Nasrid Kingdom Research Articles

Adela Fábregas (ed.), The Nasrid Kingdom of Granada between East and West (Thirteenth to Fifteenth Centuries)

Adela Fábregas (ed.), The Nasrid Kingdom of Granada between East and West (Thirteenth to Fifteenth Centuries)

Nominatissima urbs Granate: The Cultural Clash between Islam and Christianity after the Capitulation of the Nasrid Kingdom and Its Repercussions on the Arts

This essay offers a general overview of some of the main artistic, liturgical and musical works inspired by the Capitulation of Granada in favor of the Catholic Monarchs and related to the patronage of Cardinal Pedro González de Mendoza, Cardinal Bernardino López de Carvajal, Archbishop Fray Hernando de Talavera and his circle. Particular attention is paid to the composition of the well-known Oficios de la Toma de Granada (Offices of the Capitulation of Granada). Granada is conceived therein as a New Jerusalem, the center of a mono-religious but multicultural providentialist discourse identified with the Crown of Castile. Such convergent discourses in music, liturgy and the arts, both at the peninsular and European levels, helped turn the nominatissima urbs Granate after the fall of the Nasrid Kingdom in 1492 into an enduring symbol of Hispanic culture.

The process of digital fabrication and 3D printing as a tool in the study of heritage pathologies: Carcabuey Castle (Cordoba)

Highlights: High-definition scanning and 3D printing have been used as tools in the detection of heritage pathologies, as well as in the study of materials. The Carcabuey castle has been digitized and the volumetric data recovered from the study of its materials typology and its stereotomy, obtained with laser scanning. The study of construction and material phases, and the pathologies produced by them, has been carried out from the 3D printing of the heritage structure parts. Abstract: Precise documentation is essential to carry out the restoration and enhancement processes of protected heritage contexts. Data collection has been increasingly perfected, to the point of being able to perform virtual recreations of complex historical sites, in order to carry out in-depth studies and analyses. An example is Carcabuey Castle (Cordoba, Andalusia), a large fortress with important medieval structures. It is a monumental site of the so-called "Frontier Castles", which were located between the Kingdom of Aragon, and the Nasrid Kingdom of Granada. With the aim of restoring it and highlighting its value, an in-depth study was developed for its conservation and subsequent intervention. The data collection included terrestrial laser scanning and vectorising all the structures, as well as a complex and complete photogrammetric survey. From these previous data and carrying out a deductive analytical methodology, a model was generated which, after being printed in 3D (different models at different scales of detail), would allow the volumes, materials and textures which make up the castle, to be studied. The multidisciplinary team, composed of architects, archaeologists, historians and engineers, made it possible to provide multifaceted and inclusive character to all the work, both in the study of pathologies based on the models, and in the construction phases, detected by the stereotomy of the ashlars, or chemical composition of mortars. Since then, with all the data obtained in the research, summarised in this article, it has been possible to carry out a correct diagnosis for the restoration and enhancement of the heritage site.

Memories of Medieval Iberia in Early Modern Spain: The romancero viejo As Neomedievalism

This article proposes a new reading of four romances viejos as one of the earliest forms of neomedievalism in early modern Spain. First printed in the sixteenth century, but set between the eighth and thirteenth centuries, these romances emphasize Christian Iberia’s fragmentariness and disempowerment in relation to other medieval polities. This contrasts with other sixteenth-century neomedievalisms, from maurophile rewritings of the fifteenth-century Nasrid Kingdom of Granada to romances fronterizos. It concludes that they remind their early modern audiences of Iberia’s porosity and historic as well as ongoing interactions with other Mediterranean and northern European cultures.

