The diabolical siege of the Hispano-Christian world outlined above continued throughout the early modern period. Satan's wiles manifested themselves in the material world in attacks on the viceroyalty by Protestant corsairs from Northern Europe, internal strife in the key city of Potosí, involvement in severe earthquakes such as the one that devastated the Cuzco area in 1650, floods, and volcanic eruptions like that of Huaynaputina close to Arequipa in February 1600. Nor were spiritual assaults infrequent, and the increased circulation of hagiographies and spiritual guides made the culmination of the mystical journey – the very place where these assaults were characteristically thought to flourish – appear attainable to many more people. Predictably, however, a large number of these would-be mystics were ill-equipped to deal with the strain that such religious exertion placed on their mind and body, and often they fell foul of religious and social authority as a result of what appeared to be potentially heterodox practices or beliefs through which Satan might gain a hold over the individual, penetrate the community, and undermine Christian society from within.

Such was the case of the demoniac nuns of Trujillo in the 1670s. As chaos reigned at the centre, evidence of the siege mentality discussed above became all the more prevalent. Fear within the community led to outsiders being typecast as in league with the devil and actively seeking to destroy the Christian community of Trujillo. Where better to attack than what should have been one of the most secure, ordered and pious institutions of the city, a spiritual bulwark of the community? As we have seen from the demonization of María Pizarro's indigenous nanny and her mulatta neighbour, the propensity to demonize cultural outsiders was one that existed in the late-sixteenth century. This chapter shall demonstrate that this tendency did not dissipate in the seventeenth. To the contrary, at times the perceived state of diabolical siege can even be seen to have worsened.