Sign up for free online course: salamanca.ufm.edu/en The School of Salamanca is a MOOC offered by Universidad Francisco Marroquín that consists of five chapters. An overview of the School of Salamanca, the main intellectual current of early modern Spain. The online course consists of three main chapters on the school’s contributions to Human Rights, Politics, and Economics, plus an introduction, a conclusion, and brief chapters on the school’s founder Francisco de Vitoria and its climactic figure Juan de Mariana. Learn about the origins of the Hispanic liberal tradition as well as the scope of its fundamental influence on modern Western Civilization. Win a badge by successfully completing the activities of the course. Eric Clifford Graf is a professor of literature at Universidad Francisco Marroquín. He has a PhD in Spanish language and literature from the University of Virginia (1997). He specializes in medieval and early modern Spain, the history of the novel, Renaissance studies, and literary, political, cultural, and economic theory. Credits: New Media | UFM 2017 salamanca.ufm.edu newmedia.ufm.edu ufm.edu

2. The School of Salamanca is a
MOOC offered by Universidad
Francisco Marroquín that consists
of five chapters: an introduction, a
chapter each on the contributions
to thinking about human rights,
politics, and economics; and a
conclusion. It is an overview of
the School of Salamanca, the
main intellectual current of early
modern Spain. Learn about the
origins of the Hispanic liberal
tradition as well as the scope of its
fundamental influence on modern
Western Civilization. Win a badge
by successfully completing the
activities of the course.
In 2018 the course launches its
first edition: salamanca.ufm.edu
The School
of Salamanca
MOOC

3. If you are interested in fields
like economics or politics, the
School of Salamanca is just
good homework. Studying
early modern thinking about
concepts like price inflation or
republicanism can help us to
understand and evaluate them.
Moreover, as an early modern
type of Hispanic liberalism, the
School of Salamanca can help
us to understand the ideas of
Enlightenment thinkers who
were influenced by them, such as
Locke, Montesquieu, or Jefferson.
Why should
we study
The School
of Salamanca?

4. The mission of Universidad
Francisco Marroquín (ufm.edu) is to
teach and disseminate the ethical,
legal, and economic principles of
a society of free and responsible
persons. In recent years the
university has expanded its use of
innovative technology in order to
encourage the learning experience
both on and off campus.
About Universidad
Francisco Marroquín

5. Eric Clifford Graf is a professor of literature at
Universidad Francisco Marroquín. He graduated
from the University of Virginia in 1997 with a PhD in
Spanish language and literature . He has worked at the
University of Virginia, The College of William & Mary,
the University of Chicago, the University of Illinois at
Urbana-Champaign, Smith College, Wesleyan University,
and Kershner Trading Group. He specializes in the
history of the novel, medieval and early modern Spain,
and literary, political, cultural, and economic theory.
He is author of the book Cervantes and Modernity
(Bucknell UP, 2007). In addition to numerous academic
essays on the poetry, theater, and narrative of Miguel de
Cervantes, he has also published on The Poem of the
Cid, Garcilaso de la Vega, Juan de Mariana, El Greco, San
Juan de la Cruz, Pedro de Calderón, José de Cadalso,
Vicente Aleixandre, Julio Cortázar, and Sigmund Freud.
Published academic essays
ufm.academia.edu/EricCliffordGraf
Other online courses
Discover Don Quijote de la Mancha
donquijote.ufm.edu/en
EricCliffordGraf
Professor

6. The course consists of five
chapters that students complete as
they use the e-learning resources
in the platform. This learning
experience is offered in English to
disseminate the ideas and cultural
values around the world.
program
Language
English
Effort
3 hours per week
Lenght
5 weeks
program
Academic

7. Course Syllabus
Chapter 1 Introduction
The School of Salamanca’s predecessors,
historical factors, and its founder, Francisco
de Vitoria
Chapter 2 Human Rights
Late-scholastic opinions on the rights of
indigenous peoples, women’s rights, religious
liberty, and slavery

