Juan de Valdes (Renaissance and Reformation)

Introduction

Juan de Valdés is a historical enigma. In spite of praise from two popes, two cardinals, Emperor Charles V, and his chief minister, the Papal Inquisition bestowed the honor of naming a heresy after him. Heresy, like criminality or insanity, is relative to place and time. After his death, radical sects identified him as a forerunner, further distancing the Spaniard from his official position as an imperial secretary. In that position, Valdés collaborated with his twin brother, Alfonso, who served the emperor’s peripatetic court as Latin Secretary, adviser, and chronicler until his death in 1532. Valdés also served as a personal secretary of Charles V while acquiring several positions in Rome and Naples. Valdés only published one book during his life, the Díalogo de doctrina Christiana (1529), which initially passed the scrutiny of Spanish inquisitors but was quickly withdrawn from circulation for “emendation.” Later in Naples, Valdés circulated a large number of religious tracts, biblical translations, and commentaries in Spanish to his elite circle of Italian friends before his death in 1541. Just as the Council of Trent opened in 1545, Giulia Gonzaga, Valdés’s closest disciple, had Valdés’s Alfabeto cristiano and some short religious tracts translated into Italian and published in Venice. Between the second and third convocation of the Council of Trent (1552–1563), two of Valdés’s biblical commentaries—Commentary on Romans and Commentary on Corinthians (first only)—were translated into Italian and published in Geneva. After the Council of Trent, all of the aforementioned books faded from circulation. However, one of Valdés’s Italian friends took 110 of his Sunday morning sermons to Basel where they were translated into Italian and published in 1550 under the title of Le cento e dieci divine considerationi del Señor Giovañi Valdesso. The Divine Considerations were translated into French and English; five editions were published between 1563 and 1546, three in France and two in England. As the Wars of Religion ended, so too did interest in Valdés. In the 19th century, Luis Usoz y Río, Benjamin Wiffen, and Eduard Boehmer revived interest in Valdés by publishing his known works. In the 20th century, the French scholar Marcel Bataillon downplayed Valdés’s heretical image after discovering his Diálogo de doctrina Cristiana and noting Erasmus’s influence in it and on Charles V’s court. Benedetto Croce and Edmondo Cione introduced a less political and more introspective and spiritual image of Valdés. Searching for the source and influence of Valdés’s spirituality has led to considerable scholarship on Valdés’s converso family heritage, the Spanish alumbrados, and the “Valdésian” heresy in Italy. The works of José Nieto, A. Gordon Kinder, Massimo Firpo, Miguel Jiménez Monteserín, Stefania Pastore, and Daniel Crews have helped shape much of the more recent scholarship.

Major Biographical Studies

In 1840, the Spanish intellectual Luis Usoz y Río met the wealthy British industrialist and bibliophile Benjamin Wiffen, and together they published twenty volumes of works by 16th-century Spanish reformers that included most of Valdés’s books printed after his death in the 16th and 17th centuries. Wiffen and Usoz y Río continued an established tradition of viewing Valdés as a “heretic” influenced by northern mystics and Lutheranism. Meanwhile, the Cuencan historian Fermín Caballero, after listing all the prior heretical labels for Valdés, preferred to consider him a totally independent thinker who strayed from orthodoxy on points such as justification and purgatory. Bataillon 1945 altered the image of Valdés as an overt heretic with his discovery of Valdés’s 1529 Diálogo de doctrina Cristiana. Bataillon linked the Diálogo to the Erasmian reforms and policies advocated by Valdés’s brother Alfonso, a secretary to Charles V and Grand Chancellor Mercurino Gattinara, making the Valdés brothers archetypical Spanish Erasmians. In the late 1950s, Fray Domingo de Santa Teresa (Santa Teresa 1957) produced a comprehensive biography of Valdés following the Bataillon thesis and integrating diplomatic documents discovered and published by José Montesinos and Benedetto Croce in the 1930s (see the Erasmian Revision). Cione 1963 is a biography of Valdés (originally published in 1938) that offers a different perspective on the reformer’s career. Cione classifies Valdés’s religious thought as tolerant and undogmatic and therefore in line with Anabaptist and Spiritualist prophets. He further argues that Valdés began his career as a religious reformer, became a courtier in Rome, but suffered psychologically from the deceptions of court life and returned to lead religious reform in Naples after 1535 (see Juan de Valdés and Italy). Nieto 1970 directly challenged the Bataillon thesis by emphasizing the influence of the alumbrado (i.e., spiritually enlightened) Pedro Ruiz de Alcaraz on Valdés’s religious thought. Although much debated, Nieto’s thesis has stirred a significant amount of revisionist scholarship on Valdés since the 1970s (see Valdés and the Alumbrados). More recently, Crews 2008 is a biography based on new archival finds in Cuenca and Simancas that built on the studies of the Valdés family by Cuencan historians (see the Valdés Family). The result is an image of Valdés as a skillful courtier in his work as an imperial secretary, which included gathering intelligence, acting as a court solicitor, and giving advice to the Viceroy of Naples and Charles V’s chief minister. The pre-eminent Italian scholar of Valdés, Firpo 2015 focuses on Valdés’s connections to key reformers in the Catholic hierarchy while tracing his spiritual significance for radical reformers in Italy as well.

