I might have seen a mention of New Christian from the 1500s many years ago, but not sure.
But I once knew a researcher on the mainland whose village was in Northern Portugal and the records go back amazingly to about 1530s, if I recall. He told me he found mention of New Christians in those records.
So maybe that term began to fade away and by the late 1500s where we can usually find the earliest records these days the term was virtually gone.
One thing that never faded away was the term Old Christian. Witnesses had to testify that certain individuals were Old Christians and had no "tainted" blood, whether black, Arab, or anything other than Portuguese.
I have an ancestor who faced the Inquisition for what he said:
"que deus nosso senhor não era mais que Deos dos ceos e não da terra."
Someone kindly translated it for me:
"that our lord god was God of the heavens and not of the earth."
Another translation is, " that god our lord is nothing more than god in heaven, and not on earth"
Another translation is, " that god our lord is nothing more than god in heaven, and not on earth"
This happened in 1593 and he was said to be a "christão velho" (Old Christian) born in Lajes do Pico.
I can just imagine jaws dropping when those words fell on other's ears 420 years ago.
:-)
Doug da Rocha Holmes
Sacramento, California
Pico & Terceira Genealogist
916-550-1618
Sacramento, California
Pico & Terceira Genealogist
916-550-1618
---------- Original Message --------
Subject: Re: [AZORES-Genealogy] Silveira Cardoso - Lajes do Pico (Jews?)
From: John Raposo <marra...@yahoo.com>
Date: Mon, April 22, 2013 11:06 am
To: "azores@googlegroups.com" <azores@googlegroups.com>
This subject continues to pluck on very sensitive strings. The historical documentation does not support a significant number of avowed (openly practicing, suspected of practicing, or known) Jews in the settlement or subsequent population of the Azores. You can look at all the historical research all you want, and you will not find evidence for much of a presence of Jews in any significant number in the Azores. That being said, that does not mean that there were not Jews who were cryptic, i.e. secret Jews, who did not avow or practice their faith openly. We'll never know how many of those there might have been.
I have never found the terms Converso or New Christian used in any vital record in the Azores.
And then there is the question of who is a Jew. The Jewish religion says that to be a Jew one's mother must have been a Jew (not your 10th great-grandmother), not your father.
So, who is a Jew? Is it a Christian whose ancestors 500 years ago were Jewish? Not according to Jewish law. Judaism is a religion, not a race. Descendants of Abraham who are Moslems (e.g. the Arab people (who are Semites) who descend from Abraham's other son, Ishmael, or his descendants who are, Hindus, Christians, Budahists, or atheists are not Jews.
All that having been said, genetic research does support a much higher proportion of Azoreans of Jewish origin than can be documented by the historical record. I myself can proudly claim one documented Jewish female ancestor in the early 16th century. However, I am not a Jew.
As for Willem van der Hagen of Flanders, perhaps his ancestors were Jews. He himself was not as far as can be ascertained from the existing documentation. A converso totally unrelated to the man could have taken the name Silveira. That does not mean that all Silveiras are the descendants of Jews.
This whole subject and this insistence on Jewish roots continues to perplex and fascinate me. We are who we; no amount of wishful thinking can make it otherwise.
Thank you, Doug, for the additional information.
John Miranda Raposo
From: "p...@dholmes.com" <p...@dholmes.com>
To: azores@googlegroups.com
Sent: Monday, April 22, 2013 1:00 PM
Subject: [AZORES-Genealogy] Silveira Cardoso - Lajes do Pico (Jews?)