8. Chapter 3 Politics
Late-scholastic thinking on regicide, popular sovereignty,
legal codes, parliamentary bodies, taxes, jurisdictional
conflicts, and constitutionalism
Chapter 4 Economics
Late-scholastic points of view on property rights,
monetary policy, free markets, theories of value, foreign
exchange, liquidity, etc.
Chapter 5 Conclusion
Juan de Mariana and the impact that the School Sala-
manca has had on subsequent generations of Europeans
and Americans

9. Chapter 1
Vitoria
In this chapter Professor Graf
will introduce the course
content, reviewing the
predecessors, founders, and
historical factors involved
in the School of Salamanca.
Francisco de Vitoria, considered
the founder, provides early
instances of the School of
Salamanca’s modern thinking
on politics, natural law,
international law, economics,
and human rights.
The online course includes a
series of resources to facilitate
your learning. Below is a list of
activities you will perform.
1. Watch the videos about the
origins of the School of Salamanca.
2. Read the material provided in
PDF format in order to review the
chapter’s main ideas.
3. Share your impressions with
your colleagues by participating
in the discussion forums.
4. Reinforce your knowledge by
taking the quizzes.

10. -1-
The School of Salamanca
is a very broad term
used by to describe a group
of late-scholastic Catholic
thinkers from sixteenth and
seventeenth-century Spain,
Portugal, and Latin America.
The term was first used by the
German legal scholar Wilhem
Endemann in 1874. Usually
theologians, and from different
monastic orders, especially
Dominicans and Jesuits, these
men were a specific subset of
the intellectuals of their day.
Mariana
Erasmus
We tend to think of the
Salamancans as rivals of
the relatively more secular
humanists, although this
opposition is often overstated
and misunderstood, and many
scholars even view the relation
as one of mutual influence.

11. -2-
A figure like Pedro de Valencia
(1555-1620), for example, is a
liminal figure, often defined as
a humanist even though his
work was always in dialogue
with the late scholastics.
Like the humanists, the
late-scholastics reserved
for themselves the right to
comment on almost any
philosophical, scientific,
moral, or economic issue.
Their disputes with other
intellectuals were often
public spectacles.

12. -3-
For example, Bartolomé de
Las Casas (1474/84-1566) and
Juan Ginés de Sepúlveda
(1490-1573) debated the
human rights of indigenous
peoples at Valladolid in 1550
and 1551.
LasCasas
Sepúlveda

13. -4-
usury
round 1
Saravia
Villalón
Another example, Luis Saravia
de la Calle (1500s) and
Cristóbal de Villalón (d.1580?)
debated usury, that is, the
charging of interest on loans,
in major treatises published at
Medina del Campo in 1544 and
Valladolid in 1541. Cervantes
synthesizes this dialogical
public practice on the
part of the students of
Salamanca by depicting
it as an abstract and
mathematical fencing
match in DQ 2.19.

14. Not all of the members of
the School of Salamanca
attended or taught at
the actual University of
Salamanca, one of Europe’s
oldest universities, founded
in 1134 and chartered by
Alfonso IX of León in 1218.
chartered
in 1218
Alfonso IX
of León
-5-

15. Spain
Vitoria
-6-
Nevertheless, the founder,
Francisco de Vitoria (c.1483-1546),
as well as many of the school’s
subsequent figures did indeed
teach there. Thus, a great deal of
the intellectual transformation of
early modern Spain is associated
with this theological and
academic center on the banks
of the Tormes River (cf. La
vida de Lazarillo de Tormes)
When we say that the
School of Salamanca
were late-scholastics, we
are emphasizing certain
characteristics: a) they wrote
mostly, though not exclusively,
in Latin; b) they were dialectical
and meticulous in their methods;
and c) they turned to Aristotle
and Aquinas as authorities (the
humanists tended to prefer Plato
and Augustine).