Bataillon, Marcel. “Juan de Valdés.” Luminar 7 (1945): 1–60.
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Bataillon published documents proving Valdés’s brother Alfonso wrote the Diálogo de Mercurio y Caron rather than Juan, removing considerable confusion in their respective biographies (see also Erasmian Revision).
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Caballero, Fermín. Alonso y Juan de Valdés. Cuenca, Spain: Instituto de Juan de Valdés, 1995.
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Caballero discovered many documents relating to the Valdés family in Cuenca archives and on Alfonso’s work as an imperial secretary in the General Archive of Simancas. Caballero implicitly viewed their work as interdependent and politically significant.
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Cione, Edmondo. Juan de Valdés: La sua vita e il suo pensiero religioso con una completa bibliografia delle opere del Valdés e degli scitti intorno a lui. 2d ed. Naples, Italy: Fiorentino, 1963.
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By extending Benedetto Croce’s hyper-individualistic interpretation of Valdés’s doctrines, Cione’s biography has had an enduring influence on Valdésian scholarship.
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Crews, Daniel A. Twilight of the Renaissance: The Life of Juan de Valdés. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2008.
DOI: 10.3138/9781442689527Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
Emphasizes Valdés’s political career in the context of his family’s royal service, and suggests that the Papal Inquisition made Valdés a scapegoat for heresy in Italy.
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Firpo, Massimo. Juan de Valdés and the Italian Reformation. Translated by Richard Bates. Farnham, UK: Ashgate, 2015.
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A revised and updated selection of some of Firpo’s recent articles about Valdés, translated into English. He agrees with other Italian scholars on Valdés’s singular influence on the Italian Reformation.
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Nieto, José C. Juan de Valdés and the Origins of the Spanish and Italian Reformation. Geneva, Switzerland: Droz, 1970.
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Nieto labeled one group of alumbrados as the dejamientos, a Protestant movement in Spain before Luther picked up his hammer. Further, Nieto rejected any Erasmian influence on the dejamientos or Valdés.
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Santa Teresa, Domingo de. Juan de Valdés, 1498(?)–1541: Su pensamiento religioso y las corrientes espirituales de su tiempo. Rome: Apud Uedes Universitatis Gregorianae, 1957.
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A comprehensive biography of Valdés that connects his religious thought and diplomatic work to Charles V’s conciliar diplomacy.
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Wiffen, Benjamin. Life and Writings of Juan de Valdés, otherwise Valdesso, Spanish Reformer in the 16th Century by Benjamin B. Wiffen: With a Translation from the Italian of His Hundred and Ten Considerations by John T. Betts. London: Bernard Quartich, 1865.
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Wiffen and Usoz y Río do not label Valdés a conscious Protestant, but stress the influence of the German theologian Johannes Tauler and view Valdés as the forerunner of Quakerism.
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Heretical Tradition

In 1817 Juan Antonio Llorente, former secretary of the Spanish Inquisition turned critic, published his four-volume history of the Holy Office, and erroneously claimed that the Spanish Inquisition convicted Juan de Valdés as a Lutheran heretic. According to Llorente 1967, the judgment was due to three misidentified “Lutheran” books written by Valdés and his brother Alfonso: Alfonso’s Mercurio and Caron, Juan’s Commentary on Corinthians, and his Aviso (Advice on Interpreting Scripture, a Divine Consideration), which he sent to Bartolomé de Carranza in 1539. Llorente must have been confused by documents from the long trial of Archbishop Carranza (1559–1576). None of the three works listed were published during Juan’s life, nor is there evidence that the Spanish Inquisition did anything other than open an investigation on him. Because inquisitors incorrectly identified writings found with the Aviso as the work of Johannes Tauler, subsequent historians proclaimed Tauler to be a key influence on Valdés’s road to Lutheranism. M’Crie 1998, the Scottish biographer of John Knox, followed Llorente’s lead and stretched the argument further by claiming Valdés was the first Spaniard to embrace the reformed religion and crediting him with starting the first Protestant church in Naples. Boehmer 1874–1904, by a close associate of Wiffen and Usoz y Río, departed from tradition by refusing to identify Valdés with a particular Reformation sect, but continued to maintain an influence of German mysticism. The famous Spanish scholar Marcelino Menéndez y Pelayo and the German historian Jakop Heep continued the established interpretation with Heep stretching the mystical influence further (Heep 1909). Williams 2000, by the American scholar George Williams, viewed Valdés as a major influence in the radical reformation through his evangelical rationalism and emphasis on self-knowledge. In Williams’s interpretation, a follower of Valdés could easily remain Catholic or fit into other spiritual movements to include Anabaptists, Unitarians, or other radical groups. Significantly, he notes Valdés’s influence on the “Valdésian” heresy had been overstated by previous historians. Williams included the Spanish alumbrados among the radical reformers linking his work to José Nieto’s later interpretation of the predominant influence of the “Protestant” alumbrados on Valdés (Nieto 1977). Gilly 1982 countered the total rejection of Erasmian by Nieto 1977 or Lutheran influence by accusing Valdés of plagiarizing some passages from Luther in his Diálogo de doctrina Cristiana. More recent works on the heretical background of Valdés via the alumbrados is discussed in the section Valdés and the Alumbrados.

Boehmer, Eduard. Biblioteca Wiffeniana: Spanish Reformers of Two Centuries from 1520; Their Lives and Writings according to the Late Benjamin B. Wiffen’s Plan and with the Use of His Materials. 3 vols. New York: Franklin, 1874–1904.
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Boehmer completed the project begun by Wiffen and Usoz y Río.
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Gilly, Carlos. “Juan de Valdés, traductor y adaptor de escritos de Lutero en su Diálogo de doctrina Cristiana.” In Miscelánea de estudios hispánicos: Homenaje de los hispanistas de Suiza, a Ramon Sugranyes de Franch. Edited by Luis López Molina, 85–106. Montserrat, Spain: L'Abadia de Montserrat, 1982.
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Gilly published parallel texts from Valdés’s Diálogo de doctrina Cristiana and Luther. The texts concerned how the Old Testament should be used to make one aware of sin.
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Heep, Jacob. Juan de Valdés, seine Religion, seine Werden, seine Bedeutung: Ein Beitag zum Verständnis des spanisschen Protestantismus im 16. Jahrhundert. Leipzig: Verlag von M. Heinsius Nachfolger, 1909.
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Heep backed the influence of Tauler by discussing common word usage and suggested Oriental and Egyptian mystical influences.
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Llorente, Juan Antonio. Critical History of the Inquisition of Spain. Williamston, MA: John Lilburn, 1967.
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This abridged version of the 1823 English translation is readily available. It includes a reference to Juan de Valdés, but not his brother Alfonso. A complete Spanish edition was published in 1822.
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M’Crie, Thomas. History of the Progress and Suppression of the Reformation in Spain in the Sixteenth Century. Rapidian, VA: Hartland, 1998.
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Departing from Llorente, M’Crie noted that Valdés’s heresy only came to light after his death due to the abuse of his doctrines by unitarian Socinians.
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Menéndez y Pelayo, Marcelino. Historia de los heterodoxos españoles. 8 vols. Barcelona: Linkgua S.L., 2008.
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Originally published in 1986. A staunch Catholic, Menéndez y Pelayo wrote this work at age twenty-four.
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Nieto, José C. “Luther’s Ghost and Erasmus’ Masks in Spain.” Bibliothéque d’Humanisme et Renaissance 39 (1977): 33–49.
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Nieto claims the obvious Erasmian component in Valdés’s Diálogo de doctrina Cristiana was merely a mask for his heretical alumbrado doctrines (see Nieto’s biography in Nieto 1970, cited under Major Biographical Studies, and the influence of his thesis in Nieto 1978, cited under Valdés and the Alumbrados).
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Williams, George. The Radical Reformation. 3d ed. Kirksville, MO: Truman State University Press, 2000.
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According to Williams, the Radical Reformation began with Erasmus’s translation of the Bible in 1516 and ended in 1578–1579 with the deaths of the leaders of the Hutterites and the Transylvania Unitarians. Any anti-hierarchical reformer could be considered radical.
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Erasmian Revision

