Antonio Alonso
Professor / San Pablo CEU University
On April 23, Book Day in Spain, Day of the Spanish Language in Latin America, the Aula Política Joven of the CEU Institute of Democracy Studies hosted a lecture given by Alberto Gil Ibáñez, essayist, who has thoroughly researched Hispanidad and the Black Legend generated around it.
With patience and arguments, Gil Ibáñez dismantled one by one the main accusations that are often made against Spain and its role in the world. We are accused of being a genocidal empire; this has little foundation, just take a walk through our streets or those of any Latin American country. Their faces tell us that certain biological characteristics have lasted until today and, moreover, they are in the majority across the Atlantic. Not only because of miscegenation – what surnames do they have? – but also because the number of native Indians who did not mix with the Spanish “invaders” was about 14 million, a figure that is now five times higher. Where are the Native Americans of the territory that is now the USA? Those who did commit genocide were, for example, the Aztecs, thanks to whom Cortés was able to conquer present-day Mexico with only 400 men… and all the chiefs of the other tribes who placed themselves at his command to put an end to their real oppressor: the Aztecs.
An intolerant Empire, where the Inquisition was at ease, killing left and right without any kind of control. It is true that the Holy Tribunal ordered – throughout its centuries of history – some 3,000 people to be condemned to death. It is no less true that the witch hunts unleashed in Central Europe alone resulted in more than 150,000 witches being burned at the stake, in addition to all the “outrages” committed by the Protestants against the peasants or by the Anglicans against the Catholics in the United Kingdom. Comparatively lesser was our experience, but with an increased fame. The same happens with the Jews; we were neither the first nor the last to expel the Hebrews from their respective countries, and yet many decided to stay among us, which is attested by the fact that around 20% of the Spanish population has Jewish blood.
An unscientific and antiquated empire, infested with superchería. How is it possible that an unscientific civilization went to sea away from the known coasts, entering the unknown sea? How could they do it without basic knowledge of navigation? Not to mention the arts and letters. As can be seen, this accusation does not hold water either.
A slave empire, when it was Queen Isabella the Catholic who ordered that her subjects from across the seas be treated equally; when it was the School of Salamanca that theorized on Human Rights, affirming the radical equality of human beings. Therefore, they could not enslave the Native Americans, although they did “turn a blind eye” to the slaves coming from Africa, a continent enslaved by other empires. Slavers were the French, British, Belgians, Portuguese, Dutch… and some Spanish citizens enriched themselves with the slave trade.
Now, one might ask, if none of what is said is true, if at most they are real defects inflated by exaggerations, why do they happen? Who benefits from it? It seems pretty obvious that when you can’t defeat your enemy militarily, you have to do it by commercial warfare and/or by cultural warfare. It is enough to look at History to discover who benefited from denigrating our work in America and Asia to realize who worked hardest to spread that pack of lies: the Netherlands and the United Kingdom.
Our heroes are of flesh and blood, those of Hollywood are not. Why aren’t dozens of films produced every year extolling the glories of our ancestors? The most regrettable thing, for Gil Ibáñez, is not only that Spain is accused of unfounded barbarities, but also that it has worked so that the Spaniards themselves believe them, that the truth is hidden from us and that we work to spread the errors.
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