Doña Teresa Confronts the Spanish Inquisition

"Teresa Aguilera y Roche, wife of New Mexico governor Bernardo López de Mendizábal, was the only woman from New Mexico ever tried by the Inquisition for the crime of secretly practicing Jewish rituals. Doña Teresa's arrest, trial, and eventual exoneration shed light on the social fabric of seventeenth-century Santa Fe as well as the dangers of non-conformity on even the farthest frontiers of Spanish America. Accusing the governor and his wife of crypto-Judaism, Levine argues, had more to do with rival politicians and clergy that used the Inquisition to silence opposition than actual heretical behavior" --Provided by publisher.