Mozarabs

TheMozarabs^[a](fromArabic:مُسْتَعْرَب,romanized:musta‘rab,lit. 'Arabized'), or more preciselyAndalusi Christians,^[1]^: 166were theChristiansofal-Andalus,or the territories ofIberiaunderMuslimrule from711to1492.Following theUmayyadconquest of theVisigothic KingdominHispania,the Christian population of much of Iberia came under Muslim control.

Initially, the vast majority of Mozarabs keptChristianityand their dialects descended fromLatin.Gradually, the population converted toIslam—an estimated 50% by the year 951^[2]—and was influenced, in varying degrees, byArabcustoms and knowledge, and sometimes acquired greater social status in doing so. The localRomance vernaculars,with an important contribution of Arabic and spoken by Christians and Muslims alike, are referred to asAndalusi Romance,or theMozarabic language.Mozarabs were mostlyCatholicsof theVisigothic or Mozarabic Rite.Due toShariaandfiqhbeing confessional and only applying to Muslims, the Christians paid thejizyatax, the only relevant Islamic law obligation, and kept Roman-derived,Visigothic-influenced civil Law.

Most of the Mozarabs were descendants of local Christians and were primarily speakers of Romance varieties under Islamic rule. They also included those members of the former Visigothic ruling elite who did not convert to Islam or emigrate northwards after the Muslim conquest. Spanish Christians initially portrayed Muslims primarily as military or political enemies, but with time, Islam came to be seen as a religion and not merely a threat. Spanish Christians sought to discourage apostasy from Christianity and to defend Christian beliefs, but they increasingly became connected to thedar al-Islam(land of Islam), through shared culture, language, and regular interaction.^[3]

A few were Arab andBerberChristians coupled with Muslim converts to Christianity who, as Arabic speakers, felt at home among the original Mozarabs. A prominent example of a Muslim who became a Mozarab by embracing Christianity is the Andalusi rebel and anti-Umayyad military leader,Umar ibn Hafsun.The Mozarabs of Muslim origin were descendants of those Muslims who converted to Christianity following theconquest of Toledo,and perhaps also following the expeditions of KingAlfonso I of Aragon.These Mozarabs of Muslim origin who converted en masse at the end of the 11th century, many of themMuladí(ethnicIberians previously converted to Islam), are totally distinct from theMudéjarsandMoriscoswho converted gradually to Christianity between the 12th and 17th centuries.

Separate Mozarab enclaves were located in the large Muslim cities, especiallyToledo,Córdoba,Zaragoza,andSeville.

Name

Mozarab(Spanish:mozárabes[moˈθaɾaβes];Portuguese:moçárabes[muˈsaɾɐβɨʃ];Catalan:mossàrabs[muˈsaɾəps],fromArabic:مُسْتَعْرَب,romanized:musta‘rab,lit. 'Arabized') is first documented in Christian sources from the 11th century;^[4]the termMozarabwas not used by Muslims to describe Christians.^[4]Contemporary Arabic sources described Christians asnaṣārā(نصارى'Nazarenes'), or imprecisely by their legal-religious status:ahl adh-dhimma(أهل الذمة'people of thecovenant') ormu‘āhidūn(معاهدون'contractual partners').^[1]^: 166

The termMozarab,now sometimes applied broadly to all Christians in al-Andalus, is imprecise; many Christians living in Islamic Spain resistedArabization,for example.^[4]

Status

ChristiansandJewswere designated asdhimmiunderSharia(Islamic law). Dhimmi were allowed to live within Muslim society, but were legally required to pay thejizya,a personal tax, and abide with a number of religious, social, and economic restrictions that came with their status. Despite their restrictions, the dhimmi were fully protected by the Muslim rulers and did not have to fight in case of war, because they paid the jizya.

As the universal nature ofRoman lawwas eroded and replaced by Islamic law in part of theIberian Peninsula,Sharia law allowed most ethnic groups in themedieval Islamic worldto be judged by their own judges, under their own law: Mozarabs had their own tribunals and authorities. Some of them even held high offices in the Islamic administration under some rulers. A prominent example being that of Rabi ibn Zayd, a palace official, who, sometime between 961 and 976, wrote the famousCalendar of Córdoba^[5]forAbd ar-Rahman III,undertook various diplomatic missions inGermaniaandByzantium,and was rewarded with thebishopricofElvira(present-dayGranada). Furthermore, in 1064,EmirAl-Muqtadir ofZaragozasentPaternus,the Mozarabic bishop ofTortosa,as an envoy to kingFerdinand I of LeóninSantiago de Compostela,while the Christian Abu Umar ibn Gundisalvus, aSaqaliba(aSlav), served the sametaifaruler as theWazir(Vizier, or the equivalent to prime minister).

