La Inquisición española

From its very appearance, Henry Kamen's book became the undisputed reference work on the history of the Spanish Inquisition. The public demand led to new updated editions of it, until the time has come to offer us, as Kamen himself tells us, "a substantially renewed work", in which he not only incorporates the results of the investigations carried out in recent years, but tries to situate the Inquisition "within the broad perspective of what other entities -the Church, the state and civil society- were doing at the same time", with the intention of overcoming the cliché that presents it as the sole protagonist of the dramas in which he participated. In this way, he not only manages to better illuminate the past, but also allows us to understand the various forms of control and coercion that still exist today in many parts of the world, aware that "the essential component of an Inquisition was, and continues to be , the agreement and cooperation of common people".