Prison in Mexico City in the late 1500s

[erinbow]

Time: late 1500s (possibly 1593, but possibly twenty or so years earlier

Comments

[chipuni]

Although it's the Hippiepedia, its section on prison history meshes with what I remember: prisons weren't (usually) used for punishing people; they were used to hold people until they could be tried.

(Obviously, this wasn't always true: think about the Bastille.)

Good luck!

[sollersuk]

You probably already have a link to this, but this is what Mexico City looked like in the middle of the century:

http://historic-cities.huji.ac.il/america/mexico/maps/braun_hogenberg_I_58_1.html

Click on "High Resolution".

You might want to search on punishment rather than jail etc; as chipuni says, prisons weren't much used for punishment. If your character was thrown in jail it would be while awaiting trial

[pink_siamese]

If he is suspected of witchcraft, then he would be detained by the Catholic Church and held until trial. Maybe searching "Spanish Inquisition" would help you.

[erinbow]

Are you sure that's true of Mexico, as well as Spain? I haven't run across mention of the Inquisition in the histories so far.

My main character is based on a real person, and the scanty history certainly reads as if it was the army's decision to arrest then release him.

[pink_siamese]

Yeah, I'm sure. While the army would deal with his desertion, accusations of witchcraft fell under Church authority.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spanish_Inquisition

[azalaea]

Not that I know anything about it, but this article says the Mexican Inquisition was an extension of the Spanish, with some differences.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mexican_Inquisition

[orthent]

One more thing to remember is that in any pre-modern prison, the prisoner's comfort would depend heavily on his ability to bribe the jailers and on his having friends outside to bring him food, wine, and clothing.

There's a nice capsule description of a Madrid prison in the beginning of Arturo Perez-Reverte's Captain Alatriste. (Early 17th century, but probably close enough for your purposes.)