Conversion to Islamwas encouraged by theUmayyad caliphsandemirs of Córdoba.Many Mozarabs converted to Islam to avoid the heavy jizyah tax which they were subjected to as dhimmi. Conversion to Islam also opened up new horizons to the Mozarabs, alleviated their social position, ensured better living conditions, and broadened scope for more technically skilled and advanced work.Apostasy,however, for one who had been raised as a Muslim or had embraced Islam, was a crime punishable by death.

León Antiphonary Folio (11th-century),LeónCathedral

Until the mid-9th century, relations between Muslims and the majority Christian population ofAl-Andalus,were relatively cordial. Christian resistance to the first wave of Muslim conquerors was unsuccessful. InMurcia,a single survivingcapitulationdocument must stand for many such agreements to render tribute in exchange for the protection of traditional liberties; in it,Theodomirus(Todmirin Arabic), Visigothic count ofOrihuela,agrees to recognizeAbd al-Azizas overlord and to pay tribute consisting of a yearly cash payment supplemented with specific agricultural products. In exchange, Theodomir received Abd al-Aziz' promise to respect both his property and his jurisdiction in the province ofMurcia.^[6]There was no change in the composition of the people on the land, and in cases like this one, even theirVisigothiclords remained.

In theMoorishcontrolled region ofAl-Garb Al-Andalusto the west of Al-Andalus, which included the modern region ofAlgarveand most of Portugal, Mozarabs constituted the majority of the population.

The Muslim geographerIbn Hawqal,who visited the country in the middle of the 10th century, spoke of frequent revolts by Mozarab peasants employed on large estates, probably those of the ruling aristocracy. There is also substantial evidence that Mozarabs fought in the defense of the thaghr (front line fortress towns), participating in raids against Christian neighbours and struggles between Muslim factions. For instance, in 936, a significant number of Christians holed up inCalatayudwith the rebel Mutarraf, only to be massacred in a desperate stand against the Caliphate forces.

There is very little evidence of any Christian resistance at Al-Andalus in the 9th century. Evidence points to a rapid attrition in the North. For instance, during the 1st centuries of Muslim rule, the Mozarab community ofLleidawas apparently ruled by aqumis(count) and had its own judiciary, but there is no evidence of any such administration in the later period.

Although Mozarab merchants traded in Andalusi markets, they were neither influential nor numerous before the middle of the 12th century. This stemmed from commercial disinterest and disorganization in the early Middle Ages, rather than any specific or religious impediments set up by the Muslim rulers. Unlike Andalusi Muslims and Jews, Mozarabs had little interest in commerce because of their general perception of trade as lowly and despicable. This was in stark contrast to the greater respect accorded to merchants in Jewish and Muslim societies, where trade was frequently combined with other callings, such as politics, scholarship, or medicine.

It is often mistakenly assumed that Mozarab merchants forged a vital commercial and cultural link between the north and south across the Iberian frontiers. Mozarab refugees may have had influence in northern Iberian trade at places like Toledo, but there is no reason to believe that they engaged in commerce with their abandoned homeland. Most traffic between Al-Andalus and Christian regions remained in the hands of Jewish and Muslim traders until the dramatic shifts initiated by European commercial expansion throughout the 11th and 12th centuries. With the development of Italian maritime power and the southward expansion of the ChristianReconquista,Andalusi international trade came increasingly under the control of Christian traders from northern Iberia, southern France, and Italy. By the middle of the 13th century, it was an exclusively Christian concern.

There were frequent contacts between the Mozarabs in Al-Andalus and their co-religionists both in theKingdom of Asturiasand in theMarca Hispanica,the territory underFrankishinfluence to the northeast. The level of literary culture among the northern Christians was inferior to that of their Mozarab brethren in the historic cities to the south, due to the prosperity of Al-Andalus. For that reason, Christian refugees from Al-Andalus were always welcomed in the north, where their descendants came to form an influential element. Though impossible to quantify, the emigration of Mozarabs from the south was probably a significant factor in the growth of the Christian principalities and kingdoms of northern Iberia.

