Living in Fear of Revenge: Religious Minorities and the Right to Bear Arms in Fifteenth-Century Portugal

Abstract

The enforcement of law and order presented an inextricable dilemma for the Crown in the fifteenth-century kingdom of Portugal. The rulers of Portugal were faced by the conflicting necessities of ensuring their subjects were sufficiently well-equipped to serve in their armies in the event of war whilst at the same time tackling the very real threat to public order posed by the proliferation of armed men throughout their kingdom. Significantly, the response of the Crown was never to seek to restrict the ownership of weapons but rather to regulate the right of individuals to carry them in public. Various laws instituted by Joao I (1385-1433) attempted to limit the right to bear arms-beyond royal officials- to knights and citizens of Lisbon. During the minority of Afonso V (1438-81), however, the regent Prince Pedro (d. 1449) liberalized the right to carry weapons publicly to include all free men on condition that no weapons were carried to be carried in public at night or used inappropriately. The only individuals who continued to be banned outright from bearing arms in public were clerics in holy orders, Jews and Muslims.¹