Introduction of sugarcane in Al‐Andalus (Medieval Spain) and its impact on children's dental health

AbstractThe introduction of sugarcane in Europe by the Arabs in the 10th century AD brought about a drastic change in gastronomy and oral health. In Southern Spain (Al‐Andalus), sugarcane was mainly consumed by the elite, although its consumption became relatively widespread during the Nasrid Kingdom. The aim of this study was to explore the effect of the introduction of sugar on human diet and oral health by comparing patterns of caries in deciduous teeth between nonadult skeletal samples from two Nasrid populations (La Torrecilla and Talará) and a comparative set representing various Iberian populations without access to sugarcane (from Bronze to Medieval Ages). We analyzed 770 teeth from 115 nonadults divided into three groups: infants under 2 years of age, nonadults presenting only deciduous teeth, and nonadults presenting mixed deciduous and permanent dentition. The frequency of caries is high in the Nasrid individuals and very low in the comparative sample. This finding is in agreement with contemporaneous written sources on the utilization of sugarcane in the diet and as a pacifier for infants during weaning. Differences in the frequency of caries between the Nasrid samples (higher in Talará) are likely related to the socioeconomic differences between these populations.

The potential of defensive architectural heritage as a resource for proposing cultural itineraries

PurposeHeritage landmarks and historical values often coexist with places and regions of remarkable environmental and landscape wealth. This article studies their capacity to generate global understanding of their territory through the creation of cultural routes. The proposed methodology is verified through the study of the defensive features of the ancient Nasrid Kingdom, the last Islamic territory in the Iberian Peninsula from the thirteenth to the fifteenth century, which shaped the Spanish region known as the Kingdom of Granada until the nineteenth century.Design/methodology/approachTo assist in the proposal of new routes, a precise collection of physical data (topography, landmarks, resources, population centres …), existing public paths and protected natural sites was carried out. Those cultural routes relevant to the area of study were also selected and mapped through GIS. A set of indicators prioritised through an analytic hierarchy process (AHP) have evaluated the proposed itineraries.FindingsThe methodology enables the integral evaluation of parameters such as natural heritage, existing paths networks, defensive architectural heritage (watchtowers), existing cultural routes or proximity to basic services. The methodology's application allows an index to be obtained that quantifies the global implications of these parameters in the design of new itineraries. This leads to the development of a network with its own narrative that provides a historical, environmental and cultural meaning.Originality/valueWatchtowers in this region have previously been studied as isolated and locally relevant architectural features. This work studies them from an overall perspective, considering each tower as a piece of a complex defensive and territorial system. Cultural routes arise from this joint interpretation as tools to restore and highlight the interrelationship between architectural heritage and territory and people.

Regarding pandemics: Ibn Jatima from Almería anticipates the physiopathological concept of multi-organ failure in the 14th century

In 1348, a pandemic known as Black Death devastated humanity and changed social, economic and geopolitical world order, as is the current case with SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus. The doctor of the Nasrid Kingdom of Granada, Ibn-Jatima from Almeria, wrote “Treatise on the Plague”, in which it may be found epidemiological and clinical similarities between both plagues. In the context of Greco-Arab medicine, he discovered respiratory and contact contagion of Pestis and attributed its physiopathology to a lack of pulmonary cooling of the innate heat, generated in the heart and carried by the blood humor. The process described was equivalent to the oxygen transport system. Furthermore, it was supposed to generate toxic residues, such as free radicals, leading to an irreversible multiple organ failure (MOF), considered a mortality factor as in Covid-19. Due to its similitude, it would be the first antecedent of the MOF physiopathological concept, a finding that enriches the scientific and historical heritage of our clinical specialty.

The zooarchaeological identification of a \u2018Morisco\u2019 community after the Christian conquest of Granada (Spain, early 16th century): sociocultural continuities and economic innovations

This article presents the results of the zooarchaeological analysis of an assemblage dating to the second quarter of the 16th century that was discovered on the current university campus of Cartuja, on the outskirts of Granada (Andalusia, Spain). During the Middle Ages, this area was largely used for agricultural purposes, including as estates owned by high officials of the Nasrid dynasty, the last Islamicate polity in the Iberian Peninsula. The Castilian conquest of Granada in 1492 brought significant changes to the area, with the construction of a Carthusian monastery and the transformation of the surrounding landscape, including changes in property structures, different agrarian regimes and the demolition of pre-existing structures. Among these transformations was the filling up of a well with construction materials, and its further use as a rubbish dump. This fill yielded an interesting and unique zooarchaeological assemblage, the study of which is presented here. The results advance our understanding of changing patterns in animal consumption during the formative transition from the Middle Ages to the Early Modern period at the heart of the former Nasrid Kingdom of Granada, and indicate the continuity of some Andalusi consumption patterns along with specialised production and distribution systems of meat products that have no archaeological precedent in the region, suggesting that the bones were dumped by a possible ‘Morisco’ community (autochthonous Muslims forced to convert to Christianity in 1502).