16. The School
of Salamanca
St. Bernardino
of Siena
St. Antonino
of Florence
Other late-medieval sources for late-scholastic thought
included the sermons of St. Bernardino of Siena (1380-1444)
and St. Antonino of Florence (1389-1459).
Nevertheless, like the humanists, the late-scholastics began
empirically as well as theoretically to question their own
traditional authorities.

17. In many respects, the School
of Salamanca represents
a critical reexamination of
Aquinas’s and Aristotle’s
teachings. The traditional
relation between God and
man needed rethinking
around 1500 due to the rise
of humanism, the discovery of
the New World, the onset of
the Protestant Reformation,
as well as scientific advances
in fields ranging from
astronomy to anatomy.
Aquinas
Galileo
Harvey
-8-

18. -9-
The intellectual shift
represented by late-
scholasticism began
as a nominalist and
empiricist renewal at
the University of Paris, led
by Scottish Dominican John
Major (1469-1559). The goal was to
get beyond stale, rules-based reasoning,
which was often weighed down by
excessive appeals to ancient and
medieval authorities, and to overcome
silly metaphysical polemics about things
like the spatial nature of angels. Instead,
Major grounded philosophy in real life by
using reason in order to attend to issues
that mattered to everyday people.

19. -10-
Molina
Mariana
Saravia
San Juan
Fray Luis
Villalón
Covarrubias
Major’s most important Spanish
student, Francisco de Vitoria
was given the prime chair of
theology at the University of
Salamanca in 1524. In addition
to Vitoria, Las Casas, Villalón,
Saravia, and Valencia, other
Spaniards affiliated or engaged
with the School of Salamanca
included Martín de Azpilcueta
(1491-1586), Domingo de
Soto (1494-1560), Diego de
Covarrubias (1512-77), Tomás
de Mercado (1525-75), Fray
Luis de León (1527-91), Luis de
Molina (1535-1600), Juan de
Mariana (1536-1624), San
Juan de la Cruz (1542-
91), Francisco Suárez
(1548-1617), and
Felipe de la Cruz
Vasconcillos (1500s).

20. Las Casas
Suárez
De Soto
Azpilcueta
Valencia
De la Cruz Vasconcillos
Mercado
Although the reach of their
influence is hotly debated, it
is our position in this course
that many of the political and
economic theories produced by
these men represent important
contributions to modern Western
Civilization (see Quentin Skinner
and Joseph Schumpeter).
Some final points about the
importance of Vitoria.
First, Vitoria’s explanation of
evil as the inevitable result of
God’s gift of free will to humans
has realistic and anti-utopian
implications, laying the groundwork for
reason and choice to prevail over idealism
and dogma. In many ways, he unleashed
the theological adventurousness of Fray
Luis, San Juan, and Molina.
-11-

21. -12-
Second, in returning to Aristotle and Aquinas, the School of
Salamanca placed particular emphasis on natural rights, i.e.,
on the individual’s rights to his body, his possessions, and his
thoughts. Sancho Panza, for example, sounds very Salamancan
when he mocks Don Quijote’s laws of chivalry by using divine and
human law in support of his natural right to self-defense:
«Bien es verdad que en lo que tocare a defender
mi persona no tendré mucha cuenta con esas
leyes, pues las divinas y humanas permiten
que cada uno se defienda de quien quisiere
agravarle» “It’s surely true that when it comes to
defending my person, I’ll not pay much attention
to your laws, for laws both divine and human
allow each to defend himself against whomever
tries to do him harm” (1.8).

22. -13-
Third, Vitoria considered the free market a healthy contribution
to human wellbeing and rejected the notion that merchants were
greedy sinners. Just prices, usury, and commercial contracts would
become fundamental topics for nearly all of his successors.
And finally, Vitoria checked the power of the Emperor and the
Pope, questioning their supposed rights to make war on pagan
peoples and claim their territories. Indeed, he defended the rights
of indigenous peoples in a very cosmopolitan fashion, advocating for
Aristotelian and Thomistic notions of justice as a universal human
right that should be blind to political circumstance and social status.
He argued for institutions that would defend the rights of native
peoples in colonized areas and argued that natural law should be the
basis for international law. In sum, Vitoria represented a radical shift
toward a more modern, rational outlook, concerned with individual
rights, although, again, the extent to which the School of Salamanca
influenced later thinkers of the Enlightenment and classical liberalism
is still debated.

