Textiles of Medieval Iberia: Cloth and Clothing in a Multi-Cultural Context (Medieval and Renaissance Clothing and Textiles, 5) 9781783277018, 9781800106529, 1783277017

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MEDIEVAL AND RENAISSANCE CLOTHING AND TEXTILES

TEXTILES OF MEDIEVAL IBERIA

MEDIEVAL AND RENAISSANCE CLOTHING AND TEXTILES ISSN 2044–351X Series Editors Robin Netherton Gale R. Owen-Crocker This series focuses on the study and interpretation of dress and textiles throughout England and Europe, from the early medieval period to the sixteenth century. It seeks to bring together research from a wide variety of disciplines, including language, literature, art history, social history, economics, archaeology, and artifact studies. The editors welcome submissions that combine the expertise of academics working in this area with the more practically based experience of re-enactors and re-creators, offering fresh approaches to the subject. The series is associated with the annual journal Medieval Clothing and Textiles. Proposals or queries should be sent in the first instance to the editors or to the publisher, at the addresses given below; all submissions will receive prompt and informed consideration. Ms. Robin Netherton, [email protected] Professor Gale R. Owen-Crocker, [email protected] Boydell & Brewer Limited, PO Box 9, Woodbridge, Suffolk

Previous volumes in this series are listed at the back of this volume

TEXTILES OF MEDIEVAL IBERIA CLOTH AND CLOTHING IN A MULTI-CULTURAL CONTEXT E di te d by GALE R. OWEN-CROCKER with MARÍA BARRIGÓN, NAḤUM BEN-YEHUDA

and J O A N A S E Q U E I R A

THE BOYDELL PRESS

© Contributors 2022 All Rights Reserved. Except as permitted under current legislation no part of this work may be photocopied, stored in a retrieval system, published, performed in public, adapted, broadcast, transmitted, recorded or reproduced in any form or by any means, without the prior permission of the copyright owner First published 2022 The Boydell Press, Woodbridge ISBN 978-1-78327-701-8 hardback ISBN 978-1-80010-652-9 ePDF

The Boydell Press is an imprint of Boydell & Brewer Ltd PO Box 9, Woodbridge, Suffolk IP12 3DF, UK and of Boydell & Brewer Inc. 668 Mt Hope Avenue, Rochester, NY 14620–2731, USA website: www.boydellandbrewer.com A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library The publisher has no responsibility for the continued existence or accuracy of URLs for external or third-party internet websites referred to in this book, and does not guarantee that any content on such websites is, or will remain, accurate or appropriate Cover image: Pellote of Leonor (Eleanor), Queen of Aragon, from her tomb in Las Huelgas Abbey, inv. no. 00650514 © Patrimonio Nacional Cover design: riverdesignbooks.com

Contents List of Figures List of Maps List of Tables Contributors Acknowledgements Introduction María Barrigón, Naḥum Ben-Yehuda, Gale R. Owen-Crocker and Joana Sequeira

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I : Th e H i stori cal B ackgro u nd /Co nte xt 1 From the Five Kingdoms to the Hispanic Monarchy: Political Structures, Ideology and Historical Development in the Medieval Iberian Peninsula (1157–1504) 11 David Nogales Rincón

I I : Tech ni ques, Trad e and Ind u stry 2 Textile Techniques in the Iberian Peninsula (Thirteenth to Fourteenth Centuries) 41 María Barrigón 3 Cloth Trade in the Iberian Kingdoms during the Late Middle Ages 69 Máximo Diago Hernando 4 Textiles in the Crown of Aragon: Production, Commerce, Consumption 93 Germán Navarro Espinach 5 The Textile Industry in al-Andalus 123 Adela Fábregas 6 Flax, Wool and Silk: Textile Industries in Medieval Portugal 141 Joana Sequeira

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I I I : Soci al Co nte xt 7 Dress as a Language: A Survey of Arabic Texts from al-Andalus Manuela Marín 8 Muslim Dress in Medieval Portugal: Textual Evidence in the Context of the Iberian Peninsula †Maria Filomena Lopes de Barros 9 Medieval Castilian Garments and their Arabic Names Dolores Serrano-Niza 10 Clothing, Furnishings and Ceremonies at the Castilian Court (c. 1214− c. 1332) María Barrigón 11 Fabrics and Attire at the Court of Navarre in the Second Half of the Fourteenth Century Merche Osés Urricelqui 12 Textile Production and Jewish Clothing in the Iberian Peninsula: Characteristics, Customs and Differences between Catalan and Other Jewish Communities Esperança Valls Pujol 13 Silk as Reflected in Medieval Iberian Jewish Literature Naḥum Ben-Yehuda 14 The Garment and the Difference: The Attire of Portuguese Jews and New Christians (Conversos) during the Thirteenth to Fifteenth centuries Susana Bastos Mateus

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General Index Index of Textile Terms

365 383

189 207 233 265

295 319 347

List of Figures 1.1 Facade of the palace of Pedro I of Castile in Astudillo (Palencia, Spain) c. 1354–1369. Photo: © David Nogales Rincón 1.2 Monastery of Saint Mary of the Victory, Batalha (District of Leiria, Portugal), founded in memory of the Portuguese victory over King Juan I of Castile in the battle of Aljubarrota in 1385. Late 14th to early 16th century. Photo: © David Nogales Rincón 1.3 The Nasrid Palace of La Alhambra, Granada (Spain), residence of the emirs of Granada. 13th to 15th century. Photo: © David Nogales Rincón

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2.1 Pillow belonging to Queen Berenguela (d. 1246), Las Huelgas Abbey, inv. n. 00651964. © Patrimonio Nacional 56 2.2 Detail of Fig. 2.1, showing the tabby weave with liseré effect and the geometric motifs embroidered with metal threads. © Patrimonio Nacional 56 2.3 Coiffe (cofia) the weave of which is cloth of areste. Las Huelgas Abbey, inv. n. 00651903. © Patrimonio Nacional 58 2.4 Detail of the coffin lining of the tomb attributed to Maria de Almenar (d. c. 1200). Las Huelgas Abbey, 00650516. © Patrimonio Nacional 60 2.5 Macrophotograph of Fig. 2.4 showing its samite weave 61 2.6 Pillow of the tomb attributed to Maria de Almenar (d. c. 1200). Las Huelgas Abbey, 00650542. © Patrimonio Nacional 63 2.7 Macrophotograph of Fig. 2.6 showing its lampas weave 63 2.8 Pillow attributed to the tomb of Mafalda (d. c. 1185). Las Huelgas Abbey, 00651911. © Patrimonio Nacional 66 2.9 Detail of Fig. 2.8, showing its stocking stitch 67 4.1 Initial page of Valencian Silk Dyers Ordinances (1506–1578) with the image of St Michael the Archangel, holy patron of their brotherhood. Valencia, Archivo del Colegio del Arte Mayor de la Seda (signature 4.1), parchment, 20 x 27 cm. © Valencia Silk Museum

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List of F ig ures

4.2 Initial Page of the First Book of the Valencian Art de Velluters (Art of Velvet Weavers). Valencia, Archivo del Colegio del Arte Mayor de la Seda (signature 2.1.3), parchment, 21 x 30 cm. © Valencia Silk Museum 104 4.3 Altarpiece of Saint Domingo de Silos parish church from Daroca (Zaragoza) by Bartolomé Bermejo (1474–1479). Oil on board, 242 x 130 cm. © Museo Nacional del Prado de Madrid 114 4.4 Altarpiece of Saint Esteve’s parish church from Granollers (Barcelona), dedicated to Princess Eudoxia’s exorcism by The Vergós (1495–1500). Painting 192.3 x 114.2 x 6.5 cm. © Museu Nacional d’Art de Catalunya 120 6.1 Mantas do Alentejo (blankets from Alentejo) produced in Cooperativa Oficina de Tecelagem de Mértola, Portugal, in 2014. Photo: Joana Sequeira 154 9.1. Moorish woman with a two-coloured dress. Trachtenbuch des Christoph Weiditz (1530–1540), 103. © Germanisches Nationalmuseum Nürnberg, Hs. 22474. Image from the repository [accessed 29 March 2022] 215 9.2. Timeline with the arrival of words with an Arabic origin. © Dolores Serrano-Niza 218 9.3. An almaizar used as a sheet © Dolores Serrano-Niza. Published in Dolores Serrano-Niza, ‘Textiles para el sueño. Ropa y ajuar morisco para hacer una cama’, in Vestir la casa. Objetos y emociones en el hogar andalusí y morisco, ed. by Dolores Serrano-Niza (Madrid: Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas, 2019), pp. 127–58 (p. 148). 221 9.4 An almalafa used as a blanket © Dolores Serrano-Niza. Published in Dolores Serrano-Niza, ‘Una habitación con telas. El mobiliario textil de origen andalusí en una casa morisca’, in De puertas para adentro. La casa en los siglos XV–XVI, ed. by María Elena Díez Jorge (Granada: Editorial Comares, 2019), pp. 365– 96 (p. 386). 223 9.5 Moorish woman with an almalafa. Trachtenbuch des Christoph Weiditz (1530–1540), 97–98. © Germanisches Nationalmuseum Nürnberg, Hs. 22474. Image from the repository [accessed 29 March 2022] 225



List of F ig ures

9.6. The pattern of a marlota. Juan de Alcega, Libro de geometría, práctica y traça el cual trata de lo tocante al oficio de sastre (Madrid: Guillermo Drouy, 1580) © Biblioteca digital hispánica. Image of the digitised book [accessed 29 March 2022]

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10.1 Cantiga CXXII, MS. TI.1, fol. 173r, RBME. © Patrimonio Nacional 239 10.2 Cantiga CXVII, MS. TI.1, fol. 167r, RBME. © Patrimonio Nacional 241 10.3 Liseré tabby with different coloured weft threads, used: a) as a furnishing fabric in one of the pillows (00650517) of Queen Leonor of Aragón (d. 1244), daughter of Alfonso VIII and Eleanor Plantagenet. © Patrimonio Nacional 247 b) to line (00651938, detail) the coffin of Fernando de la Cerda (d. 1275). © Patrimonio Nacional 247 c) as a dress fabric in the saya (00651972) from the tomb attributed to María de Almenar (d. c. 1200). © Patrimonio Nacional 247 d) as a dress fabric in a gown (00650506) found in the tomb attributed to Alfonso (d. c. 1250), an illegitimate son of Alfonso X. © Patrimonio Nacional 247 10.4 Pellote of Fernando de la Cerda (00650538). © Patrimonio Nacional 255 r 10.5 Alfonso X in Libro de los Juegos, MS. T. I. 6, fol. 65 , RBME. © Patrimonio Nacional 258 10.6 Laced saya of Queen Leonor (Eleanor) of Aragon (00650515). © Patrimonio Nacional 262 10.7 Coffin of Alfonso de la Cerda (00650545). © Patrimonio Nacional 262 11.1 Treasurer’s accounting registers (AGN, Reg. 207, fol. 112v). Year 1389. © Royal and General Archives of Navarre 268 11.2 Woman wearing houppelande. Retable of Santa Catalina. Tudela Cathedral (Navarra). Early 15th century. © Navarre Government Historical Heritage Service 273 11.3 Dress for mourning at the king’s funeral. Ceremonial Book. AGN, Códices y cartularios, B2, fol. 22v. © Royal and General Archives of Navarre 283 11.4 Wax seal of King Carlos III. ACP, III Epi 37. Año 1392. © Cathedral Archive of Pamplona 286 12.1 Woman with capsana in the capital of the south-eastern gallery of the fourteenth-­century monastery of Ripoll (Catalonia). Photo: Miquel Bosch 300

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12.2 Jew in hooded cloak, with round, white badge. Cathedral of Tarragona. Photo: Sr. Santi Grimau Ferré; © la Delegación de Patrimonio Cultural del Arzobispado de Tarragona 302 12.3 Above, woman in laced gown; below, woman in patterned sleeves. British Library MS Additional 27210 (Golden Haggada) fol. 15r, detail. © The British Library Board, reproduced with permission 309 12.4 Men in long tunics and figure in tall hat. British Library MS Or 2737 (Hispano-Moresque Haggada), fol. 87r. © The British Library Board, reproduced with permission 310 13.1 Grades of silk (Bombyx mori) coarse to fine. Fabrics furnished courtesy of Whaleys Bradford Ltd. Photographed for Naḥum Ben-Yehuda by Isaac Canetti 324 13.2 Above, natural linen textiles: left, dew retted flax; right, pool retted flax. Below, flax stricks: left, Linho galego (Portugal); right, Beth Shean (Israel). Materials: Naḥum Ben-Yehuda. Photographed for Naḥum Ben-Yehuda by Isaac Canetti 337 13.3 Spanish Merino: left, fleece by permission of Sergio Nogales Baena; right top, sheep by permission of Proyecto dLana SL; right bottom, yarn, by permission of Proyecto dLana SL, photographed for Naḥum Ben-Yehuda by Isaac Canetti 339 13.4 Churra Lebrijana: left, fleece by permission of Sergio Nogales Baena; right top, sheep by permission of Sergio Nogales Baena; right bottom, yarn. Fleece and yarn photographed for Naḥum Ben-Yehuda by Isaac Canetti 339 13.5 Shades of wild silks. Fabrics furnished courtesy of Whaleys Bradford Ltd. Photographed for Naḥum Ben-Yehuda by Isaac Canetti 341 13.6 Silk moths and cocoons 342 a, top left, Saturnia pyri cocoons b, top right, Saturnia pyri moth c, bottom left, Pachypasa otus cocoons d, bottom right, Pachypasa otus moth Photos: courtesy of Richard Peigler 13.7 Two fragments of fabric decorated with eagles and trees of life; al-­Andalus, Almohad kingdom, 12th to 13th century. Linen warp and linen wefts; tabby with supplementary silk weft, polychrome silks. From the Collegiate Church of Sant Vicenç de Roda de Ribagorça; MEV 9188. Photo: © Museu Episcopal de Vic by permission of Anna Horns 343



List of F ig ures

14.1a and 14.1b  Drawings probably depicting Jews. Date unknown (1438–1569). Lisbon, Arquivo Nacional da Torre do Tombo, Ordem dos Pregadores, Mosteiro de Nossa Senhora da Piedade de Azeitão, liv. 18, fols 44v and 46v. Document reproduced with the authorisation of ANTT 14.2a and 14.2b  A Jew in a black outfit with the red sign on his clothes. Detail of the painted altarpiece The Adoration of São Vicente de Fora (c. 1472) Lisbon, Museu Nacional de Arte Antiga. Photograph by Georges Jansoone. Reproduced under CC-SA-3.0 14.3 Letter of privilege to the Jew Marracoxim (1475). Lisbon, Arquivo Nacional da Torre do Tombo, Chancelaria de D. Afonso V, liv. 9, fol. 13. Document reproduced with the authorization of ANTT 14.4 First paragraph of the Monitório do Inquisidor Geral (1536), containing a list of Jewish practices that should be reported to the Inquisition. In Collectorio de diversas letras apostolicas …, Lisbon, 1596. Biblioteca Nacional de Portugal. Image free of rights

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353 355

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The editors, contributors and publisher are grateful to all the institutions and persons listed for permission to reproduce the materials in which they hold copyright. Every effort has been made to trace the copyright holders; apologies are offered for any omission, and the publisher will be pleased to add any necessary acknowledgement in subsequent editions.

List of Maps 1.1 The Crown of Aragon during the reign of Jaime I of Aragon (1213– 1276), drawn by David Nogales Rincón adapted from José María Monsalvo Antón, Atlas histórico de la España medieval (Madrid: Editorial Síntesis, 2010), p. 203 1.2 The Iberian Peninsula in 1157, drawn by David Nogales Rincón adapted from José María Monsalvo Antón, Atlas histórico de la España medieval (Madrid: Editorial Síntesis, 2010), pp. 129, 132 1.3 The Iberian Peninsula in 1230, drawn by David Nogales Rincón adapted from José María Monsalvo Antón, Atlas histórico de la España medieval (Madrid: Editorial Síntesis, 2010), p. 195

19 29 33

4.1 The Main States of the Crown of Aragon, drawn by Germán Navarro Espinach 92 6.1 Flax/Hemp production centres in Portugal in the Late Middle Ages. Cartographer: Miguel Nogueira, Infografia, Faculty of Arts and Humanities, University of Porto 6.2 Wool production centres in Portugal in the Late Middle Ages. Cartographer: Miguel Nogueira, Infografia, Faculty of Arts and Humanities, University of Porto 6.3 Silk production centres in Portugal in the Late Middle Ages. Cartographer: Miguel Nogueira, Infografia, Faculty of Arts and Humanities, University of Porto

145 146 147

List of Tables 4.1 Population in the Crown of Aragon (14th–15th century) 4.2 Medieval Types of Wool Cloths in the Crown of Aragon 4.3 Medieval Types of Silk Cloths in the Crown of Aragon

94 105–07 109–11

5.1 Textile-related raw materials featured in Andalusi agronomic treatises

129

11.1 English wool cloths bought by the Navarre Court during the second half of the fourteenth century, according to treasurer’s accounting registers 271 11.2 Normandy wool cloths bought by the Navarre Court during the second half of the fourteenth century, according to treasurer’s accounting registers 274 11.3 Brabant woollen cloths bought by the Navarre Court during the second half of the fourteenth century, according to treasurer’s accounting registers 276 11.4 Languedoc wool cloths bought by the Navarre Court during the second half of the fourteenth century, according to treasurer’s accounting registers 278 11.5 Flanders wool cloths bought by the Navarre Court during the second half of the fourteenth century, according to treasurer’s accounting registers 279 11.6 Worsted cloths from the Crown of Aragon bought by the Navarre Court during the second half of the fourteenth century, according to treasurer’s accounting registers 281 11.7 Wool cloths identified by colour or type bought by the Navarre Court during the second half of the fourteenth century, according to treasurer’s accounting registers 282

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11.8 Silk fabrics bought by the Navarre Court during the second half of the fourteenth century, according to treasurer’s accounting registers 287–88 11.9 Fabrics made of vegetable fibres bought by the Navarre Court during the second half of the fourteenth century, according to treasurer’s accounting registers 293

Contributors MARÍA BARRIGÓN (co-editor) is a curator at the Royal Palace (Patrimonio Nacional) in Madrid where she is responsible for medieval textiles. She studied history at the Universidad Complutense de Madrid, where she obtained her PhD, entitled: ‘Dress for death in Las Huelgas (Burgos): textile culture in medieval Castile. A study of the grave goods of Alfonso VIII and Eleanor Plantagenet’. Trained in the technical analysis of textiles, in Lyon, and focusing on medieval Castile, she has regularly published on the Las Huelgas collection and medieval/ early modern textiles in peer-reviewed journals and books. †MARIA FILOMENA LOPES DE BARROS, who, sadly, died on 7 March 2021, was Associate Professor of History at the University of Évora, Portugal. Her fields of research and publication were mainly the Muslim Minority within the Iberian context, on the issue of identity through topics such as Islamic law, onomastics, and social and cultural ascriptions. In addition she focused on the comparison between Muslims and Jews in the medieval period, and in the Moriscos, in the sixteenth century. She was coeditor-in-chief, with José Alberto Tavim (University of Lisbon), of the online publication Hamsa, Journal of Judaic and Islamic Studies (http://www.hamsa.cidehus.uevora.pt/). Her publications include: ‘Living as Muslims under Christian rule. The Mudejars’, in The Routledge Handbook of Muslim Iberia, ed. by Maribel Fierro (Abingdon and New York: Routledge, 2020), pp. 534– 50; ‘In the name of the minorities: Lisbon’s Muslims as emissaries from the King of Portugal to the Sultan of Egypt’, in Mamluk Cairo, A Crossroads for Embassies: Studies on Diplomacy and Diplomatics, ed. by Frédéric Bauden and Malika Dekkiche (Leiden and Boston: Brill, 2019), pp. 711–24; ‘A ketubbá, in Portuguese, from the Jews of Lisbon (15th century)’, Hamsa. Journal of Judaic and Islamic Studies, 4 (2018), 33–45; José Alberto R. Silva Tavim, Maria Filomena Lopes de Barros & Lúcia Liba Mucznick, eds, In the Iberian Peninsula and Beyond. A History of Jews and Muslims (15th-17th Centuries), 2 vols (Newcastle upon Tyne: Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2015); ‘Muslim Minority in the Portuguese Kingdom (1170–1496): identity and writing’, eJournal of Portuguese History (e-JPH), 13.2 (2015): 18–33; ‘Ethno-Religious Minorities’, in The Historiography of Medieval Portugal (c.1950–2010), ed. by José Mattoso (Lisbon: Instituto de Estudos Medievais, 2011), pp. 571–90.

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NAḤUM BEN-YEHUDA (co-editor) is currently a doctoral candidate at Bar Ilan University, Land of Israel Studies and Archaeology Dept. The title of his dissertation is: ‘The production of flax-linen in the Land of Israel throughout the ages’. His previous degrees are from the departments of Talmud and Jewish History, respectively, MA thesis: ‘Jewish Dress and Religious Identity in the Land of Israel during the Roman Period – The Talmudic Dress Code’. He studied Textile Engineering at Shenkar College, and is a fellow (CText FTI) of The Textile Institute, Manchester (UK). His background includes product design and engineering in the textile industry, and he is a textile craftsman specializing in flax-linen at all stages of the chaîne opératoire. His theological training includes orthodox rabbinical ordination. These diverse qualifications enhance his longue durée and multidisciplinary approach to historical biblical, Talmudic, and rabbinic textile and garment research. His publications include: ‘Flax and Linen Terminology in Talmudic Literature’, in Textile Terminologies from the Orient to the Mediterranean and Europe, 1000 BC to 1000 AD, ed. by Salvator Gaspa, Cécile Michel and Marie-Louise Nosch (Lincoln, NE: Zea Books, 2017), pp. 122–52; ‘Dabiqui – made in Andalusia?’, in Textiles, basketry and dyes in the ancient Mediterranean world, Proceedings of the Fifth International Symposium on textiles and dyes in the ancient Mediterranean world (Montserrat, 19–22 March, 2014), ed. by J. Ortiz, C. Alfaro et al. (Valencia: Universitat de València, 2016), pp. 171–82; and ‘Jewish Dress and Religious Identity in the Land of Israel during the Roman Period’, in Kleidung und Identität in religiösen Kontexten der römischen Kaizerzeit, ed. by Sabine Schrenk, Konrad Vössing and Michael Tellenbach (Mannheim: Schnell & Steiner, 2012), pp. 71–94. MÁXIMO DIAGO HERNANDO holds a PhD in Medieval History from the Universidad Complutense de Madrid. Since 1999 he has been Tenured Scientist (Científico Titular) at the Spanish National Research Council (Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas, CSIC) in Madrid, Spain. He has been a member of several research groups financed by the Spanish Ministry of Education. His field of expertise is linked to industry, commerce and institutions in medieval Spain. He has dealt with the cloth trade and the cloth industry on multiple occasions, especially on his book La industria y el comercio de productos textiles en Europa. Siglos XI al XV (Madrid: Arco Libros, 1997). He has published regularly in academic journals. ADELA FÁBREGAS is Full Professor in Medieval History at the University of Granada, Spain. She received her PhD in 1999 from the University of Granada. Her research has focused on the study of the economy of the Nasrid kingdom, with attention on productive activities and international trade, while also studying the economic bases of power in the Nasrid kingdom. All this has been developed from national research projects which she has led. The results have been presented in monographs, including Producción y comercio de azúcar en el mundo mediterráneo medieval: el ejemplo de reino de Granada (Granada: Universidad de Granada 2000); in edited works (Power and rural communities in Al-Andalus: ideological and material

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representations (Turnhout: Brepols, 2016); De la Alquería a la Aljama. Fundamentos de poder y organización social de las comunidades rurales de matriz islámica en Granada y Castilla (Madrid: Universidad Nacional de Educación a Distancia, 2016) and more recently The Nasrid kingdom, between East and West (thirteenth to fifteenth centuries) (Leiden and Boston: Brill, 2020) as well as in papers published in national and international journals. MANUELA MARÍN is retired Research Professor of the Spanish CSIC (High Council for Scientific Research). She is a specialist in the cultural and social history of al-Andalus and had published widely on these subjects, in Spanish as well as in English and French. She is also the editor of The Formation of al-Andalus. Part I: History and Society, The Formation of the Classical Islamic World, 46 (Aldershot: Ashgate-Variorum, 1998). More recently she has expanded her academic interests towards Moroccan history and its relationship with Spanish history. She edited the book Tejer y vestir de la Antigüedad al Islam (Madrid: CSIC, 2001) in which she contributed the chapter ‘Signos visuales de la identidad andalusí’ (Visual signs of the Andalusi identity). SUSANA BASTOS MATEUS is a PhD candidate at the University of Évora (PIUDHist), Portugal. Her dissertation deals with the consequences of the General Conversion of the Portuguese Jews in 1497 and the social dimensions of the New Christians before and after the establishment of the Portuguese Inquisition. She is a researcher at the Interdisciplinary Centre for History, Culture and Societies at the University of Évora (CIDEHUS-UÉ) and at the Chair of Sephardic Studies ‘Alberto Benveniste’ at the University of Lisbon. She is also a member of the Religious History Studies Centre (Catholic University of Portugal), coordinator of the research group ‘Expansão Religiosa: Civilizações e Culturas’. Since 2009 she has been a member of the editorial board of the peer-reviewed journal Cadernos de Estudos Sefarditas. GERMÁN NAVARRO ESPINACH is Full Professor of Medieval History at the Universidad de Zaragoza, Spain and Director of the Master’s degree in Research and Advanced Studies in History at the University of Zaragoza. With a European Doctorate from Universitat de València, he has been Secretary of the Spanish Society of Medieval Studies and President of the Scientific Committee of the Valencia Silk Museum. Since the publication of his book Los orígenes de la sedería valenciana (Valencia: Ajuntament de Valencia, 1999), he has published widely on crafts, commerce and textiles in the Crown of Aragon in the fourteenth to sixteenth centuries. Author, for example, of La cofradía de San Jerónimo del Art de Velluters de Valencia with J. Martínez (Valencia: Agència Valenciana del Turisme, 2016) and Los tintoreros de seda de Valencia (Valencia: Colegio del Arte Mayor de la Seda, 2018), he has also edited important books like Las rutas de la seda en la historia de España y Portugal, with R. Franch (Valencia: Publicacions de la Universitat de València, 2017), Industrias y mercados rurales en los reinos hispánicos (siglos XIII–XV)

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with C. Villanueva (Murcia: Sociedad Española de Estudios Medievales, 2017) and Museos de la Seda / Silk Museums with R. Huerta (Valencia: Colegio del Arte Mayor de la Seda, 2020). DAVID NOGALES RINCÓN is Associate Professor (Profesor Contratado Doctor) at the Department of Ancient History, Medieval, Paleography and Diplomacy at the Universidad Autónoma de Madrid, Spain. He holds a PhD in Medieval History from the Universidad Complutense de Madrid (2009), with a doctoral dissertation focused on the study of the Chapel Royal and the royal funeral chapels in the Crown of Castile during the Middle Ages, titled La representación religiosa en la Corona de Castilla: la Capilla Real (1252-1504). He has also been a postdoctoral researcher at the Centro de História of the Faculdade de Letras at the Universidade de Lisboa (2010–2012), visiting professor at Université Bordeaux Montaigne (2014) and post-doctoral researcher as part of the Plan Nacional de Investigación Científica, Desarrollo e Innovación Tecnológica (Juan de la Cierva Programme, Spanish Government) in the Department of Medieval History at the Universidad Complutense de Madrid (2014–2016). He has participated in several research projects financed by the Spanish Ministry of Education. His research has focused on the study of the representation of royal power and the relationship between power and culture in the Crown of Castile during the Middle Ages, with several papers on royal iconography, regal mausoleums, animal symbology and Spanish political treatises. He has regularly published in peer-reviewed journals. MERCHE OSÉS URRICELQUI is a History and Geography Teacher at a secondary school in Estella (Navarre), Spain. She obtained her PhD in 2015 at Universidad Pública de Navarra. Her dissertation, Poder, simbología y representación en la Baja Edad Media: el ajuar en la corte de Carlos III de Navarra (1387–1425), will be published soon by the Government of Navarre. Her research has focused on the study of textiles and clothing for the royal elite of the kingdom of Navarre, and the representation of royal power, approaching it from documentary and iconographic sources. She has published several articles on this subject. She has participated in several research groups financed by the Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness and the Ministry of Science, Innovation and Universities. Some of these projects are: ‘Migravit. La muerte del Príncipe en Francia y en los reinos hispánicos (s. XI-XV). Modelos de comparación’ and ‘Reinas e infantas de las monarquías ibéricas: espacios religiosos, modelos de representación y escrituras, ca. 1252–1504’. She has published a transcription of the medieval documentation of the city of Estella, Documentación medieval de Estella, siglos XII–XVI (Pamplona: Gobierno de Navarra, Departamento de Cultura y Turismo, 2005). GALE R. OWEN-CROCKER (chief editor) is Professor Emerita of The University of Manchester; she was formerly Professor of Anglo-Saxon Culture and Director of the Manchester Centre for Anglo-Saxon Studies. She co-founded and for fifteen years co-edited the journal Medieval Clothing and Textiles, and she directed the

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Manchester Lexis of Cloth and Clothing Project, producing the database . She has published extensively on early medieval culture and on dress and textiles. Her recent books include Clothing the Past: Surviving Garments from Early Medieval to Early Modern Western Europe (with Elizabeth Coatsworth, Leiden and Boston: Brill, 2018); Sense and Feeling in Daily Living in the Early Medieval English World (Daily Living in the Anglo-Saxon World 4) (with Maren Clegg Hyer, Liverpool: Liverpool University Press, 2020) and Art and Worship in the Insular World (with Maren Clegg Hyer, Leiden and Boston: Brill, 2021). DOLORES SERRANO-NIZA is Professor of Arab and Islamic Studies at the University of La Laguna, Spain and researcher at the Instituto Universitario de Lingüística Andrés Bello at the same university. Her award-winning PhD was on textiles and clothing terminology according to an Andalusi Medieval Classic Dictionary from Ibn Sidah (11th–century), called Kitab al-Mujassas and since then she has been working in the field. As a result of the above, she published her book, Glosario árabe español de Indumentaria según el Kitab al-Mujassas de Ibn Sidah (A glossary of Arabic Islamic Clothing terms according to Ibn Sidah) (Madrid: Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas, 2005). She is currently working on a National Research Project in which her contribution is the identification of clothing and textiles and their role within the domestic space. JOANA SEQUEIRA (co-editor) is a Contracted Researcher at the University of Minho (Braga, Portugal) at the Landscape, Heritage and Territory Laboratory (Lab2PT) and was formerly Junior Researcher at CITCEM, Faculty of Arts and Humanities, University of Porto (DL57/2016/CP1367/CT0005). She received her PhD in 2012 at the University of Porto and the École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales, Paris, with a thesis on Medieval Portuguese textile production, published as O Pano da Terra: Produção têxtil em Portugal nos finais da Idade Média (Cloth from this land: Textile production in Portugal in the late Middle Ages) (Porto: U. Porto Edições, 2014). Specializing in Medieval Economic History, she has published papers on textile production, trade and consumption. Currently she is developing an individual project entitled ‘Wor(l)ds of Cultural Diversity: Dress and Textiles in Portugal, 13th–15th centuries’ (2020.02528.CEECIND). She is also the Co-PI of the collective project MedCrafts: ‘Crafts regulation in Portugal in the Late Middle Ages, 14th–15th centuries’ (PTDC/HAR-HIS/31427/2017). Both projects are funded by the Portuguese Foundation for Science and Technology (FCT). ESPERANÇA VALLS PUJOL is a postdoctoral research associate at the Institut d’Estudis Món Juïc, Barcelona, working on the Judaism Catalan Studies programme with the subject ‘Economic and Lending Activity of the Catalan and Provençal Jews: History, Impacts and Repercussions’. In recent years, she has worked at the Historical Archive of Girona in the classification, study and interpretation of the Hebrew manuscripts found in the notarial book bindings of this archive. Her

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main area of research focuses on the Jewish Catalan world, with a special focus on science, Jewish loans, Hebrew Catalan manuscripts and archival research and she has published and edited several studies on these issues. She also devotes part of her academic work to editing (Collections Cum Laude, Mirades, Eduard Feliu, Flaixos Juïcs and Bet Guenazim from the IMJ). She has also organised international conferences concerning the study of Judaism in the territories of Catalan language, cultural events and courses of various kinds. She participates in some research projects, such as the European project Books within Books (Hebrew Fragments in European Libraries) of École Practique des Hautes Études (EPHE), Xarxa de Calls of Institut Món Juïc and University of Barcelona for which she is a scientific coordinator.

