Afterlife

Summary

The memory of black confraternities has faded into obscurity in both Spain and Portugal. The surviving images, like the history of peninsular slavery itself, have gone largely unseen and unevenly studied, particularly in Portugal; parishioners worshipping in churches containing black sculptures often do not see them, let alone venerate them. Even when an image is recognized as being black, local traditions sometimes emerged to explain away the saint’s blackness. In northern Portugal, for example, a church in the town of Fão houses a sculpture of Efigenia in a small museum, which also sold a guide to the church’s sacred art. The author of this guide knew nothing about the saint – even misspelling her name (“Frigénia”) – so he appealed to local residents for information, which resulted in the following account: The saint had been a beautiful young woman, pursued by many men, but she wanted to become a nun instead of getting married.