23. H
1
istorical factors in
mid-sixteenth-century
Spain
Expulsions and conversions
of Jews and Moors
At the end of the fifteenth century,
the Catholic Kings mandated the
forced conversions or expulsions
of Jews and Muslims in Spain.
Before that time, and especially
during Reconquest Spain, merchant
activities were largely left to Jews
and Moors because business was
thought inherently sinful.

24. -15-
A theologian or parish confessor could be confident that
Christians worried about the fate of their souls would not
assume the moral hazard. Rather suddenly, with the expulsions
and conversions of Jews and Moors, a large number of Christians
were involved in commerce and finance.
Indeed, in 1517, Spanish merchants in Antwerp asked Vitoria
about the moral legitimacy of their profession. The students of
Aquinas and Aristotle at Salamanca now had to think deeply
about things like commerce and finance.
moral
commerce
Vitoria

25. -16-
New economic reality
The sixteenth century was the
first period of globalization:
new sea routes opened to the
New World and the Orient;
international networks of trade
and finance were established;
and merchants began to
service rapidly growing
domestic and foreign markets.
2

26. As early industrialization began: a)
larger banking and finance needs
arose; b) there was an explosion of
complex financial instruments; c)
states turned increasingly to monetary
manipulation as a means of raising
funds, and d) an overabundance of
currencies, counterfeiters, tariffs,
taxes, and marketplace interference
were problems. In Spain, public deposit
banks had already been established at
Barcelona in 1401 and Valencia in 1407.
Valencia
Barcelona

27. By the middle of the sixteenth century, due
to the massive importation of New World
silver, “the fairs at Medina del Campo became
the focus of a new financial network in
Western Europe” attended by “as many as
two thousand merchants who were served
by fifteen or so bankers for the settlement of
transactions” (D’Emric 221). Then came the
national bankruptcies of 1557, 1575, 1597, 1627,
1647, 1656, and 1662. All of this commanded
the attention of the School of Salamanca.
fairs
Medina del Campo

28. Discovery and conquest
of America
The discovery of the New World
in 1492 resulted in numerous
changes throughout Spain, not
the least of which were issues
related to human rights and just
war theory. Were militant racism
and colonialism justifiable?
Not everyone thought so. To
what degree were Spaniards
practicing injustices against
Amerindian natives and Black
African slaves?
human
rights
just war
theory
conquest
discovery
3
-19-

29. This was the essence of the
famous debate between
Las Casas and Sepúlveda at
Valladolid in 1550 and 1551. De
Soto was a judge by the way,
and there appears to have
been no clear verdict. Then
there was the matter of the
huge influx of gold and silver,
which added momentum to a
new economic reality which
now called forth serious
theoretical thinking about
money, markets, interest
rates, inflation, exchange
rates among currencies, etc.
-20-
De Soto

30. Habsburg imperialism
The concentration of
power at the Habsburg
Court in Madrid brought
serious change to Spain.
Under Charles V (r. 1519-
56), Philip II (r. 1559-1598),
Philip III (r. 1598-1621),
and Philip IV (1621-65),
the Universal Catholic
Monarchy of the Spanish
Empire imposed the
aggressive bureaucracy of
what many scholars agree
was the first modern
nation-state.
Charles V
Philip II
Philip III
Philip IV
4
-21-

31. Spain
-22-
As the Habsburgs went about asserting their geopolitical
control in Iberia, they suppressed local legal and political
traditions, first in Castile and then other kingdoms. This led to
a series of repressive wars: the Comuneros Rebellion (1520-21),
the Alpujarras War (1568-71), the Annexation of Portugal (1580),
the Revolt of Aragón (1591), and the Catalan Revolt (1640-59).

