Caceres family
Encyclopedia
Caceres was the name of a Jewish family, members of which lived in Portugal
, the Netherlands
, England
, Mexico
, Suriname
, the West Indies, and the United States
. They came from the city of Cáceres
in Spain.
, where the names of Antonio Dias (or Diaz) de Caceres and Catalina de Leon, his wife, occur as "Judaizers". The latter did penance at an auto da fé
held on February 24, 1590 in that city. Their daughter Doña Leonor de Caceres was denounced as a "Judaizer" by her aunt, Doña Mariana Nuñez de Carabajal (see Francisca Nuñez de Carabajal
), before the tribunal of Mexico. Her testimony gives these data: Antonio Dias de Caceres and Jorge de Almeida were married on the same day, in the city of Parmco, Mexico, to Catalina and Leonor de Carabajal, sisters of the deponent, and, after a visit to Spain, moved to the district of San Paolo in Mexico City.
Antonio appears to have lived in another district, in a house which served as a gathering-place for fasting and prayer; and although they all attended mass and otherwise observed the rites and ceremonies of the Roman Catholic Church, they practiced their Jewish rites in private. This was soon discovered; the deponent, her mother, and brothers were arrested by order of the Inquisition
; and Antonio Dias de Caceres, fearing a similar fate, went to China. There he lived three years, came back to Mexico, feigned at first estrangement from his wife, because she was a "Judaizing" penitent, and finally, seeming to yield to the entreaties of friends who sought to bring them together, became nominally reconciled to her and set about in earnest to obey the behests of the Mosaic law. Antonio observed caution, dreading the arm of the Holy Office, but persisted, together with his family, in keeping the Sabbath at home. Prayers were recited at home out of a Hebrew book, said to have been written in verse, and the Psalms, without the required Gloria Patri, were chanted by all. His daughter, the above-mentioned Leonor de Caceres, figured as a penitent at an auto da fé held in the city of Mexico on March 25, 1601. A facsimile of a document dated September 6, 1608, containing an account of her trial, is given in vol. iv. of Publications of the American Jewish Historical Society.
in 1625; wife of Luis Baez.
. Daniel Levi de Barrios celebrates him in verse in the prologue to his allegorical comedy Contra la Verdad no ay Fuerça. Panegirico a los tres biena venturados mártires Abraham Athias, Yahacob Rodriguez Caseres, y Raquel Nuñez Fernandez, que fueron quemados vivos en Cordova por santificar la unidad divina, en 16. de Tammuz, año de 5425 (1665), Amsterdam (no date).
One of the founders of the Portuguese community in Amsterdam, who flourished about 1600.
Johann Christoph Wolf
makes this Francisco de Caceres the author also of Dialogos Satiricos, published at Amsterdam in 1616. Meyer Kayserling
, however, ascribes that work to (2) Francisco or Jacob de Caceres who was probably a son of Moseh de Caceres, one of the founders of the Jewish-Portuguese community of Amsterdam. The latter Francisco or Jacob also translated into Spanish Los Siete Dias de la Semana Sobre la Creacion del Mundo, a work by Bastasi, dedicated to Jacob Tirado
. As the Dialogos Satiricos was published as early as 1616, it is not probable that the author was the former Francisco de Caceres.
Francisco (or Jacob) had, so far as can be determined, five sons:
(1) Daniel de Caceres: Writer of the seventeenth century; son of Jacob de Caceres. He held the degree of master of arts. Caceres was a friend of Manasseh ben Israel, upon whose works, The Conciliator and On Human Frailty (written about 1642), he wrote approbations. He also wrote a eulogy on Saul Levi Morteira
(Amsterdam, 1645).
(2) David de Caceres, who, according to Kayserling, died October 18, 1624 at Amsterdam.
(3) Henrique (or Henry) de Caceres, who lived in England ca. 1650, probably the same who, with Benjamin de Caceres, petitioned the king on April 8, 1661 to permit them to live and trade in Barbados
and Suriname.
(4) Samuel de Caceres: Dutch poet and preacher and brother-in-law of Benedict Spinoza; died November 1660, at Amsterdam. He was a pupil of Rabbi Saul Levi Morteira
of Amsterdam. The title "Poeta, Predicador, y Jaxam, de la Ley Sancta Escritor" (Poet, Preacher, and Cantor, Writer of the Holy Law), given to Caceres by his contemporaries, shows the eminent position which he occupied in the Jewish community of Amsterdam. "De la Ley Sancta Escritor" refers to the Spanish translation of the Bible, which he edited, revised, and corrected, and which was published in 1661, soon after his death.
