"The Abencerraje" and "Ozmín and Daraja": Two Sixteenth-Century Novellas from Spain

Edicts and Official Documents Concerning the Moriscos

[ 111 ] • Edicts and Official Documents • Concerning the Moriscos The following documents trace the legal treatment of Muslims and Moriscos from the aftermath of the fall of Granada in 1492 to their expulsion in 1609 to 1614. They provide an important context for the novellas in this volume, as they suggest the strength of anti-Muslim and anti-Morisco animus, against which the texts offer their idealized protagonists. The Christians violated the terms of the Nasrid surrender of Granada almost immediately, and a long period of increasing repression ensued, during which the authorities targeted not just Islam but a wide range of practices perceived to be “Moorish.” Even in the brief period when, under Archbishop Hernando de Talavera, the official policy privileged syncretism and benign assimilation, there is no question that the population of Granada was being forced to abandon Islam (“Notice for the Inhabitants of the Albaicín” below). A number of the edicts, particularly the early ones, address only one town or one community, as in the very interesting treaty for Baza (“Agreement by Which the Moors of the Moorish Quarter of Baza and the Towns and Surrounding Areas Shall Convert to Catholicism”), giving a sense of the patchwork of control that was the most the Crown could hope for in the early years. Similarly, several edicts repeat previous legislation, indicating that earlier laws were not followed and were perhaps unenforceable . The frequent legislation against “Moorish” dress emphasizes the importance of visible signs of difference; paradoxically, one edict forbids Old Christian women from wearing “Moorish” cloaks, suggesting the wider circulation of the cultural forms the Crown attempted to connect to the Moriscos. The most comprehensive and fully repressive body of laws is contained in the 1526 edict below. The Moriscos were successful in postponing the enforcement of these laws for over forty years, primarily [ 112 ] contexts through payments to the Crown. When the enforcement of the 1526 laws was finally announced in 1566−67, it led directly to the major Morisco uprising in the Alpujarras, which took the Crown over two years to subdue. (The petition by Francisco Núñez Muley, from which we also offer selections in this volume, was a last-ditch attempt by a Morisco notable to challenge the legislation.) In the wake of the uprising , Granadan Moriscos were exiled and forcibly relocated all over Spain; even this repression, however, failed to reassure the Crown of their loyalty. By the 1580s and 1590s, the debate about the possibility of assimilation had become radicalized, and many began calling for the Moriscos’ expulsion from Spain, as evinced in the “Letter of Inquisitor-General Quiroga” below. The final outcome of this century of failed policies and increasing repression was the expulsion of the Moriscos—Christian subjects, who in some cases had been at least nominally Christian for generations—from the Peninsula, in 1609 to 1614, beginning with the Moriscos of the kingdom of Valencia (“Edict of Expulsion of the Moriscos of Valencia”). • • • Notice for the Inhabitants of the Albaicín • (Exact date unknown, between 1497 and 1499) Attributed to Fray Hernando de Talavera, Archbishop of Granada (1493−1507)1 Beloveds of Our Lord, good people, inhabitants of the Albaicín: We received your petition and were very pleased to see your concern to learn and do what good Christians must. . . . So that you may all have full notice and a reminder of what we have told you at various times, we have put into writing here the sum total of rules that we want you to follow: First,youmustforgetallceremoniesandanythingMoorishinyour prayers, fasts, celebrations, festivals, births, weddings, baths, funerary customs, and in all other things. [ 113 ] edicts and officia l documents You must all know and teach your wives and your children, big and small, how to cross oneself and enter a church, to receive holy water, to say the Paternoster, the Ave Maria, and the Credo, to worship Our Lord in the holy Mass, and to adore the holy cross and venerate holy images with due reverence. You must make sure to confess and take Communion, and ensure that your wives and your households confess and take Communion. You must make sure to have all infants baptized within eight days of birth, or sooner if necessary. You must make sure to have them confirmed in the Church as soon as possible. As soon as they become ill, let them receive the sacraments of penitence and Communion, and the...