No work has affected the course of Valdésian studies more than Marcel Bataillon’s Érasme et l’Espagne, originally published in 1937 (Bataillon 1991). His linkage of Erasmus and his Spanish adherents, particularly the Valdés brothers, to Charles V’s diplomacy and imperial ideology has influenced most subsequent studies of Spanish intellectual history and literature, particularly after its 1950 Spanish translation. The publication of Juan’s correspondence with Cardinal Ercole Gonzaga by Montesinos 1931 strengthened the thesis by showing Valdés’s diplomatic service in Naples. Maravall 1960 pronounced Spanish ideologues, including both Valdés brothers, as the originators of the “modern” theory of empire used, or abused, by every European imperial apologist afterward. Ricart 1958 preferred to emphasize the pacifistic nature of Valdés’s Erasmism to support religious tolerance. John Longhurst joined Ricart on the faculty of the University of Kansas, where he completed decades of research on the Spanish Inquisition, beginning with Juan de Valdés. In Luther’s Ghost in Spain (Longhurst 1969), he summarizes his work, claiming the Spanish Inquisition feared Luther so much that the inquisitors lumped any deviant interpretation, be it Erasmian or alumbrado, together as both heretical and Lutheran. The Erasmian sanctification of Valdés continued in other works on Spanish intellectual life that increasingly created a dichotomy between progressive Erasmians and non-progressive Scholastics, a characteristic of the work of Eguiagaray Bohigas 1965 and Piñera Llera 1970 that for some scholars echoed the old Black Legend mythology about Philip II. Homza 2000 demonstrated the intellectual elasticity of both Spanish Scholastics and Erasmians making the term “Erasmian” a word to be used with care by future historians.

Bataillon, Marcel. Érasme et l’Espagne: Recherches sur l’histoire espiritualle du XVIe siècle. Geneva, Switzerland: Droz, 1991.
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Originally published in 1937. Although Bataillon stretches the term “Erasmian” quite a bit, his connection of Erasmus and his Spanish adherents to the formulation of Charles V’s irenic policies remains a fixture in Valdésian studies.
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Eguiagaray Bohigas, Francisco. Los intelectuales españoles de Carlos V. Madrid: Instituto de Estudios Políticos, 1965.
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Claims Juan was more important than his brother Alfonso in serving Charles V’s imperial policies, and emphasizes the significance of Juan’s Diálogo de la lengua in that service.
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Homza, Lu Ann. Religious Authority in the Spanish Renaissance. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2000.
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Homza destroyed the idea of Erasmians as all-knowing and Scholastics as anti-progressive.
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Longhurst, John. Luther’s Ghost in Spain. Lawrence, KS: Coronado, 1969.
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A summary of twenty years of mining Spanish Inquisition records on Erasmians and alumbrados. Compared to some recent revisionist work on the Spanish Inquisition, Longhurst maintains a very negative view of the institution.
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Maravall, Josés Antonio. Carlos V y el pensamiento político del Renacimiento. Madrid: Instituto de Estudios Políticos, 1960.
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The German historian, Peter Rassow had earlier pronounced Charles V the progenitor of modern imperial ideology, but Maravall credits the Valdés brothers more, especially Juan.
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Montesinos, José F., ed. Cartas inéditas de Juan de Valdés al cardenal Gonzaga. Madrid: S. Aquire, 1931.
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The famed literary critic’s transcription and publication of these letters demonstrated Valdés’s diplomatic service in Charles V’s Italian policies.
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Piñera Llera, Humberto. El pensamiento español de los siglos XVI y XVII. New York: Las Americas, 1970.
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According to Piñera Llera, Spanish Erasmians, best exemplified in the works of Juan and Alfonso de Valdés, presented a new theory of reality with humans as both autonomous and pre-eminent.
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Ricart, Domingo. Juan de Valdés y el pensamiento religioso europeo en los siglos XVI y XVII. Durango, México: El Colegio de México, 1958.
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Like Wiffen and Usoz y Río, Ricart sees an affinity of Valdés’s doctrines with Quakerism.
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Inquisition Trials and Juan de Valdés

As a converso, Juan de Valdés was born into a family often afoul of the Holy Office. A maternal uncle was burned for Judaizing, and his father and oldest brother were penanced for words and deeds against the Inquisition. Juan’s name appears in several Spanish and Papal Inquisition trials. The inherently warped verbiage of Inquisition testimonies makes them rather unreliable sources for theological analysis. However, the published trials relevant to Valdés’s career follow the general trajectory of Valdésian historiography. In Gibbings 1856, the ecclesiastical historian Richard Gibbings published excerpts from the trial of the Papal Notary Pietro Carnesecchi who knew Valdés in Rome and later in Naples. For refusing to label Valdés’s doctrines heretical, he was beheaded in 1567. The publicity of his trials and final demise certified a “Valdésian” heresy. Firpo and Marcatto 1998–2000 edited and transcribed Carnesecchi’s investigations by the Papal Inquisition. Other Inquisition trials have produced documents less supportive of Valdés’s heretical pursuits. Ortega-Costa 1978 describes the Spanish Inquisition’s trial of the feisty Erasmian/alumbrada María de Cazalla (1532–1534). Cazalla defended herself and her praise of Valdés’s Dialogo de doctrina Cristiana after torture, and won absolution. According to Ortega-Costa, Cazalla’s association with Valdés was only a minor charge. Valdés and his book are cited more frequently in the trial of the University of Alcalá luminary Juan de Vergara. Utilizing documents from Vergara’s trial, Longhurst 1950 published his dissertation on Valdés as an example of intellectual freedom under attack. Between 1959 and 1962, Longhurst produced the transcription of most of Vergara’s trial with extensive commentary. Valdés also appears in the trials of Cardinal Giovanni Morone (Firpo and Marcatto 1981–1995) and the Archbishop of Toledo Bartolomé de Carranza (Tellechea Idígoras 1962–1994). In both cases, inquisitors tried to exploit connections to Valdés and his doctrines, but Morone and Carranza were eventually acquitted of charges of heresy. Black 2009 is a study of the Inquisition in Italy and devotes considerable space to the role that Valdés and the Valdésians had on the Papal Inquisition’s origin and evolution in the 16th century.