Ambient Vibration as a Basis for Determining the Structural Behaviour of Watchtowers against Horizontal Loads in Southeast Spain

The Kingdom of Granada occupied the southeast of the Iberian Peninsula, what today would be the current Spanish provinces of Granada, Malaga and Almeria. Having succeeded the Nasrid kingdom of Granada (1238–1492), it remained a geographical and administrative unit until 1834, defended from the advancement of Castilian troops by means of a large network of watchtowers located principally along its inland border. Following the Castilian conquest of Granada, the extensive coastline was also strengthened with a network of towers and fortifications that were progressively adapted to house artillery. A technical survey focusing on the characteristics of their geometrics and construction, as well as their performance in a series of non-destructive tests, such as ambient vibration testing, was undertaken to study the towers’ mechanical strength against both gravitational and seismic loads. The results propose a numerical estimate that defines the fundamental frequency of this type of structure, which in turn can be used to approximate the mechanical properties of the masonry. Such a precise definition based on objective data enables accurate and rigorous numerical analysis of this defensive architecture, thus reducing uncertainties. Furthermore, slenderness is found to be a relevant parameter for adjusting fundamental frequency and for analysing the towers’ historical evolution, enabling their initial height and number of levels to be estimated.

PRELIMINARY STUDIES TO VALUE ENHANCEMENT OF THE OLD CITADEL IN ORIA, ALMERIA, SPAIN

Abstract. During the Nasrid Kingdom of Granada, the alcazaba of Oria (Old citadel) was considered one of the most outstanding medieval defensive ensembles in the province of Almeria. This defensive complex, located in the Almanzora Valley at an altitude of over a thousand metres, was built around the 12th-14th centuries and has been registered as an Asset of Cultural Interest since 1985. Nevertheless, unfortunate decisions to intervene in the monument and lack of maintenance facilitated the loss of most of its wall, which had been preserved until the twentieth century. Despite the critical situation of the complex, two sections of the rammed-earth wall are currently identified as standing. This study represents an opportunity to broaden the knowledge of this relevant wall structure and the characterisation of the rammed-earth reinforced wall with lime mortar layers. As a preliminary step towards the rammed-earth walls analysis, the graphic representation of wall elevations by photogrammetry tools is proposed. This technique allows to graphically define the morphology of the rammed-earth wall, to perform its typological analysis and constructive characterisation; and furthermore, to evaluate the state of constructive elements conservation by means of the identification of its damages. The information and results obtained will allow to establish the appropriate laboratory tests for the rammed-earth materials characterisation and to define a report that justifies the inexcusable need to consolidate and preserve them.

Regarding pandemics: Ibn Jatima from Almería anticipates the physiopathological concept of multi-organ failure in the 14th century

En el año 1348 una pandemia de la llamada «peste negra» asoló la humanidad y cambió el orden social, económico y geopolítico del mundo, tal como sucede actualmente con la causada por el coronavirus SARS-CoV-2. El médico del reino nazarí de Granada, Ibn Jatima de Almería, escribió un Tratado sobre la peste en el cual se encuentran semejanzas epidemiológicas y clínicas entre ambas plagas. Así, dentro del contexto de la medicina greco-árabe, descubrió el contagio respiratorio y por contacto de la peste, y atribuyó su fisiopatología a una insuficiente refrigeración pulmonar del calor innato generado en el corazón y vehiculizado por el humor sanguíneo, equivalente al sistema de trasporte de oxígeno, lo cual generaba residuos tóxicos, como los radicales libres, que abocaba a un fallo multiorgánico (FMO) irreversible, factor de mortalidad como en la Covid-19. Por su similitud, sería el primer antecedente conocido del concepto fisiopatológico de FMO, hallazgo que enriquece nuestro patrimonio científico-histórico de la especialidad.

