Santa Marta: The Hidden Convent

The Santa Marta nunnery is located in the San Andrés pairish, just east of Córdoba, in the lower part of the city. It is one of the oldest convents in Córdoba and one of very few still to maintain a community.

Its church was protected by the Counts of Cabra, who are now buried there, behind the beautiful facade designed by the architect Hernán Ruiz I. With echoes of the ancient Mudejar palace upon which it was founded, this magnificent building reveals the history of the ancient splendor of the convent.

Santa Marta began life in a "beguinage," a complex where a group of women lived in community dedicated to prayer, but free from monastic or canonical rule. This sanctuary was established in the houses known as "Corral de los Cárdenas," the former home of Catalina López de Morales, who gave them to the community in 1455.

In the image: The lay sisters take possession of the houses gifted by Catalina López de Morales, widow of Juan Pérez de Cárdenas.

Among the lay sisters were several close relatives of the Bishop of Córdoba, Fernando González Deza, and of Diego Fernández de Córdoba, Governor of the young noblemen known as "Donceles." They were the first women to live in the convent, which was not fully founded until 1468. Its papal bull was issued by Pope Paul II on September 16, 1464, having been requested by Catalina Torquemada and other lay sisters.

In the image: Catalina de Torquemada takes possession of houses and land in Córdoba on behalf of all the lay sisters living in her community.

The beguinage-turned-convent was soon extended thanks to a significant donation: the adjoining palace known in Córdoba as the House of Water, property of María Carrillo, widow of Lope de Ángulo.

In 1510, the convent joined the Hieronymite order as one of the first communities within its female section.

In the image: Parapet on the convent's well.

Convents offered a solution for wealthy families who wanted their unmarried daughters to leave home.

Many of the novices came from the Cordovan oligarchy, and would sometimes receive sizeable dowries, which went toward gradually bolstering the nunnery's estate.

In the image: Dowry from Fernando Cabrera, a Cordovan official, when his daughter took her vows in the convent.

One example was the dowry given by Fernando Cabrera, a Cordovan official, when his daughter Beatriz took her vows in Santa Marta: half of his rooming houses in Puente de Alcolea and half of his Fuentalba estate in the Cordovan countryside.

In the image: Dowry from Fernando Cabrera, a Cordovan official, when his daughter took her vows in the convent.
 

The convent was also consolidating and securing its estate through smart trading, for example buying the remaining rooming houses in Puente de Alcolea. The first half had been acquired via a novice's dowry.

In the image: Purchase of half the rooming houses in Puente de Alcolea on the outskirts of Córdoba.

Convents played an important role as a female realm; women not only ran and managed the institutions, but also handled their accounts.

In both this document and the next, the prioress, vicar, and other nuns from the community are seen participating as owners during the leasing of their country estates: a farmhouse in the village of Adamuz and a winery in the Bañuelo district.

In the image: Leasing of the farmhouse in Botijoso on the outskirts of the town of Adamuz.

The convent's hierarchy often reflects the social status of the lay sisters, and also shows positions being passed down through family networks.

Last names, such as those of Leonor de Góngora or Beatriz Cabrera, which appear at the top of this lease document, reveal the involvement of some of the more eminent local families.

In the image: Leasing of a winery, a house, a water tank, and clay vessels in the Bañuelo district.

In 1836, the Spanish confiscation process led to the expropriation of the convent's estate, and its financial power. Although the community still existed, and the nuns were not secularized, the State seized their properties and sold them at auction. From that moment on, the women entered a period of financial hardship.

In the image: List of country estates belonging to the Convent of Santa Marta that were sold at auction.