ABSTRACT
When in 1492 the Catholic Monarchs conquered the Kingdom of Granada, this territory became incorporated into the dominions of the Crown of Castile. A number of capitulation pacts settled conditions of surrender between the Granadian Mudéjares-as they were to be called thenceforthand the crown. They guaranteed the Mudéjares the right to maintain their religion, language, their traditional ways of life, and local self-governmentto some extent (Ladero 1969; Sánchez 1984). From the Late Middle Ages the Catholic Crown’s subjects’ rights depended on membership of the Christian community, as the Partidas issued by Alfonso X in the thirteenth century make clear. The presence of Jews and Muslims (Mudéjares) had been assimilated into the Iberian Peninsula’s political framework without major conflicts, through the creation of specific socio-political statuses based on a personal relationship with the king. This is the typical response of medieval and early modern societies based on the notion of privilege. However, the rapid changes undergone by the political and religious climate during the reign of the Catholic Monarchs dramatically transformed the conditions for the Jews and Mudéjares, in Castile, and, from 1492, in Granada. The expulsion of the Jews in 1492 was only a first step towards an increasingly restrictive religious policy in the Kingdom of Granada, driving the Mudéjares to rise in a series of revolts (1499-1502) ending in their defeat and the promulgation of the 1502 decree forcing them to convert to Christianity, or to be expelled (Pérez 2009). This was the so-called “conversión general”, following which the vast majority of the resident Muslims opted for conversion as a way of remaining in their homeland. Thenceforth they were to be referred to as “new Christians of the Kingdom of Granada” or “Moriscos”. Although this official conversion must have been a traumatic experience, the following years saw the construction of a new status quo, mostly promoted by King Ferdinand the Catholic and based on the principles of political pragmatism.
