The second group of Muslims found in Al-Andalus was the Arabs. They tended to have a higher economic position in society and constituted the majority of the ruling class. They owned land in the richest parts of the country. The most important cultural elements they brought with them were their language and the Arabic tradition of learning and high culture, which emulated that which could be found in Caliphate of Damascus.
However, the actual amount of culture these Arab invaders actually brought with them has been disputed by some historians. Montgomery Watt argues that the ancestors of the Arabs that came to invade the Iberian Peninsula had been living a very rough life in the Steppes of Arabia, thus the actual invaders had little time to acquire a high level of culture. The Iberian Umayyad golden age was also, in part, a result of its geographic location and relative isolation from the central part of the Arabian empire. These Umayyad rulers felt the need to prove that they were the equals of those in the homeland.
This was combined with their need to prove their worth as an independent region. It can thus be concluded that the invading Arabs brought some level of culture to the peninsula, but the high culture that was achieved during the golden age of Al-Andalus was the result of the combination and growth the multiple cultures present in the geographic area. The Muwallads , or Muslims of Iberian descent, were far more numerous than those of purely Arabic descent.
They were composed of those descended from the marriages of the original invading Arabs to the native women of Iberia along with those who converted to Islam by choice since the invasions. The muwallads adopted Arabic genealogies and thus became further fused to the Arabs ethnically over time. The Christians living in Al-Andalus, both before and after the invasion, were the Visigoths, Hispano-Romans, and the native tribes of the Iberian Peninsula. The Christian population as a whole was predominantly Catholic, although some Paganism and Arianism still persisted in some areas, mixing with the Catholic tradition.
This Isidorian tradition seems to have been abandoned in favor of the Arabic tradition, although it undoubtedly played a role in the further development of the Arabic tradition on the peninsula. After the Muslim invasion, the Christians were classified under Islamic law as dhimmis protected peoples.
This status allowed them to practice their religion freely under the Umayyad dynasty. Christians were allowed to maintain many of their churches and the organization of the Church remained mostly intact, with the exception of the confiscation of many Catholic properties. Although culturally many Christians adopted the Arabic tradition, the cultural tradition of the Catholic Church and the culture that had developed under the Visigoths was maintained in monasteries by monks. The strong monastic tradition throughout the southern portion of the Iberian Peninsula continued to flourish and develop under Muslim rule.
Within the cities, some Christians were able to rise to prominent positions within the Umayyad bureaucracy.
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Another example being, Revemund, a Christian who was a secretary under the same ruler and was later sent as an ambassador to Germany in He eventually became the bishop of Elvira. It is also important to note that Christian artisans, especially from the Eastern Roman Empire , were called to work on various building projects in the Caliphate of Cordoba. Some of these artisans remained integrated into Andalusian society. Although Christians lost their absolute dominant status they had previously experienced in Iberia, they were still able to gain positions of prominence under Muslim rule, however, these conditions deteriorated with the Almoravids and Almohads see Restrictions Imposed on Christians and Jews.
They began to settle in the Iberian Peninsula in significant numbers around the 1st century AD. Under Christian Visigothic rule, Jews faced persecution. In , the Visigothic King Sisebut issued a decree which forced Jews to convert to Christianity or be exiled and have their property confiscated. It comes as no surprise that many Jews welcomed their Muslim rulers and saw the Muslim conquest of the Iberian Peninsula as deliverance. After the conquest, under Islamic law, Jews were also categorized as dhimmis, having the same social standing as Christians. The Jewish communities scattered throughout the rural areas of Al-Andalus remained fairly isolated, however Jews living in cities and towns, like those in Cordoba that became integrated into Islamic culture and society.
Jews came to hold very influential positions in the Umayyad bureaucracy. One example is the Jewish scholar and physician Hasdai ibn Shaprut , who served as a diplomat of the Umayyad government.
Many Jews living in the cities also became involved in trade as merchants. Jews also contributed to the scientific and mathematic fields of study prominent in Cordoba at this time.
Arabic and Hebrew Love Poems in Al-Andalus
Overall, Jews were granted better treatment, with the coming of the Muslims invaders, than they had previously experience under Christian rule. Although Christians and Jews experienced a relatively high degree of religious and social freedom under Muslim rule, they did lack certain rights that were reserved exclusively for Muslims. The dihimmis, which included both Christians and Jews, were required to pay an annual poll tax called a jizya. If a non-Muslim also owned a substantial amount of cultivatable land, they were required to pay the kharaj or land-tax. There were also certain restrictions and taxes levied on the church buildings themselves.
Certain religious practices like processions, chanting, and church bell ringing, were also censored by law, although the enforcement of these laws varied from region to region. Under Islamic law, dihimmis were supposed to assume a subordinate position in that they were not allowed to hold authority over any Muslim. In practice this was not the case, as many Christians and Jews acquired positions in the Cordoban bureaucracy as tax collectors, translators, and secretaries.
