Your search

During a period of European peace, Spain sought to establish control of the Mediterranean. Yet a disastrous attempt to oust the Ottomans from North Africa threatened to accelerate the westward advance of Islam. Here, Allen talks about the Battle of Djerba.

Alvar Nuñez Cabeza de Vaca (1490-1557), hidalgo de la meilleure noblesse espagnole, est l’auteur d’une relation de voyage très significativement intitulée Naufragios (1542) qui constitue le coeur de cette thèse intitulée : "Un conquistador à la découverte de l’autre : Les Naufragios d’Alvar Nuñez Cabeza de Vaca". Elle vise à démontrer que le caractère exceptionnel de ce texte réside tout autant dans son contenu que dans la personne de son auteur, brutalement et bien malgré lui confronté au choc de l’altérité, du fait d’une immersion involontaire, prolongée et totale parmi différentes ethnies de l’actuel continent nord-américain. À son retour en Europe, il retranscrit dans un mémoire les différentes étapes de cette découverte et de sa prise de conscience de l’humanité pleine et entière des Indiens, cet "autre" qu’il évoque longuement après l’avoir attentivement observé. Pour Alvar Nuñez Cabeza de Vaca, les Indiens sont en tous points ses semblables, des hommes qu’il convient de traiter comme tels et dont il devient, contre toute attente, l’ardent défenseur devant la plus haute autorité temporelle et spirituelle d’Espagne, le Roi. Son texte, à la qualité littéraire inclassable, ne relate pourtant pas une aventure unique. C’est à lui cependant qu’il doit sa postérité. Considéré tour à tour comme le premier écrivain américain, un ethnologue avant l’heure ou comme le premier défenseur authentique des Indiens, Alvar Nuñez Cabeza de Vaca, à l’issue d’un périple de près de 10 ans au cours duquel il a parcouru le continent américain d’Est en Ouest connaît la déchéance sociale et n’a pas vu ses idées triompher de son vivant.

A la novel·la del Lazarillo de Tormes, l’autor esborrat de l’obra ens innova que el pare d’En Llàtzer va morir a l’illa de Gerba. Una afirmació capital que, com veureu en aquest article d’En Jordi Bilbeny, corrobora de tot en totes el context social i polític catalans del llibre.

The reign of Alphonso the Magnanimous (1416-1458) is an exceptional laboratory for the study of war. Its recurrence and the different areas where the armies were mobilized are a unique setting for observation. It is even more outstanding thanks to the vast amount of documentation preserved, which allows us to study the period in a much wider way. The aim of this paper is to do a first approximation to the great effort done by the monarchy of the Crown of Aragon to end the old military conflicts ―war against Genoa and Sardinia (1420-1421) and the problems with the crown of Castile since 1425― before starting the North African offense. We will especially focus on the open war against Castile (1429-1430), a conflict contrary to the intentions of the king, who claimed to his aristocracy not to fall into Castilian provocations. In addition, the king encountered great difficulties in his own territories, since the projects of the leaders of the Catalan Courts clashed against the eagerness of the king. Therefore, since 1423 this sequence of conflicts impeded the departure of a royal fleet against the Tunisian island of Djerba that was started to build in 1429, but was not materialized until 1432. Finally, we will display the genesis of the military conflicts of Alphonso the Magnanimous to understand how the eagerness of the king brought him to reach agreements with his old enemies and shift his alliances. The king’s necessity of resources for building new armies and, thus, creating new enemies is, in this sense, the result of the expansionist desire of the monarch.

En las atarazanas reales de Barcelona se trabajaba en la reparación y construcción de navíos y galeras. Uno de los momentos más importantes de su existencia era la preparación de una flota destinada a una empresa concreta. La voluntad de esta comunicación es la de reconstruir los aspectos asociados a la construcción naval centrándonos en la obtención, compra y transporte de la madera de los a la capital catalana, para luego poder ver los procesos de su manipulación y preparación, dónde intervienen multitud de oficios.