(5) Simon de Caceres: Military strategist, merchant, and communal leader; flourished in the middle of the seventeenth century. He was prominent in mercantile affairs in Hamburg, London, South America, and the West Indies; and his transactions extended to many parts of the world.
Caceres is described as a chauvinist Jew, boastful of his Jewish descent. He joined Antonio Fernandez Carvajal
in the acquisition of the Bet Cholim cemetery in London, and was one of the petitioners who signed the document presented to Oliver Cromwell
by Manasseh ben Israel in March 1656. Queen Christina of Sweden
is known to have interceded with Cromwell on his behalf for certain commercial privileges in Barbados. At a later date the king of Denmark gave Caceres's brother a letter of recommendation to Charles II of England
, which was instrumental in procuring for the Jews in the West Indies an extension of commercial facilities. Simon was one of Cromwell's intelligencers; and there are at least two documents among the Thurloe papers which show that his experience was utilized by the lord protector. One is called "A Note of What Things Are Wanting in Jamaica". It is a memorandum containing minute advice with regard to fortifications and implements. From a passage in Cromwell's Letters and Speeches, ed. Carlyle (iii. 131), it would seem that Caceres's recommendations were followed, for the needed supplies were forwarded.
Together with this memorandum Caceres submitted to the protector a remarkable scheme for the conquest of Chile, wherein he proposed to enlist "men of his own nation" (meaning Jews), and offered to lead the expedition in person. In his letter of instructions Cromwell refers to the desirability of hindering the Spanish trade with Peru
and Cartagena
, and of striving with the Spaniards for the mastery of all those seas. At a later date Caceres presented another plan to Cromwell, which provided for the protection of the Barbados trade and for improving the administration of the navigation act. This document seems to have been unauthorized, and turns out to be a personal application for an office he desired to have created for himself.
Daniel (see above) had two (?) sons; (1) Francisco de Caceres and (2) Samuel ben Daniel de Caceres, whose name, if he is not Daniel's son, remains a "crux interpretum". It is more than probable that the two Samuels have been confounded by bibliographers. Samuel, the poet and preacher, had a son named David de Caceres, who was printer in Amsterdam in 1661. Another person bearing that name was rabbi at Salonica, and afterward (ca. 1650) at Hebron
, Palestine
.
, W. I., in the year 1692. In 1891, a Mr. Benjamin de Caceres officiated at Curaçao in the absence of a rabbi.
Persons bearing the name were living in 1902 in New York and Philadelphia. Miss Ida Caseres of Philadelphia claims descent from the Caceres who settled in Jamaica in the seventeenth century.
Portugal
Portugal , officially the Portuguese Republic is a country situated in southwestern Europe on the Iberian Peninsula. Portugal is the westernmost country of Europe, and is bordered by the Atlantic Ocean to the West and South and by Spain to the North and East. The Atlantic archipelagos of the...
, the Netherlands
Netherlands
The Netherlands is a constituent country of the Kingdom of the Netherlands, located mainly in North-West Europe and with several islands in the Caribbean. Mainland Netherlands borders the North Sea to the north and west, Belgium to the south, and Germany to the east, and shares maritime borders...
, England
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...
, Mexico
Mexico
The United Mexican States , commonly known as Mexico , is a federal constitutional republic in North America. It is bordered on the north by the United States; on the south and west by the Pacific Ocean; on the southeast by Guatemala, Belize, and the Caribbean Sea; and on the east by the Gulf of...
, Suriname
Suriname
Suriname , officially the Republic of Suriname , is a country in northern South America. It borders French Guiana to the east, Guyana to the west, Brazil to the south, and on the north by the Atlantic Ocean. Suriname was a former colony of the British and of the Dutch, and was previously known as...
, the West Indies, and the United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
. They came from the city of Cáceres
Cáceres, Spain
Cáceres is the capital of the same name province, in the autonomous community of Extremadura, Spain. , its population was 91,131 inhabitants. The municipio has a land area of 1,750.33 km², and is the largest in geographical extension in Spain....
in Spain.