Acknowledgements The editors gratefully acknowledge grants towards publication of images from the Cátedra de Estudos Sefarditas Alberto Benveniste, Faculty of Arts of the University of Lisbon, with thanks to its director, Professor Maria de Fátima Reis, and its patrons, Monique and Serge Benveniste; and from the Pasold Research Fund.

Introduction María Barrigón, Naḥum Ben-Yehuda, Gale R. Owen-Crocker and Joana Sequeira

T

his book was inspired by a successful session at the Leeds International Medieval Congress of 2017 titled ‘Dressing Otherness – Garments as Expressions of Diverse Ethnicity in Medieval Iberia’. Featured speakers were Maria Dolores Serrano-Niza, Joana Isabel Sequeira and María Barrigón. The session covered: Andalusi garments and trousseaux bearing Castilian names; the roles of Jews and Muslims in Portuguese textile production and their respective cultural and technical legacies; and the role and implications of Castilian royal textile grave-goods and their Arabic ornamentation, cloths imported from the Islamic Hispanic territory of al-Andalus. The session had been organized by Naḥum Ben-Yehuda, an Israeli scholar with a longstanding interest in textiles, especially in rabbinical sources and Jewish garments. The session was sponsored by DISTAFF (Discussion, Interpretation and Study of Textile Arts, Fabrics and Fashion),1 and its co-founder, Gale Owen-Crocker, attended the ‘Medieval Iberia’ session. Greatly impressed both by the quality of the papers and the innovative nature of the session’s topic, Gale suggested to Naḥum Ben-Yehuda that there was scope for a book-length treatment of the dress and textiles of multicultural, medieval Iberia. The speakers were enthusiastic about the idea and expressed their eagerness to produce a publication in English. While this seemed desirable in that it would bring this little-appreciated topic to the wider English-speaking audience, it inevitably complicated the compilation of the book since all the contributors would be non-native speakers of English. With María Barrigón as editor on Spanish 1

An umbrella organization founded by Robin Netherton and Gale Owen-Crocker to sponsor sessions on dress and textiles at the annual international congresses at Kalamazoo, Western Michigan University, USA and Leeds University, UK. DISTAFF is affiliated with the annual journal Medieval Clothing and Textiles and the book series Medieval and Renaissance Clothing and Textiles.

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topics, Joana Sequeira on Portuguese, Naḥum Ben-Yehuda as co-ordinator and Gale Owen-Crocker roped in as a native English speaker and for her experience in publishing books on textiles in English, the group set about establishing the parameters of the project and finding suitable experts to write on the topics they deemed necessary for an interdisciplinary study. A team of scholars was assembled, and a meeting at the Leeds Congress of 2018, which included Caroline Palmer, Editorial Director of publisher Boydell & Brewer Ltd, the editors established a timetable to include a conference, where all the authors would present short versions of their contributions, in English, and would join in discussion about the volume in general. The conference, titled ‘Dress and Textiles in Multicultural Medieval Iberia’, was held on 13–14 June 2019 at the University of Porto, generously hosted by CITCEM (Centro de Investigação Transdisciplinar ‘Cultura, Espaço e Memória’, Centre for Transdisciplinary Research ‘Culture, Space and Memory), in the Faculty of Arts and Humanities. There were 15 speakers and a wide public audience composed of students, teachers, researchers and members of historical re-enactment societies. Lively discussion followed each paper and in a meeting of editors and speakers at the close of the conference, difficulties of terminology were discussed, lacunae identified and remedies suggested. In assembling a suitable team of experts, the editors’ procedure was necessarily coloured by work on the subject during the 20th century and the beginning of the 21st. The academic approach to the study of textiles in the Iberian Peninsula was triggered by the discovery, study and initial display of the collection of medieval textiles from the abbey church of Las Huelgas in Burgos (Spain). This collection consists of more than 200 medieval textile grave-goods from members of the royal family of Castile recovered between 1942 and 1944. It encompasses different garments, pillows and coffin linings that provide an unparalleled collection of textiles dating from very late in the 12th century to the first decades of the 14th. The more impressive and well preserved items have been exhibited in a museum located in the nunnery since 1949. Immediately after its discovery, the collection was studied by the famous historian Manuel Gómez-Moreno.2 He classified the textiles into several series according to their origin, form or technique. He established the following groups: classical Arab series, Mudejar series, Christian series, twill series, oriental series and, lastly, striped fabrics, plain fabrics, cendales, ribbons, braids, embroideries and jewels. His work is essential reading for anyone interested in studying not only this collection but medieval Spanish textiles in general. This book opened a field for subsequent studies, and its influence extends to the present day. In the subsequent decades studies around the textile fields were produced, focusing on different aspects such as industry, clothing and decorative motifs. Mainly from the perspectives of History or Art, they largely focused on specific kingdoms or cultures, trying to fill the void of knowledge. Another key study 2

Manuel Gómez-Moreno, El panteón real de las Huelgas de Burgos (Madrid: CSIC, 1946).

Int r odu cti o n 3

was carried out by a team led by Socorro Mantilla de los Ríos,3 producing for the first time a book explaining not only the restoration processes carried out on the textile grave-goods of Archbishop Jiménez de Rada (d. 1247) recovered from his tomb in the Convent of Santa Maria de Huerta, Soria, in 1968, but also publishing the complete technical aspects involved in the manufacture of these textiles. Subsequent discoveries from elite burials in other places have provided an important corpus of textiles, mostly Islamic silks. These patterned, woven silks have caught the imagination of the English-speaking world, including as they do rare survivals of medieval secular garments which testify to the dress fashions of their time and place;4 ecclesiastical vestments; and many fragments. They have been discussed as textile artworks in relation to Islamic architecture and artworks in other media, and as a cultural phenomenon which crossed religious and geographical boundaries.5 During the first decades of the 21st century, scholars have been quite active in the field of Iberian textile and costume history and have published some important collective works that have contributed to a better knowledge of the Iberian situation, demonstrating the uniqueness of its medieval material culture. Such is the case of two recent books that attribute to the Mediterranean the role of a central axis, showing how the cultural interchange in that space sponsored a common textile culture.6 This idea of global circulation of textiles and techniques is also the basis of the volume organised by Ricardo Franch and Germán Navarro on the silk routes between Spain and Portugal, which is actually a sequel to another book on the same subject published 20 years earlier.7 Both volumes provide state-of3 4

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Las vestiduras pontificales del arzobispo Jiménez de Rada, siglo XIII: su estudio y restauración (Madrid: Instituto de Conservación y Restauración de Bienes Culturales 1995). Elizabeth Coatsworth and Gale R. Owen-Crocker, Clothing the Past: Clothing the Past: surviving garments from early medieval to early modern western Europe (Leiden and Boston: Brill, 2018), Chapters 1.7, 2.6, 5.1–4. Focusing on textile literature in English: Cristina Partearroyo, ‘Almoravid and Almohad textiles’, in Al-Andalus: the Art of Islamic Spain, ed. by Jerrilyn D. Dodds (New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1992), pp. 105–13; also Catalogue pp. 224–31, 318–45; Marilyn Jenkins, ‘Al-Andalus, crucible of the Mediterranean’, in The Art of Medieval Spain AD 500– 1200, The Metropolitan Museum of Art (New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1993), pp. 73–109; Louise W. Mackie, Symbols of Power. Luxury Textiles from Islamic Lands, 7th–21st Century (Cleveland, OH: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 2015). Patricia L. Baker, Islamic Textiles (London: British Museum Press, 1995), though not confined to Iberia or the medieval period, gives a wealth of information on Islamic silks, the introduction, cultivation and politics of silk, as well as on design, calligraphy on textiles and weave structures. The hidden life of textiles in the Medieval and Early Modern Mediterranean: contexts and crosscultural encounters in the Islamic, Latinate and Eastern Christian Worlds, ed. by Nikolaos Vryzidis (Turnhout: Brepols, 2020); Arte y producción textil en el Mediterráneo medieval, ed. by Laura Rodríguez Peinado and Francisco García García (Madrid: Ediciones Polifemo, 2019). Las rutas de la seda en la historia de España y Portugal, ed. by Ricardo Franch Benavent and Germán Navarro Espinach (Valencia: Publicacions de la Universitat de València, 2017); España y Portugal en las rutas de la seda. Diez siglos de producción y comercio entre Oriente y Occidente, ed.

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the-art studies on the history of silk production and trade in Iberia, exploring the concept of the ancient ‘Silk Route’ and applying it to various historical periods, during and after the Age of Discovery. The concept of cross-cultural exchange has been a feature of the studies of Iberian textiles, as already demonstrated in a collective work from 2001, edited by Manuela Marín, focused on Antiquity and the early medieval period, which addresses the symbolic value of costume and fabric, identifying similarities and differences between the Christian and Islamic cultures.8 Even specific collections of medieval textiles and objects, like the treasury of San Isidoro, have been studied from the perspective of the cross-cultural environment that characterizes the Iberian Peninsula in the Middle Ages.9 The present volume was designed to take the concepts of multiculturalism and inter-culturalism a little further, by offering a cohesive work which presents a specific topic from various viewpoints. As a rule, the chapters focus on geographical regions or cultural groups. The studies range over types of clothing, the textile industry and its commerce, usage of textile products, technical characterization of materials, precious textiles (and their respective court culture) and commonplace ones and different ethnicities, as well as nomenclature and uses. Balance between kingdoms, ethnicities and topics has been sought. Since medieval Iberia, especially in the textile field, has received very little treatment in the English language other than Art Historical approaches to luxurious Andalusi silks, this book seeks to fill that void, including not only the Islamic lands, and the Crowns of Castile and Aragon, but also important Iberian territories such as Portugal and Navarre. Textiles are therefore studied here from multi- and inter-cultural approaches as well as from a range of methodologies to gain a better understanding of how they were produced and how they functioned in their own cultural context. Aspects of Christian, Islamic and Jewish cultures are presented, as well as different perspectives from Social and Economic History, and Philology, in order to explore the materiality of the industries, the names of the textiles and the uses of textiles and garments. The intent is to provide deep insights into textile and garment culture of the Iberian Peninsula in the Late Middle Ages, particularly during the 13th and 14th centuries – a period that has received sparse attention from historians. To achieve this goal, the editors felt that essays about the history of collections of textiles preserved or descriptions of textiles would be insufficient; rather the chosen focus rests on a critical historical interpretation of the cultural environment,

by Comisión Española de la Ruta de la Seda (Barcelona: Universitat de Barcelona Publicacions, 1996). 8 Tejer y vestir: de la Antigüedad al Islam, ed. by Manuela Marín Niño (Madrid: Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas, 2001). 9 The medieval Iberian treasury in the context of cultural interchange, ed. by Therese Martin (Leiden and Boston: Brill, 2020).

Int r odu cti o n 5

production and uses of these garments, textiles and fibres, using artworks for purposes of illustration. The sovereign states of present-day Europe are, to a large extent, modern creations. Though Portugal has enjoyed unusual continuity, surviving as a kingdom from the 12th to the early 20th century, and, now a republic, remains a nation state today, the area we now call ‘Spain’ has a complex history of separate Christian kingdoms, variously united at different times by alliances and royal marriages or in opposition to one another, in various states of dominance and subordination at different times; and of Islamic states, united by religion and culture rather than geopolitics, expanding and ebbing in territorial terms in the course of centuries. The reader is therefore presented with a historical and contextualising opening chapter, quite independent of textile issues. This contribution, ‘From the Five Kingdoms to the Hispanic Monarchy: Political Structures, Ideology and Historical Development in the Medieval Iberian Peninsula (1157–1504)’ by David Nogales Rincón, sets the cultural and political background for the studies of textiles. Acknowledging that the foundations of the later religious and cultural map are to be found in the incursion, in 711, of Muslim people into the, then declining, Visigothic ‘Kingdom of Toledo’, the author examines both the interactions between the Islamic and Christian peoples in the Iberian peninsula throughout the High and Later Middle Ages and the changing patterns of alliances and regroupings among the Christian kingdoms which culminated in the Catholic Monarchy of the late 15th and early 16th centuries. The chapter introduces important concepts such as the ‘Crowns’ of Aragon and Castile, the Cortes, the 4th Lateran Council’s pronouncements on Jewish dress and the transmission of intellectual and cultural ideas from the Muslim states to the Christian, which recur throughout the book. Chapter 2, by María Barrigón, ‘Textile Techniques in the Iberian Peninsula (Thirteenth to Fourteenth Centuries)’, establishes the fibres and dyestuffs available to Iberian craft workers and the weaving techniques employed. A detailed study of techniques is related specifically to surviving textiles, mostly luxury items made of silk, many of them recovered from elite burials, which survive in museums and galleries, or in the collections of Christian establishments. Chapter 3, ‘Cloth Trade in the Iberian Kingdoms during the Late Middle Ages’ by Máximo Diago Hernando, utilizes documentary evidence to examine the economic history of the textile trade throughout Iberia from the 12th to 15th centuries, explaining the fluctuating nature of native production and importation in terms of political and military circumstances. It includes details of the cloths traded, both higher and lower quality, for a population from elite to humble, and of the roles of merchants in importing both by sea and land, and trading within the Peninsula in shops and fairs. Germán Navarro Espinach’s paper ‘Textiles in the Crown of Aragon: Production, Commerce, Consumption’ (Chapter 4) examines the textile industry in Aragon, Catalonia, Valencia and Majorca, the four largest states of the 12th- to 16th-­ century entity known as the ‘Crown of Aragon’. Using documentary evidence

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for production and trade, including close attention to linguistic evidence for the names of cloths, the author traces the rise of the native industries associated with wool, first influenced by the south of France, which became the single most important economic factor in the realm; and the manufacture of silk, originating in Islamic territories, practised by many Jewish artisans in the 13th and 14th centuries and the making of velvet in the 14th and 15th centuries, inspired by the Italian velvet industry. The roles of cotton, hemp and linen fabrics, though less important economically, are also acknowledged. The chapter pays particular attention to the organisation of the workforce, and to the dress and furnishing products which were made from the fabrics. In ‘The Textile Industry in al-Andalus’ (Chapter 5) Adela Fábregas demonstrates evidence from geographers, chroniclers, religious legal texts, marketplace regulations, land registers, agronomical works, correspondence of merchants and royal court records for the production, processing, marketing and export of textiles in medieval al-Andalus. The chapter includes the changes in the countryside, as mulberry trees and cotton were introduced and dye plants were intensively cultivated to feed the textile industry, as well as the industrialisation of towns devoted to silk production. Chapter 6, Joana Sequeira’s ‘Flax, Wool and Silk: Textile Industries in Medieval Portugal’, uses documentary sources, largely non-literary, to study the textile production of medieval Portugal, redressing the imbalance of previous scholarship which has largely focused on imported cloth. The chapter considers the geographical distribution of textile production, manufacture, the terminology applied to cloths, and the usage, both internally and abroad, of Portugueseproduced textiles, which were not of luxury quality, but widely used, utilitarian clothing and furnishing fabrics. Chapter 7, ‘Dress as a Language: A Survey of Arabic texts from al-Andalus’ by Manuela Marín, seeks to establish, from Arabic written texts, how the inhabitants of al-Andalus dressed. She identifies the importance of dress as a social code, which, despite some cultural cross-dressing, served to indicate ethnic identity, and despite occasional transvestism for purposes of disguise or entertainment, strongly marked gender identity. It also demonstrated social standing, the difference between the free and the enslaved, and certain professions, such as that of the scholar. The Arabic/Muslim theme is continued in the next two chapters. The late Maria Filomena Lopes de Barros’s ‘Muslim Dress in Medieval Portugal: Textual Evidence in the Context of the Iberian Peninsula’ (Chapter 8) demonstrates that while Portugal, after the 4th Lateran Council of 1215, shared with the rest of the Iberian peninsula the desire to establish through dress a Christian identity, a res publica christiana, which excluded the ‘other’ (Muslim or Jew), in Portugal this was achieved by making mandatory clothing which was already traditionally Muslim (as well as the intermittent imposition of a Moorish badge). Thus, although dress law was subject to negotiation (as when sleeves, or closed garments, were impractical for work), Portuguese (male) Muslims established a visual Moorishness,

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where, as far as outer garments at least were concerned, the body was concealed by voluminous clothing. Women are largely unmentioned in the documentary sources. In Chapter 9, ‘Medieval Castilian Garments and their Arabic Names’, Dolores Serrano-Niza discusses the imitation of Andalusi dress and textiles in Castilian culture. Focusing on Arab-Islamic garment terms which were loaned into Castilian Spanish, but ultimately discontinued, she examines the contexts in which the words are documented according to 15th- and 16th-century compilations to investigate the nature of the garments, their gendered use and the phenomenon of the same word being used to describe textiles with different functions, both dress and furnishing fabrics. The chapter is illustrated with examples from manuscript illuminations. María Barrigón’s second contribution (Chapter 10) ‘Clothing, Furnishings and Ceremonies at the Castilian Court (c. 1214−c. 1332)’ focuses on the period between the death of King Alfonso VIII (1214) and the coronation of Alfonso XI, using the evidence of material remains of textiles from royal burials as well as surviving documents and artworks. It examines the administrative structure responsible for the maintenance of the royal wardrobe, from chancellor to laundress, and shows how textiles were used to convey the concept of magnificence by both Church and royalty and to convey the unique importance of the monarch. Continuing the theme of court textiles, in ‘Fabrics and Attire at the Court of Navarre in the Second Half of the Fourteenth Century’, (Chapter 11) Merche Osés Urricelqui examines the documentary evidence for the textiles acquired by the Navarre court at the height of its power. Dress and textiles were essential to the system of patronage operated by the monarchs, a system in which gifts were strictly segregated according to social hierarchy, and were a major feature of royal display, an essential ingredient of regal prestige in the courts of Europe at this time. The volume concludes with three papers on Jewish matters. In Chapter 12, ‘Textile Production and Jewish Clothing in the Iberian Peninsula: Characteristics, Customs and Differences between Catalan and Other Jewish Communities’, Esperança Valls Pujol explains that certain Jewish garments were required by biblical command, but otherwise Jews dressed in the same way as their non-Jewish contemporaries, except for ways in which their appearance was regulated by the Christian or Arab rulers of the Iberian kingdoms in which they lived. The chapter continues with a detailed description of the garments of the Jews, drawn from documentary sources, mostly notarial, the limited depictions in art, and the evidence of archaeology. Naḥum Ben-Yehuda, in ‘Silk as Reflected in Medieval Iberian Jewish Literature’ (Chapter 13) demonstrates that medieval Jewish writers, and their intended audience, must have been familiar with silk and aspects of its manufacture, since they describe it in detail and mention it often in two contexts – metaphorically in theological matters, and in factual legal (‘halakhic’) applications of various kinds.

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Silk, albeit luxurious, was so much a part of everyday life for them, that they even (inaccurately) reimagined some biblical textiles as silk. Finally, in Chapter 14, ‘The Garment and the Difference: The Attire of Portuguese Jews and New Christians (Conversos) during the Thirteenth to Sixteenth Centuries’, Susana Bastos Mateus first explains the ethnic and religious prejudice against minorities and the provisions of the Fourth Lateran Council (1215) that they should be distinguished by dress from Christians, to avoid interaction (and especially sexual relationships) between Christians and those of other faiths. She examines the distinctive signs that were imposed but also shows how there were many exceptions. Conversion of Portuguese Jews in the latter part of the 15th century removed these visible differences, but suspicion that some conversos remained crypto-Jews led to investigations that they secretly practised Jewish customs, including dressing specially for the Sabbath. Covering a wide range of themes and approaches, that range from materiality to symbolism, this book addresses the production, trade, and consumption of textiles and garments as a whole phenomenon that is influenced by a multi-cultural context which it also helps to perpetuate. Written by some of the top experts in the field, this work allows us to depict more accurately the culture of textile and costume in Medieval Iberia: essentially plural, yet singular in European context.

Part I

The Historical Background/Context

chapter 1

From the Five Kingdoms to the Hispanic Monarchy: Political Structures, Ideology and Historical Development in the Medieval Iberian Peninsula (1157–1504) 1 David Nogales Rincón

I ntroductio n

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etween 1157 and 1504,2 the Iberian Peninsula evolved from a state of fragmentation, with an important Islamic political presence and a multi-religious and multicultural society, to a new panorama that, dominated by the CastilianAragonese block, would lay the foundations at the end of the Middle Ages for the Catholic Hispanic Monarchy in conjunction with the expulsion of religious minorities from the Peninsula. Acknowledgement of the presence of Judaism and particularly of Islam, offering alternative social, political and religious systems,

1

This study is part of the Proyecto de I+D+i PID2020-113794GB-I00 Pacto, negociación y conflicto en la cultura política castellana (1230–1516) funded by the Ministerio de Ciencia e Innovación del Gobierno de España, directed by José Manuel Nieto Soria and Óscar Villarroel González. 2 A chronological frame of reference is provided by the death in 1157 of Alfonso VII, King of Castile and Leon, the event which marked the end of the unified political project known as the Leonese Empire. Queen Isabel I of Castile died in 1504. Her joint reign with her husband King Fernando II of Aragon, had created the Hispanic Monarchy.

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is fundamental to our understanding of the evolution of the Iberian Peninsula in the High and Late Middle Ages.3 In this study, in order to define a guiding theme, we have adopted the perspective of the Christian kingdoms, in consideration of the demographic and territorial influence of these kingdoms during the period analysed. We make this decision notwithstanding the importance in the evolution of al-Andalus4 and Western Islam of the different Islamic formations that arose in the Peninsula between the 12th and 15th centuries.

Th e t e r r i t ori al fram ew ork from a Christian and Isl amic p e r s pecti ve: Hispa n ia / España and al -And al u s The history of the Peninsula in the High (11th to 13th centuries) and Late Middle Ages (14th to 15th centuries) is characterized by the existence of two parallel cultural identities, shaped by the Christian and Muslim perception of the Iberian Peninsula, materialized in the entity of Hispania/España and al-Andalus respectively.5 Hispania/España – a territory that during the medieval period was identified geographically with the Roman Hispania, but was also a cultural and historical community that traced its origins to Roman, Visigothic, and even pre-Roman, 3

Some reference works about global history of the medieval Iberian Peninsula are José Ángel García de Cortázar, La época medieval (Madrid: Alianza, 1988); Thomas F. Glick, From Muslim Fortress to Christian Castle: Social and Cultural Change in Medieval Spain (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1995); Bernard Reilly, The Medieval Spains (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993); Angus MacKay, Spain in the Middle Ages: From Frontier to Empire, 1000–1500 (London: MacMillan, 1977); Joseph F. O’Callaghan, A History of Medieval Spain (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1975); Pierre Bonnassie, Pierre Guichard and Marie-Claude Gerbert, Las Españas medievales (Barcelona: Crítica, 2001); Gabriel Jackson, The Making of Medieval Spain (New York: Harcourt, Brace, Jovanovich, 1972). 4 Al-Andalus, the term used to define the territory of the Peninsula under Islamic rule throughout the Middle Ages, must not be confused with Andalusia, a name derived from the term al-Andalus that serves to designate the lands conquered by the Christians in the valley of the Guadalquivir River in the 13th century (the kingdoms of Seville, Cordoba and Jaen), the distant historical base of the current autonomous community of Andalusia; Manuel González Jiménez, Andalucía a debate (Seville: Universidad de Sevilla, 1996), pp. 16–19. 5 In this chapter the term ‘Spain’ (España) will be used consistently from the perspective of its meaning in medieval times, which is distinctly different from contemporary notions of nation-state that emerged in the 19th century. On the concept of Hispania/España in the Middle Ages, see Luis González Antón, España y las Españas (Madrid: Alianza Editorial, 1998), pp. 78–142; José Antonio Maravall, El concepto de España en la Edad Media (Madrid: Instituto de Estudios Políticos, 1964); Carlos de Ayala Martínez, ‘Realidad y percepción de Hispania en la Edad Media’, eHumanista: Journal of Iberian Studies, 37 (2017), 206–31. On the concept of al-Andalus, the following are interesting: Joaquín Vallvé Bermejo, ‘Al-Andalus como España’, in España. Reflexiones sobre el ser de España (Madrid: Real Academia de la Historia, 1998), pp. 77–94; Pedro Chalmeta, Invasión e islamización (Madrid: Editorial Mapfre, 1994), pp. 22–26.



Pol itic al St r uct ur es, Ideology an d Hi s to ri c a l Devel o pm en t 1 3

times – gave the different medieval Christian kingdoms a common awareness capable of articulating some feelings of identity. Far from being uniform, this awareness, according to Miguel Ángel Ladero Quesada, took on different manifestations, depending on the era, an individual’s social position and, above all, on the different perceptions of territory established during the historical genesis of each area.6 Furthermore, it is important to bear in mind that this awareness of forming part of a common cultural and historical community was compatible with the political diversity of the Peninsula – an awareness of diversity that would eventually lead to the expression las Españas (‘the Spains’), that sometimes also evoked the old administrative divisions of Roman Hispania7 – and with the subjective identity of belonging to the different Christian kingdoms. This shared identity manifested itself in various common projects, such as the joint military campaigns led by the Christian kingdoms against Islam, the tendency to formalise royal marriage links between the Iberian kingdoms, and the extensive cultural exchange (circulation of legal and historiographical works, dissemination of Castilian as lingua franca) between the peninsular kingdoms.8 In this context, the image of Hispania/España would at times be used to try to achieve a political hegemony over the Peninsula. A good example of this is the imperialism of the kingdom of Leon, which reached its peak with Alfonso VI (r. 1065–1109) and Alfonso VII (r. 1126–1157) adopting the title of Imperator totius Hispaniae (‘Emperor of all Spain’), or the tendency of 13th-century Western Castilian-Leonese chroniclers to identify Hispania/España with Castile.9 Al-Andalus constituted an important alternative to this idea of a Christian Hispania/España. This notion of al-Andalus, in place since at least 716, was the particular expression of the Islamic community or Ummah in the Peninsula. This importance of the Ummah explains the secondary position (i.e., not fundamental) of the territorial notion of al-Andalus, to the extent that the Ummah itself 6

Miguel Ángel Ladero Quesada, ‘Unidad y diversidad en la España medieval. En torno a las ideas de nación, patria y estado’, in Fundamentos medievales de los particularismos hispánicos. IX Congreso de Estudios Medievales (León: Fundación Sánchez Albornoz, 2005), pp. 17–39 (p. 24). 7 Julio Valdeón Baruque, Las raíces medievales de España (Madrid: Real Academia de la Historia, 2002), pp. 44–45. 8 For some references of interest see Isabel de Barros Dias, ‘Cronística alfonsina modelada em português: um caso de recepção activa’, Hispania. Revista Española de Historia, 227 (2007), 899–928; Coloma Lleal, El castellano del siglo XV en la Corona de Aragón (Zaragoza: Institución Fernando el Católico, 1997); Isabel Beceiro Pita, ‘Notas sobre la influencia de Las Siete Partidas en el reino portugués’, in Os reinos ibéricos na Idade Média: livro de homenagem ao professor doutor Humberto Carlos Baquero Moreno, ed. by Luis Adão da Fonseca, Luis Carlos Amaral and Maria Fernanda Ferreira Santos, 3 vols (Porto: Livraria Civilização Editora, 2003), I, 487–92; Manuel García Fernández, Portugal, Aragón, Castilla: alianzas dinásticas y relaciones diplomáticas (1297–1357) (Seville: Universidad de Sevilla, 2008). 9 Hélène Sirantoine, ‘Imperator Hispaniae’. Les idéologies impériales dans le royaume de León (IXe– XIIe siècles) (Madrid: Casa de Velázquez, 2012); Ayala Martínez, Realidad, pp. 212–22.

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would define the territorial extension of al-Andalus.10 This is why, in later times, the Nazari emirs continued to use the title sovereigns of al-Andalus, despite the small size of their kingdom.11 These territorial perceptions, according to Felipe Maíllo Salgado, originated with the Bedouins, whose identity was based on the links between their corresponding lineages and not on a specific territory they considered their homeland.12

Th e peni nsular k i ng do ms in co nte xt: b e t w een th e Lati n W est and the Maghre b The aforementioned period was marked by a tendency, beginning in the 11th century, that would deepen the cultural differences between the Christian and Andalusi spheres. In this sense, on one hand, the feudal kingdoms were gradually incorporated into western Christianity in a process similar to Europeanisation, whilst on the other hand, al-Andalus became part of the North African Almoravid (1086–1145) and Almohad (1145–1231) empires, in a process of Africanisation. Although these labels of Europeanisation and Africanisation simplify the complex historical processes taking place, it is safe to say that from this moment religious identities were strengthened in both the Christian and Andalusi spheres. This process would have an important symbolic manifestation in the diffusion of the images of the crusade and the Jihad. In parallel to this, both territories interweave more closely with the historical dynamics of their corresponding geohistorical regions: the Latin West and the Maghreb. Despite their distinctness, the Hispanic-Christian societies in the High and Late Middle Ages, according to Miguel Ángel Ladero Quesada and Francisco García Fitz, clearly adhered to the Latin European model.13 Therefore, the evolution of Iberian Christian societies must be analysed – without ignoring their peculiarities resulting from their contact with Islamic or Jewish cultures – in terms of the evolutionary dynamic of the medieval West: political and social (feudalism, expansion starting in the 11th century, crisis in the 14th century, the genesis of the modern 10 On this issue, see: Mª Jesús Viguera Molins, ‘Al-Ándalus y España’, in Las Españas medievales,

ed. by Julio Valdeón Baruque (Valladolid: Universidad de Valladolid, 1999), pp. 95–112; Chalmeta, Invasión, pp. 22–26. 11 Vallvé Bermejo, ‘Al-Andalus’, p. 77. 12 Felipe Maíllo Salgado, ¿Por qué desapareció al-Ándalus? (Buenos Aires: Editorial Cálamo de Sumer, 1997), pp. 27–29. 13 Miguel Ángel Ladero Quesada, ‘España: reinos y señoríos medievales’, in Lecturas sobre la España histórica (Madrid: Real Academia de la Historia, 1998), pp. 11–69 (p. 42); Francisco García Fitz, ‘Las minorías religiosas y la tolerancia en la Edad Media hispánica, ¿mito o realidad?’, in Tolerancia y convivencia étnico-religiosa en la península ibérica durante la Edad Media. III Jornadas de cultura islámica, ed. by Alejandro García Sanjuán (Huelva: Universidad de Huelva, 2003), pp. 13–56 (p. 43).