Análisis de las estructuras emergentes del castillo de La Peña, cabeza de la encomienda calatrava de Martos (Jaén)

En este artículo se aborda el análisis de los restos conservados del castillo de La Peña o fortaleza Alta de Martos (Jaén), importante yacimiento arqueológico que presenta estructuras emergentes de envergadura. Constituyó el castillo y sede principal del maestre de la Orden de Calatrava en la encomienda de Martos, territorio fronterizo con el reino nazarí de Granada entre los siglos XIII y XV, hasta que esta fortaleza fue abandonada en el siglo XVI. Además de la revisión crítica de la documentación existente sobre este singular ejemplo de arquitectura defensiva medieval, para realizar este análisis ha resultado fundamental el trabajo de campo y la elaboración de la planimetría completa y actualizada de las estructuras conservadas. Los resultados alcanzados en esta investigación arqueológica suponen un avance importante en el conocimiento de este Bien Patrimonial, y aportan nuevos datos que por ahora eran desconocidos o no se habían planteado. La documentación generada constituye la base para las intervenciones de restauración científica en este yacimiento.

The Most Advanced Hydraulic Techniques for Water Supply at the Fortresses in the Last Period of Al-Andalus (Thirteenth to Fifteenth Century)

Due to the conflicts that existed among the kingdoms of the Iberian Peninsula during the Middle Ages, the territories of al-Andalus were protected with defensive architecture that played an influential role on the landscape. The development of these fortresses was necessarily linked to water, either because of the strategic control of a hydraulic resource or because of the need to provide to inaccessible places, as it is often the case of the emplacement of these constructions. The study of their implantation in the territory and the hydraulic elements that they preserve has revealed quite diverse systems of water supply. This paper presents the comprehensive overview that emerged after verifying that many of the existing cisterns, rather than being autonomous and isolated elements, as has often been considered, are strongly related to the organization and development of the fortresses, sometimes located at the end of complex and advanced hydraulic networks, closely linked to the topography of each place. This study is devoted to the water supply systems of some of the most significant fortresses in the last territories of al-Andalus, corresponding to the Nasrid kingdom of Granada (1238–1492).

MEMORIA DE LA PÉRDIDA DE GRANADA: LA NUBḎAT (AJBĀR) AL-ʿAṢR

In this article, we analyze a chronicle that, despite not having been object of a thorough study, is a primary source of capital importance towards the study of the last years of the Nasrid Kingdom of Granada from the Islamic point of view. The Nubdhat (Ajbar) al-'asr, written by a former Granadan soldier during his exile in the Maghreb, constitutes an exceptional testimony because it is the only Andalusian chronicle that we know for the aforementioned period (c. 1477-1499). After a brief study of the chronicle as a source, we will seek to understand how the chronicler narrates the loss of Granada: the fitna, the war against the Christians (here we will pay special attention to the narrative elements that could link this chronicle with the discourse of sacralized violence or jih?d) and the situation of the Muslim population after the Christian conquest and their exile to the Maghreb.

Cadies y alcaides de la frontera oriental nazarí (s. XV)

Este trabajo se centra, dentro del marco de la práctica jurídica, en la actividad judicial en la frontera oriental granadina en los últimos años del reino nazarí. La fuente documental es el pleito que Lorca (Murcia) y Vera (Almería) sostuvieron por la delimitación de sus términos a lo largo del siglo XVI. La información viva y real aportada por los testigos, en su mayoría cristianos nuevos y de avanzada edad, viene a arrojar luz sobre la delimitación de competencias, actuaciones y jurisdicciones no sólo del cadí, sino también del alcaide, otro importante representante de la justicia, en un espacio concreto de al-Andalus y en un tiempo concreto de su historia.

