A little known corporation: the Brotherhood of Our Lady of Atocha of Lima notaries in the seventeenth century

Abstract

For a long time (mainly due to the writings of various satirists) notaries were configured as people whose thought and action were directed basically to an economic advantage as a result of their legal knowledge. This paper explore an example of charity practiced by members of this job in Lima seventeenth century, showing their organization as brotherhood and the performance of some of its leading members, an item ignored too by the Peruvian historiography.