H. S. Tabakoğlu, "16. Yüzyıl Osmanlı-İspanya Savaşlarının Gölgesinde Kehanet Olgusu: Miguel de Piedrola Örneği." Tarih Araştırmaları Dergisi (TAD). Cilt 40. Sayı 69. Mart 2021: 133-159. (original) (raw)

The rivalry of Ottoman and Spanish empires continues to be a research subject of modern studies in addition to the classical works of Leopold von Ranke and Fernand Braudel. On the other hand, these studies mostly focus on the macro-analytical study of the rulers, politics and institutions of these great Mediterranean empires, and thus individual narratives and examples remain in the background. This article as an example of micro-history aims to explain the struggle of Miguel de Piedrola who was one of the thousands of Spanish soldiers in the Ottoman-Spanish conflict, to become a prominent figure in the society by claiming to be a prophet. Piedrola who prophesized about various subjects between 1560 and 1587, gained immense fame and was even considered to be the first royal prophet in Castile. However, his arrest and conviction by the Tribunal of the Holy Office of the Inquisition in Toledo ended his rapid career. The main question of this article is how and why the prophecies of Piedrola managed to have such a broad repercussion. The primary sources for this study are a copy of Piedrola’s Inquisitional inquiry report, which is kept in the Spanish National Library, relevant records of Cortes de Castilla, and lastly Piedrola’s report on the Battle of Lepanto which is kept in the General Archive of Simancas. Apart from these sources, we can only manage to follow Piedrola’s traces in the secondary literature indirectly, with few exceptions. Thus, this article aims to form a small-scale historical narrative via the extraordinary life of Miguel de Piedrola, based on archive documents and modern studies. As a result, it is understood that Piedrola, by the help of internal opposition against Felipe II, managed to attract great attention in a period in which the apocalyptical expectations and prophecies were still alive with the impact of Ottoman-Spanish conflict in the Mediterranean world.

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