New Find Reveals Macabre Tale of 400-year-old ?Neo-con?
The University of Manchester - 24 April 2007
Boxes in a
Spanish nunnery containing documents which lay barely noticed for hundreds of years have given a unique insight into the gruesome life and times of one the first female missionaries to
Britain.
Luisa de Carvajal?s writings also helped historian Dr Glyn Redworth from The
University of Manchester to discover new evidence confirming that a Gunpowder Plotter executed in 1606 was probably innocent.
Dr Redworth, who is based at the School of Arts, Histories and Cultures, is the first historian to examine hundreds of letters, writings and poems by
Luisa de Carvajal - many of which were left unsorted in boxes at a Madrid convent.
The documents shed new light on the suffering endured by Catholics who refused to attend
Church of England services under James I. Dr Redworth believes the Spanish aristocrat was one of the first female missionaries since medieval times and possibly ancient Rome.
She also championed interventionist ideas, he says, which resemble the neo-cons of today.
Another of Luisa?s missions was to secretly rescue and then preserve in her Spitalfields house the remains of executed priests - who were hung, drawn and quartered at
Tyburn - which she sent as relics to hardline Catholics on the continent.
Dr Redworth is now putting the finishing touches to a book on her life called
The Nun of Spitalfields and has been awarded over ?300,000 by the Arts and Humanities Research Council to translate her letters into English.
He said: ?Luisa was hell-bent on smashing an English and Dutch Protestant ?axis of evil?.
?She also argued for military intervention in Ireland and the forced deportation of 400,000 Moriscos - Christians of Muslim descent living in Spain. ?That bears a strong resemblance to the sort of things some neo-cons are saying today.
?But her life was multifaceted: she challenged stereotypes of women in London as she lived alone with other women - helping the poor, including prostitutes.
?Her body remains in a casket unburied in Spain until the Catholic Church decides if she?s a saint. ?But I wouldn?t hold your breath: after 393 years they still haven?t made up their mind.?
He added: ?Luisa came to England not knowing a word of English to realise her dream of converting English protestants to the Catholic faith and martyring herself for the cause.
?She was disgusted by the English, who she said threw carrots into carts which the day before had carried the bodies of plague victims.
?But her own habits could leave a lot to be desired: she sent countless numbers of her friends the body parts of the priests as compelling mementoes of religious persecution.
?This is tremendously exciting as these documents have been seen by barely a handful of people in hundreds of years. ?After I was tipped off by American literary scholar Elizabeth Rhodes, I paid a visit to
Madrid to see the writings.?
Dr Redworth claims the research also throws new light on the Gunpowder Plot. ?Luisa was invited to England by
Henry Garnet, leader of the English Jesuits, who was hung, drawn and quartered six months later for his part in the plot to blow up the
Houses of Parliament.
?The documents suggest it is unlikely that Garnet would have invited a high-profile lone Spanish female agitator into England if he was trying to keep secret a complex plot to murder the King.?
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