Pol itic al St r uct ur es, Ideology an d Hi s to ri c a l Devel o pm en t 1 5

State), religious (adoption of the Roman liturgy in the framework of the Gregorian Reform, dissemination of the Cluniac or Cistercian orders) and cultural trends (university, scholastic philosophy). These processes were driven, among other things, by cultural exchanges between royal courts, the presence in the Peninsula of European religious orders, Frankish emigration to the Christian kingdoms, contact with the papal curia and the role of the Pilgrimage route Camino de Santiago (Way of St James) as a facilitator of cultural exchange.14 In the case of al-Andalus, the main phenomenon influencing this process was the aforementioned inclusion of the already orientalised and Arabised al-Andalus within a Moorish-Maghrebian-Andalusi unit that would survive for many decades. Firstly, this was due to the incorporation of al-Andalus into the Almoravid and Almohad empires, and later, resulted from the close military, economic and cultural ties established between the Emirate of Granada and the Marinid dynasty of the Maghreb.15

C ha r a c t e r i sti cs of peni nsular histo ry: a f ro ntie r so cie ty The history of the Iberian Peninsula is partially marked by an event that would, in the long term, be fundamental to our understanding of the later medieval situation: the entry into, in 711, and consolidation of Islam in Iberia, and its permanence there for nearly eight hundred years. This year marks the first contact between two societies: the (Christian) Visigoths, in decline, and the Arab-Muslim society in the process of consolidation and expansion.16 The complex relationship between Islamic and Christian political formations cannot be addressed here, but it is sufficient to say that it goes beyond a simple confrontation between two opposing concepts of reality. This relationship was not stable over time but was subject to the construction of the respective identities of 14 In this respect see Jean Gautier Dalché, ‘La cristiandad europea: el Camino de Santiago’, in Las

Españas medievales, pp. 141–58; José Manuel Nieto Soria, ‘Hispania y Europa’, in Año mil, año dos mil: dos milenios en la historia de España, ed. by Luis Antonio Ribot García, Julio Valdeón Baruque and Ramón Villares, 2 vols (Madrid: Sociedad Estatal España Nuevo Milenio, 2001), II, 63–80; Juan Pablo Rubio Sadia, ‘Los mozárabes frente al rito romano: balance historiográfico de una relación polémica’, Espacio, Tiempo y Forma. Serie III, Historia Medieval, 31 (2018), 619–40. 15 María Jesús Viguera Molins, ‘Al-Andalus y el Magreb’, in Triángulo de al-Andalus., ed. by Fundación El Legado Andalusí (Granada: Fundación El Legado Andalusí, 2003), pp. 29–37; Francisco Vidal Castro, ‘Nazaríes y meriníes, caminos entrecruzados: al-Andalus y el Magreb Al-Aqsà (“Marruecos”), siglos XIII–XV’, in Al-Andalus y el norte de África: relaciones e influencias, ed. by Pablo José Beneito Arias and Fátima Roldán Castro (Seville: Fundación El Monte, 2004), pp. 271–305. On the arabisation and orientalisation of al-Andalus during the Umayyad emirate (756–929) and caliphate (929–1031), we follow the terminology adopted in Pierre Guichard, Esplendor y fragilidad de Al-Andalus (Granada: Universidad de Granada, El Legado Andalusí, 2015), pp. 74–78. 16 Chalmeta, Invasión, p. 76; García Sanjuán, La conquista, p. 446.

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each formation, and to the balance of power between the two. This relationship was marked by a factor that could be considered, with some exceptions, as a constant: their condition as frontier societies. This frontier between the Islamic and Christian political formations changed as the latter advanced towards the south, until it was ultimately stabilised in the 13th century with the formation of the frontier par excellence between Castile and the Emirate of Granada, known significantly as la Frontera (‘the Frontier’). From the perspective of al-Andalus, this particular frontier awareness was manifested in the perception of al-Andalus as a privileged area for ribat – a military outpost and spiritual retreat – to the point of being considered, in the Islamic religious mentality, as one of the gates to Paradise.17 However, unlike Christian strongholds, al-Andalus showed no territorial ambitions or any desire to involve society as a whole in border defence. This led Julián Clemente Ramos to conclude that, in the case of al-Andalus, it would be better to talk about the existence of border structures rather than frontier societies.18 From the Christian perspective, the existence of the frontier determined the development of features specific to Christian societies in Iberia at the military, institutional, legal and cultural level. Among these features we could mention: a highly militarised society, which raised a caballeria popular or urban cavalry19 and established an economy focused on the capture of war booty;20 the appearance of Hispanic military orders (Calatrava, Santiago or Alcántara)21 that would play an important role in colonisation and border control, and were particularly prevalent in the southern sub-plateau;22 or the formulation of frontier laws, in the various meanings of the term.23 In addition, the colonisation and organization of these 17 Francisco García Fitz, ‘Conflictividad bélica entre cristianos y musulmanes en el medievo

18 19 20 21

22 23

hispánico. Perspectivas ideológicas y políticas’, in Conflicto, violencia y criminalidad en Europa y América, ed. by Jose Antonio Munita Loinaz et al. (Bilbao: Universidad del País Vasco, 2004), pp. 39–78 (p. 56). Julián Clemente Ramos, ‘Occidente vs. Islam. Modelos sociales y expansión territorial en la península ibérica (siglos X–XV)’, Arqueología y Territorio Medieval, 25 (2018), 169–94 (p. 181). Carmen Pescador del Hoyo, La caballería popular en León y Castilla (Buenos Aires: Instituto de Historia de España, 1961). María Luisa Ledesma, ‘La sociedad de frontera en Aragón (siglos XII y XIII)’, in Las sociedades de frontera en la España medieval (Zaragoza: Universidad de Zaragoza, 1993), pp. 31–50 (p. 37). These Hispanic military orders would imitate those institutions born in the Holy Land in the decades following the conquest of Jerusalem by the Crusaders (1099), in order to defend Christendom against the infidels. Carlos de Ayala Martínez, Las órdenes militares hispánicas en la Edad Media (siglos XII–XV) (Madrid: Marcial Pons, Latorre Literaria, 2007). These can be interpreted, on the one hand, as the laws passed in the newly colonised territories during the Middle Ages to create certain conditions of freedom that would attract new settlers, and on the other hand, as the late medieval law that regulated border relations between Castile and Granada in times of war and during ceasefires or periods of peace. Ana Maria Barrero García, ‘Los derechos de frontera’, in Las sociedades de frontera en la España



Pol itic al St r uct ur es, Ideology an d Hi s to ri c a l Devel o pm en t 1 7

new territories incorporated into the Christian kingdoms, a process that Spanish historians traditionally call repoblación (‘repopulation’),24 shaped their character, depending on the date of their incorporation and the particular circumstances of their political evolution.25 The formation of this frontier society and the expansion of the Christian kingdoms to the south involved a series of aspects which will be analysed below, mainly from the perspective of the Christian kingdoms, as these are the main drivers of those processes.

Early territorialisation The close links between Christian monarchs and their territory were manifested in various ways: firstly, the importance of the inclusion of populations from conquered territories into new institutional frameworks, in other words, the process historically known as repoblación (‘repopulation’). This is mentioned by Alfonso X of Castile (r. 1252–1284) in Las Siete Partidas, where he states that the king must ‘love his land’ and ‘populate it with good people’,26 and by Maestre Pedro (Pedro Gómez Barroso the Elder?, c. 1296–1348) in the Libro del consejo e de los consejeros who points out that one of the aims of the monarchy is ‘to populate barren lands’.27 Secondly, is the importance of the notion of territorial expansion being the main mission of kings, as expressed by Fernando III of Castile (r. 1217–1252) to his son, the future Alfonso X, shortly before his death: ‘if you win more [lands], you will be better than me’,28 or Maestre Pedro’s statement that ‘making good conquests’ is one of the main objectives of royal rulers.29 Thirdly and finally, is the early emphasis placed on the notion of ruling over the territory, embodied in the idea that the monarch exercises his power over particular territories, and not over

24

25 26

27 28 29

medieval, pp. 69–80; and Pedro Andrés Porras Arboledas, ‘El derecho de frontera durante la Baja Edad Media: la regulación de las relaciones fronterizas en tiempo de treguas y de guerra’, in Estudios dedicados a la memoria del profesor L.M. Díez de Salazar Fernández, ed. by Maria Rosa Ayerbe Iríbar, 2 vols (Bilbao: Universidad del País Vasco, 1992), I, 261–88. La reconquista y repoblación de los reinos hispánicos. Estado de la cuestión de los últimos cuarenta años. V Asamblea General de la Sociedad Española de Estudios Medievales (Zaragoza: Diputación General de Aragón, 1991); Salvador de Moxó, Repoblación y sociedad en la España cristiana medieval (Madrid: Rialp, 1979). Miguel Ángel Ladero Quedada, La formación medieval de España (Madrid: Alianza Editorial, 2017), p. 16. ‘es en fazer la poblar de buena gente’, Alfonso X, Las Siete Partidas, Partida II, Título XI, Ley I in Partida segunda de Alfonso X el Sabio, ed. by Aurora Juárez Blanquer and Antonio Rubio Flores (Granada: Impredisur, 1991), p. 106. ‘poblar las tierras yermas’, Maestre Pedro, Libro del consejo e de los consejeros, ed. by Barry Taylor (San Millán de la Cogolla: Cilengua, 2014), p. 196. ‘ganares por ti más [tierras], eres meior que yo’; Primera Crónica General de España, ed. by Ramón Menéndez Pidal (Madrid: Editorial Gredos, 1977), II, 773. ‘fazer buenas conquistas’, Taylor, Maestre Pedro Libro del consejo, p. 196.

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human populations. This process, which Faustino Menéndez Pidal dates to the beginning of the 10th century, was evidenced by the long titles adopted by some Christian kings, naming each individual kingdom and territories over which they reigned,30 or the designation of the Iberian Peninsula as Hispania/España, instead of naming it after a particular population.31 This process is clearly visible throughout the 12th and 13th centuries, when, in the context of the medieval genesis of the modern State – that is, the absolute monarchy model of state governance that would dominate the European landscape from the 16th to the 18th centuries – the notion of sovereign territorial control arose;32 references to borders multiply;33 notions like the vínculo de naturaleza (‘bond of nature’), that use territoriality to link the king with his subjects, are disseminated;34 new forms of territorial organization are defined as a reflection of the jurisdictional sovereignty of the king;35 and legal localisms are gradually replaced by a territorial legal system.36 The process of incorporating the new territories was sometimes centralised, as in the case the Kingdom of Portugal or the Crown of Castile, where these territories were integrated into a largely homogeneous political and administrative region.37 In other cases, this process occurred under a monarquía compuesta (‘composite monarchy’), as, for example, the Crown of Aragon. In the Aragonese case, the incorporation of new territories was based on the principle of personal union under the sovereignty of a single monarch, in which each component (the 30 For example, the title of the King of Castile ‘rey de Castiella, de Toledo, de León, et de Gallizia,

31 32

33

34

35

36 37

et de Sevillia, et de Córdova, et de Murcia, et de Jahén, et de Baeça, et del Algarve’, Alfonso X, Fuero real, ed. by Azucena Palacios Alcaine (Barcelona: PPU, 1991), p. 2. Faustino Menéndez Pidal de Navascués, ‘Identidades colectivas: pueblos y territorios’, Anuario de Historia del Derecho Español, 77 (2007), 9–18 (pp. 9–10, 12). See a note on the Aragonese case in Jesús Lalinde Abadía, ‘Depuración histórica del concepto de Corona de Aragón’, in La Corona de Aragón y el Mediterráneo, siglos XV–XVI, ed. by Eliseo Serrano Martín and Esteban Sarasa Sánchez (Zaragoza: Institución Fernando el Católico, 1997), pp. 433–60 (p. 437). José Ángel García de Cortázar, ‘De una sociedad de frontera (el Valle del Duero en el siglo X) a una frontera entre sociedades (el Valle del Tajo en el siglo XII)’, in Las sociedades de frontera en la España medieval, pp. 51–68 (pp. 51–52). For a systematic approach to the situation in Castile see Georges Martin, ‘Le concept de naturalité (naturaleza) dans Les Sept parties d’Alphonse X le Sage’, in Construir la identidad en la Edad Media: poder y memoria en la Castilla de los siglos VII a XV, ed. by José Antonio Jara Fuente, Georges Martín and Isabel Alfonso Antón (Cuenca: Ediciones de la Universidad de Castilla-La Mancha, 2010), pp. 145–61. For an example of the situation in Castile see Ignacio Álvarez Borge, Monarquía feudal y organización territorial. Alfoces y merindades en Castilla (siglos X–XIV) (Madrid: Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas, 2003). Enrique Álvarez Cora, ‘La territorialización del derecho (siglos XII–XIII)’, in Compendio de historia del derecho español (Murcia: Diego Marín, 2017, 6th edn), pp. 37–43. Miguel Ángel Ladero Quesada, ‘Las regiones históricas y su articulación política en la Corona de Castilla durante la Baja Edad Media’, En la España Medieval, 15 (1992), 213–47 (pp. 215–26).



Pol itic al St r uct ur es, Ideology an d Hi s to ri c a l Devel o pm en t 1 9

Map 1.1  The Crown of Aragon during the reign of Jaime I of Aragon (1213–1276), drawn by David Nogales Rincón, adapted from José María Monsalvo Antón, Atlas histórico de la España medieval (Madrid: Editorial Síntesis, 2010), p. 203.

Kingdom of Aragon, the Principality of Catalonia and Kingdom of Valencia, as well as the Kingdom of Majorca, except between 1276 and 1349, when it was an independent kingdom) maintained a similar, though independent, political, legal, administrative, economic and institutional identity, with minor differences due to specific economic and social situations (Map 1.1).38 38 José Ángel Sesma Muñoz, La Corona de Aragón. Una introducción crítica (Zaragoza: Caja de

Ahorros de la Inmaculada de Aragón, 2000), pp. 118–19. On the ‘Crown of Aragon’ concept as a historiographical construction disseminated from the 19th century onwards to refer to the kingdoms and lands of the King of Aragon, see Jesús Lalinde Abadía, ‘El significado de Corona de Aragón (contrarréplica)’, Medievalia: Revista de Estudios Medievales, 11 (1994), 31–38; Lalinde Abadía, ‘Depuración histórica’.

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The presence of religious minorities and ethnic-cultural pluralism: tolerance, coexistence? The presence of Muslim populations in the Christian kingdoms of the Iberian Peninsula, known as mudéjares (Mudejars, from the Arabic mudaijan, ‘tributary’), is an important factor in the social, cultural and religious history of the region. These populations were absorbed to a greater or lesser extent by the Christian kingdoms in their advance towards the south. For example, as Miguel Ángel Ladero Quesada points out, large Muslim populations remained in the area of Valencia in the middle decades of the 13th century after the Christian conquest, owing to the shortage of Christian settlers; while in the Balearics, the free Muslim population disappeared, and the islands were completely repopulated by Christian settlers.39 A similar situation occurred in some regions of Castile, such as Andalusia. There, following the defeat of the Mudejar revolt of Andalusia and Murcia (1264–1267), the Muslim population was drastically reduced to a few unevenly distributed enclaves as a result of mass emigration to Granada and, in specific cases, conversion to Christianity. This reduced the Andalusian Mudejar population to a residual minority, concentrated in urban centres of certain importance, such as Cordoba, Seville, Ecija (Seville) or Niebla (Huelva).40 In addition, because of the circumstances of the conquest – the demographic balance between Christian and Muslim populations played an important role – relations between the Christian majority and these Islamic populations varied greatly, as described by Brian A. Catlos in relation to the region of the Ebro River and Valencia.41 The parallel presence of Muslim populations in the Christian kingdoms of the Iberian Peninsula, together with other fundamental factors identified by Enrique Cantera Montenegro,42 could explain the long stay of the second minority population in the Iberian Peninsula, the Jews. This shared experience between Christians, Muslims and Jews forms the basis of the historiographical image of the España de las tres culturas (‘Spain of the three cultures’), based on the theory of the tres castas (‘three castes’) as the origin of Spanish idiosyncrasy, formulated by Americo Castro.43 Different concepts, such as coexistencia or convivencia (‘coexistence’) and

39 Ladero Quesada, ‘España’, pp. 39–40. 40 Manuel González Jiménez, ‘Los mudéjares andaluces: una minoría residual’, Revista de

Occidente, 224 (2000), 67–78 (pp. 73–77).

41 Brian G. Catlos, Vencedores y vencidos. Cristianos y musulmanes de Cataluña y Aragón, 1050–1300

(Valencia: Universitat de València, 2010), pp. 433–34.

42 These include the legal protection facilitated by kings and nobles, or the political-

administrative and financial dependence of the Christian elite on the Jews; Enrique Cantera Montenegro, ‘Judíos medievales. Convivencia y persecución’, in Tópicos y realidades en la Edad Media, I (Madrid: Real Academia de la Historia, 2000), pp. 179–252 (pp. 197, 214). 43 Américo Castro, La realidad histórica de España (México: Porrúa, 1954).



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tolerancia (‘tolerance’), have been used to categorize the relationship between these religious minorities and the Christian societies of the Peninsula.44 Aside from this, recent scholarship has attempted to place the focus on the separate, differentiated cohabitation of these three religions in the same space, with minorities living amidst the Christian majority in a situation of inequality, somewhat like a foreign body that is tolerated for purely pragmatic reasons as a source of labour or tax revenue, or owing to the difficulties of Christian elites in dominating them – because of the demographic imbalance between Christian and Muslim populations – or even in the hope they may eventually be converted to Christianity. This domination of one group over another, typical of Christian feudal societies, would eventually create varying degrees of tension that tended to increase in times of economic difficulties and in conjunction with the rise, at the end of the Middle Ages, of the notion of a religious homogeneous Christian state.45 These tendencies, according to Elena Lourie, gained momentum in the case of the Jews and Muslims because of their propensity to live apart in voluntary isolation from a Christian culture which they shunned.46 Despite this inequality, the multi-religious and multicultural status of the Iberian Christian societies and their contact with al-Andalus shaped the Peninsula as a sphere of transfer of Islamic and Andalusi culture towards the kingdoms in the north of the Peninsula on the one hand, in terms of art (Fig. 1.1), customs, clothing, vocabulary or technology;47 and on the other, to Latin Europe, 44 The terminological issue was addressed in Ana Isabel Carrasco Manchado, De la convivencia a la

exclusión. Imágenes legislativas de mudéjares y moriscos. Siglos XIII–XVII (Madrid: Sílex Ediciones, 2012), pp. 20–23, where the author justified the use of the term ‘hierarchical coexistence’ (convivencia jerarquizada) as opposed to the ‘democratic coexistence’ (convivencia democrática) characteristic of modern societies, in Carrasco Manchado, De la convivencia, p. 26. 45 The issue has been addressed by various authors, such as Vicente Ángel Álvarez Palenzuela, ‘Christians, Muslims and Jews. Convivencia, tolerancia y conflicto’, in Año mil, año dos mil, pp. 275–301, García Fitz, ‘Las minorías’, and Carrasco Manchado, De la convivencia. Some notes on the relationship between the consolidation of the modern State and the reinforcement of Christian identity can be found in Miguel Ángel Motis Dolader, ‘Quiebra de la estructura multiconfesional en la Corona de Aragón y nacimiento del Estado moderno’, in La Corona de Aragón y el Mediterráneo, siglos XV–XVI, pp. 155–230. 46 Elena Lourie, ‘Anatomy of Ambivalence. Muslims under the Crown of Aragon in the Late Thirteenth Century’, in Elena Lourie, Crusade and Colonisation. Muslims, Christians and Jews in Medieval Aragon (Aldershot: Variorum, 1990), pp. 1–77 (p. 76). 47 For some examples see Fernando Martínez Nespral, Un juego de espejos: rasgos mudéjares de la arquitectura y el habitar en la España de los siglos XVI–XVII (Buenos Aires: Nobuko, 2007); Ricardo Córdoba de la Llave, ‘Influencias orientales en la artesanía andaluza de la Baja Edad Media’, in Andalucía entre Oriente y Occidente (1236–1492) (Córdoba: Diputación de Córdoba, 1988), pp. 585– 98; María Martínez Martínez, ‘Influencias islámicas en la indumentaria medieval española’, Estudios sobre Patrimonio, Cultura y Ciencias Medievales, 13–14 (2012), 187–222; Thomas F. Glick, ‘Las transmisión de las técnicas hidráulicas y de regadío del mundo islámico al mundo hispánico’, in Al-Andalus allende el Atlántico, ed. by Mercedes García-Arenal (Paris: Unesco; Granada: El Legado Andalusí, 1997), pp. 222–33; Rafael López Guzmán, Arquitectura mudéjar: del sincretismo medieval a las alternativas hispanoamericanas (Madrid: Cátedra, 2000). The impact

Fig. 1.1  Facade of the palace of Pedro I of Castile in Astudillo (Palencia, Spain) c. 1354–1369. Photo © David Nogales Rincón.



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in terms of intellectual and scientific culture (mathematics, philosophy, astronomy, medicine, zoology) from the East (Persian, Babylonian) and from Antiquity (Greek, Roman).48 This transfer to Latin Europe, as Pierre Guichard suggests, was not so much driven by a free exchange between cultures, as by the pragmatism of Christian intellectuals interested in appropriating Islamic knowledge.49 The dissemination of these manifestations was complex and cannot be reduced to a single channel of influence. In some cases, the direct influence of the Andalusi or Mudejar populations on the Christian kingdoms can be seen. But in others, these influences would be the result of indirect contacts, mainly driven by the Christian elite’s dissemination of a series of artistic interests that were sometimes shared by the political elite of the Mediterranean region.50 Either way, when studying these processes, in line with Guichard, we must avoid the error, pointed out by Francisco García Fitz, of associating cultural exchange with the notion of tolerance or coexistence. This is because cultural exchanges or loans, or even more complex phenomena such as acculturation or cultural symbiosis, do not necessarily imply a prior situation of equality or respect between the parties to this transaction.51 Relations between the Christian majority and minority populations were not only shaped by internal determinants, but also by the global frameworks of Christianity, which help to explain some historical processes, as, for example,

48

49 50

51

of Islamic culture on the Christian kingdoms has been viewed in different ways by historians. Examples can be found in two opposing interpretations of these processes in Claudio Sánchez Albornoz, España, un enigma histórico (Buenos Aires: Editorial Sudamericana, 1956) and Castro, La realidad. Juan Vernet, Lo que Europa debe al Islam de España (Barcelona: Acantilado, 2006). This activity, which dates back to the 10th and 11th centuries, would result in many works being translated, particularly from the middle of the 12th century to the end of the 13th. The translations were primarily carried out in the valley of the Ebro, and particularly Toledo, the site of what has come to be called ‘the School of Translators of Toledo’, even though such an institution never existed. The most prominent translators were, as Pierre Guichard points out, Jews rather than Muslims; Esplendor, p. 247. There are some notes on this issue in Eloy Benito Ruano, ‘Ámbito y ambiente de la Escuela de traductores de Toledo’, Espacio, Tiempo y Forma. Serie III. Historia Medieval, 13 (2000), 13–28 and La Escuela de Traductores de Toledo. Exposición celebrada en la Sinagoga del Tránsito, ed. by Ana María López Álvarez et al. (Toledo: Diputación provincial de Toledo, 1996). Guichard, Esplendor, p. 247. For some examples of these cultural processes see David Nogales Rincón, ‘A la usanza morisca: el modelo cultural islámico y su recepción en la corte real de Castilla’, Ars Longa: Cuadernos de Arte, 27, (2018), 45–64 (pp. 49–50, 58–60); David Nogales Rincón, ‘La monta a la gineta y sus proyecciones caballerescas: de la Frontera de los moros a la corte real de Castilla (siglos XIV– XV)’, Intus-Legere Historia, 13.1 (2019), 37–84 (pp. 51–69); María Judith Feliciano, ‘Medieval Textiles in Iberia: Studies for a New Approach’, in Envisioning Islamic Art and Architecture: Essays in Honor of Renata Holod, ed. by David J. Roxburgh (Leiden: Brill, 2014), pp. 46–65. García Fitz, ‘Las minorías religiosas’, p. 46.

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the expulsion of the Jews from the Iberian Peninsula at the end of the 15th century.52 A good example of this is the change in relations between Christians and Jews following the Fourth Lateran Council (1215), whose Canon 68 demanded that Jews wear distinguishing dress,53 or the tendency to consider the Jews of Castile, Aragon or Portugal, at least from the 12th century onwards, as servants of the king and property of the royal treasury, in line with their legal status in Western and Central Europe.54

The confrontation between Christian and Islamic kingdoms: righteous war and holy war The recurring religious confrontation between Christian and Islamic political entities is an equally important aspect of the evolution of Iberia in the Middle Ages. This was not a permanent, uniform or monolithic confrontation, because Christians and Muslims sometimes formed alliances in order to achieve internal goals.55 Nevertheless, relations between Christians and Muslims during the period analysed were marked by open tension and rivalry sustained over time. This was rather like a guerra tivia (‘cold war’, but literally ‘warm war’), which, in the words of Don Juan Manuel ‘brings neither peace nor honour to the one who engages in it, nor implies that there is goodness or effort in him’.56 In al-Andalus, this confrontation was marked by a particular kind of holy war: the Islamic notion of Jihad (literally ‘struggle’).57 This notion was important from 52 Cf. Asunción Blasco Martínez, ‘Sefarad, otra visión de España’, in Las Españas medievales, pp.

113–40 (pp. 125–27).

53 Ana Echevarría Arsuaga, ‘The Marks of the Other: The Impact of Lateran IV in the Regulations

54 55

56

57

Governing Muslims in the Iberian Peninsula’, in Jews and Muslims under the Fourth Lateran Council, ed. by Marie-Thérèse Champagne and Irven M. Resnick (Turnhout: Brepols, 2018), pp. 183–98. Cantera Montenegro, ‘Judíos medievales’, pp. 201–02. For example, in 1282, a confrontation arose between the Castilian King Alfonso X and his son the Infante Sancho, during the course of which, whilst Alfonso established an alliance with the North African Marinids, Sancho did so with the Emir of Granada, Muhammad II; Francisco García Fitz, ‘Alfonso X y sus relaciones con el Emirato granadino: política y guerra’, Alcanate: Revista de Estudios Alfonsíes, 4 (2004–2005), 35–78 (pp. 74–75). As an additional example, it is also worth considering the alliances that the Emir of Granada, Muhammad XII, known as Boabdil, established at the end of the 15th century with the Catholic Monarchs, in part of the internal civil war against his uncle Muhammad XIII, el-Zagal; Cristóbal Torres Delgado, ‘El reino nazarí de Granada (siglos XIII–XV)’, in La incorporación de Granada a la Corona de Castilla, ed. by Miguel Ángel Ladero Quesada (Granada: Diputación Provincial de Granada, 1993), pp. 747–77 (pp. 776–77). ‘nin trae paz nin da onra al que la faze, nin da a entender que ha en él vondat nin esfuerzo’; Don Juan Manuel, Libro de los Estados, ed. by Ian R. MacPherson and Robert Brian Tate (Madrid: Editorial Castalia, 1991), ch. 79, p. 235. For some differences with respect to the Christian notion of holy war see Jean Flori, Guerra santa, yihad, cruzada. Violencia y religión en el cristianismo y el islam (Granada: Editorial



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the 11th century onwards, in the context of Christian territorial expansion and given the frontier nature of the region, and particularly in the first quarter of the 12th century under the rule of the Almoravids, continuing into Nasrid times.58 In the Christian sphere, this confrontation was guided by a particular ideology, which we could call restauracionista (‘restorationist’) or reconquistadora (‘reconquest’), the result of the confluence of two different ideological traditions. First, the goticismo (‘gothism’) or neogoticismo (‘neogothism’) of the court of Alfonso III of Asturias (866-910), who sought to present this emerging political formation in the north of the Peninsula as heir to the extinct Visigothic Kingdom of Toledo. From these ideas derived its legitimacy to carry out the restauratio (‘restoration’) of the theoretical Visigothic political and ecclesiastical order that had been eradicated after the Islamic conquest of 711.59 Secondly, crusadism, which emanated from the pontificate and was manifested for the first time in the Peninsula with the Crusade of Barbastro (Huesca), sanctioned by Pope Alexander II in 1064.60 Pontifical intervention bolstered the religious dimension of the conflict, hitherto less explicit, and deepened the sacralising elements.61 In this way, both traditions provided ideological support for the expansion of the Christian kingdoms to the south, through a process of military conquest. Thus, this expansionist process was legitimised for both a historical reason (the reintegration of the vanished

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Universidad de Granada; Valencia: Universitat de València, 2004), pp. 273–79. On this topic, see the approach of Reuven Firestone, Jihad: The Origin of Holy War in Islam (New York, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999). Alejandro García Sanjuán, ‘Bases doctrinales y jurídicas del yihad en el derecho islámico clásico (siglos VIII–XIII)’, Clío & Crímen: Revista del Centro de Historia del Crimen de Durango, 6 (2009), 243–77 (p. 265); Rafael G. Peinado Santaella, ‘Frontera, guerra santa y cruzada en la Andalucía medieval’, in Rafael Gerardo Peinado Santaella, Guerra santa, cruzada y yihad en Andalucía y el Reino de Granada (siglos XIII–XV) (Granada: Universidad de Granada, 2017), pp. 3–54 (pp. 41–54). This manifestation, which contained elements of the divine, Old Testament models, and Roman-Visigothic traditions, is studied in detail in Alexander Pierre Bronisch, Reconquista y guerra santa. La concepción de la guerra en la España cristiana desde los visigodos hasta comienzos del siglo XII (Granada: Universidad de Granada, Universidad de Oviedo, Universidad de València, 2006), who adopts the concept of ‘holy war’ (guerra santa); and in Thomas Deswarte, De la destruction à la restauration. L’idéologie du royaume d’Oviedo-León (VIIIe–XIe siècles) (Turnhout: Brepols, 2003), who prefers a more ambiguous characterization of the religious aspect of the phenomenon, putting forward notions such as ‘spiritual regeneration of the kingdom, marked by a strong ascetic ideal’ (‘régénération spirituelle du royaume, marqué par un fort idéal ascétique’). On this particular issue see Manuel González Jiménez, ‘¿Re-conquista? Un estado de la cuestión’, in Tópicos y realidades en la Edad Media, I, pp. 155–78 (pp. 171–72) and Deswarte, De la destruction, p. 325. Carlos de Ayala Martínez, ‘Fernando I y la sacralización de la Reconquista’, Anales de la Universidad de Alicante: Historia Medieval, 17 (2011), 67–115; Carlos Laliena Corbera, ‘Guerra sagrada y poder real en Aragón y Navarra en el transcurso del siglo XI’, in Guerre, pouvoirs et idéologies dans l’Espagne chrétienne aux alentours de l’an mil, ed. by Thomas Deswarte and Philippe Sénac (Turnhout: Brepols, 2005), pp. 107–109.

