Simon Barton. Conquerors, Brides, and Concubines

The study of medieval Iberia has long been an active field across several disciplines, attracting scholars from Europe, North America, and beyond to investigate its distinctive and fascinating history and culture. Much of this fascination stems from the peninsula’s turbulent political landscape and the unique social and cultural framework that emerged with the coexistence of three faith groups: Christianity, Judaism, and Islam. There has been both considerable examination of the process of Reconquista, or the notion of crusade on the part of the Christian kingdoms of the north to conquer the territories of the Muslim rulers who once effectively dominated the peninsula, and intensive discussion of the ever-shifting political and social frontiers in medieval Iberia. There has also been extensive debate about the notion of convivencia, and the extent to which the three faiths coexisted harmoniously or otherwise between the eighth-century Islamic invasion of the peninsula and the expulsions of the Jews (1492) and Moriscos (1609) in the Spanish “Golden Age.” This recent work by Simon Barton, a distinguished scholar in medieval Iberian studies, sits within the context of both Reconquista and convivencia but takes a very particular focus on sexual relations among these three faiths in the Middle Ages.

Ancient history · Archaeology · Christianity · Context (archaeology) · Faith · Islam · Middle Ages · Peninsula · Political science · Politics · Power (physics) · Theology · African Studies and Geopolitics · Historical Studies and Socio-cultural Analysis · History · Law · Multiculturalism, Politics, Migration, Gender · Philosophy