¿Justicia recta o Justicia subvertida? Dos mujeres musulmanas demandan a un oficial local mudéjar en el siglo XIV aragonés

In 1300 two Muslim women sued a local aljama official in Daroca, claiming he had unlawfully evicted them from their houses, and physically mistreated them, all without due legal process. In the trial, after witnesses corroborated the womens’ claims, the defendant accused them of being unreliable. These objections were not admitted by the magistrate, who found in the women’s favor, and punished the official. A close reading of the process reveals that, far from being a straightforward case of abuse of power, the defendant may well have been in the right. If so, the framing of Ali Dexadet, the lieutenant alamín of Daroca, exemplifies the debilities of Islamic justice in mudéjar Aragón, and reveals the depth of the factionalism which often characterized minority communities.En Daroca, en 1300, dos mujeres mudéjares demandaron a un oficial de su aljama, alegando que, sin ningún derecho, las había desahuciado de sus casas y maltratado. En el juicio, varios testigos corroboraron sus afirmaciones, pero el acusado, alegó que no eran fiables. Sin embargo, el magistrado rechazo esta defensa, y declaró culpable al oficial musulmán, puniéndole de manera ejemplar. Lo que, a primera vista, parece un caso obvio de abuso de poder por parte de este oficial, podría haberse tratado, bien al contrario, de una injusticia. Es factible que el acusado, Ali Dexadet —lugarteniente del alamín de Daroca— fuera una víctima inocente de las prevaricaciones de sus enemigos. Si fuera así, este caso pone de manifiesto la debilidad de la justicia islámica en el Aragón mudéjar, y la rencorosa política interna que, en ocasiones, podía caracterizar a las comunidades minoritarias

Muslims of medieval Latin Christendom c. 1050-1614

Through crusades and expulsions, Muslim communities survived for over 500 years, thriving in medieval Europe. This comprehensive study explores how the presence of Islamic minorities transformed Europe in everything from architecture to cooking, literature to science, and served as a stimulus for Christian society to define itself. Combining a series of regional studies, Catlos compares the varied experiences of Muslims across Iberia, southern Italy, the Crusader Kingdoms and Hungary to examine those ideologies that informed their experiences, their place in society and their sense of themselves as Muslims. This is a pioneering new narrative of the history of medieval and early modern Europe from the perspective of Islamic minorities; one which is not, as we might first assume, driven by ideology, isolation and decline, but instead one in which successful communities persisted because they remained actively integrated within the larger Christian and Jewish societies in which they lived