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Visigothic Kingdom of Toledo, of which the Christian kingdoms declared themselves heirs) and a religious one (the defence of Christianity against Islam), which would permit the Christians to present the conflict, as Garcia Fitz points out, as a righteous and holy war.62 According to Catlos, before the decadence of the Omayyad dynasty and the emergence of the crusade as an ideal, both Christian and Muslim groups considered themselves part of a single society, and marriages between Christians and Muslims were not unknown. However, the diffusion of ‘reconquest’ and Jihad ideology changed the relations between Christians and Muslims.63 Although the expansion of the Christian kingdoms to the south became stabilised in the 13th century, the ‘reconquest’ ideology survived, with variations among the Christian kingdoms of the Peninsula. For example, it was strongly entrenched in the Crown of Castile during the High and Late Middle Ages, reaching its peak during the reign of the Catholic Kings (r. 1474–1516); in the Crown of Aragon up to the 13th century, when the Treaty of Almizra (1244) definitively limited the Aragonese expansion to the south; and in the Kingdom of Portugal up to mid-13th century, with the conquest of Algarve (1249), and particularly after the start of the Joanine Dynasty in 1385.64 The reasons for this can be found in its potential as a means of legitimising the social and political pre-eminence of Christian nobility65 and royalty, who, both in Castile and in Portugal, used the reconquering ideology as a means of strengthening

62 Francisco García Fitz, ‘La Reconquista: un estado de la cuestión’, Clío & Crímen: Revista del

Centro de Historia del Crimen de Durango, 6 (2009), 142–215 (pp. 168–200).

63 Brian A. Catlos, ‘¿Conflicto de civilizaciones o convivencia? Identidad religiosa y realidad política

en la Península Ibérica’, in La Mediterrània de la Corona d’Aragó, segles XIII–XVI & VII Centenari de la Sentència Arbitral de Torrellas, 1304–2004, ed. by Rafael Narbona Vizcaíno, 2 vols (Valencia: Università de Valencia, 2005), II, 1717–29 (pp. 1722–23). In the case of Muslim societies, Maribel Fierro dates this changes to a few decades later, in the 10th century, based on the analysis of an anecdote concerning the Tujibid lord of Calatayud, and there is even clearer evidence of this multifactorial process in the 11th century, in Maribel Fierro Bello, ‘Cosmovisión (religión y cultura) en el Islam andalusí (siglos VIII–XIII)’, in Cristiandad e Islam en la Edad Media hispana, ed. by José Ignacio de la Iglesia Duarte (Logroño: Instituto de Estudios Riojanos, 2008), pp. 31–80 (pp. 36, 42–43). According to Ron Barkai, in contrast, the ‘more extremist’ (más extremistas) attitudes of the Christians towards the Muslims, based on the notion of ‘total war’ (guerra total), did not arise until the military campaigns of the 13th century; Ron Barkai, El enemigo en el espejo. Cristianos y musulmanes en la España medieval (Madrid: Ediciones Rialp, 2007), pp. 281–82. 64 There is general reference to the evolution of the process in the late medieval period in Derek W. Lomax, The Reconquest of Spain (London: Longman, 1978), pp. 160–71. 65 An example of this may be found in José Ramón Díaz de Durana Ortiz de Urbina and Jon Andoni Fernández de Larrea Rojas, ‘El discurso político de los protagonistas de las luchas sociales en el País Vasco al final de la Edad Media’, Annexes des Cahiers de Linguistique et de Civilisation Hispaniques Médiévales, 16.1 (2004), 313–36.



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royal power;66 of legitimising the king’s right to obtain revenue from the Church (for example, the incomes known as tercias reales, décimas and cruzadas);67 or of legitimising the king’s efforts to control local churches.68 A particular element linked to the creation of these legitimacies around the Gothic ideology was the myth of the sangre de los godos (‘blood of the Goths’), which claimed that the Iberian kings, especially the Castilian monarchy, and by extension, the nobility, were direct descendants of the Visigoths. For example, this idea appears in Diego de Valera’s Doctrinal de príncipes addressed to King Fernando the Catholic: ‘You will have the monarchy of all the “Spains” and you will reform the imperial chair of the illustrious blood of the Goths, from whence you come, and which has been scattered and spilled for so long’.69 This myth held considerable symbolic power, as it presented the notion of the purity of blood as an element of legitimacy of the Iberian political elite, culminating at the end of the Middle Ages in the enactment of a law excluding converts (known as cristianos nuevos, literally, ‘new Christians’), that is, Christians descended from Muslims and especially from Jews. These regulations, known as the estatutos de limpieza de sangre (‘statutes of purity of blood’)70 would be, in the opinion of Christian Geulen, one of the earliest manifestations of modern racism.71 These medieval perceptions, aimed at legitimizing Christian elites, have traditionally influenced the interpretation made by historians on the history of the Iberian Peninsula in the Middle Ages. Thus, in historiographic contexts, the concept reconquista (‘reconquest’) has been used to explain the medieval period 66 Good examples in the Christian kingdoms can be found in Ana Echevarría Arsuaga, ‘Enrique

67

68

69

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IV de Castilla, un rey cruzado’, Espacio, tiempo y forma. Serie III, Historia medieval, 17 (2004), 143–56; Fernando Arias Guillén, Guerra y fortalecimiento del poder regio en Castilla: el reinado de Alfonso XI (1312–1350) (Madrid: Ministerio de Defensa, Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas, 2012). The similarity between these systems has been noted by José Manuel Nieto Soria, ‘Las monarquías castellana y portuguesa a fines del medievo: algunas perspectivas para una historia comparativa’, História. Questões e Debates, 37 (2002), 11–36 (p. 21). Two examples of this may be found in Pablo Ortego Rico, ‘Propaganda, fiscalidad e ideal cruzadista durante el reinado de Enrique IV de Castilla’, Hispania Sacra, 141 (2018), 237–66 and Jordi Morelló i Baget, ‘En torno a la disyuntiva décima/subsidio en Castilla y la Corona de Aragón durante la Baja Edad Media’, Hispania: Revista Española de Historia, 257 (2017), 643–71. There is a case study in Jesús Suberbiola Martínez, Real Patronato de Granada. El arzobispo de Talavera, la Iglesia y el Estado Moderno (1486–1516). Estudio y documentos (Granada: Editorial Caja de Ahorros, 1985). ‘avréis la monarchía de todas las Españas e reformaréis la silla inperial de la ínclita sangre de los godos donde venís, que de tantos tienpos acá está esparsida e derramada’; Diego de Valera, ‘Doctrinal de príncipes’, in Prosistas castellanos del siglo XV. I, ed. by Mario Penna (Madrid: Atlas, 1959), pp. 173–202 (p. 173). Teófilo F. Ruiz, Discursos de sangre y parentesco en Castilla durante la Baja Edad media y la época moderna (Santander: Editorial de la Universidad de Cantabria, 2015), while Juan Hernández Franco, Sangre limpia, sangre española. El debate de los estatutos de limpieza (siglos XV–XVII) (Madrid: Cátedra, 2011) is interesting on the issue of blood purity. Christian Geulen, Breve historia del racismo (Madrid: Alianza Editorial, 2010), pp. 17–18, 176.

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in the Peninsula from the Christian perspective, to the extent that, as Miguel Ángel Ladero Quesada points out, it has become a core issue in the interpretation of Spanish history, at least from the 12th century until modern times.72 The expansion of the Christian kingdoms to the south as the origin of some specific manifestations, which could be interpreted from the specifically Hispanic perspective, does not mask the fact that over-reliance on this notion to explain medieval Christian societies simplifies and distorts the real complexities behind the historical developments.73 In this sense, this perspective tends to focus on a particular aspect – once the reconquista is presented as the common primary goal, inspired by the ideal of Hispanic unity of the Christian kingdoms throughout the medieval period – from an exclusively Christian perspective to provide an encompassing explanation of medieval history in Iberia.74 It also tends to project monolithic perspectives formulated on the basis of religious ideologies onto complex political and economic dynamics, in which geopolitical conflicts that affect the Mediterranean area are sometimes manifested.75

H i stori cal dynamics: fr o m t he Fi ve K i ng dom s to the Hisp anic Mo narchy The political organization of the Iberian Peninsula in the period analysed is ultimately a result of the political dynamics that followed the arrival of Islam in the Peninsula in 711 and the subsequent fall of the Visigoth kingdom of Toledo. Soon after the Islamic conquest, various military leaders, claiming descent from the Visigoths, advanced towards the south, between the 8th and 10th centuries, gradually shaping aristocratic political formations in the form of kingdoms, as in Navarre or Leon, or counties, as in Aragon, Ribagorza or Castile. In conjunction with the fall of the Caliphate of Cordoba in 1031, the 11th century saw the rise and consolidation of Christian political formations, such as the Catalan counties – with Barcelona rising to prominence – and the ancient counties, now kingdoms, of Aragon and Castile, in addition to those of Leon and Navarre. Some of these merged to form political units, such as Leon and Castile (1037–1157) and Aragon and Navarre (1063–1134). Despite these temporary unions, from the second quarter of the 12th century a process of political disintegration began, 72 Ladero Quesada, ‘Unidad y diversidad’, p. 27. This is echoed by García Fitz, ‘La Reconquista’,

p. 159.

73 García Fitz, ‘La Reconquista’, pp. 158–59, with a similar opinion expressed by Ladero Quesada,

‘Unidad y diversidad’, p. 27.

74 Martín Ríos Saloma, La reconquista. Una construcción historiográfica (siglos XVI–XIX) (Mexico

City: Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, Instituto de Investigaciones Históricas; Madrid: Marcial Pons Historia, 2011), p. 32. 75 Two examples in the late medieval period, in Adela Fábregas García, ‘La integración del reino nazarí de Granada en el espacio comercial europeo (siglos XIII–XV)’, Investigaciones de Historia Económica, 6 (2006), 11–39 (pp. 12–17) and Guichard, Esplendor, pp. 294–95.



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Map 1.2  The Iberian Peninsula in 1157, drawn by David Nogales Rincón, adapted from José María Monsalvo Antón, Atlas histórico de la España medieval (Madrid: Editorial Síntesis, 2010), pp. 129, 132.

giving rise to what is known traditionally as the la España de los Cinco Reinos (‘Spain of the Five Kingdoms’),76 which would define to a large extent the situation in the Peninsula until the end of the Middle Ages (Map 1.2). This process of disintegration was marked by significant events, such as the recognition by the Emperor Alfonso VII of the independence of Portugal (1143); the division of the empire of Alfonso VII following his death in 1157, which marked the beginning of the independent kingdoms of Castile, in the hands of Sancho III of Castile (r. 1157–1158), and of Leon, ruled by Fernando II of Leon (r. 1157–1188); and the independence of Navarre from Aragon, under the rule of García Ramírez (r. 1134–1150). 76 Thanks to its conciseness and visual force, we have taken the historiographical image used by

Ramón Menéndez Pidal to describe the fragmentation of the Peninsula from 1057 (kingdoms of Castile, Leon, Portugal, Navarre and the Crown of Aragon); in Ramón Menéndez Pidal, El imperio hispánico y los cinco reinos: dos épocas en la estructura política de España (Madrid: Instituto de Estudios Políticos, 1950). These Five Kingdoms, in the late medieval period, usually include the Nasrid Emirate of Granada, following the unification of the kingdoms of Leon and Castile into the Crown of Castile.

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Of these Five Kingdoms, the kingdom of Castile in the west gradually came to prominence. It was reunited with the kingdom of Leon in 1230, forming what, in current terminology, is known as the Crown of Castile. In the east of the Peninsula, the large formation known as the Crown of Aragon gained ascendency. The origins of this kingdom date back to the reign of Alfonso II (r. 1162–1196), son of Ramón Berenguer IV and Petronilla of Aragon, and heir to the kings of Aragon and the counts of Barcelona. Thus, the Crowns of Castile and Aragon became the two main territorial blocks in the Peninsula. These kingdoms challenged each other for hegemony throughout the Late Middle Ages, a conflict that came to a head with the so-called War of the Two Pedros (1356–1366) between King Pedro IV of Aragon (r. 1336–1387) and Pedro I of Castile (r. 1350–1369). Compared to Castile and Aragon, the Christian kingdoms of Portugal and Navarre and the Islamic Emirate of Granada remained minor political formations, being dwarfed even more by the expansion of both crowns to the south, in competition with al-Andalus. In the following pages we will discuss the overall political dynamics of the Crowns of Castile and Aragon, the kingdoms of Portugal, Navarre and the Emirate of Granada between 1157 and 1504. This is not intended to be a systematic description, and does not seek to address all aspects of the political evolution of the Iberian Peninsula. However, three fundamental factors can help shed light on this late medieval period: firstly, the political and territorial expansion of the Christian kingdoms, which present some important milestones: the fall of the Umayyad Caliphate of Cordoba (1031); the movement that Derek Lomax calls ‘the Great Reconquest’ (1212–1252),77 which resulted in the greatest expansion to date of the Christian kingdoms, culminating in the battle of Navas de Tolosa (1212) and the conquest of Seville (1248), and finalising with the establishment of the frontier with the Emirate of Granada; the ‘Battle of the Strait’ (Batalla del Estrecho) (1275–1350), for strategic control of the Strait of Gibraltar; and the end of Muslim political presence in the Peninsula with the conquest of Granada by the Catholic Kings, Fernando and Isabel (1492).78 The second factor is the transformation from political fragmentation, in the second half of the 12th century, to political unification, in the last quarter of the 15th century and the beginning of the 16th century, under the Catholic Kings. The following can be considered fundamental milestones in this process: the aforementioned marriage of Ramón Berenguer IV, Count of Barcelona, and Petronilla of Aragon (1137), which laid the foundation for the dynastic union of the Kingdom of Aragon and the county of Barcelona under Alfonso II of Aragon; the aforementioned union of the kingdoms of Castile and Leon under Fernando III of Castile (1230); the imposition of a single dynasty on the thrones of Castile (1369) and 77 Lomax, The Reconquest of Spain, pp. 129–59. 78 On this particular issue, see Lomax, The Reconquest of Spain and Joseph F. O’Callaghan,

Reconquest and Crusade in Medieval Spain (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2003).



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Aragon (1412) under the terms of the Compromise of Caspe (1412); and the conquest of the Nasrid Emirate of Granada (1492) and the Kingdom of Navarre (1512) by the Crown of Castile. These unifying historical processes were mainly shaped by fortuitous events or circumstantial decisions, usually motivated by a very small section of society, i.e. the high political elites of the kingdoms, who sought to defend their own interests.79 Thirdly, and finally, is the genesis of the modern State,80 the aim of which is aptly summarised in the legal aphorism Rex est imperator in regno suo (‘the king is emperor in his kingdom’), in other words, political centralization and concentration of power – in the broadest sense of the term – are in the hands of a higher authority, the king. Although some of the embryonic features of this approach, as Pascual Martínez Sopena points out, appeared between 1180 and 1230,81 it took root only between 1260 and 1360, grew rapidly in the 1400s, and took final shape at the end of that century, during the reign of the Catholic Kings in Castile and Aragon, and Manuel I (r. 1495–1521) in Portugal.82 The consolidation of the state during the Late Middle Ages, though not without its conflicts, revolved around two theoretical models, now widely discussed and analysed, that sought to systematise relations between the king and his kingdom: autoritarismo (‘authoritarianism’) of the Crown of Castile, where the king does not need to negotiate with the kingdom, and pactismo (‘pactism’) of the Crown of Aragon, where the monarch settles his agreements with the kingdom, meeting in representative assemblies known as Cortes. In this sense, these models were characterised, respectively, by the relative independence of the king with respect to such elites (i.e. ‘authoritarianism’) and by a greater balance of power between the nobility, the urban patriarchate, and the king (i.e. ‘pactism’). This does not imply necessarily a different 79 González Antón, España, p. 247; Enric Guinot Rodríguez, ‘La Corona de Aragón en los siglos

XII y XIII’, in La Corona de Aragón. Siglos XII–XVIII, ed. by Ernest Belenguer and Felipe V. Garín (Madrid: Sociedad Estatal para la Acción Cultural Exterior; Valencia: Generalitat Valenciana, 2006), pp. 23–59 (p. 25). 80 Joseph R. Strayer, On the Medieval Origins of the Modern State (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1973); Jean-Philippe Genet, L’Etat Moderne: Genèse, bilans et perspectives (Paris: Editions du Centre de la Recherche Scientifique, 1990); Miguel Ángel Ladero Quesada, ‘Algunas reflexiones generales sobre el origen del Estado Moderno’, in Homenaje académico a D. Emilio García Gómez (Madrid: Real Academia de la Historia, 1993), pp. 433–48. 81 Pascual Martínez Sopena, ‘Ideología y práctica en las políticas pobladoras de los reyes hispanos (ca. 1180–1230)’, in 1212–1214: El trienio que hizo a Europa, ed. by Eloísa Ramírez Vaquero, et al. (Pamplona: Institución Príncipe de Viana, 2011), pp. 155–82. 82 José María Monsalvo Antón, ‘Crisis del feudalismo y centralización monárquica castellana (observaciones acerca del origen del Estado moderno y su causalidad)’, in Transiciones en la antigüedad y feudalismo, ed. by Carlos Estepa Díez and Domingo Plácido Suárez (Madrid: Fundación de Investigaciones Marxistas, 1998), pp. 139–67; Maria Helena da Cruz Coelho and Armando Luís de Carvalho Homem, A génese do Estado Moderno no Portugal tardo-medievo (século XIII–XV) (Lisbon: Editorial Universidade Autónoma, 1999); Emilia Salvador Esteban, ‘Los orígenes de la organización del Estado moderno: la Corona de Aragón en el sistema político de los Reyes Católicos’, Saitabi, 1 (1996), 85–94.

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understanding of the nature and aims of royal power in any sphere – a fact that has led, in some cases, to the use of the term autoritatismo pactista (‘pactist authoritarianism’) in Aragon – or the negation of pactist and contractual practices in the political field in Castile. In fact, these aspects were influenced, on a practical level, by the financial dependence of the monarchy on institutions, which determined the degree to which the king was willing to bow to the political requests of the elite of the kingdom gathered in the Cortes.83 The evolution of the Iberian kingdoms was influenced to a large extent by the territorial and demographic prominence of one kingdom in the group: the Crown of Castile. The kings of Castile not only attributed to themselves symbolically the status of heirs to the Visigoth Kingdom of Toledo, but also legally obtained an advantageous position in the process of advancing towards the south thanks to different treaties establishing frontiers and areas of expansion agreed between the peninsular kingdoms, such as the treaties of Tudején (1151), Cazorla (1179), Almizra (1244), Badajoz (1267), Alcañices (1297) and Almazán (1375). This capacity for expansion of Castile would ultimately shape the maritime ambitions of Portugal and Aragon. After the fall of the Empire of Alfonso VII in 1157, as mentioned above, the kingdoms of Castile and Leon reunited in 1230 under Fernando III of Castile (Map 1.3). The evolution of the new Crown was marked by various royal minorities in the reigns of Fernando IV (r. 1295–1312), Alfonso XI (r. 1312– 1350), Enrique III (r. 1390–1406) and Juan II (r. 1406–1454), which presented a challenge to the consolidation of royal power. In addition to these minorities, there were a number of dynastic conflicts that preceded the accession to the throne of Sancho IV (r. 1284–1295), Henry II (r. 1369–1379) and Isabel I (r. 1474–1504), which caused additional problems to the Castilian monarchs in terms of legitimating power. One of the most outstanding figures within the design of this monarchy is Alfonso X (r. 1252–1284), who introduced a programme of political maxims aimed at defending royal superiority that, with important milestones in the reigns of the aforementioned Alfonso XI and Enrique III, would culminate in the era of Isabel I, when Castilian royalty completed the process of monarchical centralization.84 83 For these models see Enric Guinot Rodríguez, ‘Sobre la génesis del modelo político de la

Corona de Aragón en el siglo XIII: Pactismo, corona y municipios’, Res Publica: Revista de Filosofía Política, 17 (2007), 151–76 and El pactismo en la historia de España (Madrid: Instituto de España, 1980). Navarre has also been assimilated into the Aragonese pactist model, as explained by José María Lacarra, ‘El pactismo navarro’, Historia 16.5 (1976), 87–91. For a critical view of ‘pactism’ see Vicent Baydal Sala, ‘Los orígenes historiográficos del concepto de pactismo’, Historia y Política: Ideas, Procesos y Movimientos Sociales, 34 (2015), 269–95. 84 In the absence of a specific synthesis on the Crown of Castile, the biographies in the series ‘Colección Corona de España’ and the ‘Reyes de Castilla y León’ (published by La Olmeda, and re-published by Trea) are useful. For the later period, the following synthesis is interesting: Julio Valdeón Baruque, La dinastía de los Trastámara (Madrid: Ediciones El Viso, 2006); and, also focused on the Aragonese Trastámaras, Ernest Belenguer, Los Trastámara. El primer linaje real de poder político en España (Barcelona: Ediciones de Pasado y Presente, 2019); with a general description of the construction of royal power in José Manuel Nieto Soria, Fundamentos ideológicos del poder real en Castilla (siglos XIII–XVI) (Madrid: EUDEMA, 1988) and José María



Pol itic al St r uct ur es, Ideology an d Hi s to ri c a l Devel o pm en t 33

Map 1.3  The Iberian Peninsula in 1230, drawn by David Nogales Rincón, adapted from José María Monsalvo Antón, Atlas histórico de la España medieval (Madrid: Editorial Síntesis, 2010), p. 195.

The Crown of Aragon became a political reality under the aforementioned Alfonso II of Aragon, founder of the House of Barcelona. This dynasty held royal power until 1410, when, following the death of Martin I (r. 1396–1410) without an heir, the throne passed to Fernando I (r. 1412–1416) of the Trastámara dynasty, which already ruled in Castile. In the case of Aragon, two important historic milestones marked its late medieval evolution. First, the defeat and death of Pedro II the Catholic (r. 1196–1213) in the battle of Muret (1213) to the south of Toulouse, by the army led by Simon de Montfort. This defeat put an end to the Aragonese monarchy’s Occitan (south of France) expansion and forced them to focus their efforts on the Iberian Peninsula. This brought them into competition with Castile, starting with the conquests of the Islamic Kingdom of Valencia (1229–1245) and the Castilian Kingdom of Murcia (1296), followed by the incorporation of Majorca (1229–1231), Ibiza and Formentera (1235), Minorca (1287), Sicily (1282), Sardinia Monsalvo Antón, La construcción del poder real en la Monarquía castellana (siglos XI–XV) (Madrid: Marcial Pons, 2019).

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(1323–1324) and Naples (1442). Secondly, the Privilegio General de la Unión (‘General Privilege of the Union’), which was the basis of the aforementioned Aragonese ‘pactism’, which was granted by Pedro III of Aragon (r. 1276–1285) to what came to be known as the ‘Aragonese Union’ – that is, the organization or brotherhood in defence of the rights and jurisdictions of the Aragonese nobility – in the Cortes or parliament of Tarazona-Zaragoza (1283), by which the monarch undertook to observe a set of privileges and rights.85 This was followed, in December 1283, by the granting of a series of privileges (Privilegium Magnum) to the Kingdom of Valencia, and a series of constitutions (Constitutions) to the principality of Catalonia, recognising local use of the law in both territories. These concessions by the king to the kingdom were extended by the signing of the Privilegios de la Unión (‘Privileges of the Union’), granted by King Alfonso III of Aragon (r. 1285–1291) to the Aragonese Union (1287).86 The evolution of the kingdoms of Navarre and Portugal and the Emirate of Granada was often determined by their subsidiary position with respect to the great Castilian and Aragonese blocks, to the point that only Portugal was able to maintain its political autonomy, which has lasted until the present day. In the case of Navarre, this evolution was marked by its link, first with Aragon and later with France. Thus, when the Kingdom of Navarre was restored under García Ramírez (1134), the territorial unit and frontiers of the kingdom took shape and remained roughly unchanged throughout the Middle Ages. In the interest of maintaining its autonomy from its powerful neighbours, the kingdom was entrusted to a nephew of the late King Sancho VII (r. 1194–1234), Teobaldo I (r. 1234–1253). This brought Navarre within the sphere of influence of France, manifested in the establishment of the dynasties of Champagne (1234–1274), Capetian (1274–1328), Evreux (1328–1425), and finally, the Foix–Albret dynasty (1479–1512). The only interlude in this line of succession was the reign of Juan II of Navarre, son of the aforementioned Fernando I of Aragon and husband of Blanca I of Navarre (r. 1425–1441), as king consort (r. 1425– 1479). During this time, the political line of Navarre was conditioned by the interests of the aforementioned Juan, first in Castile, and later in Aragon, which he ruled as king from 1458 to 1479.87

85 Gregorio Colás Latorre, ‘El pactismo en Aragón. Propuestas para un estudio’, in La Corona de

Aragón y el Mediterráneo, siglos XV–XVI, pp. 269–93 (p. 274).

86 For some general descriptions see David Abulafia, A Mediterranean Emporium. The Catalan

Kingdom of Majorca (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1994); Ernest Belenguer, La Corona de Aragón en la monarquía hispánica. Del apogeo del siglo XV a la crisis del siglo XVII (Barcelona: Península, 2001); Sesma Muñoz, La Corona; Esteban Sarasa, La Corona de Aragón en la Edad Media (Zaragoza: Caja de Ahorros de la Inmaculada, 2001); Thomas Bisson, The Medieval Crown of Aragon. A Short History (Oxford: Clarendon, 1986). The proceedings of the ‘Congresos de Historia de la Corona de Aragón’ are also fundamental. 87 There are some basic references in Eloísa Ramírez Vaquero, Historia de Navarra. II. La Baja Edad Media (Pamplona: Gobierno de Navarra, 1994); Béatrice Leroy, Historia del reino de Navarra (San Lorenzo de El Escorial: Editoria Swan, 1986); José María Lacarra, Historia del reino de Navarra



Pol itic al St r uct ur es, Ideology an d Hi s to ri c a l Devel o pm en t 35

Fig. 1.2 Monastery of Saint Mary of the Victory, Batalha (District of Leiria, Portugal), founded in memory of the Portuguese victory over King Juan I of Castile in the Battle of Aljubarrota in 1385. Late 14th to early 16th century. Photo: © David Nogales Rincón.

The evolution of Portugal takes us from the year the kingdom was founded (1143) by uniting the existing counties of Portugal and Coimbra, to the creation of a maritime empire under Manuel I of Portugal (r. 1495–1521). This evolution in the High and Late Middle Ages was marked by several milestones, such as the reign of Dinis (r. 1279–1325); the succession crisis that followed the death of Fernando I (1345–1383), which resulted in João I of Portugal (r. 1385–1433) seizing power, founding the new Avis dynasty, and frustrating the Crown of Castile’s designs on the throne thanks to his victory in the Battle of Aljubarrota (1385), south of Coimbra (Fig. 1.2); and the Portuguese maritime expansion, beginning with the capture of Ceuta (1415), and culminating in the arrival in India (1498) and Brazil (1500).88 en la Edad Media (Pamplona: Caja de Ahorros de Navarra, 1976), and the series ‘Reyes de Navarra’, published by Mintzoa. 88 On the Kingdom of Portugal during the period analysed, the following is of interest: José Mattoso and Armindo de Sousa, História de Portugal. 2, A monarquia feudal (1096–1480) (Lisbon:

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Fig. 1.3 The Nasrid Palace of La Alhambra, Granada (Spain), residence of the emirs of Granada. 13th to 15th century. Photo: © David Nogales Rincón.

Finally, the different Islamic formations of al-Andalus, each with its own characteristics, were established during the High and Late Middle Ages period. The territory of al-Andalus was marked, on the one hand, by a process of fragmentation into independent fiefdoms – known as the first (1023–1091), second (1144– 1172) and third Taifa kingdoms (1212–1248) – which disrupted the political unit of al-Andalus; and, on the other hand, by a process of unification, with the incorporation of al-Andalus into the North African Almoravid (1086–1145) and Almohad (1145–1231) caliphates. With the departure of the Almohads from the Peninsula, the Nasrid Emirate of Granada (1238–1492) rose to power as the only remaining Islamic stronghold in the Iberian Peninsula in the closing centuries of the Middle Ages (Fig. 1.3). This emirate, founded by the Arab chief (sultán) of Arjona, Muhammad ben Yūsuf ben Nasr, and extended in the south-eastern corner of the peninsular south-east, remained in an ambivalent position, between vassalage under and independence from Castile, imprisoned, as the late 14th-century Editorial Estampa, 1997) and António Resende de Oliveira and João Gouveia Monteiro, Historia medieval de Portugal (1096–1495) (Granada: Universidad de Granada, 2018), together with various volumes of the collection ‘Reis de Portugal’, published by Círculo de Leitores and Centro de Estudos dos Povos e Culturas de Expressão Portuguesa, and republished by Temas & Debates, 2007–2011.



Pol itic al St r uct ur es, Ideology an d Hi s to ri c a l Devel o pm en t 37

scholar Ibn Hudayl (c. 1349–1409) put it, ‘between an impetuous ocean and a formidably armed enemy’ that ‘oppressed the inhabitants day and night’,89 and surviving thanks to a series of political and strategic advantages.90

Conclusio n The history of the Iberian Peninsula during the period in question was marked by the expansion of the Christian kingdoms into al-Andalus. At the end of the Middle Ages, with the conquest of the Nasrid emirate of Granada and the expulsion of the Jewish and Muslim populations, this expansion made it possible to ensure that the societies of the Peninsula conformed exclusively to European political, economic and cultural standards, under the rule of the Castilian-Aragonese bloc, the foundation of the Hispanic Monarchy. The long relationship between Islamic and Christian political groupings is of fundamental importance if we are to understand the historical reality of the Peninsula in the medieval period. Likewise, the legacy of this relationship was not insignificant for peninsular Christian societies, which were frequently analysed and thought of in light of these relationships; a fact that forced them, from the end of the 15th century, to promote attempts to purge what they saw as Arab and Jewish components: the process Alain Milhou called desemitización (‘desemitisation’)91 which would culminate in the early 17th century with the expulsion of the Moors.

89 Cit. in Rachel Arié, El reino nasrí de Granada (1232–1492) (Madrid: Editorial Mapfre, 1992), p. 74. 90 See, among others, Pierre Guichard, Esplendor; Allen J. Fromherz, The Almohads: the Rise of an

Islamic Empire (London, New York: I.B. Tauris, 2010); Arié, El reino nasrí; María Jesús Viguera Molins, Los reinos de taifas y las invasiones magrebíes: al-Andalus del XI al XII (Madrid: Editorial Mapfre, 1992); 711–1616: De árabes a moriscos. Una parte de la historia de España (Cordoba: Al-Babtain Foundation, 2012). 91 Alain Milhou, ‘Desemitización y europeización en la cultura española desde la época de los Reyes Católicos hasta la expulsión de los moriscos’, in La Cultura del Renaixement: homenatge al pare Miquel Batllori, ed. by Manuel Fernández Álvarez et al. (Bellaterra, Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona, 1993), pp. 35–60.

Part II

Techniques, Trade and Industry

chapter 2

Textile Techniques in the Iberian Peninsula (Thirteenth to Fourteenth Centuries) María Barrigón

T

I ntroduct io n

extile production was unquestionably the most significant of medieval industries, on account of its practical usages, the volume of work it involved, and its economic impact on society. Surviving material evidence, although scant, is the most important testament to the textile industry of the period. This chapter gives an explanatory outline of the manufacturing processes, surveying the most common techniques found in extant examples of 13th- and 14th-century textiles produced on the Iberian Peninsula.