Antonio Dias (Diaz) de Caceres
The first reference to any person bearing the name is in a list of heretics, posted according to custom in the cathedral in Mexico CityMexico City
Mexico City is the Federal District , capital of Mexico and seat of the federal powers of the Mexican Union. It is a federal entity within Mexico which is not part of any one of the 31 Mexican states but belongs to the federation as a whole...
, where the names of Antonio Dias (or Diaz) de Caceres and Catalina de Leon, his wife, occur as "Judaizers". The latter did penance at an auto da fé
Auto Da Fe
Auto Da Fe were an Irish new wave musical group formed in Holland in 1980 by former Steeleye Span singer Gay Woods and Trevor Knight. The band's sound incorporated keyboards and electronics. Woods stated "It was the happiest musical time I ever had so far. I learned so much. I was ridding myself...
held on February 24, 1590 in that city. Their daughter Doña Leonor de Caceres was denounced as a "Judaizer" by her aunt, Doña Mariana Nuñez de Carabajal (see Francisca Nuñez de Carabajal
Francisca Nuñez de Carabajal
Francisca Nuñez de Carabajal was a Marrana in New Spain executed by the Inquisition for "judaizing" in 1596....
), before the tribunal of Mexico. Her testimony gives these data: Antonio Dias de Caceres and Jorge de Almeida were married on the same day, in the city of Parmco, Mexico, to Catalina and Leonor de Carabajal, sisters of the deponent, and, after a visit to Spain, moved to the district of San Paolo in Mexico City.
Antonio appears to have lived in another district, in a house which served as a gathering-place for fasting and prayer; and although they all attended mass and otherwise observed the rites and ceremonies of the Roman Catholic Church, they practiced their Jewish rites in private. This was soon discovered; the deponent, her mother, and brothers were arrested by order of the Inquisition
Mexican Inquisition
The Mexican Inquisition was an extension of the Spanish Inquisition into the New World. The Spanish Conquest of Mexico was not only a political event for the Spanish, but a religious event as well. In the early 16th century, the Reformation, the Counter-Reformation and the Inquisition were in full...
; and Antonio Dias de Caceres, fearing a similar fate, went to China. There he lived three years, came back to Mexico, feigned at first estrangement from his wife, because she was a "Judaizing" penitent, and finally, seeming to yield to the entreaties of friends who sought to bring them together, became nominally reconciled to her and set about in earnest to obey the behests of the Mosaic law. Antonio observed caution, dreading the arm of the Holy Office, but persisted, together with his family, in keeping the Sabbath at home. Prayers were recited at home out of a Hebrew book, said to have been written in verse, and the Psalms, without the required Gloria Patri, were chanted by all. His daughter, the above-mentioned Leonor de Caceres, figured as a penitent at an auto da fé held in the city of Mexico on March 25, 1601. A facsimile of a document dated September 6, 1608, containing an account of her trial, is given in vol. iv. of Publications of the American Jewish Historical Society.
Isabel Caceres
A victim of the Inquisition in ToledoToledo, Spain
Toledo's Alcázar became renowned in the 19th and 20th centuries as a military academy. At the outbreak of the Spanish Civil War in 1936 its garrison was famously besieged by Republican forces.-Economy:...
in 1625; wife of Luis Baez.
Jacob (Yahacob) Rodriguez Caceres
Martyr, who died at the stake in 1665, at CórdobaCórdoba, Veracruz
Córdoba, officially known as Heroica Córdoba, is a city and the seat of the municipality of the same name in the Mexican state of Veracruz. It was founded in 1618....
. Daniel Levi de Barrios celebrates him in verse in the prologue to his allegorical comedy Contra la Verdad no ay Fuerça. Panegirico a los tres biena venturados mártires Abraham Athias, Yahacob Rodriguez Caseres, y Raquel Nuñez Fernandez, que fueron quemados vivos en Cordova por santificar la unidad divina, en 16. de Tammuz, año de 5425 (1665), Amsterdam (no date).
