[Robert357]

Let's see if I have this right. 2012 less 600 years is 1412. So that means the Spanish expelled Jews were among some of the first non-indigenous colonists to the new world (post Vikings and post Chinese - of course).

That is kind of interesting. Although a recent family tree show did a special on people of Latin ancestry and found some of the early Spanish Conquistadors were families with recent Jewish ties who had fled the Spanish Inquisition (1478 to 1834).

[SJackson]

some of the early Spanish Conquistadors were families with recent Jewish ties who had fled the Spanish Inquisition

A great many, beginning with Columbus' first voyage, sailing delayed by a day due to a jammed harbor caused by the expulsion. However mostly South America and the Carribean. A total stray aside, the first Jewish immigrants are usually dated to 1654 in New Amsterdam. Fleeing Brazil. I guess that's enough time to father a tribe, but imo not likely.

Interesting topic. Crazy title, which I guess is what sells books, but Jewish Pirates of the Caribbean, a couple years old, is a pretty interesting history of post Inquisition Jewish trade routes in the Mediterrean and Carribean/South America. A little bit about pirates too.

[katana]

Conversos (Jews who converted to Christianity to stay in Spain) real or suspected "Crypto-Jews" (kept their traditions alive but in secret) were among those most persecuted during the Spanish Inquisition which occurred in large part (started in 1478 and ended in the 19th century) after the finish of the reconquest of Spain and expulsion of the Muslims and Jews in (can you guess?) 1492.

So it's logical that Jewish Conversos would have been among the first to seize an opportunity to leave Old Spain for New Spain starting in the middle and latter half of the sixteenth century. Their only alternatives would have been tiny but tolerant Holland or continued dhimmitude in Muslim North Africa and the Ottoman Empire. Jews were not allowed back into Britain till after Cromwell took power in the 1600's.