Fi b res Medieval textile fibres are traditionally classified according to origin. Especially prominent among vegetable fibres were flax and cotton, as well as hemp and ramie (nettle family). Animal fibres included wool and silk. As natural fibres, these all needed to undergo cleaning, sorting and preparation before being spun and subsequently dyed (if desired) and woven. Metallic fibres also played an important role in the period. The majority of the fabrics crafted for the elite of the period were made from the most prestigious and valuable fibre, silk.1 Silk is produced chiefly by domes1

The classical explanation of the history of the spread of silk can be found in Maurice Lombard, Les textiles dans le monde musulman du VIIe au XIIe siècle (Paris: École des Hautes Études en

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ticated silkworms (Bombyx mori L.), which feed on mulberry leaves.2 Of the various species of mulberry trees, two are particularly relevant to silk culture: the black mulberry (morus nigra) and the white, common, or silkworm mulberry (morus alba). Both were cultivated in the Iberian Peninsula from at least the late Middle Ages. Silk culture was introduced to the Iberian Peninsula gradually, at varying speeds, and early, but there is no doubt that silkworm cultivation and the textile industry associated with silk had attained great importance by the 9th and especially by the 10th centuries under Islamic influence.3 Documentary references from those centuries refer to silk fabrics (including Gregory IV’s Liber pontificalis of the first half of the 9th century, which mentions silks described as spanica) and there is information about silk cultivation in the Calendar of Cordoba.4 Silk production and sericulture in al-Andalus have been studied by Vallvé and subsequently in greater detail by Lagardère.5 Knowledge of silk progressively spread to the other kingdoms of the Peninsula and by the Modern Age there were various centres of production located chiefly in the South and East. Mulberry leaves are the staple diet of silkworms, which go through several growth phases and changes of form: newly hatched larvae measure approximately 3 mm and fully grown about 8 or 9 cm. To breed silkworms, it is necessary to ensure a constant food supply and clean environment. When the caterpillar has completed its growth cycle – after four moults – it stops eating and begins secreting a substance that solidifies on contact with air: a fibroin protein and sericin, a gum which cements the filaments, that is the silk fibre. From a single filament between 600 metres and 1.5 kilometres long, it spins a cocoon around Sciences Sociales and Mouton Éditeur, 1978). Eulàlia Morral i Romeu and Antoni Segura i Mas, La seda en España. Leyenda, poder y realidad (Barcelona: Lunwerg, 1991), pp. 11−28; Silvia Saladrigas Cheng, ‘Los tejidos en Al-Andalus: siglos IX–XVI. Aproximación técnica’, in España y Portugal. Ruta de la seda, diez siglos de producción y comercio entre Oriente y Occidente, ed. by Comisión Española de la Ruta de la Seda (Barcelona: Universidad de Barcelona, 1996), pp. 74−98; Sophie Desrosiers, ‘Au plus près de la matière, entre Orient et Occident. Les différentes filières de transformation de la soie du Bombyx mori’, HAL (2015) 1–26; Felipe González Marín and Mariángeles Gómez Ródenas, ‘La sericicultura y el trabajo artesanal de la seda en Murcia’, in Seda. Historias pendientes de un hilo, ed. by Mariángeles Gómez Ródenas and Jorge A. Eiroa Rodríguez (Murcia: Universidad de Murcia, 2017), pp. 14−21. 3 Florence Lewis May, Silk textiles of Spain: Eighth to Fifteenth century (New York: The Hispanic Society of America, 1957), p. 3; Luis Serrano-Piedecasas Fernández, ‘Elementos para una historia de la manufactura textil andalusí (siglos IX−XII)’, Studia historica. Historia medieval, 4 (1986), 205−27 (p. 210). 4 Reinhart Pieter Anne Dozy, Le calendrier de Cordoue de l’année 961. Texte arabe et ancienne traduction latine (Leiden: Brill, 1873), pp. 32, 33, 41, 58, 84. 5 Joaquín Vallvé, ‘La industria en Al-Andalus’, Al-Qantara, 1 (1980), 209−42 (pp. 225−36); Vincent Lagardère, ‘Mûrier et culture de la soie en Andalus au Moyen Âge (Xe−XIVe siècles)’, Mélanges de la Casa de Velázquez, 26 (1990), 97−111; Julia María Carabaza Bravo et al., Árboles y arbustos de al-Andalus (Madrid: CSIC, 2004), p. 99–100. See also the chapter by Adela Fábregas in this volume. 2



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itself to begin metamorphosing into a moth. To prevent moths from emerging from cocoons after their metamorphosis and consequently weakening – though not breaking, despite what is often stated – part of the fibre, the pupae are killed inside their cocoons in order to ensure a continuous fibre suitable for weaving. They are stifled by subjecting them to high temperatures: the heat of the sun, ovens, or steam. Once the pupae are dead, their cocoons are dried, being classified and subsequently boiled to remove the external sericin from the fibroin. They are then deflossed, which consists of lightly brushing the outer part of the cocoon to eliminate some upper material to find the end of the filament to be wound off. Silk filament is so fine that the filaments of several cocoons – at least four or five in a similar state to ensure the resulting thread is as even as possible – need to be reeled together.6 When the cocoon’s filament ends, the filament of a new cocoon is joined to it so that the yarn will be continuous. Reeling a top-quality thread requires skill and experience including appropriate speed of the wheel and correct handling of cocoons. The quality of the silk thread depends on cleanliness, evenness, resistance and elasticity of the fibres. At this stage the silk fibres, which still contain up to 25% of impurities, are known as grège (raw) silk and can be woven. Silk yarn can be spun (‘thrown’) to make it more resistant. Threads (of silk and other fibres) are given a clockwise Z-twist or a counter-clockwise S-twist. Throwsters came to play an important role in silk craft,7 as they made it possible to achieve very fine threads that were in great demand for manufacturing luxury items. Fibres with only a very slight or an almost imperceptible twist can also be used. Degumming (either raw or thrown silk) can take place to completely clean the filament: this operation involves soaking at a lower temperature to obtain a more flexible and refined material. Threads could also be obtained from cocoons from which moths had emerged and from wasted material; the filament of such cocoons could not be reeled but was spun.8 The other animal fibre of great importance to the Iberian textile industry was wool.9 Different breeds of ewes or rams produced fibre of varying softness, length, 6

Walter Endrei, L’évolution des techniques du filage et du tissage du Moyen Age à la révolution industrielle (Paris: Mouton, 1968); Saladrigas Cheng, ‘Los tejidos en Al-Andalus’, p. 78. 7 Endrei, L’évolution des techniques, p. 57; Lagardère, ‘Mûrier et culture de la soie’, p. 108. 8 Frauds and different qualities of silk are discussed in Lagardère, ‘Mûrier et culture de la soie’, p. 108; David Jacoby, ‘The production and diffusion of Andalusi silk and silk textiles, mid-eighth to mid-thirteenth century’, in The Chasuble of Thomas Becket. A biography, ed. by Avinoam Shalem (Munich: The Bruschettini Foundation for Islamic and Asian Art and Hirmer Verlag GmbH, 2017), pp. 142−51 (p. 142). 9 Guadalupe González-Hontoria and Maria Pía Timón Tiemblo, Telares manuales en España (Madrid: Editora Nacional, 1983), pp. 28–49; Dominique Cardon, La draperie au Moyen Âge. Essor d’une grande industrie européenne (Paris: CNRS Éditions, 1999); Joana Sequeira, O pano da

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elasticity and fineness. After shearing, the fleece was washed, sometimes boiled to bleach it, and dried (sometimes in the sun to whiten it further). The fleece was then stretched out by hand to remove any possible remaining impurities. The fibre was subsequently carded with a sort of toothed brush, or combed, prior to spinning with distaffs and spindles, or on wheels,10 which made it possible to work faster. Once spun into yarn, it was converted into hanks or skeins, and subsequently packed as balls, ready for weaving. Although scholars disagree as to when merino sheep were introduced to the Iberian Peninsula,11 Iberian wools enjoyed great fame from early times and were highly appreciated for their quality and fineness. Indeed, the Peninsula became the major producer of wools for the Mediterranean region during the late Middle Ages,12 accounting for an important part of the textile industry. Depending on the type of wool and how it was spun, fine woollen cloth or coarse worsteds were obtained. The use of flax (Linum usitatissimum L.) is documented early.13 Linseed oil was obtained from its seeds, and textile fibres from its stalks. When the plant is ready for harvesting, it is pulled, seed pods are separated, and the stems are left to dry before being beaten using clubs.14 Afterwards the stalks are sorted into evenly sized bundles, and retted in water for several days until the outer part softens and can be removed. This breaking process is carried out after the plant is dry using the same clubs employed in the previous operation. To completely clean the fibres and remove any remaining particles of straw (outer stem), the material is scutched (a flailing and scraping process) with a heavy, bladed tool, and the stems

10 11

12

13 14

terra. Produção têxtil em Portugal nos finais da Idade Média (Porto: Universidade do Porto, 2014), pp. 39−48. Jorge A. Eiroa Rodríguez, Catálogo del Gabinete de Antigüedades. Antigüedades medievales (Madrid: Real Academia de la Historia, 2006), pp. 49−50. Lombard, Les textiles, pp. 22 and 26−27; Roberto Sabatino López, ‘El origen de la oveja merina’, in Contribución a la historia de la transhumancia en España, ed. by Pedro García Martín and José María Sánchez Benito (Madrid: Ministerio de Agricultura, Alimentación y Medio Ambiente, 1996), pp. 126−34. Ángel García Sanz, ‘Competitivos en lanas pero no en paños. Lana para la exportación y lana para los telares nacionales en la España del Antiguo Régimen’, Revista de Historia Económica, 12 (1994), 397−434. References made by Pliny and Strabo to the quality of Iberian flax are quoted by SerranoPiedecasas Fernández, ‘Elementos para una historia’, pp. 205−06. Julio Caro Baroja, Catálogo de la colección de instrumentos utilizados en la elaboración del lino y en la fabricación del hilo (Madrid: Talleres tipográficos AF, 1951), p. 13. Its cultivation on the Peninsula is borne out, among others, by Al-Awwam Libro de agricultura, ed. by Josef Antonio Banqueri (Madrid: Ministerio de Agricultura, Pesca y Alimentación, 1988), p. 117. See also Lombard, Les textiles, pp. 105–07; Vincent Lagardère, ‘Culture et industrie du lin en al-Andalus au Moyen Âge (VIIIe−XVe siècles)’, Studia Islamica, 74 (1991), 143–65; Expiración García, ‘Las plantas textiles y tintoréas en Al-Andalus’, in Tejer y vestir. De la Antigüedad al Islam, ed. by Manuela Marín (Madrid: CSIC, 2001), pp. 417–51 (pp. 427−30); Sequeira, O pano da terra, pp. 49−56.



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are scraped manually. The flax is then hackled (combed) until it is completely clean and the fibres are disentangled. The longest and best quality fibres are spun in a manner similar to that described for wool; while the inferior short fibres (tow) could also be spun or used for other purposes, like stuffing. Jute was an uncommonly used fibre.15 Obtained from the inner bast tissue of the bark of a plant belonging to the Tiliceae family, when processed properly it adds considerable shine to textiles and was sometimes combined with linen to produce stronger and more resistant fabrics.16 Another uncommon fibre is ramie, derived from a plant belonging to the nettle family (Boehmeria nivea L.) the properties of which are similar to cotton, though it can resemble flax in appearance: its fibres are obtained in a similar way, though ramie fibres are longer, stronger, and finer than those of flax.17 Though cotton (Gossypium herbaceum L. and Gossypium arboreum L.) is a fibre closely linked to the industrial revolution, its history dates back much earlier.18 Although the species cultivated on the Iberian Peninsula is thought to have been the one of low height,19 several authors of Muslim Spain also describe the tall variety.20 Whatever the case, cotton needs a mild climate and a considerable amount of water, and it was cultivated both in regions with a harsher and drier climate, where yields were larger and of higher quality, and in coastal Spain from the 10th century onwards at least. The earliest mentions of cotton fabrics are found in a document of 951 in Leon,21 which refers to two cotton chasubles, and in the Calendar of Cordoba.22 Garments containing cotton fibres were relatively common in the 13th century.23

15 González-Hontoria and Timón Tiemblo, Telares manuales, p. 52. 16 A textile fragment from a pillow of Leonor Plantagenet (d. 1214) contains jute and linen;

17

18

19 20 21 22 23

María Barrigón, ‘Textiles and farewells: revisiting the grave goods of King Alfonso VIII of Castile and Queen Eleanor Plantagenet’, Textile History, 46 (2015), 235−57 (p. 251). An example of a textile made from ramie is the warp and core of metal thread in the samite of the robes of Fernando de la Cerda (d. 1275); Pilar Borrego et al., ‘Caracterización de materiales y análisis técnico de tejidos medievales’, Ge-conservación, 12 (2017), 6−30 (p. 8). J. K. Nam, Le commerce du coton en Méditerranée à la fin du Moyen Âge (Leiden: Brill, 2007); Charlène Bouchaud, ‘Al-qutun. Importation des produits et introduction de la culture du coton en Méditerranée’, in Héritages arabo-islamiques dans l’Europe méditerranéenne, ed. by Catherine Richarté, Roland-Pierre Gayraud and Jean-Michel Poisson (Paris: La découverte, 2015), pp. 315-31. García, ‘Las plantas textiles’, p. 422. In his agricultural treatise (late 1100s–early 1200s) al-Awwam compared it to the apricot: Banqueri, Al-Awwam Libro de agricultura, p. 103. Serrano-Piedecasas Fernández, ‘Elementos para una historia’, p. 219. García, ‘Las plantas textiles, p. 421. Barrigón, ‘Textiles and farewells’, p. 251; Adela Martínez Malo, ‘Ajuar funerario de doña María. Panteón Real. Colegiata de san Isidoro. León’, in Castilla y León restaura 1995−1999 (Valladolid: Junta de Castilla y León, 1999), pp. 328−36 (p. 330).

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The growth process begins after the flowers drop off; at this point the seed pods increase in size until they ripen and burst open, revealing the cotton fibre. When this fluffy cotton comes away easily from the plant it is harvested by hand and the seed separated from the fluff.24 After spinning, cotton fibre yields particularly clean and elastic thread. Experts have been examining composition of metallic threads for several decades.25 The research conducted by Márta Járó individually and with Erzsébet Gondar and Attila Tóth26 showed that the long tradition of the use of metallic thread in textiles witnessed several innovations which improved the malleability of materials for weaving and embroidery, as well as cutting production costs. A broad variety of types was available in the Middle Ages. Threads could be made of wire or lamellae of different alloys, and the metals used ranged from almost pure gold to combinations of varying proportions of gold, silver and copper, resulting in differing visual effects. Metal-wrapped thread or filé consisted of lamella wound around core threads, which could be of different fibres such as silk or linen, more or less covering them. Metal coatings could also be applied to organic supports made of leather, parchment, or animal gut (intestine or bladder),27 which were then cut into narrow strips. These strips of gilt leather or membrane were subsequently wound around a core fibre to form a thread known as Cypriot gold.28 Florence Lewis May suggested that this type of thread was named after its place of origin and later spread to other workshops, who crafted it in the same way,29 and that the name Cypriot thread (which appears frequently in medieval inventories) has lingered on in literature, though the place of manufacture has more recently been re-examined.30 24 González-Hontoria and Timón Tiemblo, Telares manuales, p. 54; Lucie Bolens, ‘The use of

25 26

27

28 29 30

plants for dyeing and clothing. Cotton and woad in Al-Andalus: a thriving agricultural sector (5th/11th−7th/13th centuries)’, in The Legacy of Muslim Spain, ed. by Salma Kadra Jayyusi (Leiden and New York: E. J. Brill, 1992), pp. 1000–16 (pp. 1004−07). N. Indictor, et al., ‘The evaluation of metal wrappings from medieval textiles using Scanning Electron Microscopy – Energy Dispersive X-Ray Spectrometry’, Textile History, 19 (1988), 3−22. Márta Járó, ‘Gold embroidery and fabrics in Europe: XI−XIV centuries’, Gold Bulletin, 23 (1990), 40−57; ‘Metal thread variations and materials: simple methods of pre-treatment identification for historical textiles’, in Conserving textiles: Studies in honour of Ágnes Timár-Balázsi. ICCROM Conservation Studies 7, ed. by István Éri (Rome: ICCROM, 2009), pp. 68−76; Márta Járó, Erzsébet Gondàr and A. Tóth, ‘Reconstruction of gilding techniques used for medieval membrane threads in museum textiles’, Archaeometry, 90 (1991), 317−25. Dominique de Reyer et al., ‘Les lamelles des fils metalliques organiques dans les textiles medievaux: approche methodologique de leur origine biologique’, Studies in Conservation, 47 (2002), 122−33. Járó, ‘Gold embroidery’, p. 51; Járó, Gondàr and Tóth, ‘Reconstruction of gilding’, p. 317. May, Silk textiles of Spain, p. 7. Philippe Trélat, ‘Le goût pour Chypre. Objets d’art et tissus précieux importés de Chypre en Occident (XIIIe−XVe siècles)’, Cahiers du Centre d’Études Chypriotes, 43 (2013), 455−72 (p. 460); David Jacoby, ‘Cypriot gold thread in Late Medieval silk weaving and embroidery’,



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Dy es Dyeing could take place before or after spinning, or after weaving. The colouring of fabrics was achieved by using different natural dyestuffs (chiefly plants), which could be mixed in varying quantities with mordants (notably alum) to help fix the colour. There are no surviving recipe books from such an early period,31 so it is difficult to ascertain the quantities and specific processes involved. Different dyestuffs could be mixed with each other to achieve particular hues or to cut costs. Notable studies explore the chemical side of the process by examining textiles from several collections;32 others focus on documentary evidence.33 Geographical treatises on Islamic Spain mention areas where dye-producing plants are grown. Methods of cultivation are specified in writings on agriculture, while fraudulent practices are described in hisba manuals (market regulations). Mentions of dyestuffs in various cities’ records of tolls is an indication of the trade conducted in these products and their dissemination across the Peninsula. There were three basic procedures for dyeing textiles:34 • Dyes fixed with mordant. These were carotenoids, flavonoids, and quinones. They correspond to reds, oranges, yellows, and violets. • Dyes combining tannins and iron. This mixture produces a black precipitate. • Dyes obtained by reduction or oxidation. These produce blues and purples. The dyestuffs most commonly used in the period are:

31 32

33

34

in Deeds done beyond the Sea: essays on William of Tyre, Cyprus and the military orders presented to Peter Edbury, ed. by Susan B. Edgington and Helen J. Nicholson (Farnham: Ashgate, 2014), pp. 101−14. Lluís Cifuentes i Comamala and Ricardo Córdoba de la Llave, Tintorería y Medicina en la Valencia del siglo XV: el manual de Joanot Valero (Madrid: CSIC, 2011). Dominique Cardon, Tintes preciosos del Mediterráneo. Púrpura. Quermes. Pastel (Terrassa: CDMT, 1999); Le monde des teintures naturelles (Paris: Belin, 2014); Judith H. Hofenk-de Graaff, The Colourful Past. Origins, Chemistry and Identification of Natural Dyestuffs (London: Archetype, 2004); Ana Roquero, Tintes y tintoreros de América (Madrid: Ministerio de Cultura, 2006); ‘Tintorería en la Europa medieval’, in González and Navascués, Ars mechanicae, pp. 235−43; Enrique Parra Crego, ‘Caracterización de materiales de tejidos medievales hispanos’, in Arte y producción textil en el Mediterráneo medieval, ed. by Laura Rodríguez Peinado and Francisco de Asís García (Madrid: Polifemo, 2019), pp. 347−66; Borrego et al.,‘Caracterización’. Emilio Blanco, ‘Las materias tintóreas’, in Colors del Mediterrani: colorants naturals per a un tèxtil sostenible?, ed. by Sílvia Carbonell Basté (Terrassa: Centre de Documentació i Museu Tèxtil, 2010), pp. 138−60; García, ‘Las plantas textiles’; Juan Vicente García Marsilla, ‘Los colores del textil. Los tintes y el teñido de los paños en la Valencia medieval’, in L’Histoire à la source: acter, compter, enregistrer (Catalogne, Savoie, Italie, XIIe−XVe siècle). Mélanges offerts à Christian Guilleré, ed. by Guido Castelnuovo and Victor Sandrien (Chambéry: Université Savoie Mont Blanc, 2017), pp. 283–315. Roquero, ‘Tintorería en la Europa medieval’, p. 241.

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Reds Several studies have examined red-producing dyes.35 Common or rose madder (Rubia Tinctorium L.) needs to be carefully sown and, interestingly, one of the few references to the process of extracting red dye from it is found in an explanation given by al-Awwam and quoted by Expiración García, who reckons that it must have been a local technique.36 Various types of madder were used as dyestuffs, such as wild madder (Rubia peregrina L.) and munjeet or Indian madder (Rubia munjista L.). Safflower (Carthamus tinctorius L.), known as a dyestuff since ancient times, was used to obtain orange-pink or red dyes (and even yellows depending on how it was processed). Safflower dyes produced in Seville and Niebla (Huelva) were notable.37 The red and purple dye par excellence was produced from grains of kermes (kermes vermilio), an insect that lives on the Kermes oak (genus Quercus). Seville, Niebla, Medina Sidonia, Valencia, and Almería were famed for their kermes (called grana in Spain), and it was also found in Portugal in the 15th century.38 As a highly luxurious dyestuff, it was also exported. Other sources of red in the Middle Ages were brazilwood (Caesalpinia sappan L.), lac dye (from the Kerria laca insect), and sandalwood (Pterocarpus santalinus L.).

Yellows Saffron (Crocus sativus L.) was used in the textile industry to achieve an orange-­ yellow, and also in cooking, cosmetics, and pharmacology. It is mentioned in Andalusian sources and was an important export. Guadalajara, Jaen, and Toledo were renowned for their saffron.39 Yellow was commonly obtained from weld (Reselda luteola L.), a plant which had been used as a dyestuff for centuries, and also from Persian berries (Rhamnus family). Other plants used in the Middle Ages to achieve shades of yellow were 35 Elena Phipps, Cochineal red. The art history of a color (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press,

2010).

36 Banqueri, Al-Awwam, Libro de agricultura, pp. 125−28; García, ‘Las plantas textiles’, p. 446;

Ibn Bassal, Libro de agricultura, ed. by Expiración García Sánchez and J. Esteban Hernández Bermejo (Granada: Artes Gráficas, 1995), pp. 190−92; Abu-l-Jayr, Tratado de agricultura, ed. by Julia María Carabaza (Madrid: AECI, 1991), pp. 323−24. 37 Al-Himyari, La Péninsule Ibérique au Moyen-Âge, ed. by E. Lévi-Provençal (Leiden: Brill, 1938), pp. 27, 203. 38 May, Silk textiles of Spain, p. 13; García, ‘Las plantas textiles’, p. 447; Sequeira, O pano da terra, pp. 113−14. 39 García, ‘Las plantas textiles’, p. 434; Banqueri, Al-Awwam, Libro de agricultura, pp. 118−21; Carabaza, Abu-l-Jayr, Tratado de agricultura, p. 334; García Sánchez and Hernández Bermejo, Ibn Bassal, Libro de agricultura, p. 154; Al-Idrisi Description de l’Afrique et de l’Espagne, ed. by R.P.A. Dozy and M.J. de Goeje (Leiden: Brill, 1866), pp. 229, 249; Lévi-Provençal, Al-Himyari La Péninsule Ibérique, pp. 72, 161, 234.



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barberry root (Berberis vulgaris L.), Thymelaea tinctoria L., dyer’s broom (Genista tinctoria L.), flax-leaved daphne (Daphne gnidium L.), young fustic (Cotinus coggygria Scop.), and turmeric (Curcuma family).

Purplish-blues Several historical monographs have been published on blue,40 which could be obtained from numerous plants. Prominent among the family of indigo-yielding plants are Indigofera tinctoria L., the indigo plant or true indigo, a luxury product, and Isatis Tinctoria L., woad, for which Toledo was famous.41 Alkanet root (Alkanna tinctoria L.), besides being used in cooking, also yielded chiefly purple tones and, to a lesser degree, reddish shades which served as substitutes for costlier and higher quality dyes.42 Orchil was another alternative.

Browns-blacks Sumac (Rhus coriaria L.) has been examined in detail by Ricardo Córdoba de la Llave.43 Used in medicine and cooking but above all in tanning leather, it could also dye textiles shades of red and brown. Henna (Lawsonia inermis L.) was another source of brown. This plant, which was important in Islamic ceremonies, could be used in the textile industry combined with madder to obtain reddish shades, though they soon faded. Expiración García also includes – in her list of dye-yielding plants in al-Andalus­– ivy (Hedera hélix L.), used since early times to obtain a black dye.44 Black was also obtained from the bark of the black walnut tree, and shades of brown from oak galls. The dyer’s profession required a high degree of specialisation and was often performed near rivers on the outskirts of cities owing to its unpleasant odours.

40 Jenny Balfour-Paul, Indigo in the Arab World (Richmond: Curzon, 1997); Bolens, ‘The use of

plants’.

41 Lévi-Provençal, Al-Himyari La Péninsule Ibérique, p. 161. 42 García, ‘Las plantas textiles’, p. 443.

43 Ricardo Córdoba de la Llave, ‘El zumaque, planta mediterránea, curtiente y tinte en la España

medieval’, in Castilla y el mundo feudal: homenaje al profesor Julio Valdeón, ed. by María Isabel del Val Vadivieso and Pascual Martínez Sopena (Valladolid: Junta de Castilla y León, 2009), pp. 455−68. 44 García, ‘Las plantas textiles’, p. 448.

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H andloom s and we aving A detailed history of the technical evolution of looms on the Iberian Peninsula during the Middle Ages has yet to be written. Essential reference works are the general histories by Endrei, Broudy, and Borrego,45 as well as a number of monographs focusing on the Iberian Peninsula from an archaeological and anthropological approach.46 A distinction can be drawn between vertical looms (where the warp yarns are perpendicular to the ground) and horizontal looms (where the warp yarns are parallel to the ground).47 According to Endrei’s classic study, the horizontal treadle-loom, which originated in the East and made it possible to weave at a faster speed, spread to most of Europe between the 11th and 12th centuries.48 However, Islamic archaeological evidence from the Conímbriga and Cidade das Rosas sites in Portugal and from Vascos in Toledo, Spain, demonstrates the existence of horizontal looms on the Iberian Peninsula in the 8th and 9th centuries. Retuerce identified several pieces found in these places as temples (stretchers), tools used to keep the textile taut during weaving, associated with the horizontal loom.49 The horizontal loom not only enabled speed, but allowed for a greater variety of weaves and, accordingly, end products. The two main types of horizontal loom are the treadle loom and the drawloom. Treadle looms include all varieties involving a foot-operated mechanism to raise the shed for the weft thread to be passed through. Simpler fabrics were woven on these. In drawlooms, warp yarns creating the pattern are controlled in groups 45 Walter Endrei, ‘L’apparition en Europe du metier à marches’, Bulletin du CIETA, 8 (1958),

46

47

48 49

22−27; Endrei, L’évolution des techniques; Walter Endrei, ‘A 13th-century computus and the broad silk-loom’, Techniques & Culture, 34 (1999), 165−77; Eric Broudy, The Book of Looms. A History of the Handloom from Ancient Times to the Present (London: Studio vista, Cassell Ltd, 1979); Pilar Borrego Díaz, ‘Evolución de los telares y ligamentos a través de la historia’ (2003) [accessed 30 March 2022] González-Hontoria and Timón Tiemblo, Telares manuales; Manuel Retuerce Velasco, ‘El templen ¿primer testimonio del telar horizontal en España?’, Boletín de Arqueología Medieval, 1 (1987), 71−79; Saladrigas Cheng, ‘Los tejidos en Al-Andalus’; Sequeira, O pano da terra, pp. 87–103. Warp ‘indicates the longitudinal threads of a textile, those that are arranged in the loom. A thread of warp is called an end. Alone, the term warp denotes all the warp ends in a textile. Suitably qualified, it denotes all the warp ends engaged in a specific function’. Weft indicates ‘the transverse threads of a textile, those which are passed through the sheds’: CIETA, Vocabulary of technical terms. Fabrics. English, French, Italian, Spanish (Lyon: Centre International d’Etude del Textiles Anciens, 2006), pp. 81, 85. Endrei, ‘L’apparition en Europe’, p. 27; Endrei, L’évolution des techniques, pp. 61−62, 84−85. González-Hontoria and Timón Tiemblo, Telares manuales, p. 81; Retuerce Velasco, ‘El templen’; Manuel Retuerce Velasco, ‘Útiles medievales relacionados con la actividad textil procedentes de Calatrava la Vieja (Ciudad Real)’ in Rodriguez Peinado and Asís García, Arte y producción, pp. 369–96.



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by the figure harness (normally by means of lashes and shafts) so that they can be raised separately from other warp ends. Drawlooms made possible decorative motifs that could be repeated successively throughout the length and width of the cloth. Drawlooms – technically the more complex type – needed two people to operate them in a fully coordinated manner: the weaver and the draw-boy.50 The forerunner of this system was the pattern-rod loom in which the shed was raised to compose the decorative motifs by manually lifting rods, to which the related warp ends were tied by small cord loops, while the ground was woven using shafts and pedals. Technically speaking, looms can therefore be distinguished between those that weave relatively simple fabrics with a single warp and those capable of producing figured textiles with a double warp. Both horizontal treadle-looms51 and draw looms52 would have been in operation on the Iberian Peninsula by the early 13th century, and we cannot rule out the possibility there were also vertical looms,53 as well as tablet looms.54 Craftsmen always tended to specialise not only in producing certain goods but also in weaving certain fibres.

E n d p r od u cts: texti les g rouped acco rd ing to te chniq u e The myriad combinations of materials and manners of weaving, and the many types of designs, resulted in a broad variety of end products, some linked to very specific periods of the Middle Ages, others continually produced for centuries. Surviving pre-18th-century fabrics and garments are rare, because of widespread recycling of textiles and their innate fragility. Most of those still extant are silks – rich fabrics that were highly regarded and deliberately preserved, unique testaments to the textile industry and culture of their period. They are chiefly in public museum collections or private ecclesiastical collections. 50 Marie-Hélène Guelton and Gabriel Vial, ‘Samit and lampas: a brief history and technical

51

52

53 54

observations’, in Samit & Lampas. Motifs indiens. Indian motifs, ed. by Krishna Riboud (Paris: AEDTA, 1998), pp. 15−26. Various municipal charters (Cuenca, Iznatoraf, Zorita de los Canes) refer to a four-pedal loom as reported by Iradiel; Paulino Iradiel Murugarren, Evolución de la industria textil castellana en los siglos XIII-XVI. Factores de desarrollo, organización y costes de la producción manufacturera en Cuenca (Salamanca: Gráficas EUROPA, 1974), pp. 24−25. Daniel de Jonghe, ‘Le métier à la tire des samits espagnols 3 lie 1’, Bulletin du CIETA, 69 (1991), 113; Anna Muthesius, ‘Essential processes, looms, and technical aspects of the production of silk textiles’, in The Economic History of Byzantium. From the Seventh through the Fifteenth Century, ed. by Angeliki E. Laiou (Washington: Dumbarton Oaks, 2002), pp. 147−68; Isabelle Riaboff, ‘El arte de tejer lampás en telares de tiro manuales’, Datatèxtil, 23 (2010), 57−71. Saladrigas Cheng, ‘Los tejidos en Al-Andalus’, p. 88. Otfried Staudigel, ‘Tablet-weaving and the technique of the Ramsese-girdle’, Bulletin du CIETA, 41−42 (1975), 71−98; Laura Jiménez Martínez, ‘Orígenes e historia del telar de tablillas. Una aproximación a través de las fuentes materiales e iconográficas’, in I Coloquio de investigadores en textil y moda. Libro de Actas, ed. by Sílvia Carbonell (Barcelona: Impresión, 2018), pp. 144−49.