That being said, there were numerous advantages to converting to Islam. The ability for social mobility changed drastically upon conversion to Islam.
Converts had a greater ability to acquire wealth and status. Under the Almohads these relative eras of tolerance ended with many Christians and Jews being forced to convert to Islam or face persecution. Many churches and synagogues were destroyed during Almohad rule and many Christians and Jews moved to the newly conquered Christian city of Toledo. Overall, relations between the various religious groups varied from region to region and the term convivencia, or culture of tolerance, cannot be universally applied to Al-Andalus.
The invasion of the Almoravids, and later the Almohads, signaled a shift and eventual end to the religious tolerance fostered under the Caliphate. Conversion to Islam translated into a higher rate of social mobility for Christians and Jews alike. There is little documentation available to indicate the conversion rates of Jews in Al-Andalus, although the numbers of Jewish converts have been estimated as relatively small. This is perhaps due to the tightly knit Jewish communities that had formed before the Muslim invasion. Christians on the other hand were more eager to convert to Islam.
Many wished to secure higher ranking government positions; while others took such liking to Islamic teaching and culture that they felt compelled to convert. Many Christians who did not accept Islam as their religion became increasingly Arabized in terms of culture. At the time of the invasion, many Christians did indeed resist Muslim rule. In these early years, certain kingdoms within Al-Andalus itself attempted to retain semi-autonomous status under Muslim rule, but were soon forced to submit.
Many Christians also fled to the mountains up north and eventually formed the northern Christian kingdoms of Iberia that would eventually bring down Islamic rule, through the Reconquista. After this initial struggle, religious fervor did not manifest itself in the form of any significant religious revolts. This is shown by the fact that not a single religious revolt took place during the 8th century within Al-Andalus.
These outbursts were mostly tied to the monastic movement and purposeful [martyrdom]. Between and AD, Eulogius and forty-eight other Christians were put to death. Around the year AD, Jews were being persecuted throughout Al-Andalus, although the city of Toledo still remained fairly tolerant. The Almohads were especially severe in their treatment of non-Muslims and persecution of Christians and Jews prompted many to migrate from Al-Andalus. By understanding the background and social standing of each individual religious and ethnic group, as well as their individual cultural backgrounds within Al-Andalus, it is possible to understand how the culture of Al-Andalus formed into, not a completely unified new culture, but rather a composite hybrid culture.
These cultural aspects have withstood the test of time and prove as the most evident examples of this hybridization that can be seen in the art, architecture, language, and literature of Al-Andalus. The hybrid works that were produced under, and resulted from Muslim rule of Al-Andalus, resulted in what has become known as the Golden age of Jewish culture in Spain and laid the foundation for the European Renaissance and the Scientific Revolution. It is important to note that a distinction between Islamic art and architecture is not important since the two are often tied together.
Muslim art is limited, in a sense, by Islamic religious dogmas that frown upon the glorification of human being or animals in the form of art. Thus Muslim art tends to avert from depicting people or animals in art. The art of Al-Andalus had a distinctly Arabic and Islamic inspired flavor, and manifested itself mostly in sculptures and mosaics , as well as, other artifacts that served a dual purpose besides that of being aesthetically pleasing.
What made these works distinctly Andalusian was the combination of various artistic elements from Catholic, Classical Roman, and Byzantine artistic traditions. The culmination of Christian and Moorish art culminated in the 11th century.
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This style became known as the Mozarabic art. This artistic style included ceramics which incorporated mosaic works. It also included the use of repetitive patterns revolving around flower-like designs within sculptures and crafted works. Moorish ivory caskets in Al-Andalus showed signs of western influences. Some depicted individual people and human forms, an element that is not typical in Islamic art. Visigothic tradition also had an influence on the rulers of Cordoba as they adopted the crowns in the style of those worn by Visigothic kings.
This is indicative of the multi-cultural influences that culminated in the unique architectural style of Al-Andalus. It was built in part to demonstrate the linkage between Al-Andalus and the ancestral land of the Arabs in Syria. They share many of the same features like the prayer halls, high ceilings held by double-tiered arcades on columns, and many mosaics. See if you have enough points for this item. Arabic and Hebrew Love Poems in al-Andalus investigates a largely overlooked subset of Muslim and Jewish love poetry in medieval Spain: This book examines the ways in which the scriptural referents fit in with, or differ from, the traditional Andalusian poetic conventions.
The study then proceeds to compare the scriptural stories and characters as presented in the poems with their scriptural and exegetical sources. In the Hebrew lust poems, which utilize biblical heroes, we can detect subtle, subversive, and surprisingly placed interpretations of biblical accounts. Moving beyond the concern with literary history to challenge the traditional boundaries between secular and religious poetry, this book provides a new, multidisciplinary, approach to existing materials and will be of interest to students, scholars and researchers of Islamic and Jewish Studies as well as to those with an interest in Hebrew and Arabic poetry of Islamic Spain.
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