Converso jew Duke of Alba suckled the blood of babies, massacred surrendered cities, purged Dutch nobility and presided over the Council of Blood
(History)https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pimentel_(surname)"Pimentel is a Portuguese Sephardic (Jewish) surname denoting pepper plants and spices, suggesting an occupation (pepper farmer) or a location (where pepper grows).
The name is associated with the history of the Jews in Portugal, specifically the conversos to Catholicism during the Portuguese Inquisition. Tribunal records now maintained in the Torre do Tombo National Archive contain hundreds of examples of New Christian Pimentels accused of heresy and relapsing into Judaism.
Fernando Álvarez de Toledo y Pimentel (1507-1582), Spanish duke"
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Council_of_TroublesThe Council of Troubles (usual English translation of Dutch: Raad van Beroerten, or Spanish: Tribunal de los Tumultos, or French: Conseil des Troubles) was the special tribunal instituted on 9 September 1567 by Fernando Álvarez de Toledo, 3rd Duke of Alba, governor-general of the Habsburg Netherlands on the orders of Philip II of Spain to punish the ringleaders of the recent political and religious troubles in the Netherlands. Due to the many death sentences pronounced by the tribunal, it also became known as the Council of Blood (Bloedraad in Dutch and Conseil de Sang in French).
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spanish_FurySeveral requests for relaxation of religious coercion in the Low Countries, including a petition by a covenant of noblemen in the winter of 1565–66, had been rejected. The summer then brought renewed violent outbursts of iconoclasm, in which 'Beeldenstorm' Calvinists destroyed religious images in Catholic monasteries and churches. The Battle of Oosterweel in March 1567 was the first Spanish military response to the many riots, and a prelude to or the start of the Eighty Years' War.[Note 1] The Spanish King's captain-general Alba, the Iron Duke, with 10,000 men made the first military use of the Spanish Road. He was granted powers exceeding those of the king's half-sister Margaret of Parma, who had manoeuvred both Granvelle and William the Silent of Orange to the background while trying to reconcile local priorities with Spanish orders. Upon their meeting, judging the duke's inflexibility on extreme positions, the duchess resigned. He replaced her as governor-general of the Seventeen Provinces, and unlawfully instituted the Council of Troubles in September of that same year. This court-martial style tribunal often sentenced political opponents and religious Reformists to death; the more than 1,000 executions caused it being called the 'Council of Blood'.
Looting a conquered town was not uncommon, and Governor Alba took it a step further by intentionally setting horrifying examples against sympathy for the rebels.[6][7]
The Spanish Fury at Mechelen was the earliest event that became known by this term. After Orange's lieutenant Bernard of Merode had taken the city and controlled Mechelen for a month, he and his men left because a much stronger Spanish force was coming. Despite welcoming the latter by singing psalms of penitence in a gesture of surrender, from 2 October 1572, under command of Governor Alva's[Note 2] son Fadrique, three days long the city was sacked by his slaughtering, raping and pillaging troops. Alva reported to King Philip II (who later imprisoned him) that "no nail was left in the wall".[8][9][10]
The Army of Flanders that had sacked Mechelen reconquered Diest and Roermond, marched on to Guelders and in November easily regained Zutphen, which had been taken for Orange in June. Don Fadrique ordered his men to kill the garrison and allowed them to murder and plunder the city. After the Spanish Fury at Zutphen, the counties to its north capitulated.[11]
By December at Naarden in Holland, the inhabitants negotiated their surrender but the city was sacked and burnt down, and only 60 people survived the Massacre of Naarden.[11]
The Spanish Fury at Haarlem, in 1573, following the half-year-long Siege of Haarlem[12]
By December 1573, high yet ineffective financial expenditures, and complaints about the sheer cruelty of the governor's expeditions, led Philip II to Requesens, where he replaced Alba, who returned to Spain. The notorious 'Council of Blood' ordered no more executions, and was already in June 1574 officially abolished by Requesens, but remained in session until the Summer of 1576.
Odd depiction of Alba sucking the blood of a baby.. or it might be baby jesus thus sucking the blood of christians:
https://media.gab.com/system/media_attachments/files/126/682/565/original/370797f5f55a7759.jpg![]()
