From the end of the fifteenth century until the eighteenth century Spanish Jews carried on Jewish practices in the shadow of the Inquisition. Those caught were forced to recant or be burnt at the stake in public "autos de fe". This book describes the private lives of these secret Jews, drawing on their confessions and trial documents. This paperback edition covers the survival of Jewish practices into modern times in Portugal and Spain, where families descended from "conversos" (Christian converts) still carry out long-hidden Jewish traditions.