This book fills several voids in the literature of colonial Brazil. It focuses on Pernambuco, a major Portuguese sugar-producing colony which has received less attention than it merits. James Wadsworth looks at the Inquisition from a new perspective: instead of exploring the impact of the Inquisition on colonial society, Wadsworth examines this organization from the inside to produce a powerful institutional study. The work draws heavily on the documents related to the 1,046 applicants from Pernambuco for affiliation, primarily as familiares, during the years between 1613 and 1821. Whereas the Spanish Inquisition functioned bureaucratically in the New World, Brazil and other parts of the Portuguese empire (except Goa) were under the jurisdiction of the Lisbon Inquisition, where interrogations of the accused, their trials, and ultimately their punishments occurred. Without ignoring the functioning of the Lisbon Inquisition, Wadsworth focuses on operations and staffing in the sugar colony.
Within this context,...
