By 
The text by Alexandra Cook and Noble Cook, Good Faith and True Ignorance, traced the life of one of the first settlers of the New World and his two wives. The authors’ purpose in writing this book was to provide modern readers with a “mirror of a segment of sixteenth-century Spanish society, the middle class and lesser nobility” (Cook xii). The authors explored all facets of this society: its values and customs, legal structure, its economy, and its home life.
The authors weaved the story of this man’s life with other historical information, legal proceedings, and the social mores of the time with such skill that the reader was not bogged down in mundane details. The writing was lively and interesting; he kept the reader in suspense as the court case unfolded. Although the bigamy trial was the main theme of the book, the authors inserted other instances of Spanish law into the text, such as that the family of a murdered man can claim against the inheritance of the person who murdered him (Cook 2).
In unraveling Francisco Noguerol’s trial, the authors linked many aspects of Spanish society, such as the power and control that widowed women could exhibit in this patriarchal society (as seen through Nougerol’s mother and Dona Catalina). The text also provides examples of life in Spanish convents through the sisters of Nougerol. It was very interesting that the nuns who lied to Noguerol were not made to take responsibility for what their actions caused, except by his brother. This shows, I think, how the Catholic Church tried to protect its religious orders from scandal.
The Spanish judicial system was considered to have attempted to protect the rights of women in its society, as seen in the experience of Doña Beatriz and Doña Catalina. For Beatriz, she was protected from being destitute by her husband’s remarriage, and Catalina was protected from losing the husband with whom she had made a life and a home.
The authors offered the reader logical motivations for people’s actions during this time. An example were the reasons why Noguerol left his homeland to come to Peru. The authors indicated that her main motivation was to escape an unwanted marriage, and this seemed highly plausible since he stayed away from her for a long time, returning to Spain only when he believed she was dead. Another example was why Doña Beatriz waited until after Noguerol’s death to affirm that the marriage was consummated; if he couldn’t deny it, she would have been more successful in winning the trial. That she was bitter at having been discarded in favor of dona Catalina was made very explicit in her actions.
Noguerol also remained bitter towards his family for cheating on him. This bitterness was seen by the fact that he deliberately disinherited his family in his last will and testament, preferring to enact a line of succession for his estate in the descendants of his wife (Cook 137). Dona Catalina’s character, namely her abhorrence of her scandal, was exhibited by her agreement to pay more money to dona Beatriz after Noguerol’s death (Cook 143).
In the above examples and many others, the authors present an astonishingly clear picture of Spanish society during the conquest of the Americas. The reader can discern the many ways in which women were able to circumvent the Spanish law that restricted them in this patriarchal society. The Spanish emphasis on values such as respectability was marked in the characters of Noguerol, Catalina and Beatriz. The reader can also see how the custom of arranged marriages can cause unexpected catastrophes among the people forced to participate in them. Through their extensive research of church records, legal documents, and others, Alexandra Cook and Noble Cook gave us exciting insight into Spain’s social history in a period of continual change caused by the exploration and conquest of the Americas.
Bibliography
Cook, Alexandra Parma, and Noble David Cook. Good faith and truthful ignorance: a case of transatlantic bigamy. Duke University Press, 1991.