Editing Spanish Inquisition (section)

== Origins == 

Fast-forward two centuries : the real-life Spanish Inquisition were a combined political/religious party formed in 1480 by the Spanish Monarchs Ferdinand II of Aragon and Isabella I of Castille. [[Skub|While the reasons for their founding have been debated by historians]], several clear goals (or more popular theories) are that it was intended to maintain Catholic orthodoxy in their kingdoms and to replace the Medieval Inquisition under Papal control with one answerable to the Spanish monarchs.  

While the groundwork was laid in 1478, the Spanish Inquisition was officially formed in the year 1480. For context, the reason why the Spanish monarchy wanted their own Inquisition was because Spain was in the final stages of the Reconquista, conquering Moorish Grenada ten years later. Spain, being only very recently unified and having conquered a great deal of land formerly held by Muslim rulers, wanted to maintain its existence through a strong central government supported by an orthodox system of laws & religion. All remaining Muslims were required to convert, but the monarchy wanted to make extra sure that they were being for realsies and wouldn't try to rebel or conspire with the Ottomans. They also threw in the Jews, because of the Jews' allegedly traitorous actions during much of the reconquista, allying with the Moors and often fighting alongside them such as in the [https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Higueruela.jpg Battle of La Higueruela (notice the banners)] for one instance. The scope often changed with Spain's political agenda- Lutherans (who were making controlling the Netherlands more difficult) and unruly nobles often fell under investigation.  As a result, encouraged by reports corroborated by Isabella's long-time friend and advisor to the royals, Tomas de Torquemada (yes, THAT Torquemada), they requested a Papal Bull (official decree from the Pope) to start an Inquisition in Spain.

It is important to keep in mind that Inquisitions controlled by the Church (i.e. "actual" Inquisitions) were very different.  For starters, they didn't kill people.  The problem was that secular governments had their own laws about heresy...and were very torture and execution happy.  This somewhat contributed to the end of the Inquisitions as Inquisitors weren't exactly enthusiastic about their jobs when they knew anyone found guilty faced horrific treatment but not finding them guilty so they could be forgiven by a priest would risk those people's souls. A real rock-and-a-hard-place situation. Catholic Inquisitors rarely decided there was enough evidence to go investigate an accusation and dismissed the claim as false. On the occasions they did investigate, they rarely found enough evidence for a trial. When the investigation did progress to a trial, the Inquisitors rarely found someone guilty. When someone was found guilty, they were given God's forgiveness and released. The Catholic Inquisitors set standards of practice which grew into the modern day ideas of the humane treatment of prisoners and modern police investigative practices: for instance, they would allow any suspect brought before them to 'name those they considered mortal enemies', with any accusation/testimony by such a named person discarded as mere human grudges and revenge-mongering.

The politically-controlled Inquisitions were basically "you're guilty and I'm going to hurt you until you admit it" if you were a political enemy of the State, but were generally actually pretty good at their jobs when you were a random Joe.