For most of the 9th and 10th centuries, Iberian Christian culture in the north was stimulated by the learning of Mozarab immigrants, who helped to accentuate its Christian identity and apparently played a major role in development of Iberian Christian ideology. The Mozarab scholars and clergy eagerly sought manuscripts, relics and traditions from the towns and monasteries of central and southern Iberia that had been the heartland ofVisigothicCatholicism. Many Mozarabs also took part in the many regional revolts that formed the greatfitnaor unrest in the late 9th century.

The Caliphate of Cordoba

The ability of the Mozarabs to assimilate into Moorish culture while maintaining their Christian faith has often caused them to be depicted by Western scholars as having a strong allegiance toCatholicismand its cause. However, the historianJaume Vicens Vivesoffers another view of the Mozarabs. He states that one of the EmperorCharlemagne's major offensives was to annihilate the Moorish frontier by taking Zaragoza, which was an important Mozarab stronghold. However, the offensive failed because the Mozarabs of the city refused to cooperate with the Catholic emperor. Vives concludes that the Mozarabs were primarily a self-absorbed group. They understood that they could gain a great deal by remaining in close contact with the Moors.

There was a steady rate of decline among the Mozarab population of Al-Andalus towards the end of the Reconquista. This was mainly caused by conversions, emigration towards the northern part of the peninsula during the upheavals of the 9th and early 10th centuries and also by the ethno-religious conflicts of the same period.

The American historian,Richard Bulliet,in a work based on the quantitative use of theonomasticdata as furnished by scholarly biographical dictionaries, concluded that it was only in the 10th century when the Andalusi emirate was firmly established and developed into the greatest power of the western Mediterranean under CaliphAbd ar-Rahman III,that the numerical ratio of Muslims and Christians in Al-Andalus was reversed in favour of the former. Prior to the middle of this century, he asserts, the population of Al-Andalus was still half Christian.^[7]

The expansion of the Caliphate had come primarily through conversion and absorption, and only very secondarily through immigration. The remaining Mozarab community shrank into an increasingly fossilized remnant.

Relatively large numbers of Mozarab communities did, however, continue to exist up to the end of thetaifakingdoms; there were several parishes in Toledo when the Christians occupied the city in 1085, and abundant documentation in Arabic on the Mozarabs of this city is preserved. An apparently still significant Mozarab group, which is the subject of a number of passages in the Arabic chronicles dealing withEl Cid's dominion overValencia,was also to be found there during this same period. Similarly, the memoirs of the emir ofGranadaclearly indicate the existence of a relatively large rural Christian population in some parts of theMálagaregion towards the end of the 11th century. Until the reconquest of Seville by the Christians in 1248, a Mozarab community existed there, though in the course of the 12th centuryAlmoravidpersecution had forced many Mozarabs in Al-Andalus to flee northward.

Restrictions

Mozarab mural painting fromSan Baudelio de Berlanga,now in thePrado Museum

Christians did not enjoy equal rights under Islamic rule, and their original guarantees, at first fairly broad, steadily diminished. They were still allowed to practice their own religion in private, but found their cultural autonomy increasingly reduced. Mozarabs inevitably lost more and more status, but they long maintained their dignity and the integrity of their culture, and they never lost personal and cultural contact with the Christian world.

In the generations that followed the conquest, Muslim rulers promulgated new statutes clearly disadvantageous todhimmi.The construction of new churches and the sounding of churchbellswere eventually forbidden. But whenEulogius of Córdobarecorded the martyrology of theMartyrs of Córdobaduring the decade after 850, it was apparent that at least four Christian basilicas remained in the city, including the church ofSaint Acisclusthat had sheltered the only holdouts in 711, and nine monasteries and convents in the city and its environs;^[6]nevertheless, their existence soon became precarious.