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Notable among the former are the medieval fabrics housed in institutions such as Patrimonio Nacional (PN, Burgos and Madrid), the Museo Arqueológico Nacional (MAN, Madrid), the Museu del Disseny (Barcelona), the Museo de la Alhambra (Granada), the Museu de Aveiro/Santa Joana (Aveiro), the Museu Alberto Sampaio (Guimarães), the Instituto Valencia de don Juan (IVDJ, Madrid), the Centre de Documentació i Museu Tèxtil (CDMT, Terrasa), and the Fundación Lázaro Galdiano (FLG, Madrid). These holdings generally originated from the fashion for textile collecting that began in the late 19th century which led to donations to these institutions, or from discoveries made during examination of medieval tombs of elite people, which contained luxurious textiles. Paradigmatic is the royal mausoleum in the abbey of Santa María la Real de las Huelgas in Burgos (Patrimonio Nacional), where, between 1942 and 1944, what is to date the finest ensemble of medieval clothing and fabrics in the world was discovered. Also important are other royal burial places such as Santes Creus (Tarragona), and tombs of royal families scattered among various locations such as the church of Santa María la Blanca in Villalcázar de Sirga (Palencia), and more recent finds in the convent of Caleruega (Burgos) and Segovia cathedral. The Church, throughout history, assembled treasures and served as a repository for them. As a result, collections have survived in cathedrals, monasteries and convents, and churches scattered across the Peninsula. Particularly notable in this respect are the cathedrals of Santiago, Burgos, Toledo, and Burgo de Osma (Soria); the monasteries of Guadalupe (Cáceres) and Santa María de Huerta (Soria); the collegiate church of San Isidoro de Leon; and the churches of Covarrubias, Oña, and Quintanaortuño (Burgos), and Roda de Isábena (Huesca). In addition to these Spanish institutions there are collections of Iberian textiles in museums elsewhere in Europe (Musée de Cluny, Paris; Musée des Tissus, Lyon; and Victoria & Albert Museum, London) and in America (Metropolitan Museum in New York, Hispanic Society of America, Cooper Hewitt Museum, Cleveland Museum of Art). Textiles go by different names in medieval documents, be they municipal charters, regulations and other sets of rules, inventories, accounting records, or literary works. Some names are based on the provenance of the textiles, others refer to their respective colours or fibres. However, the naming of cloths is not a simple matter. Sometimes the name of a fabric no longer matches its original characteristics – described by that name. Even more so, the particular technical or decorative features of textiles are generally still somewhat unclear, and many have yet to be fully defined. In addition, products originating in certain areas were copied and manufactured by workshops in others. One of the main problems in this field of study lies in establishing an exact correlation between the surviving pieces and the names used in written records, as well as fully understanding the connotations of those names themselves. In this respect it is appropriate to stress the significant progress made in the field of historical and philological studies, especially by Gual Camarena, Alfau, Martínez Meléndez, and Serrano-Niza, whose publications endeavour to



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match medieval nomenclatures to the textiles.55 Another approach to this problem involves studying the physical characteristics of the surviving pieces, that is, their technical characterisation. As textile production was highly specialised – it was carried out in specific trade and production centres with a high degree of standardisation – it is important to conduct thorough analyses of textile techniques in order to shed light on all the production processes. Analyses of this kind not only make it possible to group together fragments of the same garment (particularly important when dealing with textiles from the same collection)56 but furthermore enable them to be classified into technical groups, thus providing varied data and information about the period and occasionally, with the assistance of documentary sources, even allow them to be attributed to specific workshops in various locations. Pioneering reference works on the so-called panni tartarici and pannus d’areste57 prove the potential of studies on technical characterisation.

55 Miguel Gual Camarena, Vocabulario del comercio medieval (Barcelona: Ediciones El Albir, 1976);

Jesusa Alfau de Solalinde, Manual de tejidos españoles o nomenclatura de tejidos españoles en el s. XIII (Mexico: Instituto de estudios y documentos históricos, 1981); María del Carmen Martínez Meléndez, Los nombres de los tejidos en castellano medieval (Granada: Universidad de Granada, 1989); Dolores Serrano-Niza, Glosario árabe español de indumentaria según el Kitab al-Mujassaas de Ibn Sidah (Spain: Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas, 2005); Sequeira, O pano da terra, pp. 185–279. 56 For examples of recent work in piecing together fragments of textiles by means of technical analysis see Silvia Saladrigas Cheng, ‘Proyecto Des-fragmento, puzles textiles medievales’, in Carbonell, I Coloquio de investigadores en textil y moda, pp. 215−18; Silvia Saladrigas Cheng, ‘Proyecto Des-fragmento. Puzzles textiles medievales, v.02’, in Rodríguez Peinado and Asís García, Arte y producción, pp. 421−38; María Barrigón, ‘New interpretations concerning the shape of Queen Eleanor Plantagenet’s headdress from her tomb in Las Huelgas Abbey (†1214)’, Textile History, 49 (2018), pp. 191–207; María Barrigón, ‘Investigación y análisis de tejidos medievales: posibilidades para reconstruir algunos usos textiles en la Castilla del siglo XIII’, in Rodríguez Peinado and Asís García, Arte y producción textil, pp. 153−80. Some paradigmatic publications are: Pilar Borrego Díaz, ‘Análisis técnico del ligamento en los tejidos hispanoárabes’, Bienes Culturales, revista del IPHE, 5 (2005), 75−122; Sophie Desrosiers, Soieries et autres textiles de l’Antiquité au XVIe siècle. Musée National du Moyen-Âge-Thermes de Cluny, catalogue (Paris: Édition de la Réunion des musées nationaux, 2004); João Soalheiro, Paula Monteiro and Carmo Serrano, Tecidos medievais (Lisbon: Instituto Portugués de Conservaçao e Restauro, 2004; Borrego et al.,‘Caracterización’; Silvia Saladrigas Cheng, L’estudi tècnic dels teixits com a recurs en la recerca històrica. El cas dels teixits medievals del Centre de Documentació i Museu Tèxtil, Terrassa (Lleida: Universitat de Lleida, 2017). 57 Anne E. Wardwell, Panni Tartarici: eastern islamic silks woven with gold and silver, 13th and 14th centuries, Islamic Art, III (Genoa: The Bruschettini Foundation; New York: Islamic Art Foundation, 1989); Donald King, ‘Two medieval terms: draps d’ache, draps de l’arrest’, Bulletin du CIETA, 27 (1968), 26−29; Sophie Desrosiers, Gabriel Vial, and Daniel de Jonghe, ‘Cloth of aresta. A preliminary study of its definition, classification and method of weaving’, Textile History, 20 (1989), 199−223; Sophie Desrosiers, ‘Draps d’areste II. Extension de la classification, comparaisons et lieux de fabrication’, Techniques & Culture, 34 (1999), 89−119; Sophie Desrosiers, ‘Draps d’areste III. Singularité du tissage et origine des tisserands’, in

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Various reference works offer information about the processes of weaving and/ or explanations and technical classifications. Although it is not the purpose of this chapter to survey the literature on technical analyses of textiles, it is appropriate to highlight a few of these works. Notable among publications in English is that of Emery;58 European studies focus more on guidelines established by Lyon owing to the lasting textile industry in the area. In addition to older studies,59 a particularly prominent handbook is that of Guicherd,60 as is Vial’s (somewhat later) work as part of the Centre International d’Etude des Textiles Anciens (CIETA), an association for studying textile techniques created in 1954.61 This organisation has compiled a vocabulary and notes on technique, which have been translated into several languages with the aim of standardising terminology employed in technical characterisation.62 In Spain, a notable contribution is Castany’s study. The survival of the industry in the Valencia area has given rise to another interesting technical handbook.63 Although all the above studies help understand the weaving processes, it is also necessary to consider an aspect underlined by Desrosiers: the methodology for addressing the problem of textile classifications with respect to the definitions and connotations of the terms currently employed compared to their past uses.64 With these aspects in mind, a brief description of the most prevalent textile techniques on the Iberian Peninsula during the medieval period follows, particularly considering the 13th and 14th centuries, citing examples of surviving, published pieces with their technical analyses (if possible, complete), which are, as stressed earlier, chiefly silks.

58

59 60 61

62 63

64

Islamische Textilkunst des Mittelalters: aktuelle Probleme, ed. by Muḥammad ʻAbbās Muḥammad Salīm (Riggisberg: Abegg-Stiftung, 1997), pp. 181–93. Irene Emery, The Primary Structures of Fabrics (New York: Thames & Hudson, 2009, first pub.1966); Ann Pollard Rowe, ‘After Emery: Further considerations of fabric classification and terminology’, Textile Museum Journal, 23 (1984), 53–71. C. Villard, Manuel de théorie du tissage (Lyon: Societé Anonyme de l’imprimerie de A. Rey, 1923). Félix Guicherd, Cours de théorie de tissage: la soie, tissus unis, armures classiques (Lyon: Sève, 1946). Gabriel Vial published a number of technical analyses in the CIETA’s bulletin over the course of several decades, for example: ‘Dossier de recensement. Chasuble de Brauweiler’, Bulletin du CIETA, 18 (1963), 29−37; ‘À propos de la chasuble de Brauweiler’, Bulletin du CIETA, 19 (1964), 37−42; ‘Etudes techniques’, Bulletin du CIETA, 43−44 (1976), 41−73. In English: CIETA, Vocabulary of technical terms, CIETA, Notes on hand-weaving techniques in plain and figured textiles (Lyon: Centre International d’Etude del Textiles Anciens, 1987). F. Castany Saladrigas, Análisis de tejidos: reconocimiento y análisis de fibras textiles, hilos y tejidos (Barcelona: Editorial Gustavo Gili, 1944); Ramón Giner Bresó, Apuntes de tecnología textil. Escuela Textil del Colegio del Arte Mayor de la Seda de Valencia (Valencia: Direcció General de Patrimoni Artístic, 1998). Sophie Desrosiers, ‘Textiles terminologies and classifications: some methodological and chronological aspects’, in Textile terminologies in the Ancient Near East and Mediterranean from the third to the first Millennia BC, ed. by Cécile Michel and Marie-Louise Nosch (Oxford: Oxbow, 2013), pp. 23−52.



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Tabby The simplest type of weave is tabby or plain weave. In this system each weft yarn passes over one and under one warp. Variations were created in different ways, the simplest changing the colours of warp or weft or both, which made it possible to alternate colours grouped together vertically, horizontally, or in both directions.65 More complex variations could be achieved by creating minor weft effects, such as floating a weft across the whole warp at intervals (liseré, Figs 2.1, 2.2) or inserting a supplementary weft thread only visible on the obverse, floating it over the warp threads (weft-patterned effect). These techniques enabled small decorative patterns to be created.66 Tabby weave encompasses two special groups. The first is what modern Spanish historiography conventionally calls cendales. These are bands of fabric between 10 and 20 cm in width which can be extremely long (the longest known example is 7 metres in length). They are generally tabby weave with a very low thread count and very tight Z-twist. Their selvages are sometimes in different hues (for example red) and they can also be decorated with several combinations of coloured wefts or metallic threads, creating alternating striking bands. They were wound around parchment structures to make tall headdresses.67 The other group comprises tabby-weave fabrics with tapestry decoration. Their characteristics were defined by Saladrigas.68 Technically speaking, these fabrics, which have a single warp, combine a plain area in tabby weave and another in tapestry technique created by brocading shuttles working with two warp threads simultaneously. The silk wefts can be of several colours, and are very lightly twisted. Sometimes tabby (whether combined with tapestry or not) was also adorned with equidistant twill stripes with wefts of metal-wrapped threads in textiles woven on a 75 cm-wide loom.69 The Las Huelgas collection has two versions of this type: one made of silk and another – no doubt cheaper – version made of plant fibres. 65 There is an example in the veil found in the tomb attributed to Sancho, natural son of Alfonso

66

67

68 69

XI (d. c. 1343): Manuel Gómez-Moreno, El Panteón Real de las Huelgas de Burgos (Madrid: CSIC, 1946), p. 36. Examples (among others): Sophie Desrosiers, ‘Soiries médievales du Museu Episcopal de Vic’, Quaderns del Museu Episcopal de Vic, 1 (2005), 151−55 (p. 152); Borrego et al., ‘Caracterización’, p. 7. There are many examples in the collection at Las Huelgas abbey in Burgos; Gómez-Moreno, El Panteón Real, pp. 72−73; Barrigón, ‘New interpretations’. Further examples in María Teresa Sánchez Trujillano, ‘Catálogo de los tejidos medievales del MAN, II’, Boletín del Museo Arqueológico Nacional, 4 (1986), 91−116 (p. 108). Saladrigas Cheng, ‘Los tejidos en Al-Andalus’, pp. 89−92. Examples of this type are relatively abundant in the grave-goods of the Castilian royal family; Gómez-Moreno, El Panteón Real, pp. 68–69; María Barrigón, ‘Alfonso VIII y el color azul: nuevas investigaciones sobre un rey medieval a la vanguardia de la moda’, Reales Sitios, 202 (2015), 16−33 (p. 26); Martínez Malo, ‘Ajuar funerario de doña María’, p. 331.

Fig. 2.1 Pillow belonging to Queen Berenguela (d. 1246), Las Huelgas Abbey, inv. no. 00651964. © Patrimonio Nacional.

Fig. 2.2  Detail of Fig. 2.1, showing the tabby weave with liseré effect and the geometric motifs embroidered with metal threads. © Patrimonio Nacional.



Tex t ile T echniques in t he I b eri a n Pen i n s ul a 5 7

Bayadère textiles have alternate bands of different weaves. Examples are fragments from the tomb of the Infante Felipe in Villalcázar de Sirga and from that of the Infante Fernando de la Cerda (d. 1275) in Las Huelgas, Burgos, woven on a 120 cm-wide loom.70

Twills and lozenge twill textiles Twill is a binding system based on a unit of three or more ends and three or more picks, in which each end passes over two or more adjacent picks and under the next one or more, or under two or more adjacent picks and over the next one or more. The points of binding are set over by one end, always in the same direction, on successive picks forming diagonal lines. The repeat of a twill may be expressed as a numerical ratio, the first figure indicating the number of picks over which an end passes, and the second the number of picks under which it passes.71

Twills vary greatly depending on the number of threads and types of stepping, including different combinations of lozenge twill. Again there are examples denoting evident decorative intent as they include stripes in other colours, alternating types of fibres, or combinations of weaves.72 Within the group of twills, cloths referred to in medieval records as cloth of areste, of arista, of Larest, or ad spinam piscis have been identified by Donald King and characterised technically by Sophie Desrosiers in several publications.73 King’s identification is based on their derivation from the Latin noun arista (ear of wheat), probably an allusion to the twill pattern, which resembles a corn spike but also a herringbone; hence the identification ad spinam piscis in documents (Fig. 2.3). These textiles can have a twill ground, though they more commonly have the appearance of small lozenges or rhombuses. Desrosiers based her technical classification on a number of criteria including fineness of warp threads, their density, type of decorative motif (together with the existence of transverse bands), type of filé and number of threads used to make the lozenges, and proposed dividing them into two main groups with several subgroups. She also reported several similarities between the textiles in group 1 and a particular, very light type of samite in 3/1 twill, as well as with another type of double-face lozenge.74 She proposed the south of France as the location where those of group 1 (and the 3/1 samite) were 70 Borrego et al., ‘Caracterización’, p. 7; Gómez-Moreno, El Panteón Real, p. 62. 71 CIETA, Vocabulary, p. 77.

72 One of the pillows of Leonor Plantagenet (d. 1214) has a blue cotton twill ground alternating

with decorative yellow silk stripes; Barrigón, ‘Textiles and farewells’, p. 251.

73 King, ‘Two medieval terms’; Desrosiers, Vial and Jonghe, ‘Cloth of aresta’; Desrosiers, ‘Draps

d’areste II’; Desrosiers, ‘Draps d’areste III’.

74 Desrosiers, ‘Draps d’areste II’, p. 109; Sophie Desrosiers and Isabelle Bédat, ‘Une soierie

médiévale a grands losanges bicolores apparentée aux draps d’areste’, Bulletin du CIETA, 70 (1992), 91–100.

Fig. 2.3  Coiffe (cofia) the weave of which is cloth of areste. Las Huelgas Abbey, inv. no. 00651903. © Patrimonio Nacional.



Tex t ile T echniques in t he I b eri a n Pen i n s ul a 5 9

woven, and the Iberian Peninsula for the group 2 textiles, which were finer and of higher quality than those in the other group. The textiles in this second group may have been manufactured in a Christian area but there is also the possibility that the workshops producing one of the subgroups might have been located in al-Andalus.75 As with the previous group, there are several surviving examples which are very similar to each other but illustrate very well how the same design could be manufactured in different qualities, logically with varying prices. Similarities exist between one of the linings of the coffin attributed to María de Almenar (00651954, PN) and a textile fragment housed in the CDMT (6162), both of which are decorated with stars inside a white circle on a blue ground.76 In addition, another two pieces from the same collections display identical fleur-de-lis decoration – although in that of Las Huelgas (00651960 PN) these motifs are woven in metallic thread, whereas in that of the CDMT (6161) they are made of silk and are not outlined in another colour.77 Besides differences in the quality of the craftsmanship, a final example from Las Huelgas provides an interesting indication of hierarchy in funerary textiles: the same type of fabric with a white ground and gold flowers or stars used to line the coffin of Queen Leonor Plantagenet is also found in one of the tombs in the portico. The queen’s was much more luxurious as it had an extra tabby pick of very fine silk for every twill pick.78

Figured textiles: taquetés (weft-faced compound tabby), samites (weft-faced compound twill) and lampas Figured textiles make it possible to produce highly intricate, repetitive patterns and ornamental motifs, including complex figurative decoration. Fabrics of this kind required greater technical skill and would have fetched the highest prices during the period. They all have two warps, the main warp operated by the weaver using the pedals of the treadle loom and a binding warp controlled by a draw-boy by means of lashes.79 In taquetés and samites, the main warp is always concealed; taqueté has a tabby weave,80 and samite a twill weave.81 If one of the wefts is visible on the obverse side 75 Desrosiers, ‘Draps d’areste III’, pp. 181–93; Desrosiers, ‘Draps d’areste II’, p. 105. 76 Gómez-Moreno, El Panteón Real, p. 58; Saladrigas Cheng, L’estudi tècnic, p. 75. 77 Gómez-Moreno, El Panteón Real, p. 57; Saladrigas Cheng, L’estudi tècnic, p. 75. 78 Barrigón, ‘Investigación y análisis’, pp. 167−68.

79 Depending on their design, it is not possible to specify whether some textiles were made on

a pattern-rod loom or a drawloom; Borrego Díaz, ‘Análisis técnico’, p. 78.

80 The garments of the Infante Felipe (MAN 76/130/1; IVDJ 2079) are analysed in Borrego Díaz,

‘Análisis técnico’, pp. 108−11.

81 ‘Weave employing a main warp, a binding warp, and a weft composed of two or more series of

threads, usually of different colours. By the action of the main warp ends, only one weft thread appears on the face, while the other or others are kept to the reverse. The ends of the binding

Fig. 2.4  Detail of the coffin lining of the tomb attributed to Maria de Almenar (d. c. 1200). Las Huelgas Abbey, 00650516. © Patrimonio Nacional.



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and another on the reverse side, the result is a plain weave with a double-weave effect.82 A common combination found in samites is 2/1 S-twill (Figs 2.4, 2.5). These fabrics are associated with the Byzantine world on account of their iconography and the existence of coloured warps, or with the workshops of al-Andalus, Sicily or Egypt. The latter have even, undyed warps (1 binding and 1 ground; or 1 binding and 2 ground).83 Examples belonging to the first group are the textile adorning the frame of the portable altar of San Millán de la Cogolla and the textile of Bishop Pere d’Urg.84 Examples of textiles belonging to the second group are the ‘cloth of the witches’ from Sant Joan de les Abadesses and the ‘cloth of the eagles’ from the chasuble of Saint Bernat Calvó.85 An interesting type of samite Fig. 2.5 Macrophotograph of Fig. 4.4 showing its combines vegetable fibres for samite weave. Owing to a loss of weft in the upper part, the main warps and silk for the the pairs of main warps are visible, although in origin they were concealed by the (today) missing weft. For binding warps and the wefts (the the same reason, the wefts that are not active in the fibres visible on the right side), obverse remain visible too. resulting in a strong, robust fabric. Known as half-silks, these fabrics have several distinguishing features: the core of the metal-wrapped thread is made of vegetable fibre; the metal part is silver gilt, applied to animal gut;

82

83 84 85

warp bind the weft in passes, and the ground and the pattern are formed simultaneously. The entire surface is covered by weft floats which hide the main warp ends. If the passes are bound in tabby, the construction is called weft-faced compound tabby (Fr. Taqueté); if in twill, weft-faced compound twill (Fr. Samit)’: CIETA, Vocabulary, p. 85. An example of plain samite is the textiles (beginning of the 12th century) of the bishop of San Ramón del Monte in Roda de Isábena (Huesca); including a technical analysis, Borrego Díaz, ‘Análisis técnico’, pp. 85−87. Saladrigas Cheng, L’estudi tècnic, pp. 57−60. Borrego Díaz, ‘Análisis técnico’, pp. 89−91. Saladrigas Cheng, L’estudi tècnic, p. 59.

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and they have an S-twist. The proposed places of origin of these fabrics range from Germany (now dismissed) to a Mudejar manufactory in the Castilian area (Gómez-Moreno, Shepherd) or an Italian textile mill in Venice (King); these last two hypotheses are currently supported by different authors.86 Two pieces from Las Huelgas, the linings of the coffins of Fernando de la Cerda (d. 1275) and Berenguela (d. 1279), respectively, indicate the width of the looms: 120−124 cm. Another known example is the cloak of Abbot Biure (d. 1350), fragments of which are scattered among several institutions.87 In contrast, if samite is made with a 3/1 twill and fine silk warps, the result is a very light fabric; as stated earlier, this group of textiles has been associated with the so-called cloth of areste. In lampas weave both warps are visible as they form both ground and decoration on the face of the cloth – in other words, the weaver works with a combination of two weaves (which may or may not coincide) on the obverse side of the fabric (Figs 2.6, 2.7). Since the publication of Shepherd’s studies,88 scholars have identified a group of lampas fabrics as being produced in Almería. This group is thought to have first been manufactured in the 12th century and continued with a few variations. The ground is an uneven tabby weave (in later examples it is even weave), while the decoration is an even tabby. In addition, when there is a filé weft it has a Z-twist and is brocaded, creating what has been called a ‘honeycomb’ effect: as the filé is positioned beneath the binding warp but does not exchange places with it, it is shifted towards the points of binding, creating rhomboid shapes. This can be seen in the fragment of the textile of Saint Daniel (IVDJ 2087),89 in the dalmatic and alb of Archbishop Jiménez de Rada (d. 1247) in Santa María de Huerta in Soria and in the textiles of Santa Librada (CDMT 6469 and CDMT 6470).90 If the main weft is bound in even tabby by the base warp, and all the binding warps are positioned beneath this main weft and are bound behind it by the pattern weft, a double-weave effect is created in these areas. In addition, when the main weft does not work on the face of the fabric, a honeycomb effect is again created (this time on the reverse side) because of how these wefts are interlaced with the binding warp. The result is therefore a lampas with a double-weave ground. Examples of this double-weave lampas are found in the dalmatic and cloak of

86 Gómez-Moreno, El Panteón Real, p. 62; Dorothy G. Shepherd, ‘The textiles from las Huelgas de

87 88 89 90

Burgos’, The Bulletin of the Needle and Bobbin Club, 35 (1951), 2−27 (p. 21); Donald King, ‘Some unrecognised Venetian woven fabrics’, in Collected textile studies, ed. by Anna Muthesius and Monique King (London: Pindar Press, 2014), pp. 111−34. Borrego Díaz, ‘Análisis técnico’, pp. 116−17. Dorothy G. Shepherd, ‘A dated hispano-islamic silk’, Ars Orientalis, 2 (1957), 373−82. Borrego Díaz, ‘Análisis técnico’, p. 92. Borrego Díaz, ‘Análisis técnico’, pp. 96−101; Saladrigas Cheng, L’estudi tècnic, pp. 68–69.

Fig. 2.6  Pillow of the tomb attributed to Maria de Almenar (d. c. 1200). Las Huelgas Abbey, 00650542. © Patrimonio Nacional.

Fig. 2.7  Macrophotograph of Fig. 2.6 showing its lampas weave. Detail of one of the golden circles. Both warps are visible as they form both ground and decoration on the face of the cloth. On the right can be seen the metallic threads forming the small circles.

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Saint Valero (IVDJ 2063 and 2062) and in the fragment of the ‘music cloth’ in the Instituto Valencia de don Juan (2098).91 Lampas with twill and satin ground weaves already existed during the late medieval centuries. Examples are the palm-leaf motif fabric and the fabric with the motto in Arabic ‘Glory to our lord the sultan’ (IVDJ 2091 and 2101).92 Another specific group of lampas fabrics is the so-called panni tartarici, which came from the Far East and whose designs were soon imitated in Italy. Asian fabrics differed substantially from their European counterparts as to type of selvages, combination of the fibres, and composition of the metallic thread.93 These three weaves are not incompatible: fabrics can combine two of them. For example, we find lampas combined with parts woven in taqueté (weft-faced compound tabby); and figured taqueté with double-faced taqueté.94 The history of these textile types is de longue durée, spanning several centuries. Although they are all found on the Iberian Peninsula in the 13th century, lampas gradually became the predominant weave and maintained its foothold, evolving in the 14th and 15th centuries and continuing into the Modern Age. The reason for its success is simple: this weave allowed for many manufacture and design possibilities.

New Late Medieval textile types: satin, velvet, and damask The Late Middle Ages saw the emergence of new types of textiles that went on to enjoy great fame and lasting prominence in the Modern Age in the Iberian Peninsula – velvets and damasks. Produced in various centres from the 15th century onwards, their manufacture attained high degrees of perfection. Velvets are very thick fabrics with cut or uncut pile (loops). Damasks combine two weaves in the same pick resulting in a combination of a lustrous effect and a matte effect, which are reversed on the wrong side. Satin was a common weave beginning in the 1300s and especially in the 1400s. However, the recent discovery of a garment belonging to the Infanta Leonor (d. 1275) in the convent of Santo Domingo de Caleruega (Burgos) proves it existed on the Iberian Peninsula considerably earlier than previously thought.95 Interestingly, the 5-end satin of this garment was made by combining cotton 91 Borrego Díaz, ‘Análisis técnico’, pp. 102–08. Gabriel Vial describes this group as pseudo-

92 93

94 95

lampas; ‘Les vêtements liturgiques dits de saint Valère. Étude technique de pseudo lampas à fond (ou effet) double-étoffe’, Techniques & Culture, 34 (1999), 67−81. Borrego Díaz, ‘Análisis técnico’, pp. 117−19. Wardwell, Panni Tartarici. For examples from las Huelgas see Gómez-Moreno, El Panteón Real, pp. 33−35 and 64−65; Concha Herrero Carretero, ‘Marques d’importation au XIVe siècle sur les tissus orientaux de las Huelgas’, Bulletin du CIETA, 81 (2004), 41−47. Lampas with taqueté in Rada’s dalmatic (IVDJ 2111) and Saint Valero textiles (CDMT 3938 and MTIB 5203); Borrego et al., ‘Caracterización’, p. 18. María Barrigón, ‘El ajuar de la infanta Leonor de Castilla (†1275)’, in El sepulcro de la infanta Leonor de Castilla (Valladolid: CCRBC) (forthcoming).



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wefts and silk warps, which were also used to create a decorative square pattern in tapestry technique, constructed in the usual manner of the time. Satin weave was commonly used as a ground for lampas in the late Middle Ages, as mentioned previously.

Tapestry and carpets Tapestry and carpets are made using the tapestry and knotting techniques respectively.96 Tapestry is a technique in which the weft yarns are not inserted all the way across the cloth from selvage to selvage but used only where required by the decorative motif to complete the pattern. The so-called Banner of Navas de Tolosa is an example of this technique.97 Rugs contributed significantly to making rooms more comfortable. There are abundant references to rug workshops in Arabic sources from the 10th century onwards (Cuenca or Chinchilla). Some of them survived throughout the Modern Age, such as those located in Castilla La Mancha (Alcaraz and Liétor, as well as those mentioned above) and the eastern coastal region.98 They are frequently depicted in images and recorded in inventories.

Tablet weaving and knitting Tablet weaving employs small tablets (which can be made of different materials, and of different shapes), which are punched in various places with at least two and at most four holes and threaded with yarns. These yarns, when fixed, become the warp and the tablets are turned to and fro to create the shed through which the weft is passed.99 Tablet weaving produced narrow bands (from about 2 to 15 cm wide) to embellish other fabrics or to function as narrow wares: for example, as orphreys on liturgical vestments or strips nailed to coffins to hold their textile linings in place. These bands were normally decorated with geometric motifs, though there are examples with castle or eagle motifs in Las Huelgas. Metallic threads were sometimes used.100 It has lately been thought that the stole and maniple of Leonor Plantagenet (d. 1214) in the treasury of San Isidoro de Leon were also tablet woven. The decoration of these pieces includes an inscription referring to the queen, as well as castles.101 96 Saladrigas Cheng, ‘Los tejidos en Al-Andalus’, pp. 85−86; Alberto Bartolomé Arraiza, ‘Alfombras

españolas’ in Alfombras españolas de Alcaraz y Cuenca, siglos XV−XVI (Madrid: Ministerio de Educación, Cultura y Deporte, 2002), pp.13–51 (p. 31). 97 Carmen Bernis Madrazo, Tapicería hispano-musulmana, siglos XIII y XIV (Madrid: Instituto Diego Velázquez, 1956). 98 Bartolomé Arraiza, ‘Alfombras españolas’, pp. 35–50. 99 Staudigel, ‘Tablet-weaving’; Jiménez Martínez, ‘Orígenes e historia’. 100 Gómez-Moreno, El Panteón Real, pp. 76−80. 101 Jitske Jasperse, ‘Matilda, Leonor and Joanna: the Plantagenet sisters and the display of dynastic connections through material culture’, Journal of Medieval History, 43 (2017), 1−25.

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Fig. 2.8  Pillow attributed to the tomb of Mafalda (d. c. 1185). Las Huelgas Abbey, 00651911. © Patrimonio Nacional.

Knitting consists of works made by one continuous thread that is made to intertwine with itself by means of needles.102 Stocking stitch was the most characteristic (Figs 2.8, 2.9), as in one of the silk pillows of Fernando de la Cerda (d.1275).103 Complexity was attained by using several colours and elaborate designs, as in the gloves of Beatrice of Swabia (d. 1235) and Alfonso X (r. 1252−84), found in their tombs in Seville cathedral, and those of Archbishop Jiménez de Rada (d. 1247), 102 Irena Turnau, ‘The diffusion of knitting in medieval Europe’, in Cloth and Clothing in Medieval

Europe: Essays in Honor of Professor E. M. Carus-Wilson, ed. by N. R. Harte and K. G. Ponting (London: Heinemann Educational, 1983), pp. 368−89. 103 Lourdes de Luis Sierra, ‘Almohada de Fernando de la Cerda’, in Vestiduras Ricas. El monasterio de las Huelgas y su época 1170−1340, ed. by Joaquín Yarza Luaces (Madrid: Patrimonio Nacional, 2005), p. 218.



