Un negro suyo le quiso matar con hechizos: Hechicería, sociedad y política en la Lima de 1547

Abstract

The article analyses a 1547 lawsuit about a case of sorcery in Lima. In the middle of the conflict between the encomenderos of Peru and the Spanish crown, the black slave of a Spanish surgeon was accused of having tried to murder his owner by magical means. The following investigation by the Spanish authorities discovered a network of indigenous religious practitioners who aided their customers from all strata of the city’s population in solving problems and conflicts in their daily life. The lawsuit offers insights into the interaction of the different social and cultural groups of the city. It documents as well how people of different backgrounds were able to participate in magical practices and share certain religious beliefs in spite of the dif-ferent religious concepts behind them.