Catalina de Erauso
May 19, 2009 by sitonmyfacebook
Thanks to my friend Soraya Field Fiorio, I came to be acquainted with Catalina de Erauso, or the Lieutenant Nun, the swashbuckling, cross-dressing pirate. Ms. Erauso was born in 1585. At the age of 15 she escaped from the nunnery to which she had been sent, revamped her habit into men’s clothing, and boarded a ship bound for Peru disguised as a manservant. And that was just the beginning. The following synopsis is provided by Soraya:
Catalina de Erauso
Catalina de Erauso was a Basquero, born into a family of minor nobility in San Sebastian. She was tithed to the Church because her family had too many daughters (hence too many dowries to pay), and well, Catalina was not a great beauty, and it was surmised that she would not attract a wealthy, politically advantageous suitor. Right before she took her vows, she escaped the convent and ran off, wreaking havoc wherever she went until her death in Mexico City circa 1650.
She held various posts, including: page to aristocrats, pupil to religious scholars, assistant to merchants, soldier for the Spanish army in Peru and Chile, but more interestingly, pirate, thief, gambler, murderer, and of course, cross-dresser. Modern scholarship focuses on her identity as either lesbian or transgender/queer, but any sexual motivation to her cross-dressing seems unlikely. It was not unheard of for women with no other options to feign a male identity — it was the only way to get decently paid work.
Interestingly, after her sex was revealed when she was captured, she was sent back to Spain to see what the Pope had to say about her. According to Church laws, he could have excommunicated her, and possibly have had her put to death. Instead, he granted her dispensation to continue dressing like a man! And blessed her! This was the same pope — Urban VIII — who, a mere few years later, excommunicated Galileo.
She wrote an autobiography titled, Lieutenant Nun: Memoir of a Basque Transvestite in the New World. It is next on my reading list, for sure. She makes those Somali pirates look like child’s play, oh wait, they are children. Anyway, you get my drift.
As of now, I would like to make Catalina my patron saint, ARGH!
What a fascinating story. It reminds me a little of a story by Tahar Ben Jelloun, and I’d say it’s not the only story of its kind in those historic moments of upheaval and across-the-seas vanishing acts, which made possible the exploration and ‘conquest’ of a wider world.
I once reported on the story of a nun who was so brash as to keep a library of her own and to comment on the proper meaning of scripture, even writing to the Pope to express her distaste for certain elements of lavish Vatican life. It was in the times of Catalina, and naturally, though she could not be excommunicated for having an opinion, she was ordered to surrender her library, cease scholarship and devote herself to the quieter monastic life suitable to a nun, as seen from the Vatican.
There was definitely a potent separation of male and female roles, as seen not only by a patriarchal society, but perhaps more severely in the patriarchal autocracy of the Catholic Church, so it’s totally understandable how Catalina came to her productive and accomplished charade.