in 1472.57
In return for their efforts and expenditures, the municipal authorities hoped for dramatic social repercussions and in this they were largely gratified. Ferrer effectively called Murcianos to greater moral fervor, permitting the concejo to pass a series of new laws against collective sins such as gambling.58 At the same time, the amiable enmity of the frontier meant that visiting preachers had to tread carefully when commenting on interfaith concerns. Ferrer, for instance, made an impassioned appeal for strict segregation between the various religious communities in the city, and particularly for the removal of Jews from much of civic life. But, although they were very much open to these ideas, the concejo was chiefly concerned with local antiseignorial movements and the broader problem of urban violence. Their hope for Ferrer’s visit was that, “through the words he preaches to many people, he may move Christians as well as Jews and Muslims to voluntarily pardon the deaths of their fathers and mothers, siblings and other relatives as well as other offenses and injuries” and thus put an end to reciprocal violence and ongoing feuds.59
Although they could be comfortable on stage, clerics tended to remain on the margins of more playful public events. The idea that they should spend their leisure time in service to God was well established, as were priestly obligations to serve as moral exemplars. The expectations for their public and private comportment were explicitly laid out not only in ecclesiastic law but also in the civil code, as the Partidas decreed that “prelates should pay careful attention to their conduct as men whose example others follow, as above stated; and for that reason, they should not witness exhibitions, as, for instance, lance throwing, tilting or fights with bulls or other wild beasts, or visit those who take part in them. Moreover, they should not throw dice, or play draughts, or ball, or quoits, or any games like those which tend to interfere with their composure, nor should they remain to witness them, or be familiar with those who play them.”60
The documentary record for the actual behavior of ecclesiastics is scattered and frequently unreliable. This is due partly to the paucity of official church records, which understandably glossed over this issue, and partly to the nature of chronicle and literary descriptions, which often presented highly subjective views of the clergy. The minutes, however, of a number of synods held in fifteenth-century Castile detail attempts to legislate clerical behavior, while reports from diocesan inspectors describe the failings of the parish priests.61 From these sources, it appears that efforts to proscribe playful activities were less than effective, leaving the councils repeatedly obliged to ratify formal bans on any number of private or semiprivate diversions. These ranged from drinking in taverns, consorting with women, and playing at cards and dice to attending bullfights or public dances and musical performances to participating in burlesque dramas.
But church authorities sought to improve not only the morality of the clergy, but also that of society as a whole. Both Cartagena and Arévalo, although they disagreed sharply in their views of caballero tournaments, emphasized the moral influence of these spectacles. Although Cartagena’s objections were frequently echoed by others, knightly jousts and melees did not receive much overt church scrutiny. This lack of reaction may in part be explained by the frequent presence of high ecclesiastic officials at the more lavish events, where they mingled with their temporal peers. What really drew their ire were the entremeses and theatrics that frequently accompanied these games, especially those that mocked, or seemed to them to mock, holy rituals. Most efforts to suppress entremeses, however, focused on popular festivals. While these had much in common with noble tournaments, their relative lack of powerful sponsors made them more attractive targets for suppression.
Such events were performed in all Castilian cities but seem to have been more popular and prevalent—or at least better documented—in some places. On the frontier, Murcia, for instance, possessed a particularly vibrant festive culture that led to a number of ecclesiastic and civil attempts to curb its ardor.62 These festive activities took a number of forms, from spontaneous celebrations and games to formal dramatic presentations. The most elaborate tended to fall near major church holidays, including Carnival immediately before Lent or the festival of the reyes pájares on 27 December.63 This timing incensed the clergy, who especially despised games of ridicule (juegos de escarnio), in which sacred rites were given a comic or burlesque treatment.64 They therefore tried to abolish popular events that coincided with religious observances but lacked a strictly liturgical character. In 1473, for instance, the Council of Aranda prohibited playful spectacles during the festivals of Christmas, Saint Stephen, Saint John, and the Holy Innocents, referring specifically to “staged games, performances with masks or monsters, spectacles and other diverse fictions … clumsy poems and burlesque speeches.”65
How does this discourse relate to ecclesiastic reception of noble spectacles and tournaments? Whether or not Church authorities considered sporting events to be moral threats for secular participants and spectators, they deemed clerical involvement in almost any aspect of those occasions as unacceptable. Moreover, they would likely have deemed the majority of the plays and skits presented during breaks as juegos de escarnio. Nevertheless, the church’s purview was not wholly spiritual, and political considerations made direct criticisms of caballero spectacle relatively rare. That positive relations with influential nobles outweighed the moral dangers of irreverent theater is attested to by the presence of often-senior churchmen at these games. Several prominent bishops and archbishops, to give just one example, attended the closing banquet for the 1434 tournament in Valladolid in which Roman gods handed out the trophies.66 It is unlikely that they openly decried any pagan or burlesque elements in a skit honoring the king himself. Politics aside, such acts were fun. Church officials high and low attended them, participated in them, and tacitly condoned them for just that reason; they were a guilty pleasure that many no doubt rationalized as less heinous than other available forms of entertainment.
The onlookers who gathered at knightly tournaments to enjoy the sports as well as the skits and entremeses were perfectly aware that the nobility presented such shows to confirm their social status, to parade their wealth, fidelity, and courage before their peers, and to demonstrate both their generosity and their monopoly on the use of force. They were also fully cognizant that the church nominally condemned these shows but that this disapproval was insufficient to prevent all but the most zealous prelates from attending. Commoners lacked a voice both in the content of these performances and in the dominant mode of analyzing them. They did not record in writing their experiences of the tournament and, when they appear in chroniclers’ accounts, it is collectively, as the large crowd whose presence confirmed the prominence of the organizers or the appeal of the message.
However, audiences need not have consented to the perceptions of reality shown to them. In practice, spectator priorities acted in concert with noble and church messages to create meaning. Although popular concerns varied from time to time and place to place, and it is misleading to make broad generalizations, there were several structural issues that nearly always influenced popular perceptions of power in fifteenth-century Castile. Chief among these were economic stresses related to the degradation of the currency and particularly the price of grain. The structure of urban society and the concentration of power in noble hands rankled many of the nascent merchant class who not only resented high taxes and their lack of influence but also aspired to the very trappings of nobility and knighthood flaunted in the tournaments. Religious as well as social boundaries divided urban populations, with ambivalence toward religious minorities a constant undercurrent.67 There was a growing desire among the populace for their own public statements of civic identity and religious devotion, expressions that may have competed with noble tournaments but also drew inspiration from them.68 Finally, the role of diversion should not be ignored; festivals were enjoyable, regardless of their sponsorship, and even the bluntest propaganda represented a bit of excitement and a break in the workday.
Elites were aware of all this. For them, it was imperative that their spectacles would