Alcazaba of Baza (Granada) Spain, Rediscovered

The Andalusian medieval citadels are walled enclosures that, strategically placed on hills, still continue showing their defensive function inside the city and the surrounding territory. There are still good examples in the south of Spain, especially concentrated in the last territories of Al-Andalus. To the north of the old Nasrid kingdom of Granada, the city of Baza, with a brilliant Iberian and Roman past, also preserves some remains of its medieval past in its urban fabric. However, the Alcazaba of Baza, which was its main medieval architectural landmark, has suffered during the last century a lamentable process of abandonment and destruction that has almost made it disappear. Today its limits are unrecognizable and there are hardly visible parts of its walls or its towers. Anyone that visits it for the first time only recognizes a central empty space in the urban fabric. It has been mistreated by sporadic inappropriate uses, most of the time in disuse and converted into residual space of the city, a focus of marginality where it is not convenient to go. Despite its poor state of preservation, the fact of being an old military structure makes it a Historical Place of Interest (Bien de Interés Cultural–BIC-), the highest level of protection granted by the Law of Spanish Historical Heritage (1985). Since then, with greater or lesser fortune, the urban planning of Baza has recognized its values, although it has allowed lamentable interventions inside. With some more success, the current General Plan for Urban Development (2009) established, as a public free space, a scope of the Special Plan for the Interior Reform of the Alcazaba (PERICH-02) through which the protection, conservation and revaluation of the delimited space, as well as establishing determinations of use, qualification of the land and intervention criteria in its historical and archaeological heritage. The Special Plan of the Alcazaba of Baza is the result of an international contest carried out in 2007 and develops the winning proposal that dealt briefly with the values of the Alcazaba. Consequently, the regional administration competent in the protection of the historical heritage demanded that, for a correct drafting, an exhaustive study of the emergent and hidden remains of the medieval military structure should be carried out previously. From here it comes the commission that a research group of the University of Granada developed at the end of 2016 and which is the subject of this article: Combining digital technology through drones and field work, it has achieved surprising results that has been shown in several maps: an updated topographic of great precision and, what is even more interesting, a typological map at different levels that allows to establish accurate hypotheses for the future archaeological intervention and that conditions all the initial approach of the Special Plan that resulted from the contest of 2007.

Territorio y poblamiento en la frontera nororiental granadina. La Hoya de Baza y el Altiplano

La investigación sobre las formas materiales de vida y la organización del territorio de un espacio fronterizo, el situado en el extremo nororiental del reino nazarí de Granada, obliga a un examen de las fuentes escritas y un análisis predominantemente arqueológico. A partir de ellos, dentro de la Arqueología del Paisaje, hemos podido estudiar los asentamientos humanos, en su mayor parte fortificados, la estructuración de las actividades agrícolas y ganaderas. Hemos visto así que el distrito al norte de la ciudad de Baza tenía una gran capacidad productiva, más allá de la agricultura irrigada, y que estaba, además, integrada en su condición de tierra de frontera.

HERITAGE SURVEY AND SCIENTIFIC ANALYSIS OF THE WATCHTOWERS THAT DEFENDED THE LAST ISLAMIC KINGDOM IN THE IBERIAN PENINSULA (THIRTEEN TO FIFETEENTH CENTURY)

Abstract. The Islamic Nasrid kingdom of Granada occupied the mountainous areas of the southeastern area of the Iberian Peninsula. There, a natural border was established between the Nasrid kingdom and the Christian kingdom of Castile from 1232 to 1492. To control this frontier and establish visual communication between it and the Nasrid center at the Alhambra citadel, an extensive network of watchtowers and defensive towers was constructed. Studies have been done of individual towers, but no comparative study has been undertaken of all of them. Graphic, homogenous, and exhaustively planimetric documentation would bring together existing information on the majority of them and enable comparative analysis. For this reason, this work conducts systematic architectural surveys of all these military structures, using photogrammetry. In addition to studying the construction typology and techniques, the structural capacity of these towers has been analyzed. It examines how they have been affected by human and natural destructive forces, especially earthquakes, which are common in eastern Andalusia. Although all the historical military architecture is protected by the Spanish and Andalusian Heritage laws, many of these medieval towers and their cultural landscapes are in severe risk. The towers are being studied as individual specimens (emphasizing their differences) and as a unit in a typological group (looking for similarities and unifying characteristics). New technologies for Information and Communication are being used in order to disseminate the results among specialists and to make them available to the general public. Guidelines for restoration projects are also being formulated from the cases analyzed.