Moseh de Caceres
Francisco de Caceres
(1) Writer of the seventeenth century; son of Daniel de Caceres of Amsterdam. He translated from Italian into Spanish the Vision Deleytable y Summarico de Todas las Sciencias, a work written by Alfonso de la Torre and translated into Italian by Domenico Dolphino. The translation of Caceres, published at Amsterdam in 1663, and dedicated to Don Emanuel, prince of Portugal, consists of two parts, the first dealing with the various sciences, the second with moral philosophy. Of the first part, chapter I treats of the "evil of things, and the confusion in the world"; the following six chapters treat of logic, rhetoric, arithmetic, geometry, music, and astrology, and the remaining chapters treat of metaphysics, pneumatics, and physics. Part II discusses ethics and politics.Johann Christoph Wolf
Johann Christoph Wolf
Johann Christoph Wolf was a German Christian Hebraist, polyhistor, and collector of books....
makes this Francisco de Caceres the author also of Dialogos Satiricos, published at Amsterdam in 1616. Meyer Kayserling
Meyer Kayserling
Meyer Kayserling was a German rabbi and historian.-Life:He was educated at Halberstadt, Nikolsburg , Prague, Würzburg, and Berlin. He devoted himself to history and philosophy...
, however, ascribes that work to (2) Francisco or Jacob de Caceres who was probably a son of Moseh de Caceres, one of the founders of the Jewish-Portuguese community of Amsterdam. The latter Francisco or Jacob also translated into Spanish Los Siete Dias de la Semana Sobre la Creacion del Mundo, a work by Bastasi, dedicated to Jacob Tirado
Jacob Tirado
Jacob Tirado was one of the Spanish-Portuguese community of Amsterdam.With several Marranos he sailed from Portugal in a vessel which was driven out of its course to Emden in East Friesland. Following the advice of Rabbi Moses Uri ha-Levi, he continued his travels with his companions to Amsterdam,...
. As the Dialogos Satiricos was published as early as 1616, it is not probable that the author was the former Francisco de Caceres.
Francisco (or Jacob) had, so far as can be determined, five sons:
(1) Daniel de Caceres: Writer of the seventeenth century; son of Jacob de Caceres. He held the degree of master of arts. Caceres was a friend of Manasseh ben Israel, upon whose works, The Conciliator and On Human Frailty (written about 1642), he wrote approbations. He also wrote a eulogy on Saul Levi Morteira
Saul Levi Morteira
Saul Levi Morteira was a Dutch rabbi of Portuguese descent.In a Spanish poem Daniel Levi de Barrios speaks of him as being a native of Germany...
(Amsterdam, 1645).
(2) David de Caceres, who, according to Kayserling, died October 18, 1624 at Amsterdam.
(3) Henrique (or Henry) de Caceres, who lived in England ca. 1650, probably the same who, with Benjamin de Caceres, petitioned the king on April 8, 1661 to permit them to live and trade in Barbados
Barbados
Barbados is an island country in the Lesser Antilles. It is in length and as much as in width, amounting to . It is situated in the western area of the North Atlantic and 100 kilometres east of the Windward Islands and the Caribbean Sea; therein, it is about east of the islands of Saint...
and Suriname.
(4) Samuel de Caceres: Dutch poet and preacher and brother-in-law of Benedict Spinoza; died November 1660, at Amsterdam. He was a pupil of Rabbi Saul Levi Morteira
Saul Levi Morteira
Saul Levi Morteira was a Dutch rabbi of Portuguese descent.In a Spanish poem Daniel Levi de Barrios speaks of him as being a native of Germany...
of Amsterdam. The title "Poeta, Predicador, y Jaxam, de la Ley Sancta Escritor" (Poet, Preacher, and Cantor, Writer of the Holy Law), given to Caceres by his contemporaries, shows the eminent position which he occupied in the Jewish community of Amsterdam. "De la Ley Sancta Escritor" refers to the Spanish translation of the Bible, which he edited, revised, and corrected, and which was published in 1661, soon after his death.
(5) Simon de Caceres: Military strategist, merchant, and communal leader; flourished in the middle of the seventeenth century. He was prominent in mercantile affairs in Hamburg, London, South America, and the West Indies; and his transactions extended to many parts of the world.