Black, Christopher. The Italian Inquisition. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2009.
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Black draws on records from the Roman Inquisition opened in 1998.
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Firpo, Massimo, and Dario Marcatto, eds. Il processo inquisitoriale del cardinal Giovanni Morone. 6 vols. Rome: Instituto Storico Italiano per l’Età Moderna e Contemporanea, 1981–1995.
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Papal inquisitors tried to link Morone to Carnesecchi and Valdés to implicate suspects of heresy at the top of the clerical hierarchy.
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Firpo, Massimo, and Dario Marcatto, eds. I processi inquisitoriali di Pietro Carnesecchi (1557–1567). 2 vols. Vatican City: Archivio Segreto Vaticano, 1998–2000.
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Includes the first two processos of Carnesecchi, 1556–1559 and 1560–1561, in which the notary was absolved of heresy, as well as his complete final trial and conviction.
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Gibbings, Richard, ed. and trans. Report on the Trial and Martyrdom of Pietro Carnesecchi: Sometime Secretary to Clement VII and Apostolic Protonotary. Dublin: University Press, 1856.
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Includes the final sentence and emphasis on Valdés’s independent heresy.
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Longhurst, John. Erasmus and the Spanish Inquisition: The Case of Juan de Valdés. Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 1950.
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This revision of his doctoral dissertation was the first work by a US historian devoted entirely to Valdés. It supports the Bataillon thesis and champions Valdés in the name of intellectual freedom.
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Longhurst, John. “Alumbrados, erasmistas y luteranos en el processo de Juan de Vergara.” Cuadernos de Historia de España 27–31/32 (1957–1960).
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A nearly complete transcription of the trial in several issues of this journal with commentary to establish the chronology and drama of the confrontation between one of Spain’s greatest scholars and his inquisitors. See volumes 27 (1957): 99–163; 28 (1958): 102–165; 29/30 (1959): 266–292; and 31/32 (1960): 356–371.
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Ortega-Costa, Milagros. Proceso de la Inquisición contra María de Cazalla. Madrid: Fundación Universitaría Española, 1978.
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The trial illustrates the interconnections of alumbrado and Erasmian reformers at the University of Alcalá while Valdés resided there.
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Tellechea Idígoras, José Ignacio, ed. Fray Bartolomé Carranza: Documentos historicos. 7 vols. Madrid: Real Academia de la Historia, 1962–1994.
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The trial records indicate the desire of inquisitors to link Valdés to Carranza, and Carranza to the debate on justification at the first convocation of the Council of Trent.
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Juan de Valdés and Italy

For most of his career, Valdés served imperial interests in Italy. Gli eretici d’Italia (Heresy in Italy) by Cantù 1865–1866 would appear to be in the mold of the heretical tradition, but it has an Italian twist. Cantù takes the long view of heresy going back to the High Middle Ages and credits Valdés with his brother Alfonso’s dialogues, thus connecting his Protestantism to the infamous 1527 sack of Rome. According to Cantù, Valdés later spread Luther’s doctrines among the Italian elite and church hierarchy. Thus, Cantù discusses Vittoria Colonna, Michelangelo, Pietro Carnesecchi, and Cardinals Morone and Pole in the context of heresy, imperial policy, and Catholic reform. Church 1932 opted to view Valdés’s doctrines as individualistic and psychologically independent of any denomination. The author listed Valdés as the first in the Italian reformers’ “Hall of Fame” and stressed the importance of Spanish spirituality (Valdés, Ignatius Loyola, and Miguel Servetus) on the Italian Reformation over northern Protestantism. After decades of studying the Spanish cultural impact on Renaissance Italy, Croce 1938 furthered the hyper-individualist interpretation of Valdés, especially in the Alfabeto cristiano, and viewed his thought as a precursor to Kantian ethical philosophy. As noted earlier, Croce greatly influenced Cione’s influential biography of Valdés (see Cione 1963, cited under Major Biographical Studies). Castellán 1962–1967 recognized Erasmus as the predominant influence on Valdés but credits Valdés with subtly adapting Erasmian doctrines to an Italian cultural elite that did not care for the Dutch reformer by linking language and religion together. Investigating Valdés’s association with Bartolomé Carranza led Tellechea Idígoras 1975 to uncover the wide-ranging circulation of Valdés’s unpublished Divine Considerations before and after Valdés’s death. Firpo 2000 has extensively studied Valdés’s influence on the Catholic hierarchy through Italian reform groups, i.e., spirituali. Significantly, he makes a distinction between Valdés and Valdésians, between the image of Valdés represented in the trial and subsequent execution of Pietro Carnesecchi and Valdés in life. Russell 2006 has produced a thorough analysis of the religious networks of Valdés’s closest disciple, Giulia Gonzaga. Her relationship with Carnesecchi and expansion of their religious network shaped the “Valdésian heresy” of the 1560s and beyond. Addante 2010 traces some Neapolitans associated with Valdés’s circle and their spread of radical anti-Trinitarian, Arian, Anabaptist, and Judaic doctrines. Bonora 2014 focuses on Valdés’s religious and diplomatic influence in Italian princely courts dealing with divergent papal and imperial goals.

