ABSTRACT

The Reconquista not only effectively ended a unique situation of coexistence between Islam and Christianity on the northern shores of the western Mediterranean, but it also created the phenomenon of the forced baptism of Jewish and Muslim minorities, who became known as Conversos and Moriscos respectively. The process of "religious change" in Iberia depended on certain principle factors: the government directly promoting it through its decisions and decrees and in a more indirect manner, the clergy attempting to convince the non-Christian population through proselytisation to embrace Christianity. Jews had to choose between retaining their faith and expulsion, or embracing Christianity and preserving their possessions. The Spanish not only exercised an ever-increasing religious and political pressure on the Moriscos to embrace Christianity, but also demonstrated a lack of trust in the sincerity of the Christian faith of those Moriscos who had converted and in their political loyalties as well.