Siren’s song: the news of Tabarka and its impact on Spanish Mediterranean policy in the mid-sixteenth century

Abstract

The island of Tabarka, off the northwestern coast of modern Tunisia, was an active coral-fishing factory during the mid-sixteenth century. Its political status was unclear, straddling Tunisian sovereignty and Spanish military control, while being economically exploited by the Genoa-based Lomellini company. It also operated as a privileged hub of information for Maghrebi affairs, supplying fresh news to the Spanish authorities during the critical phase of Ottoman Mediterranean expansion throughout the 1550s. Particularly, this information’s flow fed into a wider web, and competed with alternative sources of news to influence decision-making processes in the Spanish monarchy. This article presents a micro-historical analysis of a place, a network, and specific political conditions to go beyond the mere reconstruction of information flows and reveal the real impact of the news coming from Tabarka on Spanish Mediterranean policy in the mid-sixteenth century.