The Phoenix and the Flame : Catalonia and the Counter-Reformation

In 1492, while Columbus set about "discovering" the Americas for Ferdinand and Isabella, at home the Spanish monarchy banished the Jews and slaughtered the Moors, driving both from Hispanic soil.

This was post-medieval Christian Europe, where the Catholic Church ruled supreme with her absolute monarchs - a moral, political and cultural force without rival. The upstart rival which the Catholic establishment - kings, popes, theologians, warriors, bureaucrats - was to devote all its resources to fending off during the next few centuries, was only just stirring to life.

The Papacy, with its military, spiritual and monastic mercenaries orchestrated a rigorous and violent rearguard action against the Protestant Reformation throughout Europe in the 16th and 17th centuries.

This book looks at this situation, concentrating on the spiritual and ideological warfare and how this affected the lives of those who were not commandeered for military service, nor cross-examined or tortured by the infamous Inquisition, nor jailed, burnt or excommunicated. The author concentrates on one region of Spain, and recounts the festivities, family life, daily labours and occupations of ordinary Catalonians.

He analyzes how changes in religious practice - in the liturgy, in rites, in church building, in prohibitions, in clerical discipline - percolated down.

He also investigates the cult of saints, and the worship of the Virgin and assesses how the Inquisition operated in the region.