Political satire as a communicative mechanism: the example of the collection of Various Papers of the Historical Archive of the University of Salamanca

Abstract

The Miscellaneous Papers Collection (P.V.) of the Historical Archive of the University of Salamanca (A.U.S.A.) is a documentary collection, that is, a set of documents gathered according to non-objective criteria, and that therefore, do not preserve an organic structure nor respond to the principle of archival provenance, and that given its interesting material, largely unpublished, deserves to be consulted by researchers not only linked to university history, but also by scholars of other specialties devoted to studying the sixteenth to eighteenth centuries. On this occasion, we will focus on documents related to political satire, a documentary form that is characterized by its critical, instructive and humorous quality, making it an extraordinary instrument of communication. The invectives to the ecclesiastical establishment, the criticisms to politics or other anecdotal issues are reflected in our documents. Finally, we present the appendix of these documents.