Juan de Torquemada, O.P. (1388 – 26 September 1468), (church Latin Johannes de Turre cremata, various spellings), Spanish ecclesiastic, defender of Jewish conversos, has been described as the most articulate papal apologist of the fifteenth century. He was an uncle of Tomás de Torquemada, afterwards notorious as the persecuting Grand Inquisitor. Life Juan de Torquemada was born in Valladolid, Spain. “There is a general historical consensus that the family were former Jews“. Though those converso origins are very often stated without providing any source, they are “based primarily on Hernando del Pulgar’s statement that Juan de Torquemada’s abuelos were converts from the Jewish faith“. As a converso, Pulgar is considered to have made this assertion out of hate for Juan de Torquemada’s nephew, Tomás de Torquemada. However, through a study of all Juan de Torquemada’s ancestors no such jewish converts were found in his family. At an early age he joined the Dominican Order, and soon distinguished himself for learning and devotion. In 1415 he accompanied the general of his order to the Council of Constance. Thereafter he proceeded to the University of Paris for study, and took his doctor's degree in theology in 1423. After teaching for some time in Paris, he became prior of the Dominican house in Valladolid, and then in Toledo. Torquemada attended the Council of Basel (1431–1449) as a representative of his order and of the King of Castile. At the Council of Basel he was one of the ablest supporters of the viewpoint of pope Eugene IV and the Roman curia. He was rewarded with the office of Master of the Sacred Palace (4 March 1435), and later with a cardinal's hat in 1439. Torquemada participated in the Council of Florence, speaking on theological issues involving the eastern churches and defending papal primacy in a debate with Cardinal Giuliano Cesarini. He also worked on behalf of Pope Eugene on missions to Germany and France before settling in the Roman curia. As Cardinal of San Sisto, Torquemada supported papal Crusade policy in opposition to the Ottoman Turks. In 1449 Toledo an unpopular tax law caused an insurrection against a weak government, during which a mob burned the house of a "new Christian" tax collector. (These "new Christians", or conversos, were persons of Jewish descent professing Christianity; their sincerity was doubted by some.) A faction led by one Pedro Sarmiento imposed a law that deprived conversos