Addante, Luca. Eretici e libertini nel Cinquecento italiano. Rome: Laterza, 2010.
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Views Valdés as unleashing religious freethinking in Italy.
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Bonora, Elena. Aspettando l’imperatore: Principi italiani tra il papa e Carlo V. Turin, Italy: Giulio Einaudi Editore, 2014.
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Includes Valdés’s role in the balancing act of Italian princes between imperial and papal policies.
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Cantù, Cesare. Gli eretici d’Italia. 3 vols. Turin, Italy: Unione Tipografico-Editrice, 1865–1866.
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Extensive quotations from primary sources make the work quite valuable.
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Castellán, Angel. “Juan de Valdés y el circulo de Napoles.” Cuadernos de historia de España 35/36–43/44 (1962–1967).
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Examines Valdés’s cultural adaptation and network of Italian friends and followers. See volumes 35/36 (1962): 202–273; 37/38 (1963): 199–291; 39/40 (1964): 261–308; 41/42 (1965): 127–223; and 43/44 (1967): 188–242.
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Church, Frederic C. The Italian Reformers, 1534–1564. New York: Columbia University Press, 1932.
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Translated into Italian in 1935. Insightful treatment of the increasing radicalization of Italian reformers to the end of the Council of Trent by the Columbia University professor.
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Croce, Benedetto, ed. Alfabeto cristiano: Dialogo con Giulia Gonzaga. Bari, Italy: Gius, Laterza e Figli, 1938.
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The first republication of the Alfabeto since Usoz. Appendixes include Valdés’s testament and seven letters he wrote to Francisco de Los Cobos (1539–1540) that Croce discovered in the Spanish Archive of Simancas.
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Firpo, Massimo. Entre alumbrados y “espirituales”: Estudios sobre Juan de Valdés y el valdesianismo en la crisis religiosa del ‘500 italiano. Translated by Daniela Bergonzi. Madrid: Fundación Universitaria EspañolaUniversidad, Pontificia de Salamanca, 2000.
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Italian edition originally published in 1990. Firpo places Valdés’s doctrines in the context of imperial policy and refers to a crisis of Italian evangelism between the failure of religious compromise at the Diet of Ratisbon, shortly followed by Valdés’s death, and the death of Cardinal Contarini the next year, 1542.
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Russell, Camilla. Giulia Gonzaga and the Religious Controversies of Sixteenth-Century Italy. Turnhout, Belgium: Berpolis, 2006.
DOI: 10.1484/M.LMEMS-EB.5.112210Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
A study of the influence of Valdés’s closest and most significant disciple who saved many of his manuscripts for publication and spread his religious doctrines through Russell’s network of elite friends before and after Valdés’s death.
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Tellechea Idígoras, José Ignacio. “Introduction.” In Las ciento diez divinas consideraciones: Recensión inédita del manuscrito de Juan Sanchez (1558). By José Ignacio Tellechea Idígoras, 1–32. Salamanca, Spain: Universidad Pontificia, 1975.
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In tracing a consideration that Valdés sent to Bartolomé de Carranza in 1539, Tellechea Idígoras discovered an untitled Spanish version of 120 Considerations quite different from the published Italian versions.
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Valdés and the Alumbrados

Bataillon argued that Juan de Valdés exemplified how the Erasmian movement in Spain absorbed alumbrado doctrines. Traditionally, the alumbrados have been considered an extension of the Franciscan reforms of Ximénez de Cisneros, who also founded the University of Alcalá that Valdés attended. As such, Inmaculada 1958 did not consider the alumbrados a real threat to orthodoxy. The Inquisition never arrested Francisco de Osuna, the most influential alumbrado theologian. Osuna dedicated his Third Christian Alphabet to the Marquis de Villena, and Valdés did the same with his Diálogo de doctrina Cristiana. Osuna’s close friend, the Franciscan preacher Francisco de Ortiz, held doctrinal positions similar to Osuna and, like Osuna, condemned the Inquisition’s arrest of the alumbrado leader Francisca Hernández. Hernández’s trial was lost, but Ortiz attacked the Grand Inquisitor for arresting her and proclaimed himself as her lawyer. He was quickly seized and tried for heresy. Selke 1968 is a detailed analysis of Ortiz’s trial in which the author concludes that, although there were Erasmian and Lutheran elements in his defense, Ortiz most closely fit the doctrines of Valdés’s “third way.” According to Selke 1968, Ortiz and Valdés were both anti-hierarchical and willing to challenge ecclesiastical authority. Nieto 1978 made alumbrado doctrine a more radical influence on Valdés by defining the alumbrado Pedro Ruiz de Alcaraz as a pre-Lutheran Spanish Protestant. Alcaraz was arrested by the Inquisition in 1524 and convicted of heretical doctrines in 1529. From his letters to inquisitors, Kinder 1996 enumerated Alcaraz’s wide reading in scripture and theology, including Erasmus, available in Spanish translations. Alcaraz’s trial created the basis for the Inquisition’s 1525 edict condemning alumbrado doctrines that later would be used against Ortiz, the Valdés brothers, Ignatius Loyola, and a wide variety of other suspect alumbrados. Hamilton 1992 has carefully described the varied nature of “alumbradismo,” including Loyola, who like Valdés was hounded out of Spain by inquisitorial suspicions of alumbrado/Erasmian heresies. The theory in Nieto 1978 that Valdés’s obvious Erasmism in the Diálogo de doctrina Cristiana was merely a mask for heretical alumbrado doctrine has generated quite a bit of scholarship on Nicodemism beginning with converso alumbrados, as in Pastore 2004. García-Arenal and Pereda 2012 have used the Nicodemite concept to understand how more orthodox figures such as St. Teresa disguised dissent. These recent studies, which also draw on the work of Firpo and other Italian scholars, again raise questions about how heresy is defined.

