Syntactic Trees

Request letter, dictated, from António Álvares Cardoso, priest, to Fernando de Ataíde Vasconcelos.

The author asks the recipient to visit him at his place.

The files 2388 and 4203 of the Lisbon Inquisition are related, since their defendants ‒ Antonio Álvares Cardoso and Alonso Carrillo de Albornoz, respectively ‒ were denounced by the same person, Fernando de Ataíde Vasconcelos, an accusation that also involved Mariana Galindo and António de Cáceres. They were among the various members of a group that was said to practice witchcraft, and exchanged correspondence with each other. Fernando de Ataíde Vasconcelos was invited to one of their meetings, in March 1617. Since then, some of the letters were also sent to him, being later included in the files as criminal evidence against the people he denounced. Father António Álvares Cardoso was arrested in 1618. Alonso Carrillo de Albornoz, Spanish, resident in Lisbon and a professional comedian, who signed his letters as Martim Lopes, was also found guilty of witchcraft and sentenced to exile for eight years to the island of Príncipe.

«It is important that you come here soon, if possible, because divinations will take place and the senators are together and, perhaps, the orphan boys brotherhood and the thieves of Santa Misericórdia will come after me, in the end. And your presence is important. And may Our Lord Jesus Christ be with us. Your slave, the father António Álvares»