Catalina de Erauso

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Catalina de Erauso (portrait painting by Juan van der Hamen y León , 1626)

Catalina de Erauso (* 1585 or 1592 in Donostia-San Sebastián , Spain ; † 1650 in Cuitlaxtla , New Spain , now Mexico ) was a Basque noble person who became known in Europe and America in the first half of the 17th century by being successfully built a life as a trans man .

Life

According to the baptismal register of the parish of St. Vincente in San Sebastián, Catalina de Erauso was born biologically female in 1592, but the autobiography gives the year 1585. He was the child of Capitán Miguel de Erauso and his wife María Peréz de Galarraga y Arce.

As a 4-year-old, his parents sent him to a convent for further education . When he was 15, he fled from there, cut his hair short and dressed as a man in order to remain undetected. For several years he stayed, always in men's clothing, under the name Francisco de Loyola in different places in Spain, including as court page, before he hired an uncle's ship between 1603 and 1607 that went to New Spain .

In Chile he took part in the Arauco war against the Mapuche under the name Antonio de Erauso and achieved the rank of alférez , a low non-commissioned officer title, comparable to the second lieutenant , ensign or lieutenant . He lived alternately as a soldier and trader working in what is now Chile, Argentina, Panama and Peru.

Around 1620 he was arrested for killing his opponent in a fight. During the interrogation, de Erauso confessed to the Bishop of Huamanga that he was biologically a woman. Temporarily again in a convent, he embarked for Spain again in 1624 and in 1625 wrote a petition to the Spanish king for a reward for his military services, in which context he probably also wrote his autobiography. The king then granted him a pension, the Pope gave him permission to continue wearing men's clothing, and he was granted honorary citizenship of the city of Rome. He returned to New Spain around 1630 and probably lived there as a trader and muleteer until his death in 1650.

reception

Monument to Catalina de Erauso in Orizaba, Mexico.

After his return to Spain in 1624, de Erauso wrote or dictated his autobiography Vida i sucesos de la monja alférez and quickly became known in Spain and its colonies as La monja de alférez , the "lieutenant nun ". In several pamphlets, so-called relaciones , his life story was brought to the people, in 1625 a play by Juan Pérez de Montalbán was premiered in Madrid , the Comedia famosa de la Monja Alférez . He toured Europe and Juan van der Hamen y León painted his portrait around 1626.

The autobiography was first published in Spanish in 1829 by Joaquin Maria De Ferrer and quickly translated into numerous languages ​​or retold in literary terms, around 1830 by Ferrer in French as Histoire de la Monja-Alferez Dona Catalina de Erauso , in 1830 in German as Die Nun-Fähnrich and 1847 in English as an independent short story The Spanish Military Now by Thomas De Quincey . Since then, this life story has regularly been the subject of numerous historical works, novels and films (around 1944 in Mexico and 1987 in Spain under the title La monja de alférez and 1996 as Pasages and 1987 as She must be seeing things ). Monuments exist in San Sebastian as well as Orizaba , Mexico.

The autobiography has been critically examined by many modern authors as the primary source . But neither the original manuscript has survived, nor a print based on it; Ferrer's edition was based on a copy from 1784, which in turn was based on previous copies and contains recognizable inserts by another hand. Not only is it unclear how much the original has been changed by the copies, but questions about the authorship and historical authenticity of the original are also open, especially since inaccuracies and contradictions can be found in numerous points of the document.

In the late twentieth and early twenty-first centuries, life history increasingly became the subject of research on identity politics . In gender research , the question was discussed whether de Erauso perhaps practiced pure cross-dressing due to his living conditions (compare transvestism ) or whether it is an early example of a lesbian or transgender life plan. Because de Erauso continued to wear men's clothing even after the disclosure of his own biological gender and fought for the right to do so, cross-dressing is considered unlikely. Thus, Erauso is to be understood as a heterosexual trans man, as he made an effort not only to completely change his own social gender role , but also underwent treatments to reduce his breasts. In his sexual orientation he was completely geared towards women.

At that time, the Basques were privileged within the Spanish kingdom and at the same time driving forces in the colonization of America. This fact, as well as the peculiarity of the Basque language not to know any pleasure system , led to the fact that his life story was repeatedly examined with regard to his origin in the Basque Country.