--This is such a reckless comment and should be viewed with contempt.There is no mention of the specific family of Silveira Cardoso in Lajes do Pico being of Jewish origin.All they say is that Silveira and Cardoso are names that were used by Jews when forced to convert.Sure. They picked every name available, but it has no bearing on whether the specific family of Silveira Cardoso in Lajes just happened to be these same Jews. It's highly unlikely.But put it to the test. Get some direct male descendant tested for Y-DNA and then you can put this to rest.Now, let's look a little closer. Silveira in most of the Azores has it's origins in Willem van der Hagen of Flanders. Nobody ever hinted that he was a Jew. He was a nobleman and that almost by itself tells us he was not.OK, so maybe someone forced to convert assumed this Silveira name. Well, that could happen, just as with any other surname. Same for Cardoso.I have at this moment 24 males who used Silveira Cardoso and were married in Lajes do Pico.Most have fathers with other names - not Silveira Cardoso. So to be clear, one must pick one of these and I don't know which ones they might pick.Let's narrow it down to those born in the 1700s.Two have a father using Silveira Machado.Two have a father named Amaro Luis Pereira.One has a father names Silveira da Silva.One has an unknown father and was born in Ribeiras next door.One has Silveira Armao.One was a Capitao and surely of noble descent whose father was Silveira de Bettencourt, the Capitao-mor (highest military title available).One has Pereira Cardoso.One has Pereira Gigante.Another is from Ribeiras and traces back to the 1600s with Cardoso da Silveira.Chances are best that the reason there are many by this particular name combination is that both Silveira and Cardoso are revered names by reason of the noble family such as the above Capitao-mor.If anyone wants to give me a specif person, I would be willing to look at that exact line and give the surnames of the father from the oldest known generation.So until proven otherwise, the answer is "no" they are not Jews converted by force.Yes, there are others from Pico who were. I mentioned my line from Faria tracing to a Vieira in Sao Mateus, Pico in the late 1500s with haplogroup J which indicates Middle Eastern DNA and could easily be of Jewish origins.But I hate the tendency to pick a name rather than a specific person and say that name is of Jewish origin, unless you pick one that is ONLY Jewish, like Benarus or Cohen, etc.Doug da Rocha Holmes
Sacramento, California
Pico & Terceira Genealogist
916-550-1618-------- Original Message --------
Subject: Re: [AZORES-Genealogy] Pat Amaral: Stone Fleet and Conversos
From: eric edgar <noblankt...@gmail.com>
Date: Mon, April 22, 2013 9:07 am
To: Azores Genealogy <azores@googlegroups.com>
David,This website has a source for the Silveira Cardoso converso backgroundSilbeira y Cardoso- (23) From the book, "Secrecy and Deceit: The Religion of theCrypto-Jews", by David Gitlitz. The names of the Sephardim (and their residences) mentioned were, sometimes, involved with the inquisition. There were other names which are not listed here because the author did not identify those names as Sephardic.(~)
Attached is page from that book. It only mentions the name once.On Sun, Apr 21, 2013 at 12:13 AM, David <dsdscorn...@gmail.com> wrote:
When I started working on the family history as a teen in the '70s, I maintained for a while a lively correspondence with Pat Amaral, one of the leaders in establishing Portuguese-American genealogy. I understand that she passed away some years ago.
Pat informed me that my g'g'grandfather Antonio Hurd / António da Terra had served the Union during the Civil War, as a sailor in the Stone Fleet (sometimes called the "Great Stone Fleet"). (For those not familiar with this attempt to blockade Confederate harbors, here's an overview: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stone_Fleet)
I have combed through Union records (from during the period as well as later records regarding veterans and pensioners) but found no mention of my g'g'grandfather under any conceivable variant of his anglicized name or of his original Portuguese name. I'm thinking that perhaps the sailors of the Stone Fleet were never formally enlisted in the Union Navy...
I have my side of my correspondence with Pat in storage in a different city, but as I recall she didn't indicate what her source was. Does anyone else here have an ancestor who (actually or allegedly) sailed with the Stone Fleet, and thus has familiarity with the relevant sources? And/or does anyone know what Pat did with her source materials collection -- i.e., is it in a library somewhere, or otherwise accessible to researchers?
She also insisted to me (again, iirc, without naming her source(s)) that certain of my families were of known Converso descent, e.g., Silveira Cardoso from Lajes do Pico. For this reason too I'd love to know whether her source materials have been preserved and are accessible somewhere.
Thanks in advance,
David da Silva Cornell
Miami, FL
Researching the following surnames:
Faial - Terra (unknown freguesia(s))
Flores - Freitas, Lourenço, Coelho (unknown freguesia(s))
Pico - Silveira Cardoso, Macedo, Machado, Pereira Madruga, Ferreira,
Cardoso, Cardoso Machado, Vieira, Bettencourt, Dutra, Castanho, Homem,
Goulart, Quaresma, Moniz, Barreto, Silveira, Mancebo, Pereira, Álvares (all
Lajes do Pico)
S. Jorge - Silva, Botelho, Azevedo, Cardoso (Urzelina); Silva, Azevedo,
Cardoso (Santo António in Norte Grande)
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