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and Archbishop Gonçalo Pereira (first half of the 14th century).104

Embroidery Textiles could be obrados, embroidered, the base fabric decorated by using a needle to apply thread. Not only were expensive silk threads used; so were metallic threads and other materials including seed pearls and precious stones, which substantially enriched these items and enhanced their value. The technically simplest surviving embroideries are linen fabrics decorated in silks using different Fig. 2.9  Detail of Fig. 2.8, showing its stocking stitch. stitches105 to create a variety of motifs, usually geometric (Fig. 2.2), combining cross stitch with braid stitch or herringbone stitch,106 or braid stitch or herringbone stitch with rope stitch.107 Embroidery with metallic threads might create interlaced geometrical shapes.108 Embroidery could be solid – covering the entire ground – as in a pillow of Jiménez de Rada (d. 1247),109 and a recently-­restored pillow from Las Huelgas which, owing to this characteristic 104 Manuel Gómez-Moreno, ‘Preseas reales sevillanas (san Fernando, doña Beatriz y Alfonso el

Sabio, en sus tumbas)’, Archivo hispalense, 27−32 (Sevilla: Diputación Provincial de Sevilla, 1948), 191−204 (p. 198 and 200); María Socorro Mantilla de los Ríos, Vestiduras pontificales del arzobispo Rodrigo Jiménez de Rada, s. XIII (Madrid: Ministerio de Cultura. Instituto de Conservación y Restauración de Bienes Culturales, 1995), pp. 70–76; Rosa Pomar, Malhas portuguesas. História e prática do tricote em Portugal, com 20 modelos de inspiraçao tradicional (Porto: Civilização, 2013), p. 15. 105 Maria Ángeles González Mena, Catálogo de bordados (Madrid: Instituto Valencia de don Juan, 1974); Kay Staniland, Bordadores. Artesanos medievales (Madrid: Akal, 2000). 106 Such as a fragment of the pillow of Leonor Plantagenet (d. 1214); Barrigón, ‘Textiles and farewells’, p. 251. Also, the pillow of the Infante Sancho (d. 1343, PN 00651959); Luis Sierra, ‘Almohada del infante Sancho’, in Yarza Luaces, Vestiduras Ricas, p. 238. 107 For an example in a 15th to 16th-century fragment in the Instituto Valencia de don Juan (2207), see Borrego et al.,‘Caracterización’, p. 19. 108 Luis Sierra, ‘Almohada de doña Berenguela’, in Yarza Luaces, Vestiduras Ricas, p. 236. 109 Mantilla de los Rios, Vestiduras pontificales, pp. 28−55.

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and the type of stitch used (braid), has sometimes been described as knitted, but is actually embroidered.110 Embroideries with elaborate iconography include the ‘Embroidered tunic of Oña’, from the caliphal period, the so-called ‘Tapestry of the Creation’ in the museum of Girona Cathedral (11th-century, which, unlike the others is worked in wool) and the so-called chasuble of St Thomas Becket in Fermo cathedral (12th-­ century).111 The technique that was all the rage in medieval Europe from the 12th century onwards was that known as opus anglicanum, a term which referred both to pieces from England characterised by their quality and materials (using silk and gold thread) and to similar work produced elsewhere.112 At the end of the Middle Ages the workshops in religious houses, particularly that of Guadalupe (Cáceres), were famed for their exquisite craftsmanship.

Conclusio ns The complexity of medieval textiles is apparent from the few surviving examples. The study of them can take various approaches. Of major importance is establishing the technical characteristics of the pieces, classifying them into groups and relating them to historical knowledge about the textile industry in different regions and periods. This chapter presents a general view of the various materials and processes that can be involved in medieval textiles, mainly through extant, surviving examples.

110 Patrimonio Nacional, ‘Almohada del Infante d. Fernando de la Cerda. Monasterio de las

Huelgas. Burgos’ [30 March 2022].

111 Manuel Casamar and Juan Zozaya, ‘Apuntes sobre la yuba funeraria de la Colegiata de Oña

(Burgos)’, Boletín de Arqueología Medieval, 5 (1991), 39−60; Laura Ciampini, ‘La capa de Fermo: un bordado de Al-Andalus’, in Arte y cultura: patrimonio hispanomusulmán en Al-Andalus, ed. by Antonio Fernández Puertas and Purificación Marinetto Sánchez (Granada: Universidad de Granada, 2009), pp. 143−78; Miriam Alí de Unzaga, ‘Nuevos datos sobre el bordado de Oña: testigo ineludible de la historia, la política y la cultura entre Al-Andalus y Castilla’, in Oña: Un milenio. Actas del Congreso internacional sobre el Monasterio de Oña 1011−2011, ed. by Rafael Sánchez Domingo (Madrid: Fundación Milenario San Salvador de Oña, 2012), pp. 562−73; Shalem, The Chasuble; El brodat de la Creació de la catedral de Girona, ed. by Carles Mancho (Barcelona: Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona, 2018). 112 English Medieval Embroidery, opus anglicanum, ed. by Clare Browne, Glyn Davies, and M. A. Michael (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2016). The Daroca cloak, now in the MAN, Madrid, is discussed on pp. 160−64. Another example is the cloak of Cardinal Gil de Albornoz (d. 1367) in Toledo cathedral; Tapices. Textiles. Orfebrería de la Catedral Primada y Colegio de infantes. Guía Catálogo, ed. by Juan Pedro Sánchez Gamero, Carlos Turillo, and Maria del Prado López Martín (Toledo: Instituto Superior de estudios teológicos san Ildefonso, 2014), p. 60.

chapter 3

Cloth Trade in the Iberian Kingdoms during the Late Middle Ages Máximo Diago Hernando

G e n e r a l b ack g round: Economic e xpansio n o f f e u d al E u r o p e a n d developm ent of long d istance trad e d u ring th e 12 th and 13 th ce ntu rie s

F

rom the 11th century Europe had enjoyed a long period of economic growth that promoted a significant increase of the levels of population and agrarian production. New lands were put under cultivation and extensive territories were conquered. The economic growth was simultaneous with a process of increased commercialisation of the economy.1 This triggered both the multiplication of local markets and the foundation of new towns, and encouraged the development of long-distance trade. Many commodities were traded between distant regions, but among them textiles stand out. Certain European regions, mainly in the Low Countries and northern and central Italy, specialised in the production of quality textiles for export to distant markets, and were able to feed an increasing population through grain imports. In contrast, other European regions became importers of textiles.2 That was the case of the Iberian Christian kingdoms.

1

For a relatively recent overview of this general process see Robert Bartlett, The Making of Europe: Conquest, Colonization and Cultural Change, 950–1350 (London: Penguin, 2003). 2 For an overview of this process see Máximo Diago Hernando, La industria y el comercio de productos textiles en Europa. Siglos XI al XV (Madrid: Arco Libros, 1997).

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T h e d ecli ne of I slam and the e xp ansio n o f the C h r i s t i an k i ng dom s and th e co nse q u e nce s the re o f for texti le m anu f actu re During the 12th and 13th centuries the territorial expansion of the Christian kingdoms in the Iberian Peninsula progressed rapidly. As a result of this process of military expansion, al-Andalus became reduced to a small and marginal territory, the emirate of Granada, in the east of what is now Andalucía, which continued under Muslim rule until 1492. Extensive areas of land were incorporated into the Christian kingdoms in a relatively short period of time. As a result, societies with a strong military component developed in each of these kingdoms. The abundance of resources for a relatively small population made it possible for a large group of people to enjoy a relatively high standard of living and purchasing power. Accordingly there were not many incentives in these militarized societies for the development of their own manufacturing activities, since many of the inhabitants could obtain good incomes from the performance of military activities. Therefore they became accustomed to acquiring in the market many of the commodities they consumed. Most of these commodities were imported from other European countries, like northern and central Italy, the Low Countries, France and England. This under-development of manufacture in general, and specifically of textiles, in the Iberian Peninsula during the 13th century contrasts with the situation during the flourishing period of the Caliphate of Cordoba (912–1035), and even during the period of the Taifa kingdoms that followed the disappearance of the caliphs in 1035. At this time a sophisticated culture blossomed, that made possible the development of a prestigious textile manufacturing industry. Silk textiles made in al-Andalus enjoyed high prestige during these centuries, and were exported to many different destinations around the Mediterranean. They were also absorbed in the Christian kingdoms of Iberia.3 As a result of the decline of Muslim textile manufacture after the Christian conquest of most of the territories under the rule of Islam, with the exception of Granada, in the course of the 13th century textile manufacture in Iberia underwent a severe process of contraction. The decline was only reversed with the emergence of a new textile manufacturing industry in several territories of the Crown of Aragon at the beginning of the 14th century.

3

Olivia Remie Constable, Trade and Traders in Muslim Spain (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1994), pp. 223–26.



Clot h T r ade in t he Iberi a n K i n g do m s 7 1

I m p o r t s o f texti les from th e L o w Co u ntrie s and F rance i n th e 13 th ce ntu ry The scarce archival sources that have been preserved in the Iberian kingdoms from the 13th century prove that textiles from European regions beyond the Pyrenees were being acquired on a large scale at that time, and that, with the exception of low quality cloths, they dominated the market in all the Iberian territories.4 One of the first testimonies to this fact is provided by a privilege granted by King Jaime I of Aragon (1213–1276) to the recently conquered city of Valencia. In this document reference is made to fabrics from towns of the Low Countries, such as Ghent and Ypres, from northern French towns like Rheims, and from towns in the Languedoc, such as Narbonne and Montpellier.5 Another interesting document that proves the extent of the consumption of imported cloths from the Low Countries and France in the territories of the Crown of Castile is the so-called Ordinance of Jerez of 1268. It sets prices for a wide range of cloths that were traded in this kingdom during the reign of Alfonso X. The overwhelming majority of the cloths mentioned were imported from other European territories beyond the Pyrenees.6 There are no mentions of cloths from the Crown of Aragon, and just two from the kingdom of Navarre, which were among the cheapest ones. The overwhelming majority of the cloths mentioned in this document came from the Low Countries. They were also the most expensive ones, because of their higher quality. If we except the silk cloths, the wool textiles that attained the highest prices were dyed cloths from Cambrai and Ghent, and the brunetas prietas from Douai and Ypres.7 Other wool textiles from these towns and other places like Bruges, Lille, Saint-Omer and Valenciennes, were also among the most valued, according to their prices. But in this document, besides the cloths made in the Low Countries, that at this time included several towns that later became French, there are also references to cloths from towns of Northern France such as Blois, Rheims or Rouen, and from southern France, such as Montpellier. They cover a wide variety of types that are identified in the document with the 4

Miguel Gual Camarena, ‘El comercio de telas en el siglo XIII hispano’, Anuario de Historia Económica y Social, 1 (1968), 85–106; Miguel Gual Camarena, Vocabulario del comercio medieval: Colección de aranceles aduaneros de la Corona de Aragón (Siglos XIII y XIV) (Barcelona: El Albir, 1976). 5 Constable, Trade and Traders, p. 225. 6 The Ordinance of Jerez of 1268 is published in Cortes de los Antiguos Reinos de Castilla y León, ed. by Manuel Colmeiro, 5 vols (Madrid: Real Academia de la Historia, 1861–1884), I (1861), pp. 48–52. The information provided by this document is studied in Teófilo F. Ruiz, ‘Textile consumption in Late Medieval Castile: the social, economic and cultural meaning of clothing’, Erasmo. Revista de Historia Bajomedieval y Moderna, 2 (2015), 101–14. 7 Paño tinto de Cambrai (3.5 maravedis, henceforth mrs) and Paño tinto de Gante (3 mrs). Bruneta prieta from Yprés and Douai (3 mrs).

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following names: befa (or bifa), blanqueta, camelina, escarlata, frisa, pardo, prieto, sarga, tinto y grana, tiritana and valancina.8 The extent of wool textile imports from northern Europe in the Crown of Castile in the last decade of the 13th century is confirmed by the accounts of the customs of some northern seaports of the Basque provinces. They provide a tiny and partial sample, because they contain information concerning just two years, 1292 and 1293, and refer only to the seaports of Fuenterrabía and San Sebastián, and other minor ones. This source gives us no information about the activity of the most important seaport of the region, Bilbao.9 According to this source imports of cloths made of wool from the Low Countries and France had attained a high level of development at that time. Many references can be found to textiles from Flemish towns like Ghent, Lille, Saint-Omer, Valenciennes, Ypres, and also from the French region of Languedoc, mainly from Narbonne, Carcassonne and Montolieu. Plenty of cloth names are used in these accounts but not all of them can be easily linked to an identifiable town. Besides the Ordenamiento de Jerez of 1268, and the 1292–93 Customs Accounts of Sancho IV (r. 1284–1295), many other disparate documents, among them lists of products that had to pay customs duties or other taxes in certain places, testify to the widespread consumption in Castile and other Iberian kingdoms of cloths made in the Low Countries during the 13th and 14th centuries. Most of these sources have been studied by Verlinden10 and Gual Camarena.11 Some of these cloths attained such a widespread circulation that the names of the towns where they had been originally manufactured became common cloth names, such as Santomeres and Valancinas, originally made in the towns of Saint Omer and Valenciennes, respectively. The capture in 1350 of a Castilian ship by the English testifies to the widespread consumption in Castile of cloths from Valenciennes. The ship was transporting large quantities of these cloths, 8

It is often difficult to identify textiles from the names used in the documents. The following works may be helpful: Jesusa Alfau de Solalinde, Manual de tejidos españoles o nomenclatura de tejidos españoles en el siglo XIII (Mexico [City]: Instituto de Estudios y Documentos Históricos, 1981); María del Carmen Martínez Meléndez, Los nombres de los tejidos en el castellano medieval (Granada: Universidad de Granada, 1989). 9 These accounts were first published by Mercedes Gaibrois, Historia del reinado de Sancho IV de Castilla, 3 vols (Madrid: Tipografía de la Revista de Archivos, Bibliotecas y Museos, 1922–28), I (1922); much later also by Asunción López Dapena, Cuentas y gastos (1292–1294) del rey Don Sancho IV el Bravo (1285–1295) (Córdoba: Caja de Ahorros, 1984). They are studied, among others, by T. F. Ruiz, ‘Textile consumption’. 10 Charles Verlinden, El comercio de paños flamencos y brabanzones en España durante los siglos XIII y XIV (Madrid: Editorial Maestre, 1952); Charles Verlinden, ‘Draps des Pays Bas et du nord de la France en Espagne au XIVe. Siècle’, Le Moyen Âge, 8 (1937), 21–36 ; Charles Verlinden, ‘Deux pôles de l’expansion de la draperie flamande et brabançonne au XIVe. siècle: La Pologne et la péninsule ibérique’, Studia Historica Gandensia, 104 (1968), 679–89. 11 Miguel Gual Camarena, ‘Para un mapa de la industria textil hispana en la Edad Media’, Anuario de Estudios Medievales, 4 (1967), 109–68. Gual Camarena, ‘El comercio de telas’; Gual Camarena, Vocabulario.



Clot h T r ade in t he Iberi a n K i n g do m s 7 3

which were later used to dress the servants of King Edward III of England (r. 1327– 1377).12 In fact the large quantities of Valenciennes textiles imported into Castile were mainly intended to make clothing for servants who received livery (librea) from their lords. Cloths imported from the Low Countries were of very varied qualities. There were among them very luxurious and expensive sorts, like the so-called rases, a name used in the Castilian documents for certain high quality cloths of Arras. Also some cloths from Ypres attained a very high level of quality and price, as the accounts of the purchases made by the Royal Household of Aragon in 1303 prove.13 Cloths from this Flemish town attained the highest prices registered in this document. Cloths from Douai, home city of the well-known clothier and merchant Johan Boinebroke, were of high quality, as they were purchased to make garments used in the most solemn ceremonies of the court. Other varieties of Flemish textiles were acquired by people of more modest social profile. For instance, cloths called Ypres are mentioned in the notarial records from the Castilian town of Ágreda, near the border with Aragon and Navarre, in the mid-14th century. They were sold by Jews to humble inhabitants of this town, who bought them on credit.14

I m ports from Southe rn F rance As we have seen, cloths from southern France, especially from Narbonne, arrived in large quantities at the Castilian seaports at the end of the 13th century, alongside those manufactured in the Low Countries and northern France. But the territories of southern France had kept close political contacts with those of the Crown of Aragon since Carolingian times (the late 8th and 9th centuries), and they encouraged the development of an intense commercial relationship by land. The French historian Romestan has proved that, during the second half of the 13th century and the first decades of the 14th, merchants from Languedoc were very active in the city of Valencia, where many of them established themselves. These French merchants traded with cloths manufactured in the region of Languedoc to supply the needs of the most affluent social groups not only of the kingdom of Valencia but also of the Crown of Castile. In fact, a large proportion of the cloths they sold were purchased by merchants from towns of eastern Castile, like Castillo de Garcí Muñoz, Cuenca, Chinchilla, and Iniesta, and from Andalusia, like Úbeda.15 They personally travelled to Castilian territory to sell cloths. Many 12 Gual Camarena, ‘El comercio de telas’, p. 96. 13 Gual Camarena, ‘El comercio de telas’, pp. 98–99.

14 Notarial contracts dated in 1338 and 1339, published in Agustín Rubio Semper, Fuentes

Medievales Sorianas. Ágreda. 1 (Soria: Diputación Provincial, 1999), docs. 29, 59, 66.

15 Guy Romestan, ‘À propos du commerce des draps dans la péninsule ibérique au Moyen

Âge: Les marchands languedociens dans le royaume de Valence dans la première moitié du

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of them established companies with Valencian merchants that invested in the cloth trade and did business in Valencia as well as in Castile, where they visited the fairs of Valladolid. There are also testimonies of merchants from southern France who brought cloths to the kingdom of Navarre, like the one from Pamiers who paid taxes in 1357 in Carcastillo for five loads of cloths.16 As the manufacture of quality cloths developed in Catalonia and Valencia in the course of the first half of the 14th century, textiles from southern France faced increasing competition from local products in the inland markets. However, archival sources prove that they continued to be used in many regions of the Iberian Peninsula throughout the 14th century. For instance, notarial records from the middle of the century show that cloths from Narbonne were on sale in shops in Aragonese towns like Tarazona, and even people from the nearby kingdom of Castile travelled to buy them there on credit.17 Sales of cloths from Narbonne and from Montolieu, near Carcassonne, are also documented in 1339 and 1340 in the Castilian town of Ágreda,18 where they were also employed as a means of payment by peasants for the purchase of draft animals.19 Information about the transportation of textiles from southern France to Castile in the 14th century is provided by Aragonese Chancery records concerning cloths that were subsequently stolen. In 1319 a merchant from Valencia received cloths from other merchants from Narbonne and Perpignan, in order to sell them in the kingdom of Castile; but during his journey he was attacked by Castilians, who robbed him, so he could not pay back the money he owed to his French suppliers.20 In 1342 a Catalan merchant from Lleida who travelled with cloths from Carcassonne and from Puigcerdà (Cerdanya) in the territory of the kingdom of Castile was robbed there.21 There is some evidence that cloths from southern France arrived in Portugal via land routes. In 1336 cloths from Narbonne and Perpignan were taken by a

16 17 18 19 20

21

XIVe. Siècle’, Bulletin Philologique et Historique, 1 (1969), 115–92; Guy Romestan, ‘Les relations commerciales entre Montpellier et Valence dans la première moitié du XIV siècle’, in VIII Congreso de Historia de la Corona de Aragón. La Corona de Aragón en el siglo XIV, 3 vols (Zaragoza: Caja de Ahorros, 1969–73), III (1973), 243–54. Ángel J. Martín Duque, ‘Peajes navarros. Carcastillo (1357)’, Principe de Viana, 126–27 (1972), 69–102. Agustín Rubio Semper, Fuentes Medievales Sorianas. Ágreda II (Soria: Diputación Provincial, 2001) doc. 195, Ágreda, 21-VII-1340. Rubio Semper, Fuentes… Ágreda II, docs. 58, 152 and 270. Rubio Semper, Fuentes… Ágreda II, doc. 469. Ágreda, 23-II-1341. One peasant paid for a draft horse 40 golden coins (escudos), and a piece of cloth of Narbonne. ACA (= Archive of the Crown of Aragon, in Barcelona), C (= Cancillería – Royal Chancery), reg. (= register) 176–23 (Number of the register, and of the first folio of the document), Barcelona, 2-VIII-1322. Máximo Diago Hernando, ‘El comercio de tejidos a través de la frontera terrestre entre las coronas de Castilla y Aragón en el siglo XIV’, Studia Historica. Historia Medieval, 15 (1997), 171–207 (p. 175).



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royal officer in Zaragoza from a merchant who travelled to Castile, in order to compensate several merchants, subjects of the King of Aragon, who had been robbed in Castilian territory. The officer justified the seizure by saying that the cloths belonged to Castilian subjects; but the merchant who had brought the cloths claimed that they belonged to him, a subject of the king of Portugal and inhabitant of the Portuguese town of Villanueva de Miranda. In fact, he was a partner of a trade company with a merchant from Puigcerdà, and both were dedicated to the export of cloths to Castile; but since he was Portuguese it is quite likely that they also did business in Portugal.22 During the 13th century, cloths from southern France had satisfied the demand for quality cloths in all the Iberian kingdoms, and they continued to be appreciated during the 14th century, in spite of the development of local industries in Catalonia and Valencia, which tried to imitate these fabrics, and made products of a similar quality. French production covered a wide range of grades, including cheaper varieties for the use of lower social groups. In the accounts of the treasurer of Jaime II are cloths from Narbonne (blancos narboneses), acquired by the monarch in large quantities to be given in alms to his poor subjects during the festivities of the Holy Week. More expensive textiles, like negro de Narbona and brunet, were also purchased for the monarch to gift to individuals of higher social standing in the court.23 The prestige that textiles made in southern France enjoyed in the Iberian kingdoms during the 14th century explains the fact that native Iberian merchants travelled to southern France to acquire them at this time. In 1377 merchants from Burgos purchased in the French city of Toulouse cloths from the Occitan cities of Montolieu and Pamiers.24 Burgalese merchants were particularly interested in commerce with Toulouse, because of their active role in the trade of woad, one of the most important dyestuffs of the time, which was cultivated in that region of France. Some of them even established themselves there, acquiring citizenship.25 Archival sources also document merchants from the Basque city of Vitoria who travelled to purchase cloths in southern France in the first half of the 14th century.26

22 ACA, C, reg. 573-91, Daroca 19-IX-1335 and reg. 573-142, Zaragoza, 26-I-1336. 23 Gual Camarena, ‘El comercio de telas’, p. 92.

24 Philippe Wolff, Commerce et marchands de Toulouse vers 1350–vers 1450 (Paris: Plon, 1954), pp.

152–58.

25 Hilario Casado Alonso, ‘El comercio del pastel: Datos para una geografía de la industria

pañera española en el siglo XVI’, Revista de Historia Económica, 8–3 (1990), 523–48; Hilario Casado Alonso, ‘Finance et commerce international au milieu du XVIe. siècle: La compagnie des Bernuy’, Annales du Midi: revue de la France méridionale, 195 (1991), 323–43. 26 Diago Hernando, ‘El comercio de tejidos’, p. 175.

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I mp or t s o f texti les at th e end o f the Mid d l e Age s: The r i s e o f c o n sum pti on of cloth s f ro m E ngl and and Brabant Imports of foreign cloths on a large scale continued to be a constant characteristic of the foreign trade pattern of the Crown of Castile after the 13th century, during the rest of the Middle Ages and in the modern age. Many of them continued to arrive through the seaports of the Cantabrian Sea (part of the Atlantic on the northern coast of Iberia). According to a document that records the payment of a tax (avería) by Castilian merchants in the last decades of the 15th century for the commodities that they imported and exported through Bilbao, the busiest port of the Cantabrian Coast, huge quantities of cloths made of wool from Flanders and England (London and Bristol) were at that time introduced into Castile, distantly followed by those made in northern France (Nantes and La Rochelle). Besides cloths made of wool, a large number of linen cloths also arrived through this thriving seaport.27 If we compare the data of the late 15th century with that of the 13th century, certain changes in the origin of imported textiles are noticeable. In the first place, the Low Countries certainly continued to export cloths in huge quantities, but those made in the towns of Brabant had partially displaced those of other prestigious Flemish towns; secondly, the English cloths, mainly from London and Bristol, that were almost absent in the 13th century, made up a significant part of the imports at the end of the Middle Ages. Customs accounts for Bristol that have survived for the second half of the 15th century (1461–1504) demonstrate that the main exports from this port to the kingdoms of Castile and Portugal were high quality broadcloths made of wool.28 The increasing importance of imports from Brabant and England can also be perceived in the tiny kingdom of Navarre at an even earlier date. The archival sources that provide detailed information about the purchases of cloths for the Household of the King Carlos III of Navarre (r. 1387–1425), studied by Osés Urricelqui, show that cloths from England and Brabant were acquired on a very large scale at the end of the 14th century.29 27 José Damián González Arce, ‘Los flujos comerciales del Puerto de Bilbao con la Europa

atlántica (1481–1501)’, Cuadernos Medievales, 19 (2015), 82–110.

28 Hilario Casado Alonso and Flávio Miranda, ‘The Iberian Economy and Commercial Exchange

with Northwestern Europe in the Later Middle Ages’, in The World of the Newport Medieval Ship. Trade, Politics and Shipping in the Mid-Fifteenth Century, ed. by Evan T. Jones and Richard Stone (Melksham: University of Wales Press, 2018), pp. 205–28 (p. 220). See also Wendy R. Childs, Anglo-Castilian Trade at the end of the Middle Ages (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1978). 29 See the contribution of Merche Osés Urricelqui, to this volume. Also her article, ‘El ajuar de una infanta: María, condesa de Denia (1397)’, in Cataluña y Navarra en la Baja Edad Media, ed. by Eloisa Ramírez Vaquero and Roser Salicrú Lluch (Pamplona: Universidad Pública de Navarra, 2010), pp. 230–36.



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Ana María Ferreira has also proved that in 15th-century Portugal English wool textiles replaced imports of fabrics from Flemish towns, which had been dominant during the previous centuries.30

D e v e l opm ent of new ty pes o f q u al ity cl o ths i n t he Crow n of Arag on du ring the 14 t h ce ntu ry: Cataloni a and Val e ncia The war between the kings of France and Aragon that followed the revolt of the Sicilian Vespers (1282) triggered the process of the development of a new textile industry manufacturing high quality textiles in several territories ruled by the king of Aragon, like the counties of Roussillon and Cerdanya, Catalonia and Valencia. According to the theory established by Joan Reglá,31 subsequently confirmed by the studies of Antoni Riera,32 the development of the cloth industry in Catalonia was a direct consequence of this war, because the conflict stopped the supply of cloths from the Low Countries, northern France and Languedoc to the territories of the Crown of Aragon. The French Monarchy imposed a ban on exports of cloths from France to the territories of the Crown of Aragon, which remained in force until 1333. As a reaction, efforts were made to promote local manufacture of quality cloths, with measures to facilitate the arrival of English wool, at that time the highest quality fibre available, and the basic component of the best cloths made in the Low Countries and Italy. Gual Camarena mentions a document of around 1306 that establishes that before the war between Aragon and France broke out in 1284, English wools had only been used in the looms of Carcassonne and Narbonne, but that, as a consequence of the war, the weavers of Perpignan and Barcelona had started to work with them.33 In 1307 the weavers of Barcelona persuaded King Jaime II (r. 1291–1327) to suppress taxes that had so far been imposed on imported English wools. Ordinances that these artisans issued the following year, 1308, in Barcelona, marked a turning point in the manufacture of quality cloths in the Iberian Peninsula. In fact, the process had started in Perpignan, the capital of the county of Rousillon, beyond the Pyrenees, but also under the rule of the royal family of Aragon. In this city, which now belongs to 30 Ana María Ferreira, A importaçao e o comercio textil em Portugal no seculo XV (1385 a 1481) (Lisbon:

Imprenta Nacional-Casa da Moeda, 1983).

31 Joan Reglá Campistol, ‘El comercio entre Francia y la Corona de Aragón en los siglos XIII y XIV

y sus relaciones con el desenvolvimiento de la industria textil catalana’, in Actas del Primer Congreso Internacional de Estudios Pirenaicos. San Sebastián, 1950, 7 vols (Zaragoza: Instituto de Estudios Pirenaicos, 1952), VI, pp. 47–65. 32 Antoni Riera Melis, La Corona de Aragón y el reino de Mallorca en el primer cuarto del siglo XIV. Las repercusiones arancelarias de la autonomía balear (1298–1311) (Barcelona: CSIC, 1986) pp. 77–153. 33 Gual Camarena, ‘El comercio de telas’, p. 88.

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France, some artisans had already been dyeing and finishing quality cloths from northern Europe. This activity encouraged the emergence after 1290 of a new cloth industry, which tried to imitate the products of the industry of the towns of Languedoc.34 Thanks to these new facilities for the manufacturing of quality cloths in Perpignan and Barcelona, local production started to replace the cloths previously imported from Languedoc and other European regions. The process did not stop in these big cities. Soon many smaller Catalan towns started to develop their own woollen industries. Most of them were in the northern districts of Old Catalonia (Bagà, Berga, Banyoles, Camprodon, Cardona, Castelló d’Empúries, Girona, Manresa, Olot, Ripoll, Sant Joan de les Abadesses, Vic, Vilafranca de Conflent). Another important centre of cloth production, Puigcerdà, in the county of Cerdanya, belonged, like Perpignan, to the kingdom of Majorca, until the conquest and annexation of this kingdom by King Pedro IV of Aragon in 1344. Finally, in the southern part of the Principality (New Catalonia), the important city of Lleida became also a dynamic centre of cloth production, with an active group of merchants. In 1304 the bailiff of Barcelona made a proposal in a letter to King Jaime II advising that, after the sealing of the impending peace treaty with Castile, Jaime should try to reach an agreement with the Castilian monarch, to ban the import of foreign cloths into the Iberian Peninsula. According to this officer, this measure would encourage the expansion of Catalan cloth manufacture, because its products would have at their disposal the huge Castilian market, previously dominated by cloths imported from beyond the Pyrenees.35 This proposal was apparently not implemented by the king, but, in spite of that, in the course of the 14th century the cloth industry of Catalonia and Cerdanya found a receptive market in the inland territories of the Iberian Peninsula, especially Aragon, Navarre and Castile, and a significant quantity of its output was absorbed there. This development was made possible to a large extent by the intense activity of many Catalan merchants, who not only travelled to these kingdoms to sell textiles but even took residence, and opened shops in their most important cities devoted to the cloth trade. The city of Valencia also followed in the footsteps of Catalonia, Rousillon and Cerdanya. The town authorities encouraged the development of a new industry devoted to the production of cloths imitative of the French textiles previously imported. In the course of the first half of the 14th century, several ordinances were issued by the town council in order to encourage the improvement of the quality of the cloths produced in the city. The first important one is dated 1311, and it was followed by others in 1316, 1336 and 1346. All these ordinances pursued the target of encouraging the production of a new kind of textile called a la 34 Riera Melis, La Corona de Aragón, p. 38. 35 Document dated on 13–IV–1304, published by José Ernesto Martínez Ferrando, Jaime II de

Aragón. Su vida familiar (Barcelona: Escuela de Estudios Medievales, 1942), doc. nº. 463.