The reign of Alfons the Magnanimous (1416-1458) is an exceptional laboratory for the social study of war. Its recurrence and the different areas where the armies were mobilized are a unique setting for observation. And it is even more outstanding thanks to the vast amount of documentation preserved, which allows us to study the period in a much wider way. The aim of this paper would be to approach the human component of the medieval Catalano-aragonese armadas studying the particular case of the Royal fleet organised by King Alfons the Magnanimous in 1432 against de Tunisian island of Djerba. Often the motivation and relationship between the sea and the men who participated in such expeditions were very diverse, heterogeneous or even non-existent. The armada became somehow an exchange between social groups, sometimes forced, of different influences –economic, social, political, cultural- of different social status, communities of diverse territories and Kingdoms of the Crown of Aragon and, finally, between seafarers and landsmen.

مثّلت السياسة الإسبانية تجاه بلاد المغرب الإسلامي حلقة مهمة من حلقات الحروب الصليبية المتأخرة، ورغم عودة جذور الأطماع الإسبانية في بلاد المغرب إلى عهود مبكرة من تاريخ الصراع الإسلامي المسيحي؛ إلا أنها قويت بعد ضعف الدولة الموحدية وانهيارها في كل من الأندلس والمغرب منذ القرن الثالث عشر الميلادي/السابع الهجري.وبلغت السياسة العدائية ذروتها؛ عندما تمكّن الإسبان من إنهاء الحكم الإسلامي في الأندلس بُعَيد سقوط غرناطة؛ آخر المعاقل الإسلامية عام 1492م، وحينها أصبح الطريق ممهّداً لنقل الصراع إلى بلاد المغرب، برعاية بابوية، وبتوجيه وتنفيذ مباشر من المؤسسة الدينية والسياسية الإسبانية على حد سواء، لتحقيق أهداف استعمارية وتنصيرية ، وسياسية ، واقتصادية، فسيطر الإسبان على بلدتي مليلة وغساسة، واتخذوا منهما موطئ قدم للسيطرة على باقي المناطق الساحلية، فمثلت السيطرة عليهما باكورة الإنجازات الاستعمارية الإسبانية في بلاد المغرب خلال القرن السادس عشر.

رغم الود الظاهر في العلاقات بين الحفصيين و الأرغونيين، إلا أن المراسلات المملوءة بعبارات الود

Throughout the twelfth century, a number of Arabic-speaking Muslims produced poetry in the court of the Normans of Sicily. This article examines literary figures active under Roger II in the context of their interlocutors, professional colleagues, and other contemporaries around the western Mediterranean and North Africa. It argues that, in this context, most of the Sicilian Arab literary figures were only secondarily poets, their primary role being within a chancery or other administrative milieu, and that they continued to assert an undiminished Islamic identity, although living under Christian rule. This identity is mirrored in the intertextual play on topoi (maʿānī) found in Sicilian Arabic poetry, which was heavily engaged with cultural activity around the Mediterranean.

The recurrence of war and the different areas where the armies were mobilised make the reign of Alfonso the Magnanimous an outstanding laboratory for the social study of war. Furthermore, it is even more excellent thanks to the vast amount of documentation preserved, which allows us to study the period in a much more comprehensive way. This paper would aim to be an approach the human component of the medieval Aragonese fleets analysing the particular case of the Royal fleet organised by King Alfons the Magnanimous in 1432 against de Tunisian island of Djerba. Often the motivation and relationship between the sea and the men who participated in such expeditions were very diverse, heterogeneous or even non-existent. The armada became somehow an exchange between social groups, sometimes forced, of different influences –economic, social, political, cultural- of different social status, communities of diverse territories and Kingdoms of the Crown of Aragon and, finally, between seafarers and landsmen. In this sense, we will focus on the study of the geographical and social origin of the crews of the Armada. Specifically, to the men who served in the four Royal ships and the Royal galley of the fleet. First of all, we will identify the centres of enlistment, and we will focus on the recruitment system. Secondly, we can note the nationalities so recorded, and comment on the patterns of service of the foreigner and identify if there was a government policy towards the service of crews of non Catalano-Aragonese origin, and the consequent attempts to record nationality on the enrolment books.