Book contents
- The Cambridge Companion to the Spanish Inquisition
- Cambridge Companions to History
- The Cambridge Companion to the Spanish Inquisition
- Copyright page
- Contents
- Figures
- Contributors
- Introduction: Beginnings, Endings, Myths
- Part I The Institution
- Part II Targets
- 5 Conversos
- 6 Moriscos
- 7 Alumbrados
- 8 Protestants
- 9 Old Christians
- 10 Texts
- Part III Geographical Reach
- Index
- References
6 - Moriscos
from Part II - Targets
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 04 December 2025
Edited by
Book contents
- The Cambridge Companion to the Spanish Inquisition
- Cambridge Companions to History
- The Cambridge Companion to the Spanish Inquisition
- Copyright page
- Contents
- Figures
- Contributors
- Introduction: Beginnings, Endings, Myths
- Part I The Institution
- Part II Targets
- 5 Conversos
- 6 Moriscos
- 7 Alumbrados
- 8 Protestants
- 9 Old Christians
- 10 Texts
- Part III Geographical Reach
- Index
- References
Summary
This chapter considers Christian converts from Islam who were converted forcibly in the early sixteenth century and known as moriscos. Once Catholic, the moriscos came under the jurisdiction of the Spanish Inquisition. For more than a century, Spanish authorities worried about Moriscos adhering to their former religion and being Christian in name only; Spanish inquisitors investigated and prosecuted them for practicing Islam. The number of trials reached a high point in the second half of the sixteenth century, and only dropped when the monarchy expelled the Moriscos from the Spanish kingdoms between 1609 and 1614. This essay examines how the Spanish Inquisition constructed a model of Islamic heresy that encompassed Morisco cultural traditions. It surveys the rise in inquisitorial prosecution of this population across multiple Spanish regions. It also considers Morisco responses to the Inquisition, including strategies of petitioning and financial negotiation. This chapter assesses what Inquisition records can reveal about Morisco histories, as well as methods for reading beyond inquisitorial perspectives.
Keywords
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- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- The Cambridge Companion to the Spanish Inquisition , pp. 142 - 163Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2025
References
Suggestions for Further Reading
Benítez Sánchez-Blanco, Rafael. “La Inquisición ante los Moriscos.” In Villanueva, Joaquín Pérez and Bonet, Bartolomé Escandell, eds., Historia de la Inquisición en España y América Vol. 3. Biblioteca de Autores Cristianos/Centro de Estudios Inquisitoriales, 2000.Google Scholar
Dadson, Trevor J. Tolerance and Coexistence in Early Modern Spain: Old Christians and Moriscos in the Campo de Calatrava. Boydell & Brewer, 2014.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Domínguez, Ortiz, Antonio, and Vincent, Bernard. Historia de los moriscos: vida y tragedia de una minoría. Revista de Occidente, 1978.Google Scholar
García-Arenal, Mercedes. “The Inquisition and the Search for Qur’ans.” In García-Arenal, Mercedes and Wiegers, Gerard, eds., The Iberian Qur’an: From the Middle Ages to Modern Times. De Gruyter, 2022.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
García-Arenal, Mercedes, and Sanchez-Blanco, Rafael Benitez. The Inquisition Trial of Jerónimo de Rojas, A Morisco of Toledo (1601–1603). Brill, 2022.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Green-Mercado, Mayte. Visions of Deliverance: Moriscos and the Politics of Prophecy in the Early Modern Mediterranean. Cornell University Press, 2019.Google Scholar
Núñez, Muley, Francisco, and Vincent, Barletta. A Memorandum for the President of the Royal Audiencia and Chancery Court of the City and Kingdom of Granada. The University of Chicago Press, 2007.Google Scholar
O’Banion, Patrick J., ed. This Happened in My Presence: Moriscos, Old Christians, and the Spanish Inquisition in the Town of Deza, 1569–1611. University of Toronto Press, 2017.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Perry, Mary Elizabeth. The Handless Maiden: Moriscos and the Politics of Religion in Early Modern Spain. Princeton University Press, 2005.Google Scholar
Bibliography
Benítez Sánchez-Blanco, Rafael. “La Inquisición ante los Moriscos.” In Bonet, Bartolomé Escandell and Villanueva, Joaquín Pérez, eds., Historia de la Inquisición en España y América Vol. 3. Biblioteca de Autores Cristianos/Centro de Estudios Inquisitoriales, 2000.Google Scholar
Cook, Karoline P. Forbidden Passages: Muslims and Moriscos in Colonial Spanish America. University of Pennsylvania Press, 2016.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cook, Karoline P. “Navigating Identities: The Case of a Morisco Slave in Seventeenth-Century New Spain.” The Americas 65, no. 1 (2008): 63–79.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Dadson, Trevor J. Tolerance and Coexistence in Early Modern Spain: Old Christians and Moriscos in the Campo de Calatrava. Boydell & Brewer, 2014.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
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García-Arenal, Mercedes. “Religious Dissent and Minorities: The Morisco Age.” The Journal of Modern History 81 (2009): 888–920.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
García-Arenal, Mercedes, and Sanchez-Blanco, Rafael Benitez. The Inquisition Trial of Jerónimo de Rojas, A Morisco of Toledo (1601–1603). Brill, 2022.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
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Green-Mercado, Mayte. Visions of Deliverance: Moriscos and the Politics of Prophecy in the Early Modern Mediterranean. Cornell University Press, 2019.Google Scholar
Haliczer, Stephen. Inquisition and Society in the Kingdom of Valencia, 1478–1834. University of California Press, 1990.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hess, Andrew C. “The Moriscos: An Ottoman Fifth Column in Sixteenth-Century Spain.” The American Historical Review 74 (1968): 1–15.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kamen, Henry. The Spanish Inquisition: A Historical Revision. Yale University Press, 1998.Google Scholar
Núñez Muley, Francisco, and Vincent, Barletta. A Memorandum for the President of the Royal Audiencia and Chancery Court of the City and Kingdom of Granada. The University of Chicago Press, 2007.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
O’Banion, Patrick J., ed. This Happened in My Presence: Moriscos, Old Christians, and the Spanish Inquisition in the Town of Deza, 1569–1611. University of Toronto Press, 2017.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Otero Mondéjar, Santiago, “‘Que siendo yo cristiano viejo la justicia procedió contra mí … ’ Lainstrumentalización de la imagen del morisco.” Historia y Genealogía 1 (2001): 113–31.Google Scholar
Perry, Mary Elizabeth. The Handless Maiden: Moriscos and the Politics of Religion in Early Modern Spain. Princeton University Press, 2005.Google Scholar
Reinhardt, Nicole. Voices of Conscience: Royal Confessors and Political Counsel in Seventeenth-Century Spain and France. Oxford University Press, 2016.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Tapia, Sánchez, Serafín de. La comunidad morisca de Ávila. Universidad de Salamanca, 1991.Google Scholar
Vincent, Bernard. “The Geography of the Morisco Expulsion: A Quantitative Study.” In García-Arenal, Mercedes and Wiegers, Gerard A., eds., The Expulsion of the Moriscos from Spain. Brill, 2014.Google Scholar
Wasserman-Solier, Daniel. Truth in Many Tongues: Religious Conversion and the Languages of the Early Spanish Empire. Pennsylvania State University Press, 2020.Google Scholar
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