Syntactic Trees

Copy of a private letter from Manuel Leitão, prior guard of the Holy Office, to Álvaro Mendes.

The author complains about the conditions he is enduring while in captivity.

This is the second process of Manuel Leitão, prior guard of the Holy Office in Coimbra, who was accused of facilitating the correspondence between inmates and their families and friends. While in prison, he kept corresponding with an old inmate, Álvaro Mendes. These letters were intercepted and copied by members of the Inquisition, who then put them back in their envelopes and sent them to the intended recipient. This exchange lasted from August to October 1576. The defendant later tried to deny these contacts, but ended up confessing and accusing a large number of other people.