Caceres is described as a chauvinist Jew, boastful of his Jewish descent. He joined Antonio Fernandez Carvajal
Antonio Fernandez Carvajal
Antonio Fernandez Carvajal —in —was a Portuguese-Jewish merchant, who became the first endenizened English Jew.He was born about 1590, probably at Fundão, Portugal...
in the acquisition of the Bet Cholim cemetery in London, and was one of the petitioners who signed the document presented to Oliver Cromwell
Oliver Cromwell
Oliver Cromwell was an English military and political leader who overthrew the English monarchy and temporarily turned England into a republican Commonwealth, and served as Lord Protector of England, Scotland, and Ireland....
by Manasseh ben Israel in March 1656. Queen Christina of Sweden
Christina of Sweden
Christina , later adopted the name Christina Alexandra, was Queen regnant of Swedes, Goths and Vandals, Grand Princess of Finland, and Duchess of Ingria, Estonia, Livonia and Karelia, from 1633 to 1654. She was the only surviving legitimate child of King Gustav II Adolph and his wife Maria Eleonora...
is known to have interceded with Cromwell on his behalf for certain commercial privileges in Barbados. At a later date the king of Denmark gave Caceres's brother a letter of recommendation to Charles II of England
Charles II of England
Charles II was monarch of the three kingdoms of England, Scotland, and Ireland.Charles II's father, King Charles I, was executed at Whitehall on 30 January 1649, at the climax of the English Civil War...
, which was instrumental in procuring for the Jews in the West Indies an extension of commercial facilities. Simon was one of Cromwell's intelligencers; and there are at least two documents among the Thurloe papers which show that his experience was utilized by the lord protector. One is called "A Note of What Things Are Wanting in Jamaica". It is a memorandum containing minute advice with regard to fortifications and implements. From a passage in Cromwell's Letters and Speeches, ed. Carlyle (iii. 131), it would seem that Caceres's recommendations were followed, for the needed supplies were forwarded.
Together with this memorandum Caceres submitted to the protector a remarkable scheme for the conquest of Chile, wherein he proposed to enlist "men of his own nation" (meaning Jews), and offered to lead the expedition in person. In his letter of instructions Cromwell refers to the desirability of hindering the Spanish trade with Peru
Peru
Peru , officially the Republic of Peru , is a country in western South America. It is bordered on the north by Ecuador and Colombia, on the east by Brazil, on the southeast by Bolivia, on the south by Chile, and on the west by the Pacific Ocean....
and Cartagena
Cartagena, Colombia
Cartagena de Indias , is a large Caribbean beach resort city on the northern coast of Colombia in the Caribbean Coast Region and capital of Bolívar Department...
, and of striving with the Spaniards for the mastery of all those seas. At a later date Caceres presented another plan to Cromwell, which provided for the protection of the Barbados trade and for improving the administration of the navigation act. This document seems to have been unauthorized, and turns out to be a personal application for an office he desired to have created for himself.
Daniel (see above) had two (?) sons; (1) Francisco de Caceres and (2) Samuel ben Daniel de Caceres, whose name, if he is not Daniel's son, remains a "crux interpretum". It is more than probable that the two Samuels have been confounded by bibliographers. Samuel, the poet and preacher, had a son named David de Caceres, who was printer in Amsterdam in 1661. Another person bearing that name was rabbi at Salonica, and afterward (ca. 1650) at Hebron
Hebron
Hebron , is located in the southern West Bank, south of Jerusalem. Nestled in the Judean Mountains, it lies 930 meters above sea level. It is the largest city in the West Bank and home to around 165,000 Palestinians, and over 500 Jewish settlers concentrated in and around the old quarter...
, Palestine
Palestine
Palestine is a conventional name, among others, used to describe the geographic region between the Mediterranean Sea and the Jordan River, and various adjoining lands....
.
Other individuals
A Bernard de Caceres is mentioned in the Calendars of State Papers 1661-68, as residing in the West Indies. One of the chief members of the Jewish congregation in Suriname, whose name is affixed to a special charter of privileges dated October 1, 1669, was Henrique de Caceres, and a Samuel de Caceres is spoken of in CuraçaoCuraçao
Curaçao is an island in the southern Caribbean Sea, off the Venezuelan coast. The Country of Curaçao , which includes the main island plus the small, uninhabited island of Klein Curaçao , is a constituent country of the Kingdom of the Netherlands...
, W. I., in the year 1692. In 1891, a Mr. Benjamin de Caceres officiated at Curaçao in the absence of a rabbi.
Persons bearing the name were living in 1902 in New York and Philadelphia. Miss Ida Caseres of Philadelphia claims descent from the Caceres who settled in Jamaica in the seventeenth century.
Further reading
- G. A. Kohut, Simon de Caceres and His Plan for the Conquest of Chili, New York, 1899 (reprinted from the American Hebrew, June 16, 1899).