“Documents in Transition”: Notarial Legalization of Jewish Documents used by Conversos for the Lawsuit of the Inheritance of Beatriz de Arqueñigo

Abstract

Beatriz de Arqueñigo, called Mazalto before the conversion in 1498 of the Jews of the kingdom of Navarre, brings in 1535 an action over the inheritance of her father in Pamplona’s royal courts, against the heirs of Maria Diez (ol. Astruga Mataron), who had married in 1479 Jaco Farax, later converted as Miguel de Arqueñigo, who was in turn the father of Beatriz, the daughter from his first marriage with Aljohar. During the legal process certain notarial certified documents are submitted, transcribed (or translated) from Hebrew letters to Castilian in 1509 and 1525 by a notary from Tudela, Pedro de Agramont. Before 1498, the later had been an scribe of the aljama of the Jews, under the name of Jaco de la Rabiça, and had signed some of these documents. These offer a rare picture of Navarre’s Jews before and after the expulsion or conversion in 1498 and of the transition from Jew to Christian of individual participants in the legal case. It also opens a debate as to the motives of the editor of the pre-1498 documents for his removal of Jewish references.