32. -23-
Charles V
Philip IV
Then there was foreign policy: successes against the Ottoman
Empire and against Aztecs, Mayans, Incans, and Mapuches
in the New World contrasted with the relatively disastrous
adventures against England, France, and the Low Countries. As
outsiders from Austria who dynastically maneuvered themselves
into power in Spain, the Habsburgs were almost immediately
subjected to intense political scrutiny. Their authority and their
wars, expulsions, and conquests all caused anxiety, resentment,
and nostalgia for previous dynasties. Endless public debate
and imaginative satire highlighted specific issues like monetary
manipulation, tyranny, imperialism, colonialism, taxation,
diplomacy, wars, corruption, and courtly extravagance. Of course,
the School of Salamanca actively commented on all of these.

33. -24-
Printing press and Reformation
Among the many important
technological and ideological
changes in Renaissance Europe, two
that had great impact on sixteenth-
century Spain were the invention
of the printing press and the rise
of Protestantism. Both phenomena
increased intellectual competition.
Like an early modern internet,
the printing press allowed for the
uncontrollable dissemination of both
new and old ideas. The Protestant
Reformation caused reactionary
behavior in the Counterreformation,
such as the Spanish Inquisition’s
infamous autos de fe; but it also
pushed some religious orders,
especially the Dominicans and the
Jesuits, to undertake their own
internal reforms.
5

34. -25-
Religion will be a transversal
theme throughout this course.
In the first half of the sixteenth
century, Spain was heavily
influenced by the reform-minded
humanist Erasmus of Rotterdam
(1466-1536). Think of Erasmus
as radical but not willing to
take the plunge like Luther and
Calvin. After 1559, however, the
Erasmians came to be viewed
as crypto-Protestants, so the
forces of the Counterreformation
turned on them. A number of
Salamancans, from Fray Luis de
León to Juan de Mariana, soon
found themselves in similar
conflict with the same forces.
Saravia
Villalón
Las
Casas
Sepúlveda

35. -26-
Vitoria
Molina
It’s fundamental to realize that the thinkers of the School of
Salamanca did not share a monolithic point of view, that debate
and methodical dialogue were important, even with their humanist
rivals. Again, in this course, we’ll consider the debate over human
rights between Las Casas and Sepúlveda in 1550-51 and the debate
over usury between Villalón and Saravia in 1541-44.
A simple example of different perspectives within the School
of Salamanca, and an example that has modern relevance, can
be found in the opinions regarding free international trade
held by Vitoria and Molina. Vitoria would be analogous to
the libertarian view that commerce trumps all other
concerns; whereas Molina would be a conservative
arguing that a nation’s interests require
restrictions on commerce with
dangerous international rivals. Will
trade with China make that country
freer and less dangerous or are
we enriching an enemy who
wants to repress other nations?

36. Analyze the content of the comic and participate in the
discussion forum.
Why would a benevolent God allow evil to exist? Is not free will a
prerequisite for politics? In what ways can religion be political?
To enrich your learning experience it is important that you ask
interesting questions, formulate relevant comments, and respond
to the contributions of your classmates.
Chapter 1 Activity

39. UFM New Media production
Universidad Francisco Marroquín
Executive Director
Script and Proffesor
E-learning Coordinator
Illustration
Editorial design
Comic Illustration
Stephanie Falla
Eric Clifford Graf
Lisa Quan
Sergio Miranda
Gabriella Noar
Sandy Rodríguez
Sandy Rodríguez
Carlos Rodríguez

40. Website salamanca.ufm.edu
Direction Calle Manuel F.Ayau (6ta Calle
final), zona 10 Guatemala, Guatemala 01010
Phone Number (+502) 2338-7849
Guatemala, October 2017
UFM thanks the following sponsors for their
generous support of this MOOC: Smith Family
Foundation, The Bottoms Family
Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0.
(CC-BY-NCSA 3.0) Copying, distribution and public communication
is allowed, providing that the acknowledgement of the work is
maintained and it is not used for business. If it is transformed or
a secondary work is generated, it can only be distributed with an
identical license.