It is supposed that the Mozarabs were tolerated as dhimmi and valued taxpayers, and no Mozarab was condemned to death until the formation of the party led by the Christian leaders Eulogius (beheaded in 859) andAlvaro of Córdoba,whose intense faith led them to seek martyrdom by insultingMuhammad,and criticizing Islam. The Arabization of the Christians was opposed by Eulogius himself, who called for a more purely Christian culture stripped of Moorish influences. To this end, he led a revolt of the Mozarabs at Córdoba in which Christians martyred themselves to protest against Muslim rule.^{[citation needed]}

However,Kenneth Baxter Wolf^[6]concludes that Eulogius was not the instigator of these persecutions but merely a hagiographer. This is consistent with other historical records of two Christians executed in 860, and shortly after a third one. The subsequent executions were in 888–912 and 913–920. Still more executions were recorded in Córdoba in 923 (Eugenia), a boy Pelagius in 925 (for refusal to convert toIslamand submit to the caliph's sexual advances), and Argentea in 931. According to Wolf, there is no reason to believe that they stopped even then.

Pelagiusis depicted in the 1660Martyrs Mirror.

Eulogius's writings documenting stories of the Córdoba martyrs of 851–59, encouraged by him to defy Muslim authorities with blasphemies and embracemartyrdom,contrast these Christians with the earlier official Christianity of the Visigoths, by Reccared, the previous bishop of Córdoba, who counseled tolerance and mutual forbearance with the Muslim authorities. However, since then Christians became increasingly alienated not only because they could not build new churches or ring church bells, but primarily because they were excluded from most positions of political, military, or social authority and suffered many other indignities as unequals under the Islamic law. By the mid-9th century, as the episode of the Córdoba martyrs reveals, there was a clear Christian opposition against the systematic pressure by a variety of legal and financial instruments of Islam, resisting their conversion and absorption into Muslim culture.

The initial official reaction to the Córdoba martyrs was to round up and imprison the leaders of the Christian community. Towards the end of the decade of the martyrs, Eulogius's martyrology begins to record the closing of Christian monasteries and convents, which to Muslim eyes had proved to be a hotbed of disruptive fanaticism rather than a legitimate response against a slow but systematic elimination of Christianity.

As previously with the Muslims, so as theReconquistaadvanced, the Mozarabs integrated into the Christian kingdoms, where the kings privileged those who settled the frontier lands. They also migrated north to theFrankishkingdom in times of persecution.

Significantly large numbers of Mozarabs settled in theEbro valley.KingAlfonso VI of Castileinduced Mozarab settlers by promising them lands and rewards. His importation of Mozarab settlers from Al-Andalus was very unusual because of its startling nature. According to theAnglo-Normanhistorian,Orderic Vitalis,some 10,000 Mozarabs were sent by Alfonso for settlement on the Ebro. Mozarabs were scarce inTudelaorZaragossa,but were more common in a place such asCalahorra,conquered by theKingdom of Navarrein 1045.

Language

During the early stages ofRomance language development in Iberia,a set of closely related Romance dialects was spoken inMuslim areas of the Peninsulaby the general population. These closely related historic dialects are today known as theMozarabic language,though there never was a common standard.

This archaic Romance language is first documented in writing in the Peninsula in the form of choruses (kharjas) inArabicandHebrewlyrics calledmuwashshahs.As they were written inArabicandHebrew alphabetsthe vowels have had to be reconstructed.

Mozarab had a significant impact in the formation ofPortuguese,Spanish andCatalan,transmitting to these many words ofAndalusi Arabicorigin. The northward migration of Mozarabs explains the presence of Arabic toponyms in places where the Muslim presence did not last long.

The cultural language of Mozarabs continued to beLatin,but as time passed, young Mozarabs studied and even excelled at Arabic. The implantation of Arabic as the vernacular by theMoorishconquerors led the Christian polemicist Petrus Alvarus of Córdoba to famously lament the decline of spoken Latin among the local Christians.

The use of Arabic cognomens by the Mozarab communities of Al-Andalus is emblematic of the adoption by the Christians of the outward manifestations of Arab-language Islamic culture. The Mozarabs employed Arabic-style names such asZaheid ibn Zafar,Pesencano ibn Azafar,Ibn Gafif,Ibn Gharsiya(Garcia),Ibn Mardanish(Martinez),Ibn Faranda(Fernandez), in purely Christian contexts. This demonstrates that they had acculturated thoroughly and that theirArabic nameswere not mere aliases adopted to facilitate their movement within Muslim society. Conversely, some Christian names such asLopeandFortunentered the local Arabic lexicon (LubbandFortun), and others were adopted in translated form (such asSa'adforFelix). In the witness lists, Mozarabs identified themselves with undeniably Arabic names such asal-Aziz,andIbn Uthman.Several Mozarabs also used the nameAl-Quti(The Goth), and some may have been actual descendants from the family of the Pre-Islamic Visigothic Christian king,Wittiza.

