People, Pamphlets and Popular Mobilisation in the Aragonese Rebellion of 1591
From Firenze University Press Journal: Journal of Early Modern Studies (JEMS)
Jesús Gascón Pérez, Universidad de Zaragoza
- Introduction: Subversive Writings and Popular Sedition During the Early Modern Age
The verses cited above were published by Canon Vicencio Blasco de Lanuza, who attributed them to ‘un Poeta de mi patria’ and explained that they formed part of a longer composition arguing ‘que ciertamente es el vulgo perniciosissimo si se descompone’. Upon analysing the content of these verses, it is noteworthy that the author includes libels and pamphlets among the manifestations of violence that may generate serious disturbances. !is notion aligns with the assessment by Francis Bacon, who argued that ‘Libels, and licentious Discourses against the State, when they are frequent and open; And in like sort, false Newes, often running up and downe, to the disadvantage of the State, and hastily embraced, are amongst the Signes of Troubles’. Bacon then refers to Virgil’s view that Fame was the sister of the Giants, which made rumours (Fames) ‘Reliques of Seditions past’ and, simultaneously, ‘the preludes of Seditions to come’. This is why he claims that the Latin author was correct in concluding that ‘Seditious Tumults, and Seditious Fames, differ no more, but as Brother and Sister, Masculine and Feminine’ (1625, 76–77). And, in a similar way, it is interesting to note that years later, in a 1664 trial of a bookseller accused of disseminating seditious pamphlets, the King’s sergeant Sir William Morton argued that ‘Dispersing seditious Books is very near a kin to raising of Tumults, they are as like as Brother and Sister: Raising of Tumults is the more Masculine, and Printing and Dispersing Seditious books, is the Feminine part of every Rebellion’ (Dzelzainis 2006, 139). A little earlier, chroniclers recounting the conflicts in the kingdom of Aragon in the late sixteenth century highlighted the subversive influence of pasquinades circulated during various crises. This was particularly evident during the clerical riot in Teruel in 1571 and the Aragonese Rebellion which took place two decades later. Blasco de Lanuza and the Argensola brothers — contemporaries of his and, just like him, privileged witnesses to both events — shared a similar perspective on the issue. According to Bartolomé Leonardo de Argensola, the unrestrained action of a royal official in Teruel in 1571 ‘tentó harto la paciencia a toda la provincia y, si no causó alborotos violentos, nacieron de su despecho pasquines y quexas’ (1996, 118). A similar view was expressed by Lupercio Leonardo de Argensola throughout his Informacion on the revolt against Philip II. In a first allusion, he stresses how widespread the diffusion of subversive writings had been during this episode and noted that ‘como estaba quitado el freno del temor, publicábanse sin autor muchos versos, que llaman pasquines … que encendian los ánimos’ (1991, 94). A few pages later, he affirms that, when the order to raise men to resist the King’s army was received in Teruel, ‘Amanecieron en ciertos lugares públicos papeles culpando á los que estorvaban esta resolucion, y solevando al pueblo’ (121). Finally, he explains that one of the accused was ‘hombre de buen entendimiento y amigo de novedades, que no le hizo esto poco daño, porque le aplicó el fisco muchos de los pasquines que en aquellas sediciones alborotaron el pueblo’ (185–186).
DOI: https://doi.org/10.36253/jems-2279-7149-15264
Read Full Text: https://oajournals.fupress.net/index.php/bsfm-jems/article/view/15264
