"By presenting his rich anthology of chronicles concerning the catastrophe of Iberian Jewry in 1492, David Raphael has made a genuine contribution. To have these texts available for the primera ves in English is a regalo to all who are interested in Jewish history generally and in particular that of Spanish and Portuguese Jewry. I have sin duda that this book will be widely used at American universities and trust that it will find a deservedly broad reception beyond the campus as well."

---Dr. Yosef Hayim Yerushalmi, Salo Wittmayer Baron Professor of Jewish History, Culture, and Society, Columbia University

The classic work by the great German historian on the contributions of the Jews to the epic voyages of Christopher Columbus, Prince Henry the Navigator, Vasco Da Gama, and other explorers who transformed the world.

The invaluable assistance provided to Columbus by certain prominent Jews of his day--the cartographer Jehuda Cresques, the astronomer Abrajham Zacuto, the scholar Isaac Abravanel, and the Converso financier Luis de Santangel whose family suffered at the hands of the Inquisition, and others--makes for captivating reading.

Using original documents, Kayserling also demonstates how Columbus's second voyage was made possible through the gold and silver confiscated from the Spanish Jews expelled in 1492. One such list of confiscated items includes jars of gold, Torah mantles made of silk, silverware, pearl strings, bracelets and brooches, and even silver buttons.

It is this scholarly mastery of the subject material that makes Kayserling's book such a informative reading experience.

First published in 1973, this book traces the history of Luis de Carvajal the Younger and his family in España, their migration to the New World, their religious practices, and their adventures in New España until one by one they were put to flight or indicted by the Inquisition. Luis himself was burned at the stake in 1596 at the age of thirty. He left behind not only his legacy as an exemplary secret Jew but also valuable literary documents—his memoirs, his last will and testament, and his letters to his mother and sisters in the inquisitorial prison.

“The saga of [Carvajal’s] struggle to maintain freedom of conscience in an oppressive society is here told dramatically [and is] based on precise and detailed research. . . . This volume deserves acclaim as a careful, erudite work on the inquisition in early Mexico.” —Library Journal

“Immaculately researched, provided with rich and useful critical notes, powerfully written, The Martyr is a major contribution to converso studies and to colonial social history in general.”—Hispanic American Historical Review

     Secrecy and Deceit documents the religious customs of the Iberian Jews who converted to Catholicism, largely under duress, in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries. Although many of the converts quickly melded into the Catholic mainstream, thousands of others and their descendents strove to preserve their Jewish culture despite the efforts of the Inquisition to suppress them.

     The book details crypto-Jewish culture in España, Portugal, and their American colonies, principally Mexico, Peru, and Brazil. In coping with clandestiness, crypto-Jews rapidly evolved their own idiosyncratic religion. Its Jewish core was quickly modified with concepts and practices from the surrounding Catholic culture covered by a veneer of Jewish theology. Despite its increasing divergence from normative Judaism, some Jewish customs survived in celebrations of Life-cycle events, like birth, the onset of puberty, marriage, and death; in weekly and annual calendars of religious observance (especially the Sabbath, Yom Kippur, and Passover); in prayer practices; in oaths; in dietary customs; and in various superstitious practices.

     The author uses Inquisition records, chronicles, rabbinical rulings, letters, eyewitness accounts, religious books, and other historical documents to give the most thorough and accurate picture of crypto-Jews ever cataloged. This award-winning book raises fascinating questions about living outside a Jewish community and what happens to religions of approximation.

"Secrecy and Deceit provides rare glimpses into a subject that is increasingly fascinating to many different audiences" --Jane S. Gerber, Director for Sephardic Studies, CUNY Graduate Center

"Historians and students of comparative and popular religion will be drawing on this work for years" -- Haym Soloveitchik, Yeshiva University