Culture and religion

There are but few remains of Christian scholarly discourse in Muslim Iberia. What remains in Arabic are translations of theGospelsand thePsalms,anti-Islamic tractsand a translation of achurch history.To this should be added literary remains in Latin which remained the language of the liturgy.

There is evidence of a limited cultural borrowing from the Mozarabs by the Muslim community in Al-Andalus. For instance, the Muslims' adoption of the Christiansolar calendarand holidays was an exclusively Andalusi phenomenon. In Al-Andalus, the Islamiclunar calendarwas supplemented by the local solar calendar, which were more useful for agricultural and navigational purposes. Like the local Mozarabs, the Muslims of Al-Andalus were notoriously heavy drinkers. Muslims also celebrated traditional Christian holidays sometimes with the sponsorship of their leaders, despite the fact that such fraternisation was generally opposed by theUlema.The Muslims also hedged their metaphysical bets through the use of Roman Catholic sacraments.^{[citation needed]}

In the earliest period of Muslim domination of Iberia, there is evidence of extensive interaction between the two communities attested to by shared cemeteries and churches, bilingual coinage, and the continuity of lateRomanpottery types. Furthermore, in the peninsula the conquerors did not settle in theamsar,the self-contained and deliberately isolated city camps set up alongside existing settlements elsewhere in the Muslim world with the intention of protecting Muslim settlers from corrupting indigenous influences.

The Arab and mostly Berber immigrants who settled in the existing towns were drawn into broad contact with natives. Their immigration, though limited in numbers, introduced new agricultural and hydraulic technologies, new craft industries, andLevantinetechniques of shipbuilding. They were accompanied by an Arabic-language culture that brought with it the higher learning and science of the classical and post-classical Levantine world. The emir ofCórdoba,Abd ar-Rahman I's policy of allowing the ethnic Arab politico-military elite to practice agriculture further encouraged economic and cultural contact and cohesion. Moreover, the interaction of foreign and native elements, fostered by intermarriage and contact in day-to-day commercial and social life rapidly stimulated acculturation between the two groups.

The heterodox features of Mozarabic culture inevitably became more prominent. However, Christian women often married Muslim men and their children were raised as Muslims. Even within Mozarab families, legal divorce eventually came to be practised along Islamic lines. Some Mozarab men were evencircumcised.^[8]Ordination of the clergy ultimately drifted far from canonical norms, breakingapostolic succession,and various Muslim sources claim that concubinage and fornication among the clergy was extremely widespread.^{[citation needed]}

Some Christian authorities (ÁlvaroandEulogius of Córdoba) were scandalized at the treatment of Christians, and began encouraging the public declarations of the faith as a way to reinforce the faith of the Christian community and protest the Islamic laws that Christians saw as unjust. Eulogius composed tractates and martyrologies for Christians during this time.^[9]

The forty-eight Christians (mostly monks) known as theMartyrs of Córdobawere martyred between the years 850 and 859, being decapitated for publicly proclaiming their Christian beliefs. Dhimmi (non-Muslims living under Muslim rule) were not allowed to speak of their faith to Muslims under penalty of death.

Wolf points out that it is important to distinguish between the motivations of the individual martyrs, and those of Eulogius and Alvarus in writing theMemoriale.^[10]Jessica A. Coope says that while it would be wrong to ascribe a single motive to all forty-eight, she suggests that it reflects a protest against the process of assimilation. They demonstrated a determination to assert Christian identity.^[11]

The Mozarab population was badly affected by the hardening of relations between the Christians and the Muslims during the Almoravid period. In 1099, the people ofGranada,by order of the Almoravid emir,Yusuf ibn Tashfin,acting on the advice of hisUlema,destroyed the main Mozarab church of the Christian community.^{[citation needed]}