García-Arenal, Mercedes, and Felipe Pereda. “A propósito de los alumbrados: Confesionalidad y disidencia religiosa en el mundo ibérico.” La Corónica 41 (Fall 2012): 109–148.
DOI: 10.1353/cor.2012.0039Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
Although not specifically about Valdés, the article demonstrates the widening path of alumbrado research and Nicodemism.
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Hamilton, Alastair. Heresy and Mysticism in Sixteenth-Century Spain: The Alumbrados. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1992.
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A comprehensive analysis of the wide variety of alumbrados.
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Inmaculada, Ramón de la. “El fenomeno de los alumbrados y su interpretación.” Ephemerides Carmeliticae 79 (1958): 49–80.
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Believes the alumbrados were neither sectarian nor heretical.
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Kinder, A. Gordon. “‘Ydiota I sin letras’: Evidence of Literacy among the Alumbrados of Toledo.” Journal of the Institute of Romance Studies 4 (1996): 37–48.
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Many of the texts cited by Alcaraz are also recommended by Valdés in his dialogues.
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Nieto, José C. “The Heretical alumbrados dejados: Isabel de la Cruz and Pedro Ruíz de Alcaraz.” Revue de Littérature Comparee 52.4 (1978): 293–313.
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Another Nieto work distinguishing the doctrines of these two from other alumbrados.
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Osuna, Francisco de. The Third Spiritual Alphabet. Translated and introduction by Mary Giles. New York: Paulist, 1981.
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Originally published in 1527. Often referred to as the “manual of the alumbrados.” Best introduction to alumbrado theology.
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Pastore, Stefania. Un’eresia spagnola: Spiritualità conversa, alumbradismo e inquisizione (1449–1559). Florence: Olschki, 2004.
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Pastore shifts the origin of the alumbrados from Cisneros and Franciscan reform to the Jeronimite order and converso opposition to purity of blood statutes in Toledo in 1449.
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Selke, Angela. El Santo Oficio de la Inquisición: Proceso de Fr. Francisco Ortiz, 1529–1532. Madrid: Ediciones Guadarrama, 1968.
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The trial of the popular Franciscan preacher at Alcalá establishes his connection to the emperor and his court, as well as numerous alumbrados and Erasmians.
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The Valdés Family

Cuencan historians have unearthed a great deal of documentation about the converso heritage and political clout of the Valdés patriarch, Fernando de Valdés. Further, they have shown how Juan and his brothers cooperated to raise the family’s status by eventually obtaining the vaunted privilege of a mayorazgo, an entailed estate. In spite of their converso heritage and brushes with the Inquisition, the Valdés family achieved and maintained an honorable reputation in Spain reflected in Mártir-Rizo 1629, a history of Cuenca. Martínez Millán 1976 is a collection of numerous documents establishing Fernando’s political leadership on the Cuenca City Council and his influential converso connections. Donald and Lázaro 1983 is a solid biography of Juan’s twin brother Alfonso that includes many documents in the appendixes showing transfers of royal appointments among several of the six Valdés brothers and favors for their sisters. No historian has done more to fill out the Valdés family tree than Jiménez Monteserín 1979, Jiménez Monteserín 1996, Jiménez Monteserín 1997, and Jiménez Monteserín 2004. Using the Valdés application for a mayorazgo in 1541, Jiménez Monteserín 1997 established the names and birth order by gender of the eleven children of Fernando de Valdés. In addition, he found more documents about the converso social circle of the family and absolute proof that Juan and Alfonso were identical twins. Using the latter documentation, Elvy 2015 discovered what appears to be a portrait of Juan de Valdés in a private art collection in London.

Donald, Dorothy, and Elena Lázaro. Alfonso de Valdés y su época. Cuenca, Spain: Excmo. Diputación Provincial, 1983.
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A solid biography of Alfonso de Valdés that includes numerous documentary appendixes related to his brother Juan.
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Elvy, Peter. “A Tale of Two Sitters: Juan and Alfonso de Valdés.” Bulletin for Spanish and Portuguese Historical Studies 40.1 (2015), article 6.
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The journal is open access so anyone can see the two portraits and weigh the author’s hypothesis.
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Jiménez Monteserín, Miguel. “La andadura humana de Juan de Valdés.” In Diálogo de doctrina Cristiana. Edited by Javier Ruiz, 161–189. Madrid: Editora Nacional, 1979.
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The appendix includes a brief biography of Valdés in the context of his converso heritage. Includes many references to the family’s brushes with the Inquisition.
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Jiménez Monteserín, Miguel. “Los hermanos Valdés y el mundo Judeoconverso conquense.” In Política, religión e inquisición en la España moderna. Edited by P. Fernández Albadalejo, J. Martínez Millán, and V. Pinto Crespo, 379–400. Madrid: Universidad Autónoma de Madrid, 1996.
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Develops Fernando de Valdés’s leadership of a powerful converso political faction in Cuenca and anti-converso assaults employing Cuenca inquisitors. According to Jiménez Monteserín, these attacks influenced Juan and Alfonso to adopt a universal spiritualism.
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Jiménez Monteserín, Miguel. “La familia Valdés de Cuenca: Nuevos datos.” In Los Valdés: Pensamiento y literatura. 43–89. Cuenca, Spain: Instituto de Juan de Valdés, 1997.
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Using the Valdés application for their mayorazgo in 1541 and his research in Cuenca’s Inquisition cases, Jiménez Monteserín fills in most of the family tree from the late 14th to the early 17th century.
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Jiménez Monteserín, Miguel. “Los hermanos Valdés eran gemelos.” In Ecos callados de Cuenca: Hallazgos históricos. Edited by Manuel Amores Torrijos, 127–132. Cuenca, Spain: Editórial Alfonsípolis, 2004.
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Jiménez Monteserín found an Inquisition testimony referring to Fernando de Valdés as saving the placenta of his twins proving that Juan and Alfonso were identical twins.
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Martínez Millán, Miguel. Los hermanos conquenses Alfonso y Juan de Valdés: Su ambiente familiar y la clasificación de su familia. Cuenca, Spain: Imprenta de Falange, 1976.
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An assortment of documents firmly establishing the family’s interconnections with conversos in Cuenca and a considerable amount of information on the extended family even though some members are incorrectly identified.
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Mártir-Rizo, Juan Pablo. Historia de la muy noble y leal ciudad de Cuenca. Madrid: Herederos de la Viuda de Pedro Madrigal, 1629.
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The noble positions of the father and his sons are taken from the Valdés application for their mayorazgo.
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The Diálogo de la Lengua

