Juan Bautista Pérez and the Plomos de Granada: Spanish Humanism in the Late Sixteenth Century

Abstract

This article addresses the Parecer of the humanist Juan Bautista Pérez (d. 1597), one of the earliest critics of the relics unearthed in Granada in the decade after 1588. Given his relatively progressive morisco policy as bishop of Segorbe, Pérez might well have welcomed the plomos, which created a history that encompassed both Muslims and Christians. His humanist training, however, led him to conclude that the plomos were a modem forgery, and that their veneration would lead the Spanish people astray. The Parecer (1595) of Pérez represents one example of scholarly rigor, creativity, and religious devotion among Spanish humanists in the later sixteenth century.