The Mozarabs remained apart from the influence of FrenchCatholic religious orders,such as theCistercians– highly influential in northern Christian Iberia, and conserved in their masses theVisigothicrite, also known as theMozarabic Rite.The Christian kingdoms of the north, though, changed to theLatin liturgical ritesand appointed northerners as bishops for the reconquered sees. Nowadays, the Mozarabic Rite is allowed by a papal privilege at the Mozarab Chapel of theCathedral of Toledo,where it is held daily.^[12]^[13]ThePoor Clarechurch inMadrid,La Inmaculada y San Pascual, also holds weekly Mozarabic masses. A Mozarab brotherhood is still active inToledo.Since Toledo was the most deeply rooted centre where they remained firm, the Gothic rite was identified and came to be known as the"Toledan rite".^{[citation needed]}

In 1080,Pope Gregory VIIcalled the council of Burgos, where it was agreed to unify the Latin liturgical rite in all Christian lands. In 1085, Toledo was reconquered and there was a subsequent attempt to reintroduce the ecumenical standards of Rome. The reaction of the Toledan people was such that the king refused to implement it, and in 1101 enacted the"Fuero (Code of laws) of the Mozarabs",which awarded them privileges. He specified that it applied only to the Castilians, Mozarabs, and Franks of the city.^{[citation needed]}

During both his first marriage toAgnes of Aquitaineand his second marriage toConstance of Burgundy,both of whom were devout Catholics, KingAlfonso VI of Castilewas under constant pressure to eradicate the Mozarabic Rite. A popular legend states that Alfonso VI submitted the Mozarab liturgy and its Roman counterpart to ordeal by fire, putting the fix in for the Catholic rite. Hence, the Mozarab liturgy was abolished in 1086.^{[citation needed]}The Mozarabic Chapel in theCathedral of Toledostill uses the Mozarabic Rite and music.^[14]^[15]

In 1126, a great number of Mozarabs were expelled to North Africa by the Almoravids. Other Mozarabs fled to Northern Iberia. This constituted the end of the Mozarabic culture in Al-Andalus. For a while, both in North Africa and in Northern Iberia, the Mozarabs managed to maintain their own separate cultural identity. However, in North Africa, they were eventually Islamized.

Over the course of the 12th and 13th centuries, there unrolled a steady process of the impoverishment of Mozarab cultivators, as more and more land came under control of magnates and ecclesiastical corporations. The latter, under the influence of theBenedictinebishop ofCluny Bernard,and theArchbishop of Toledo Rodrigo Jiménez de Rada,who was himself the principal buyer of Mozarab property in the early 13th century fomented a segregationalist policy under the cloak of religious nationalism. Jiménez de Rada's bias is symbolized in his coining of the semi-erudite etymology of the word Mozarab fromMixti Arabi,connoting the contamination of this group by overexposure to infidel customs, if not by migration.^{[citation needed]}

At Toledo, KingAlfonso VI of Castiledid not recognize the Mozarabs as a separate legal community, and thus accentuated a steady decline which led to the complete absorption of the Mozarabs by the general community by the end of the 15th century. As a result, the Mozarabic culture had been practically lost. CardinalFrancisco Jiménez de Cisneros,aware of the Mozarabic liturgy historical value and liturgical richness, undertook the task of guaranteeing its continuation, and to this end gathered all the codices and texts to be found in the city. After they had been carefully studied by specialists, they were classified and in 1502 theMissalandBreviarywere printed. They revitalized the faith and a chapel was instituted at the cathedral, with its own priests which still exists today.^{[citation needed]}

The MozarabMissal of Silosis the oldest Western manuscript onpaper,written in the 11th century.^[16]The Mozarab community in Toledo continues to thrive to this day. It is made of 1,300 families whose genealogies can be traced back to the ancient Mozarabs.