The Diálogo de la lengua remained a sort of afterthought for most historians until the 1970s, but not for literary scholars. Upon its discovery and publication in 1737, it was immediately hailed as a pioneering work in Spanish linguistics and in the 20th century became the most widely published and read work by Juan de Valdés. However, the almost totally secular content of the work did not fit the heretical image of Valdés. The Socratic figure in the Diálogo, identified as Valdés, led scholars, such as Llorente, to credit his brother Alfonso with the work. Usoz y Río 1860 discovered an older text of the manuscript and using internal evidence in the Diálogo assigned Juan as the author. Although many scholars could not credit a heretic with such an important work, Menéndez y Pelayo had no problem condemning Juan’s religious doctrines while praising the Diálogo de la lengua (see Menéndez y Pelayo 2008, cited under Heretical Tradition). By ranking Valdés’s prose with Cervantes and Fernando de Rojas, Menéndez y Pelayo made the work essential reading for scholars of Spanish literature. In the 1920s, the debate about authorship ended for all but a few skeptics, with the detailed analysis of Cortarelo y Mori 1920 and the discovery of Alvar de Gomez Castro’s testament noting his copy of the text. Significantly, the testament indicates the circulation of the manuscript among Valdés’s old friends at Alcalá and Gomez Castro’s desire to fund its publication. Many literary scholars followed Menéndez y Pelayo in praising the genius of the work that Montesinos 1964 listed as Valdés’s best prose and one of the best literary works of the Renaissance. The linguistic turn in historical studies has brought the Diálogo more into the historical narrative of Valdés. Barbolani de García 2009 insists the work can be understood only by viewing it the context of Valdés’s diplomatic service. She views the dialogue’s discussion through the lens of the arms versus letters debate during the Renaissance. Calvo Pérez 1991 disputes the Nicodemist interpretation of the Diálogo’s orthodoxy and rejects the use of the term “heretic” for Valdés. Rather, he connects Valdés and his Diálogo with the “proper climate” of a court where Erasmians and Italian humanists interacted. Navarrete 2004 takes this reasoning further by identifying Valdés as the creator of a court language identifiable in the literary works of courtiers Garcilaso de la Vega and Diego Hurtado de Mendoza. Using the publication of new documents about Valdés’s diplomatic work, Anipa 2014 establishes the complex plan of the Diálogo and its relation to imperial policy.

Anipa, Korme. Juan de Valdés, “Diálogo de la lengua”: A Diplomatic Edition. Cambridge, UK: Modern Humanities Association, 2014.
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Argues the manuscript Usoz y Río published in 1860 is not the same as the one dated 1540 that is currently in the Biblioteca Nacional in Madrid. He transcribes all the side notes and corrections of the 1540 manuscript.
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Barbolani de García, Cristina. “Prólogo.” In Diálogo de la lengua. 2d ed. Edited by Cristina Barbolani, 11–44. Madrid: Editorial Cátedra, 2009.
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Influenced by Croce’s Kantian dichotomy in interpreting the thought of Valdés in the dialogue.
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Calvo Pérez, Julio. Tres biografías lingüísticas en torno a Cuenca. Vol. 1, Juan de Valdés y la fuerte de la contradicción. Cuenca, Spain: Diputación Provincial de Cuenca, 1991.
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Concludes that Valdés represents a double contradiction: one, the rupture between his religious beliefs and a church he never left, and the other between Spanish literary tradition and his own original linguistic ideas.
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Cortarelo y Mori, Emilio. Cuestion literaria: Quién fué el autor del Diálogo de la lengua? Madrid, Museos, 1920.
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Thorough analysis making a definitive argument in favor of Juan’s authorship.
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Montesinos, José F. “Introducción.” In Diálogo de la lengua. By José F. Montesinos, IX–LXVI. Madrid: Espasa-Calpe S.A., 1964.
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Originally published in 1928. Montesinos emphasizes Valdés’s intent to make Spanish a language of culture.
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Navarrete, Ignacio. “Juan de Valdés, Diego Hurtado de Mendoza, and the Imperial Style in Spanish Poetry.” Renaissance and Reformation 28.3 (2004): 3–25.
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Notes the court connections in Italy between Valdés and Diego Hurtado de Mendoza, Charles V’s ambassador to Venice and later Rome.
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San Roman, Francisco de. “El testamento del humanista Alvar Gómez de Castro.” Boletin de la Real Academia Española 15 (1928): 543–566.
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This testament also establishes Valdés’s authorship. Gómez de Castro’s desire to publish it together with Antonio de Nebrija’s Gramática de la lengua castellana indicates the high esteem for Valdés’s linguistic skill among 16th-century Spanish humanists.
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Usoz y Río, Luis, ed. Diálogo de la lengua (tenido azia el A. 1533). Madrid: Martín Alegría, 1860.
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Usoz y Río identified an older manuscript of the Diálogo de la lengua in the Biblioteca Nacional and used knowledge of the different careers of Juan and Alfonso de Valdés to identify Juan’s authorship.
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Lazarillo de Tormes

The anonymous classic Lazarillo de Tormes appeared in print in four different editions in 1554 and the leading contenders are one of the Valdés brothers and Diego Hurtado de Mendoza. The “war for authorship” began in the 1880s when Morel-Fatio 1925 proclaimed Juan de Valdés the author because of its anticlerical and Lucianesque satirical style. Marcel Bataillon declared the anticlericalism in Lazarillo was un-Erasmian because it failed to contrast the spiritual nature of Christianity with the clerical abuses it ridiculed; therefore, Juan could not have composed the satire (see Erasmian Revision). In the early 1960s and again in 1992, Asensio 1992 presented a new case for Juan as the author based on his biographical similarities to Lázaro’s travels and the religious perspective presented in the text. Rather than identifying the book with Erasmism, Asensio related it to the teachings of Pedro Ruiz de Alcaraz, the converso and alumbrado mentor of Juan. While researching her biography of Diego Hurtado de Mendoza (Spivakovsky 1961), the author challenged Asensio’s argument. Spivakovsky agreed with the earlier chronology of real events mentioned in the text (1510–1525) but postulated that Hurtado de Mendoza would not have had time to compose the work until after his supposed disgrace at court in 1553–1554, hence the later date of publication. Ricapito 1976 focused on Alfonso de Valdés as the author by noting the common episodic structures of both Lazarillo and Alfonso’s Diálogo de Mercurio y Carón and the use of Italianisms. Navarro Durán 2004 expanded on Ricapito’s argument by analyzing closely the works that apparently influenced the Lazarillo and drawing on Juan’s stylistic views in his Diálogo de la lengua. In Navarro Durán 2010, the author noted a connection between the Lazarillo and court humor about the syphilis epidemic. The Mendoza candidacy gained renewed interest in the work of Agulló y Cobo, the Spanish bibliophile (Agulló y Cobo 2010). In the 1699 inventory of the estate of a Madrid lawyer named Juan de Valdés, Agulló y Cobo discovered a two-line reference to a bundle/box (legajo) of corrections and expurgations of Lazarillo. Inquisitor Juan López de Velasco had ordered the revision and republication of the Lazarillo because of its linguistic significance, and the Madrid lawyer Valdés had been Velasco’s executor. However, numerous scholars have argued that Agulló y Cobo’s evidence does not rule out the original authorship by someone else as shown in recent studies, e.g., that of Javier de la Rosa and Juan Luis Suárez. Following the possible syphilis connection to Lazarillo, Crews 2010 has documented the activities of Fernando de Valdés and his son Juan in battling the epidemic as stewards of all the hospitals and houses of San Lázaro in the diocese of Cuenca. Rosa and Suárez 2016 contains the results of a linguistic computer analysis that includes some data favorable to a Valdésian authorship and a good historiography of the debate.

