Bernardo de Aldrete, humanist and laminario

Abstract

The humanist scholar and philologist Bernardo de Aldrete had a contradictory relationship to the Sacromonte affair. His first book in 1606 was a pathbreaking history of the Spanish language. Notable for its rigorous methods of linguistic inquiry, that work demonstrated the Latin origins of Spanish and rejected its existence before the time of the Visigoths. Aldrete's thesis was attacked for impugning the authenticity of the Turpiana parchment. In a second book Aldrete defended both his earlier work and the Sacromonte discoveries. He assisted Archbishop de Castro in the defense of the lead books, but that role has received little attention from historians. This article draws together Aldrete's published work and his correspondence with the Archbishop's house- hold to bring his role in the Sacromonte case into focus. It attempts to identify the continuities as well as the more often noted contradictions between Aldrete's roles as laminario and humanist scholar.