Debates on population

There is a long-running debate about how many of the population of Al-Andalus were Mozarabs. Some maintain that the Mozarabs were part of a historical continuum of Latinized Christians that represented the majority of the population of Al-Andalus, while others argue that the Christian population was relatively small in the areas under Muslim rule. The former camp bases their position on the work of Francisco Javier Simonet, whose worksGlosario de voces ibéricas y latinas usadas entre los mozárabes(1888) andHistoria de los mozárabes de Españasupported the idea that the indigenous Christian community of Al-Andalus formed the majority of the population. Other historians argue that the work of Simonet and those who preceded him in studying this question did not use sources properly, and that there is no historical evidence that can be used to make a definitive pronouncement on the ethnic composition of Al-Andalus society.^[17]According to scholar Josephine Labanyi, at the end of the 11th century there were about 75,000 Christians in theEmirate of Granadaor roughly 15% of the population of Islamic Iberia.^[18]

Literature

The literature of the Mozarabs is bilingual in Latin and Arabic. Mozarabs were originally those Christians living under Islamic rule following their ownMozarabic rite.Many continued to live under Christian rule while keeping their distinctive rite down to the 14th century. The switch from a predominantly Latinate culture to an Arabic one was already well underway in the mid-9th century. The use of Arabic by Mozarabs rapidly declined in the late 13th century.^[19]

Among the Latin works of early Mozarabic culture, historiography is especially important, since it constitutes the earliest record from al-Andalus of the conquest period. There are two main works, theChronicle of 741and theChronicle of 754.^[20]

At the height of theCórdoban martyrs' movement(850–859),Albarus of Córdobawrote a treatise in Latin,Indiculus luminosus,defending the martyrs and decrying the movement towards Arabic among his fellow Mozarabs.^[21]A generation later,Ḥafṣ ibn Albar al-Qūtī,finished a rhymed verse translation of thePsalmsfrom the LatinVulgatein 889. Although it survives in only one manuscript, it was a popular text and is quoted by Muslim and Jewish authors. Ḥafṣ also wrote a book of Christian answers to Muslim questions about their faith calledThe Book of the Fifty-Seven Questions.It is lost, but there are excerpts in the work ofal-Qurṭubī,who praises Ḥafṣ' command of Arabic as the best among the Mozarabs. The 11th-century writerIbn Gabirolalso quotes from a lost work of Ḥafṣ al-Qūtī.^[22]

Notes

^Spanish: mozárabes [moˈθaɾaβes]; Portuguese: moçárabes [muˈsaɾɐβɨʃ]; Catalan: mossàrabs [muˈsaɾəps]

References

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^Bulliet, Richard W. (1979-12-31).Conversion to Islam in the Medieval Period.De Gruyter.doi:10.4159/harvard.9780674732810.ISBN 9780674732803.Cited inMorillas, Consuelo López (2000-08-31), Menocal, María Rosa; Scheindlin, Raymond P.; Sells, Michael (eds.),"Language",The Literature of Al-Andalus(1 ed.), Cambridge University Press, pp. 31–59,doi:10.1017/chol9780521471596.004,ISBN 978-0-521-47159-6,retrieved2023-02-17
^MacKechnie, Johan (22 May 2020). "Envisioning Islam: Syriac Christians and the Early Muslim World".Al-Masāq.32(2): 221–223.doi:10.1080/09503110.2020.1767876.S2CID 219451228.
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^McCluskey, Stephen C.Astronomies and Cultures in Early Medieval Europe,Cambridge, p.170.
^^a ^b ^cWolf, Kenneth Baxter (1988)."The Martyrs of Córdoba".Christian Martyrs in Muslim Spain.Cambridge University Press.
^The legacy of Muslim Spain, Volume 2,ed.Salma Khadra Jayyusi,Manuela Marín, BRILL, 1992, p. 158.
^"Al-Andalus. Mozarabs".18 December 2017.
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^Wolf 1988,Chap.3 "The Martyrs of Córdoba and Their Historians".
^Coope, Jessica A. (January 1, 1995).The Martyrs of Cordoba: Community and Family Conflict in an Age of Mass Conversion.U of Nebraska Press.ISBN 0803214715– via Google Books.
^Beale-Rivaya, Yasmine (2018).A Companion to Medieval Toledo: Reconsidering the Canons.Brill Publishers. p. 100.ISBN 9789004380516.
^F. Bosch, Lynette M. (2010).Art, Liturgy, and Legend in Renaissance Toledo: The Mendoza and the Iglesia Primada.Pennsylvania State University Press. p. 61.ISBN 9780271043814.
^Beale-Rivaya, Yasmine (2018).A Companion to Medieval Toledo: Reconsidering the Canons.Brill Publishers. p. 100.ISBN 9789004380516.
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