Remarks

  1. ↑ When it comes to evaluating the data, research is divided, both data are cited as possible years of birth, cf. z. B. Altamiranda and Eaklor.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c d e f Daniel Altamiranda: Erauso, Catalina de in: Robert Aldrich, Garry Wotherspoon (ed.): Who's who in Gay and Lesbian History , pp. 178-179, 2002, ISBN 0-415-15983-0
  2. ↑ a b c d Vicki L. Eacklor: Erauso, Catalina de in: George Haggerty, Bonnie Zimmerman (Ed.): Encyclopedia of Lesbian and Gay Histories and Cultures , p. 269, 2003, ISBN 1-135-57870-2
  3. ↑ Dan Harvey Pedrick: The Sword & the Veil - An annotated Translation of the Autobigraphy of doña Catalina de Erauso Section II , accessed January 25, 2020
  4. ↑ Cathy Rex: Ungendering Empire: Catalina de Erauso and the Performance of Masculinity in: Mary McAleer Balkun, Susan C. Imbarrato (ed.): Women's Narratives of the Early Americas and the Formation of Empire , 2016, ISBN 978-1-137 -54320-2
  5. ↑ a b Aintzane Legarreta Mentxaka: The Ensign Nun, The Witch And The Goddess; Some Basque Lesbians of History and Myth in: Mary McAuliffe, Sonja Tiernan (Eds.): Tribades, Tommies and Transgressives; History of Sexualities: Volume I , 2009, ISBN 1-4438-0788-5 , pp. 40-45

literature

Autobiography

  • The Nun-Ensign or Story of Catalina de Erauso - written by herself. Edited by Joaquin de Ferrer and translated into German by Andreas Daniel Berthold von Schepeler. Aachen [u. a.]: Mayer, 1830; Published again in German in 1839 and 1929 under the title Die Nun als Fähnrich: Die Geschichte der Donna Catalina de Erauso written by herself. After the Spanish with notes and afterword by Alfred Semerau. Blömer, Leipzig 1929.

German specialist literature

  • Cornelia Lotthammer. «La Monja Alférez»: The autobiography of Catalina de Erauso in its literary and social context (European University Writings, Volume 796), Peter Lang GmbH 1998, ISBN 978-3-631-33750-9
  • Niki Trauthwein: Biographical Sketches of Gender Identity. In: Loccumer Pelikan 1/2017, ISSN 1435-8387, pp. 45-47

English specialist literature

  • Sherry M. Velasco. The Lieutenant Nun: Transgenderism, Lesbian Desire, and Catalina De Erauso, University of Texas Press 2000, ISBN 0-292-78745-6
  • Catalina de Erauso. Lieutenant Nun: Memoir of a Basque Transvestite in the New World, Beacon Press 1997, ISBN 0-8070-7073-4
  • James Fritzmaurice-Kelly. The Nun Ensign. Translated from the Spanish with an Introduction and Notes by James Fritzmaurice-Kelly also La Monja Alférez - A Play in the Original Spanish by Juan Perez de Montalban. Illustrated by Daniel Vierge, Fisher T. Unwin 1903.
  • La Monja Alférez: La juventud travestida de Catalina de Erauso. The Life of Catalina de Erauso, the Lieutenant Nun: An Early Modern Autobiography, New Jersey 2014, ISBN 1-61147-660-7
  • Elizabeth Teresa Howe. Autobiographical Writing by Early Modern Hispanic Women (Women and Gender in the Early Modern World), Routledge 2015, ISBN 1-4724-3577-X
  • Francisco Vazquez Garcia. Sex, Identity and Hermaphrodites in Iberia, 1500-1800 (Body, Gender and Culture, Volume 16), Taylor and Francis 2013, ISBN 1-84893-302-9

Spanish specialist literature

  • Eva Mendieta Garrote. En busca de Catalina de Erauso: identidades en conflicto en la vida de la monja Alférez (Sendes, Volume 15), Universitat Jaume I. Servei de Comunicació i Publicacionsin Castellón de la Plana 2010, ISBN 84-8021-789-8
  • Ricard Ibáñez. La Monja Alférez: La juventud travestida de Catalina de Erauso, independently published 2013, 1848933029, ISBN 1-71801-362-0
  • Chufo Lloréns. Catalina, la fugitiva de San Benito (CAMPAÑAS, volume 26092), Debolsillo 2008, ISBN 84-8346-837-9
  • J. Ignacio Tellechea Idigoras. Monja Alferez, La. Doña Catalina De Erauso, Soc.Gip. Ediciones Y Publicaci 1992, ISBN 84-7173-205-X

French specialist literature

  • Alexis de Valon. Catalina de Erauso: La Monja Alferez, CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform 2017, ISBN 1-979189-42-0
  • Eduardo Manet. La Conquistadora, Robert Laffont 2006, ISBN 2-221-09872-2

Historical novels

Web links

personal data
SURNAME Erauso, Catalina de
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Erauso y Galarraga, Catalina de (full name); Loyola, Francisco (pseudonym); Monja Alférez
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Basque soldier, lived as a trans man
DATE OF BIRTH 1592
PLACE OF BIRTH Donostia-San Sebastian , Spain
DATE OF DEATH 1650
Place of death Cuitlaxtla , Viceroyalty of New Spain