Agulló y Cobo, Mercedes. A vueltas con el autor de Lazarillo: Con el testamiento y el inventorio de bienes de don Diego Hurtado de Mendoza. Madrid: Calambur, 2010.
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Her discovery has fueled the debate about authorship to a high level in the early 21st century.
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Asensio, Manuel J. “El Lazarillo en su circunstancia histórica.” Revista de Literatura 54.107 (1992): 101–128.
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Asensio’s articles rely more on biography and historical context than literary analysis. Thus, Asensio connects the Lazarillo to Charles V’s welfare reforms.
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Crews, Daniel A. “Biografía y autobiografía novelesca: Datos nuevos sobre Juan de Valdés y Lazarillo de Tormes.” In Actas del XVI Congreso de la Asociación Internacional de Hispanistas. Vol. 2. Edited by Pierre Civil and Françoise Crémoux. Madrid: Iberoamericana, 2010.
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Connects Juan and his father to Charles V’s welfare reforms. Available online.
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Morel-Fatio, Alfred. “Recherches sur Lazarillo de Tormes.” In Vol. 1, Études sur L’Espagne. 2d ed. By Alfred Morel-Fatio, 111–166. Paris: Champion, 1925.
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Originally published in 1888. A renowned scholar whose French translation of the Lazarillo remains the standard.
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Navarro Durán, Rosa. Alfonso de Valdés, autor del Lazarillo de Tormes. 2d ed. Madrid: Gredes, 2004.
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The most extensive and persuasive argument supporting the authorship of the work by Alfonso de Valdés.
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Navarro Durán, Rosa. La verdad sobre el caso del “Lazarillo de Tormes.” Berriozar, Spain: Cénlit Ediciones, 2010.
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A more recent defense of Navarro Durán’s argument that connects the Lazarillo to court humor and syphilis. Poor syphilitics were often forced into the hospitals of San Lázaro.
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Ricapito, Joseph V. “Introduction.” In La vida de Lazarillo de Tormes y sus fortunas adversidades. Edited by Joseph V. Recapito, 11–85. Madrid: Ediciones Cátedra, 1976.
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In his seventy-four-page introduction, Recapito merges historical context with literary analysis.
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Rosa, Javier de la, and Juan Luis Suárez. “The Life of Lazarillo de Tormes and of His Machine Learning Adversities: Non-traditional Authorship Attribution Techniques in the Context of the Lazarillo.” Lemir 20 (2016): 373–438.
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The authors use recent computer applications to scan selected texts of potential authors. The selection of texts is, as the authors admit, suspect. Their conclusion places Mendoza out of the running as author, and Alfonso de Valdés finishes a strong second. Despite the methodological problems, the article includes good numerical data about scholars’ support of various candidates for authorship.
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Spivakovsky, Erika. “The Lazarillo de tormes and Mendoza.” Symposium 15 (1961): 271–285.
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An authority on Mendoza, Spivakovsky’s research culminated in her 1970 biography, Son of the Alhambra. Austin: University of Texas Press.
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Collected Works and Bibliographies

Collections of Valdés’s work are available in both Spanish and English. Valdés Obras Completas, vol. 1 1997 is a collection of Valdés’s dialogues, letters and spiritual writings. The projected volume two to include Valdés’s scriptural translations and commentaries has yet to appear. Wiffen and Usoz y Río 1982–1983 offers many of Valdés’s publications translated into English. Kinder 1988 produced the most complete bibliography on Valdés, and Kinder 1994 is a general bibliography that includes works on Valdés’s friends and associates. Nieto 1993 provides comments on Valdésian historiography between 1970 and 1990 in the English translation of Valdés’s Dialogue on Christian Doctrine and his Christian Instruction for Children. Kinder’s and Nieto’s work can be supplemented by the bibliography in Firpo 2015 (cited under Major Biographical Studies).

Kinder, A. Gordon. “Juan de Valdés.” Bibliotheca Dissidentium 9 (1988): 111–195.
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A complete and exhaustive bibliography that includes the frontispieces of Valdés’s works published in the 16th century.
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Kinder, A. Gordon. Spanish Protestants and Reformers in the Sixteenth Century. Suppl. 1. London: Grant & Cutler, 1994.
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After Kinder’s death in 1997, the John Rylands Library at the University of Manchester named its special collection of materials on Spanish reformers the “Kinder Collection.” A fitting honor.
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Nieto, José. “The Changing Image of Valdés.” In Valdés’ Two Catechisms: The Dialogue on Christian Doctrine and the Instruction for Children. 2d ed. Translated by William B. Jones and Carol Jones. Edited by José Nieto, 53–130. Lawrence, KS: Coronado, 1993.
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The first English translation of the Dialogue on Christian Doctrine.
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Valdés, Juan de. Obras Completas. Vol. 1, Dialogos, Escritos Espirituales, Cartas. Madrid: Biblioteca Castro, 1997.
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It includes all of Valdés’s published writings, except his scriptural translations and commentaries. Many of the works are in the original Latin or Italian with a Spanish translation. Ángel Alcala’s introduction, pp. IX–LXXVI, contextualizes these writings and includes bibliographic information about their source and editions.
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Wiffen, Benjamin, and Luis Usoz y Río, eds. Reformistas antiguos españoles. 20 vols. Barcelona: Librería de Diego Gómez Flores, 1982–1983.
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Facsimile reprint, originally published from 1847 to 1880. Volumes 9, 16, and 17 are different original editions of the One Hundred Ten Divine Considerations; volumes 10 and 11 include Valdés’s commentaries on St. Paul’s letter to the Romans and his first letter to the Corinthians; volume 15 is Valdés’s Alfabeto cristiano in the original Italian and in modern Spanish and English translations.