Neither Saints nor Sinners: Writing the Lives of Women in Spanish America

From Madres del verbo/Mothers of the Word: Early Spanish American Women Writers, ed. and trans. Nina M. Scott (Alburquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 1999), pp. 35–49.

I, Doña Catalina de Erauso, was born in the town of San Sebastián, in Guipúzcoa, in the year 1585, the daughter of Captain Don Miguel de Erauso and of Doña María Pérez de Galarraga y Arce, natives and residents of that town. My parents brought me up at home with my other siblings until I was four years old. In 1589 they put me in the convent of San Sebastián el Antiguo, in said town, which belongs to Dominican nuns, with my aunt Doña Ursula de Unzá y Sarasti, my mother's cousin and the abbess of that convent; there I was raised until I was fifteen, when the matter of my profession came up.

When I was almost at the end of my year of the novitiate, I had a quarrel with a professed nun named Doña Catalina de Aliri who, being a widow, had professed and entered the convent. She was strong and I but a girl; she slapped me, and I resented it. On the night of March 18, 1600, the eve of St. Joseph, the convent arose at midnight for Matins. I went into the choir and found my aunt kneeling there; she called me over, gave me the key to her cell, and told me to bring her prayer book. I went to get it. I unlocked [the cell] and took it, and, seeing all the keys to the convent hanging from a nail, I left the cell open and gave my aunt her key and the prayer book. The nuns were already in the choir and had solemnly begun Matins; at the first lesson I went up to my aunt and asked her permission to withdraw, as I was feeling ill. My aunt put her hand to my forehead and said, “Go lie down. ” I left the choir, took a lamp, and went to my aunt's cell; there I took a pair of scissors, thread, and a needle; I took some coins (reales de a ocho) that were lying there and took the convent keys and left. I went along opening doors and shutting them behind me, and at the final one left my scapulary and went out into the street, which I had never seen, with no idea which way to turn or where to go. I don't remember where I went, but I came on a stand of chestnut trees that was outside [of town] but close behind the convent. There I hid, and spent three days designing, fitting, and cutting out clothes. I made myself a pair of breeches from a blue cloth petticoat I was wearing, and from an underskirt of coarse green wool, a sleeved doublet and leggings; I left

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