The Theology of Colonization in Urban Granada, 1492–1502

The Theology of Colonization in Urban Granada, 1492–1502 Mark D. Johnston On November 25, 1491, the Nasrid kingdom of Granada, the last Muslim realm in the Iberian Peninsula, surrendered to Castile, ending over seven hundred years of independent Islamic rule in Spain. During the decade that followed, the kingdom's capital city of Granada underwent a rapid—and ultimately traumatic—transformation of its urban environment, as Christian authorities sought to reorganize every aspect of the city's life. Generations of modern scholars have scrutinized the well-documented transformation of the city's social, economic, political, legal, and cultural institutions in these years, seeking insights into the conditions, limits, and eventual failure of a situation often cited as the last major example of Muslim-Christian convivencia (co-existence) in medieval Spain.1 The 1992 quincentenary of Granada's surrender inspired a new surge of scholarship on Granada in the 1490s,2 much of it devoted to pursuing sociological and anthropological perspectives,3 and important new work continues to appear.4 Although—or perhaps because—so much information and analysis is available, several simple questions remain unanswered, including what general policies—if any—guided the city's new Christian leaders in managing their treatment of the city's Muslim population. Especially unclear are the policies of Hernando de Talavera, the first Christian archbishop of Granada. Regarded for centuries as a champion of tolerance for religious minorities and their conversion through peaceful means, Talavera nonetheless assented to the forced conversion of Granada's Muslims in 1500 and then issued in 1502 a sweeping decree that required their immediate and complete assimilation into Christian culture and society. This essay examines how Talavera's Confesional, a hastily prepared guide to confession that he published at Granada in 1496, already defined, using precepts of moral theology, principles for ensuring the transformation of Granada from a Muslim to a Christian city.5 Talavera's dictates in his manual, read in the context of contemporary [End Page 51] municipal legislation, strongly suggest that he neither anticipated nor favored the convivencia of separate religious communities. When Isabel of Castile and Ferdinand of Aragon triumphantly entered the city of Granada on January 6, 1492, they faced a challenge that no Spanish Christian kingdom had known for almost 250 years: absorbing a huge Muslim population, far too numerous to resettle or exile without disastrous demographic and economic consequences. The capitulation of Granada culminated a decade of warfare during which Castilian forces successfully besieged one strategic town after another—from Ronda (1485) to Almería and Guadix (1489)—in the Muslim kingdom of Granada. Once conquered, each town typically underwent a kind of "ethnic cleansing," applied with varying degrees of severity depending on circumstances. The Castilian victors offered these towns' Muslim residents some or all of these terms: (1) safe-conduct to North Africa or the kingdom of Granada, (2) resettlement in other regions of Castile, (3) evacuation of their town centers to accommodate Christian colonists and garrisons, and most importantly (4) the right to retain their religion, laws, and customs.6 When the city of Granada finally surrendered in late 1491, most of these precedent terms were simply impractical: the city and its contiguous territory were home to some 300,000 Muslim residents; the city alone probably held some 50,000.7 Resettling all these Muslims elsewhere in Spain was logistically impossible. So, to those who preferred exile, the Castilian Crown offered safe conduct and free transportation for three years. The kingdom's small aristocratic elite accepted this offer, but the vast majority of Granadan Muslims could not afford to leave. To them, the terms of surrender nonetheless guaranteed full exercise of their religion, customs, laws, and local institutions, along with continued possession of their homes and property, including mosques. In addition, Granada's Muslims could bear arms, but not keep gunpowder. Any residents born Christian, but converted to Islam through marriage or other circumstances (the so-called elches), could remain Muslim. Isabel and Ferdinand appointed three experienced leaders to govern their new territory under these terms of capitulation: Hernando de Talavera, the queen's long-time confessor and chief political advisor, was named archbishop; Íñigo López de Mendoza...

Historical Frontiers and the Rise of Inequality: The Case of the Frontier of Granada

This paper explores the political economy that leads frontier regions to be unequal. By focusing on the presence of a stable frontier between Castile and the Nasrid Kingdom of Granada in the late Middle Ages, our analysis shows how a historical border may generate differences in inequality that can become extremely persistent. We argue that the dynamics of being a militarily insecure frontier region created the conditions on the Castilian side for a high concentration of economic and political power. Through the application of a border specification and a spatial regression discontinuity design to municipal-level data, we find that municipalities on the Castilian side have a significantly higher percentage of landless workers, a greater accumulation of wealth, and more jurisdictional rights among the privileged orders, as measured in the 18th century. We use current indicators of land inequality and development to show that the effect of the frontier of Granada persists even today. (JEL: C14, N2, N9, O1)