Dominican friar, and the first Grand Inquisitor in Spain's movement to homogenize religious practices with those of the Catholic Church in the late 15th century, otherwise known as "The Spanish Inquisition."

Mainly because of persecution, Muslims and Jews in Spain at that time found it socially, politically, and economically expedient to convert to Catholicism, (see Converso, Morisco, and Marrano). Large in number, the existence of superficial converts, (i.e., Crypto-Jews), was perceived by the Spanish monarchs of that time, (principally King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella), as a threat to the religious and social life of Spain. This led Torquemada, who himself had converso ancestors, to be one of the chief supporters of the Alhambra Decree that expelled the Jews from Spain in 1492.

Torquemada was born in 1420, either in Valladolid, Old Castile, in the Kingdom of Castile, or in the nearby small village of Torquemada.  He came from a family of conversos (converts from Judaism); his uncle, Juan de Torquemada, was a celebrated theologian and cardinal, whose grandmother was a conversa. The contemporary historian, Hernando del Pulgar, (himself a converso) recorded that Tomás de Torquemada's uncle, Juan de Torquemada, had an ancestor, Álvar Fernández de Torquemada, who was married to a first-generation conversa.