Tomás de Torquemada (14 October 1420 – 16 September 1498), also anglicized as Thomas of Torquemada, was a Castilian Dominican friar and first Grand Inquisitor of the Tribunal of the Holy Office (otherwise known as the Spanish Inquisition). The Spanish Inquisition was a group of ecclesiastical prelates created in 1478 and charged with the somewhat ill-defined task of "upholding Catholic religious orthodoxy" within the lands of the newly formed union of the crowns of Castile and Aragon. The lands of this newly formed royal union are now known as the Kingdom of Spain.
In part because of persecution, Muslims and Jews in Castile and Aragon at that time found it socially, politically, and economically advantageous to convert to Catholicism (see Converso, Morisco, and Marrano). The existence of superficial converts from Judaism (i.e., Crypto-Jews) was perceived by the Catholic Monarchs as a threat to the religious and social life in their realms. This led Torquemada, who himself was believed to have had converso ancestors, to be one of the chief supporters of the Alhambra Decree that expelled the Jews from the Crowns of Castile and Aragon in 1492.
Owing to the Inquistion's use of torture to extract confessions and burning at the stake of those declared guilty, and to Torquemada's own approval, even advocacy, of these practices, his name has become synonymous with cruelty, religious intolerance, and fanaticism. The number of burnings at the stake during Torquemada's tenure has been estimated at 2,000.
Source : Wikipedia
