Biography
Sebastián Amaya is a Ph.D. student in History. He has taught at the University of Antioquia, the National University of Colombia, the Pontifical Bolivarian University, and EAFIT University. He received the 14th La Rábida Group Award for Ibero-American Studies (2021) and is the author of Las galeras de Tierra Firme (1578–1612), published in 2023. His research focuses on the Hispanic fiscal-military state, payment methods, and human trafficking in New Granada and the Caribbean during the colonial period.
Project summary
To control Portuguese migration to the New World, the Spanish Crown created and amplified a narrative that portrayed Lusitanians as Jewish descendants and likely Jewish converts themselves. This discourse licensed the Inquisition to investigate these people’s backgrounds and impose various punishments, ranging from pecuniary fines to expulsion or even execution. The Castilians sought to exert political control over their colonies and to gain rents from the Portuguese wealth. But why were there so many Lusitanians, and how did they manage to accumulate so much wealth? Is there enough evidence of their Jewishness, or could it have been just a political persecution backed by religious zeal?
This research aims to explore the overlapping Portuguese and Jewish-descendant diasporas that facilitated the forced migration of Africans from 1595 to 1640 in the New Kingdom of Granada. Reconstructing their mercantile network allows us to connect the Caribbean colonial elites with the mercantile nodes and the large transatlantic trafficking societies. Moreover, recovering their names from oblivion helps trace the people who carried out the African diaspora, as well as track whether those individuals were persecuted by Inquisition tribunals for their Jewish descent or suspicion of being so.
