Margins of the Encubierto: The Messianic Kings’ Tradition in the Iberian World (15th–17th Centuries)

Abstract

The eschatology and the messianic views in the Iberian Early Modern World has been often studied in a comparative way by showing their similarities in aspects like the expansion of the faith, the war against the infidels and the providential kings. However, only few scholars have studied together the Portuguese and Spanish millenarian and messianic traditions. The same can be said of the history of eschatology in Iberian dominions in America. This chapter explores these eschatological and messianic traditions, considering especially the case of the encubierto and the messianic king, to show the migrations of ideas between Portugal and the Spanish territories in both sides of the Atlantic, how they passed from one kingdom to the others, how they changed and how they knew mutual influence. So, it holds that Portuguese, Spanish, and American contacts are critical to explain certain episodes of the tradition of the messianic kings in the Iberian world.