2 research outputs found
A Turke turn'd Quaker: conversion from Islam to radical dissent in early modern England
The study of the relationship between the anglophone and Islamic
worlds in the seventeenth century has been the subject of increas-
ing interest in recent years, and much attention has been given to
the cultural anxiety surrounding “Turning Turke”, conversion from
Christianity to Islam, especially by English captives on the Barbary
coast. Conversion in the other direction has attracted far less
scrutiny, not least because it appears to have been far less com-
mon. Conversion from Islam to any form of radical dissent has
attracted no scholarship whatsoever, probably because it has been
assumed to be non-existent. However, the case of Bartholomew
Cole provides evidence that such conversions did take place, and
examining the life of this “Turke turn’d Quaker” provides an insight
into the dynamics of cross-cultural conversion of an exceptional
kind