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francesa (in the French way), that imitated cloths made in Rousillon and Languedoc (Montpellier, Narbonne and Carcassonne). The local authorities encouraged the employment of artisans from Narbonne and Perpignan to teach local workers the technical skills needed for the manufacture of these kinds of cloths. In 1341 the local council even planned to ban the import of French cloths, in order to boost local production.36 Thanks to all these measures the Valencian cloth industry boomed, and its products were exported on a large scale to the territories of the Crown of Castile, where cloth manufacture was at that time less developed. Trade exchanges between the kingdom of Valencia and the Crown of Castile during the 14th century were characterized by the export of cloths to Castile and the import of animals for meat consumption by the urban population in Valencia.37 The emergence of these new cloth industries in the territories of the Crown of Aragon in the course of the first half of the 14th century did not end the import of cloths produced beyond the Pyrenees, which continued to be important; but these foreign textiles no longer dominated the peninsular market as they had done during the 13th century and the first decades of the 14th.

C o n tri b uti on of I b eri an me rchants to the e x p a n s i o n of th e cloth trade d u ring the 14 t h ce ntu ry: th e Catalan me rchants The spread of the textile products of the new industries that flourished in the Catalan towns from the beginning of the 14th century was to a large extent made possible thanks to the intense activity of the merchants of the Principality in the course of this century. Archival sources testify to the presence of a great number of Catalan merchants devoted to the cloth trade in the kingdoms of Aragon, Navarre and Castile. They made a decisive contribution to the commercialization of the increasing textile production of the Principality, although at the same time they continued selling imported cloths from southern France and, in much smaller quantities, from other European regions. Within this heterogeneous group of Catalan merchants a very dynamic group stands out, made up of people born in the little mountain town of Puigcerdá, in the county of Cerdanya, which was under the authority of the kings of Majorca 36 José Bordes García, Desarrollo industrial textil y artesanado en Valencia, de la conquista a la crisis

(1238–1350) (Valencia: Comité Económico y Social de la Comunidad Valenciana, 2005) pp. 105–19. 37 Máximo Diago Hernando, ‘Introducción al estudio del comercio entre las Coronas de Aragón y Castilla durante el siglo XIV: Las mercancías objeto de intercambio’, En la España Medieval, 24 (2001), 47–101. See also Juan Leonardo Soller Milla, El comercio en el reino de Valencia durante la primera mitad del siglo XIV: Instituciones, grupos y rutas mercantiles (Alicante: Universidad, 2015), pp. 463–70.

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during the first half of the 14th century, until it was conquered by the King of Aragon in 1344. When Puigcerdà was governed by this senior branch of the House of Barcelona, many merchants from the town traded actively in the territories of the Crown of Aragon. For convenience, they frequently became citizens of other Catalan towns, like Berga or Lleida, although at the same time they claimed to be subjects of the King of Majorca when it suited them.38 Many of these merchants established themselves in important towns of the kingdom of Aragon like Calatayud, Daroca, Tarazona and Teruel,39 where they opened shops marketing textiles, among other commodities.40 They became wealthy, and the municipal authorities of the towns where they opened their shops, in dire need of money, tried to tax them. However they refused to pay municipal taxes, claiming to be citizens of Puigcerdà. Several conflicts arose over this issue in Calatayud, the second largest town in Aragon after Zaragoza, near the border with Castile. Thus, in 1351, merchants from Puigcerdà and from Lleida complained because the local authorities of Calatayud tried to impose taxes on them, as if they were citizens of Calatayud. They claimed to be foreign businessmen, who thanks to their mercantile activity contributed to the welfare of the local population.41 In 1373, it was the turn of the municipal authorities of Puigcerdà to denounce the council of Calatayud, because its officers forced some merchants who had opened shops in that town, run by themselves or their employees, but who were citizens of Puigcerdà, to pay taxes in order to finance the repair of walls and fortifications.42 The land trade route that linked Puigcerdà, Lleida, Zaragoza and Calatayud was very busy during the 14th century. Disputes broke out because different towns and nobles tried to influence the route in order to increase their revenues, obtained from the collection of tolls (portazgo, pontazgo), depriving the others of this important source of income.43 The opening of shops by Catalan merchants in towns of Aragon like Calatayud made a decisive contribution to the expansion of the cloth trade, not only in 38 Máximo Diago Hernando, ‘Mercaderes catalanes en el interior de la Península Ibérica durante

39

40

41 42 43

el siglo XIV. El caso de Puigcerdá’, in La Corona catalanoaragonesa, l’Islam i el món mediterrani. Estudis d’història medieval en homenatge a la doctora Maria Teresa Ferrer i Mallol, ed. by Josefina Mutgé i Vives, Roser Salicrú i Lluch and Carles Vela Aulesa (Barcelona: CSIC, 2013) pp. 211–20. Concerning merchants from Puigcerdà and Perpignan that had business in Teruel at the beginning of the 14th century, see Antonio J. Gargallo Moya, El concejo de Teruel en la Edad Media, 1177–1327. II. La población (Teruel: Centro de Estudios Turolenses, 1996), pp. 511–13. Concerning the role of these towns near the border between the kingdoms of Aragon and Castile in the promotion of the cloth trade in the 14th century, see Máximo Diago Hernando, ‘Desarrollo de las ciudades aragonesas fronterizas con Castilla como centros mercantiles durante el siglo XIV: Tarazona, Calatayud y Daroca’, Cuadernos de Historia Jerónimo Zurita, 74 (1999), 211–46. ACA, C, reg. 665–190, Perpignan, 12-X-1351. ACA, C, reg. 769–16, Barcelona, 24-X-1373. Diago Hernando, ‘Desarrollo de las ciudades aragonesas’, p. 215.



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Aragon but also in the nearby kingdoms of Castile and Navarre. In fact some of these merchants often crossed the borders to do business, or even established themselves permanently in another kingdom. And, although many of them came from Puigcerdà, archival sources also refer to merchants from many other Catalan towns, for example, Thomas dez Coll, born in the Catalan town of Cervera, who lived in 1372 in Olite, in Navarre.44 The customs accounts of Calatayud from the middle of the 15th century also evidence an important flow into Castile of large quantities of cloths made in Catalan towns like Sant Joan de les Abadesses, Valle de Ribes in Ripollés, La Pobla and Puigcerdà.45 No doubt merchants from these Catalan towns made a decisive contribution to the development of this movement. They also contributed to the expansion of the usage of textiles in these inland regions, encouraging recourse to credit. Indeed, archival sources related to Calatayud show that during the 14th century Catalan merchants very often sold their cloths to retail merchants of this city, many of them Jews, granting them a delay of payment of several months, or even more than a year. In 1376 and 1378 some Jews from Calatayud explained to the king that they had bought cloths on credit from Catalan merchants, but could not pay them on time, because the customers that had bought the cloths in their shops did not pay them punctually.46 Indeed the notarial records that have survived prove that sales of cloths to consumers of relatively low social profile were not exceptional. For example, in 1396, a peasant of the tiny village of Vozmediano, in Castile, bought a cloth on credit in a shop in the nearby city of Tarazona, in Aragon, where many Catalan merchants did business.47 The intense activity in the cloth trade of Catalan merchants, including those of Cerdanya, during the late Middle Ages is a remarkable fact of the socioeconomic history of the Iberian kingdoms in the late Middle Ages that deserves more scholarly attention. However, they were not the only ones that contributed to the development of the cloth trade in this period. Many other merchants who lived in cities of the kingdoms of Aragon and Valencia also played a very active role. Among them were Castilians, especially from Burgos, the main commercial town of the north of Castile, who travelled to the Crown of Aragon and even to southern France to buy cloths.48

44 Máximo Diago Hernando, ‘Las relaciones comerciales entre Navarra y la Corona de Aragón en

el siglo XIV’, Príncipe de Viana, 215 (1998), 651–87 (pp. 668–69).

45 Mª Carmen García Herrero, ‘Las aduanas de Calatayud en el comercio entre Castilla y Aragón

a mediados del siglo XV’, En la España Medieval, 4 (1984), 363–90.

46 Diago Hernando, ‘El comercio de tejidos’ pp. 184–85; Diago Hernando, ‘Desarrollo de las

ciudades aragonesas’, pp. 211–46.

47 Miguel Ángel Motis Dolader, Los judíos de Tarazona en el siglo XIV. Colección Documental

(Tarazona: Centro de Estudios Turiasonenses, 2003), doc. 1.186.

48 Diago Hernando, ‘El comercio de tejidos’, pp. 194–97.

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D e la y ed developm ent of cl o th manu f actu re i n th e Crow n of Castil e and P o rtu gal Although the overwhelming majority of the cloths mentioned in the price regulation of Jerez of 1268 were imported, some Castilian cloths were also included in this document. They were of much lower quality than the imported ones, and accordingly were, next to those imported from Navarre, the cheapest. The cloths of the highest quality made in Castile mentioned in this document were made in Segovia, followed by those of Zamora and Ávila, which imitated them. Segovian cloths were already utilized in the course of the 13th century in Portugal, where they were mentioned at the fairs of Guimaraes,49 and in Galicia.50 However, the considerable difference in price between Castilian cloths and those imported from Europe in this Ordenamiento of 1268 reflects the backwardness of 13th-century textile manufacture in Castile. In fact, in certain important Castilian towns like Soria, textile manufacture was still restricted to cheap linen cloths, because, despite the existence of a local supply of high quality wool, from transhumant sheep,51 it was not until the end of the 14th century that the manufacture of wool textiles began in the town itself.52 It is a well-known fact that in the territories of the Crown of Castile, from the 13th century until the beginning of the 19th, the breeding of transhumant sheep of the prestigious breed called merino attained a high degree of development. The sheep-breeders were associated in a guild called Mesta, in order to defend the privileges they had received from the Monarchy to facilitate the movement of the sheep and the access to the pastures.53 The wool produced by these transhumant sheep was of a superior quality to the wool obtained from the rest of the sheep of other breeds, which was usually called churra, and was much cheaper.54 This wool obtained from the transhumant merino sheep was exported on a large scale to other European regions from the late Middle Ages until the end of the 18th 49 Isabel Vaz de Freitas, Mercadores entre Portugal e Castela na Idade Média (Gijón: Ediciones Trea,

2006) pp. 59–60.

50 Elisa Ferreira Priegue, Galicia en el comercio marítimo medieval (Corunna: Fundación Pedro

Barrie de la Maza, 1988) p. 175.

51 Flocks moved to higher grazing grounds in summer. 52 Máximo Diago Hernando, ‘La ciudad de Soria como centro manufacturero durante el período

bajomedieval’, Espacio, Tiempo y Forma. Historia Medieval, 22 (2009), 65–89.

53 Julius Klein, The Mesta. A Study in Spanish Economic History. 1273–1836 (Cambridge, MA: Harvard

Economic Studies, 1920) (Spanish translation, La Mesta. Estudio de la historia económica española, 1273–1836 (Madrid: Alianza Editorial, 1985)); Máximo Diago Hernando, Mesta y trashumancia en Castilla. Siglos XIII a XIX (Madrid: Arco Libros, 2002). 54 Carla Rahn Phillips and William D. Phillips Jr. Spain’s Golden Fleece. Wool Production and the Wool Trade from the Middle Ages to the Nineteenth Century (Baltimore, MD: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1997). Merino and churra wools are illustrated at Figs 13.3 and 13.4 of the present volume.



Clot h T r ade in t he Iberi a n K i n g do m s 8 3

century.55 The main consequence of these exports was that the manufacture of cloths of high quality did not attain a high degree of development in the kingdom of Castile. Castilian cloth producers specialized in the manufacture of cloths of middle or low quality, while more prestigious textiles were imported. There has been much controversy among scholars about the reasons why this happened. For some it was the result of the colonial character of the Castilian economy, and of the support that the monarchy gave to the big sheep owners and big merchants. Yet it is a well proven fact that the monarchy also approved measures to ensure that Castilian manufacturers could buy wool that had already been sold to exporters, to support Castilian industry. The fact that they did not very often take this wool proves that most of them were not interested in the production of high quality textiles, because they could not compete with their European counterparts. As García Sanz has argued, Castile became competitive in the production of high quality wool, displacing England after the 15th century as the main provider of the finest wools available in European markets; but the same objective could not be achieved in the manufacture of high quality cloths.56 The highest quality and most expensive of the wool cloths made in Castile were from Segovia. They had already attained relative prestige in the Iberian market in the 15th century, although they could not compete with imported cloths from other European regions, with regard to value for money. They were exported to other regions of Iberia where textile manufacture was less developed, such as Portugal and Galicia. Portuguese merchants who attended the fairs of Medina del Campo in the 15th century acquired there cloths made of wool from Segovia and other Castilian towns, like Cuenca,57 while they brought with them Portuguese linens for sale.58 Certainly both Portugal and Castile remained net importers of quality cloths throughout the Middle Ages. These cloths arrived in large quantities by land and

55 Concerning the exports of Castilian lana merina on a large scale to the Low Countries since the first decades of the 15th century, and their consequences, see John H. Munro, ‘The

Symbiosis of Towns and Textiles: Urban Institutions and the Changing Fortunes of Cloth Manufacturing in the Low Countries and England, 1270–1570’, The Journal of Early Modern History: Contacts, Comparisons, Contracts, 3.1 (1999), 1–74; Peter Spufford, Power and Profit. The Merchant in Medieval Europe (New York: Thames and Hudson, 2002), pp. 330–31. 56 Ángel García Sanz, ‘Competitivos en lanas pero no en paños. Lana para la exportación y lana para los telares nacionales en la España del Antiguo Régimen’, Revista de Historia Económica, 12.2 (1994), 397–434. 57 Paulino Iradiel Murugarren, Evolución de la industria textil castellana en los siglos XIII–XVI. Factores de desarrollo, organización y costes de producción manufacturera en Cuenca (Salamanca: Universidad, 1974). 58 Violeta Medrano Fernández, Un mercado entre fronteras. Las relaciones comerciales entre Castilla y Portugal al final de la Edad Media (Valladolid: Universidad, 2010), pp. 175–84. Concerning the importance of linen manufacture in Portugal, see Joana Sequeira, O pano da terra. Produçao textile em Portugal nos finais da Idade Média (Porto: University of Porto, 2014) pp. 49–56.

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sea.59 Nevertheless, Joana Sequeira has proved that the manufacture of textiles made a certain amount of progress in Portugal at the end of the Middle Ages, and products of linen were even exported to Castile.60

Trade i n si lk te xtil e s The manufacture of silk textiles had attained a high degree of development in the regions of Iberia under Muslim rule during the 11th and 12th centuries. In fact, Islam had been the main driving force for the spread of silk fabrics around the Mediterranean and Europe in the High Middle Ages. Since the 9th century al-Andalus and Muslim Sicily had exported silk textiles to European Christian territories. Fabrics from towns like Almería attained a high reputation, and were exported to the Christian kingdoms of northern Iberia.61 From the beginning of the 13th century, however, this industry experienced an abrupt decline, parallel to the rapid conquest of the major part of al-Andalus by the Christians. Certainly in the Muslim emirate of Granada, silk continued to play an important role in economic life during the late Middle Ages. Yet most references to the silk of Granada in this period pertain to the raw fibre, which was exported on a large scale to Italy in order to supply the silk weavers who worked in the textile industry in Lucca, Genoa and other cities.62 Under the new Christian rulers, the manufacture of silk textiles following the Muslim tradition continued in certain places, like Xátiva, in Valencia, thanks to the activity of the Muslim artisans that remained (Mudéjares).63 At the same time this industry is also documented throughout the medieval period in many other places without Muslim tradition. The production of raw silk and the cultivation of mulberries also flourished in other regions apart from the emirate of Granada.64 The highly specialized industry of luxury silk cloths was initially introduced to the Italian city of Lucca by Jews in the 12th century. It became the main centre in Christian Europe for production of this kind of luxurious textile, providing silks for the whole of western Europe, and employing around 240 silk weavers. But over the course of the 13th century its prestigious fabrics began to be imitated in 59 Ferreira, A importaçao; Vaz de Freitas, Mercadores, p. 102. 60 Sequeira, O pano da terra, pp. 49–57.

61 Constable, Trade and Traders, pp. 223–26. 62 Germán Navarro Espinach, El despegue de la industria sedera en la Valencia del siglo XV (Valencia:

Generalitat Valenciana, 1992) p. 37; Constable, Trade and Traders, p. 224.

63 Gual Camarena, ‘El comercio de telas’, p. 113. 64 Miguel Ángel Ladero Quesada, ‘La producción de seda en la España medieval’, in La seta in

Europa. Secc. XIII–XX, ed. by S. Cavaciocchi (Florence: Le Monnier, 1993), pp. 124–39; Germán Navarro Espinach, ‘El arte de la seda en el Mediterráneo medieval’, En la España Medieval, 27 (2004), 5–51. Concerning silk textiles in Portugal see Sequeira, O pano da terra, pp. 57–67 and Joana Sequeira’s chapter in this volume.



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Venice and some Lombard towns.65 During the 14th century many artisans fled from Lucca because of political instability,66 and they contributed their technical knowledge to other Italian cities, where silk manufacture also flourished. In Castilian documents of the 13th century, silk cloths from Lucca stand out as the most expensive, by far more costly than Flemish woollens. There is little information about how they were traded at that time. Presumably they arrived mainly by ship to the seaports of the Mediterranean. We also know that, during the late Middle Ages, Genoese, Venetian and Galician ships that had previously brought fish to the Mediterranean countries, unloaded velvets and other valuable Italian silk cloths in the seaports of Galicia.67 There is also evidence of the import of Italian silks into the kingdom of Portugal, which has been studied by Ana María Ferreira.68 Joana Sequeira has shown that for the Salviati-Da Colle Company, an Italian company established in Lisbon in 1462, silk fabrics from Florence were among the most frequently traded products in the period 1464–1465.69 Besides Italian silks, those made in the French city of Montpellier were also traded in the 13th century in Valencia.70 Further, the proximity and close commercial relations of the city of Barcelona with Italy explain the fact that merchants from the inland kingdoms of Navarre and Castile travelled to that city to make purchases of silk cloths, for the use of the upper classes. For example, in 1375, an officer of the Chamber of the King of Navarre travelled to Barcelona to buy cloths made of silk and gold. At some time before 1423, Joan de Cassi, a merchant from Barcelona, sold to Carlos III, King of Navarre, silk cloths with gold threads for more than 538 florins.71 According to the accounts of King Enrique II of Castile (r. 1369–1379) cloths made with gold threads were purchased for his court from the merchant of Barcelona, Bartolomé Paredes, valued at 32,483 morabetins.72 The sources also demonstrate purchases of silk cloths of very high quality by Castilian merchants in the territories of the Crown of Aragon although it is impossible to know if they acquired them in Barcelona. In 1423 Juan Mercer, one of the 65 Florence Edler de Roover, The silk trade of Lucca during the thirteenth and the fourteenth centuries

(Chicago: University of Chicago, 1930).

66 M. E. Bratchel, Lucca, 1430–1494. The Reconstruction of an Italian City Republic (Oxford: Clarendon

Press, 1995).

67 Ferreira Priegue, Galicia en el comercio, p. 177. 68 Ferreira, A importaçao.

69 Joana Sequeira, ‘A companhia Salviati-Da Colle e o comercio de panos de seda florentinos em

Lisboa no século XV’, De Medio Aevo, 7–1 (2015) 47–62.

70 Silk cloths from Montpellier, called cendat, are documented in Valencia around 1271; Navarro

Espinach, El despegue, p. 35. See also K. L. Reyerson, ‘Medieval Silks in Montpellier. The Silk Market ca. 1250–ca. 1350’, The Journal of European Economic History, 11 (1982), 117–40. 71 Diago Hernando, ‘Las relaciones comerciales entre Navarra’, p. 670. 72 Julio Valdeón Baruque, ‘Un cuaderno de cuentas de Enrique II’, Hispania, 101 (1966), 99–134 (p. 44). The morabetin or maravedí was not at this time a real coin but was used only for purposes of accounting and assigning a value to the goods.

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most important merchants of the city of Zaragoza, in retaliation against Castilians, took some mules loaded with luxury silk cloths, that belonged to a merchant from Burgos, Diego García de Santa María.73 Merchants from Barcelona invested in the acquisition of these precious cloths, in order to sell them in the inland markets. In 1429 some of them informed the king that they had bought from merchants of Florence some silk cloths, worked with gold threads, and also wool cloths. Their purpose had been to travel to Castile to sell them, but they had not been able to do so as planned, because war broke out between Castile and Aragon.74 The city of Valencia also played an increasingly important role in the redistribution of imported silk cloths to Castile. In 1323, the son of a Valencian merchant travelled to the fairs of Valladolid, but was robbed in Arévalo. The robbers stole a large quantity of money in coins, but also a box with silk veils and headdresses, worked with gold threads.75 This overwhelming predominance of Italian imports of silk cloths into Iberia only began to diminish at the end of the 15th century, after the emergence of a strong and dynamic silk industry in the city of Valencia during the second half of that century.76 This industry produced for export, and, as Navarro Espinach has shown, its products soon found an important market in big cities of inland Iberia, like Zaragoza.77 During the 16th century other Iberian cities developed their own silk industries on a similar large scale, as was the case of Toledo, in Castile.78 In consequence local production of silk cloths was considerably increased and diversified during the modern age in the Iberian kingdoms, although extensive imports from Italy and other European regions continued.

Trade i n ch eaper and co arse r cl o ths The expansion of the cloth trade during the latter centuries of the Middle Ages made it possible for an increasing quantity of textiles for the use of ordinary people to be traded in the markets. Admittedly references in the archival sources to these cheaper and coarser cloths are considerably fewer and less frequent, but some can be found. The registers of the collection of the tax called quema in Zaragoza in 1386 show that some Castilian merchants from the north, and 73 ACA, C, reg. 2962-108, Morella, 28-IX-1423. 74 ACA, C, reg. 2580-18v, Valencia, 5-IV-1430. 75 ACA, C, reg. 179-79v, Tortosa, 7-VI-1323. 76 Navarro Espinach, El despegue.

77 Germán Navarro Espinach, ‘Los Ribas y el comercio de sedas de Valencia a Zaragoza (1493-

1513)’, in Consumo, comercio y transformaciones culturales en la Baja Edad Media: Aragón, siglos XIV– XV, ed. by Carlos Laliena Corbera and Mario Lafuente Gómez (Zaragoza: CEMA-Universidad, 2016), pp. 97–122. 78 Ángel Santos Vaquero, La industria textil sedera de Toledo (Toledo: Universidad de Castilla-La Mancha, 2010).



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many carrying goods on pack mules, introduced linen textiles of very low quality and price, such as burlaps and sackcloths, among others, into the kingdom of Aragon. This is a remarkable fact, because, according to this same document and many other archival sources, most of the textiles that were traded during the 14th century between Aragon and Castile travelled from the former territory to the latter. Only textiles of inferior quality and price made their journey in the opposite direction. Among the most affordable textiles that could be found in the markets in the late Middle Ages were those woven in a mixture of linen and cotton. They were utilized by a large number of people of varied socioeconomic profiles. Northern Italy was the most important producer of this kind of textile until the middle of the 14th century; but after 1360 a very active manufacturing region developed in southern Germany, in Swabia, where the merchant class promoted through the Verlagsystem the production of a new kind of textile, Barchent, made of linen and cotton, that was exported on a large scale throughout Europe,79 the Iberian Peninsula included, where the big German trade companies were very active in the 15th century, especially in the Crown of Aragon.80

T h e role of fai rs i n the cl o th trad e From the 12th century fairs played an increasing role in the European cloth trade. The importance of the Champagne fairs for the distribution of textiles made in the towns of the Low Countries throughout continental Europe is well established. From the beginning of the 12th century until the middle of the 13th, Flemish merchants attended these fairs in order to sell the textile products of their towns, ensuring the distribution of these cloths throughout Europe. However, while some Flemish towns, like Arras, sent most of its production to the fairs, others, like Ghent, preferred to sell their cloth in the territories of the German Empire, establishing close links with the city of Cologne.81 The fairs of Champagne also played a key role in the trade of Flemish cloths on a large scale in the Iberian Peninsula, although, as we have seen, many of them arrived by ship. During the 13th century merchants from Catalonia and the kingdom of Majorca travelled to these fairs in order to purchase high-quality cloths 79 Wolfgang von Stromer, Die Gründung der Baumwollindustrie im Mittelalter. Wirtschaftspolitik im

Spätmittelalter (Stuttgart: Hiersemann, 1978).

80 Máximo Diago Hernando, ‘Los mercaderes alemanes en los reinos hispanos durante los siglos

bajomedievales: Actividad de las grandes compañías en la Corona de Aragón’, in España y el Sacro Imperio. Procesos de cambios, influencias y acciones recíprocas en la época de la ‘europeización’ (Siglos XI-XIII), ed. by Julio Valdeón, Klaus Herbers and Karl Rudolf (Valladolid: Universidad, 2002) pp. 299–328. 81 Henri Laurent, Un grand commerce d’exportation au Moyen Âge: La draperie des Pays-Bas en France et dans les pays méditerranéens (XIIe.-XVe. Siècle) (Paris: E. Droz, 1935).

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which they later sold in the Iberian Peninsula. They also acquired significant quantities of these kinds of wool textiles in Perpignan and Montpellier, though, which became important centres for redistribution of textile products from the Low Countries.82 The fairs of Champagne declined in the course of the 13th century, but in the Iberian Peninsula other fairs continued to play a key role in the marketing of cloths during the last two centuries of the Middle Ages.

Cloth trade in the fairs in the Crown of Aragon during the 14th and 15th centuries According to the scarce archival sources available, a lively cloth trade took place in the fairs of the Aragonese town of Barbastro, near the border with Catalonia. The register of the collection of the tax called quema, paid by Castilians who traded in the territories of the Crown of Aragon, preserved for only a few months of the year 1386, demonstrates that Castilian merchants purchased a great deal of cloth at the fair, which they later introduced into Castile following the land route via Zaragoza. Mention is made of 46 cloths of Pamiers bought by four merchants, and 39 cloths from Toulouse bought by five merchants. Wool cloths from Fanjeaux, Montolieu and Saint-Girons were also traded in smaller quantities. However, the Catalan cloths they introduced on this occasion were far fewer, just six from Berga, four from Camprodon and one from Ripoll.83 Not far from Barbastro was the Aragonese city of Huesca, where fairs took place in which cloths were also traded on a large scale, although the archival sources of the 14th century do not provide much precise information about them. A document of 1339 does inform us, however, that many people from France, Gascony and the kingdom of Majorca went to these fairs in order to sell cloths and other commodities.84 At a much later date, customs tax accounts of the years 1449 and 1450 offer much more information about the role of these fairs in the marketing of cloths. These registers show that a huge quantity of textiles from the Catalan towns of Bagá, Banyoles, Camprodon, Girona, Lleida, Manresa, Olot, Puigcerdà, Sant Joan de les Abadesses and Vic, among others, were brought for sale to the spring fair of Corpus Christi. The merchants who acquired them at the fairs did so with the purpose of selling them in the kingdoms of Castile and Navarre. This abundance of Catalan woollen cloths in Huesca contrasts with the small number of textiles of European origin that were registered, since only small quantities of cloths from Brussels, London and Bristol paid taxes. However, other textiles made

82 Riera Melis, La Corona de Aragón y el reino, pp. 149–50. 83 ACA, Maestre Racional, 2.908-3. See also, José Ángel Sesma Muñoz, ‘Zaragoza centro de

aprovisionamiento de mercaderes castellanos a finales del siglo XIV’, Aragón en la Edad Media, 13 (1997), 15–158. 84 ACA, C, reg. 602-46V, Barcelona, 23-IX-1339.



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of vegetal fibres, like flax, in Germany, France, Holland and the north of Italy appear in large quantities in the registers.85 References to merchants who traded cloths in fairs held in other towns of the Crown of Aragon can be found in the registers of the chancery. In Catalonia the fairs of Cervera played a prominent role in the cloth trade during the 14th century, and were attended by Castilian merchants from Burgos.86 In the kingdom of Aragon the fairs of Albarracín were attended by cloth merchants during the first half of the 14th century: in 1317 several Jews from Teruel sent cloths from Narbonne to be sold at these fairs, and in 1325 another merchant from this same city, Bernat Huguet, of Catalan origin, sold cloths at the fair that was celebrated at the feast of St Michael.87

Trade in cloths in the fairs of Castile, Navarre and Portugal during the 14th and 15th centuries Fairs were established in around 150 towns of the Crown of Castile between the 12th and 15th centuries.88 During the 14th century some of them stand out because they attracted merchants from other kingdoms. For instance, in the fairs of Valladolid around 1329, merchants from Valencia traded textiles.89 The busy fairs of Alcalá de Henares and Brihuega were attended by cloth merchants from different cities of the Crown of Aragon like Calatayud, Lleida, Puigcerdà and Valencia.90 In this same region, there is archival evidence about cloth trade in fairs of second rank: around 1322 a merchant from Puigcerdà who lived in Teruel sold cloths in the fairs of Molina, near the border with Aragon.91 In 1371 merchants from Valencia did the same at the fairs of Montiel, employing the money obtained from the sales to purchase 700 rams to be consumed as meat in

85 José Ángel Sesma Muñoz, Huesca, ciudad mercado del ámbito internacional en la Baja Edad Media

según los registros de su aduana (Zaragoza: Universidad, 2005), pp. 23–25.

86 Diago Hernando, ‘El comercio de tejidos a través de la frontera’, pp. 203–04. 87 Gargallo Moya, El concejo de Teruel, pp. 512–13.

88 Miguel Ángel Ladero Quesada, Las ferias de Castilla, siglos XII a XV (Madrid: Comité Español de

Ciencias Históricas, 1994).

89 Andreu and Jaume Parençon sent their agent Joan Badía to these fairs around 1329, and

when he was in the town of Olmedo, not far from Valladolid, the officers of the king of Castile seized from him a dozen bales of white cloth; Diago Hernando, ‘El comercio de tejidos a través de la frontera’, p. 191. 90 Diago Hernando, ‘El comercio de tejidos a través de la frontera’, p. 205. 91 Raimon Rovira, a merchant from Puigcerdà who lived in Teruel, travelled to the fairs of Molina around 1322 and was robbed by Castilians, who took from him one piece of cloth of Perpignan; ACA, C, reg. 434-265v y and reg. 435-101. See also Gargallo Moya, El concejo de Teruel, p. 510.

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M áx im o Diago Hern a n do

their home city.92 Finally, Valencian merchants also attended fairs celebrated in important cities of Andalusia, like Cordoba.93 In the course of the 15th century new fairs developed in the Crown of Castile that played a very active role in the trade of textiles. The most important ones were those of Medina del Campo.94 As we have seen, Portuguese merchants purchased Castilian cloths in these fairs, although there was also a very busy trade in imported cloths from other European countries, encouraged to a large extent by merchants from Burgos who were also wool exporters. Brief reference must finally be made to the textile trade in the kingdoms of Navarre and Portugal. There is one testimony concerning the fairs of Estella, which, in 1323, were attended by an individual from Berlanga de Duero (Soria) who was robbed as he returned home, bringing with him several cloths, one of Narbonne among them.95 In 1344 another Castilian travelled to do business in the fairs of Tudela, but in the town of Borja (Aragon) was robbed of some cloths that he brought with him for sale.96 In Portugal there was also a very lively trade in cloths in fairs such as Guimaraes, Bragança and Miranda.97

Conclusio n During the Middle Ages many changes took place in the Iberian Peninsula. One of the most important ones was the replacement of Muslim rulers, established since 711, by Christians, a process which took place gradually between the 11th and 13th centuries. During the period of hegemony of the Muslim civilization the manufacture of textiles had flourished in al-Andalus. Territories of Iberia under Muslim rule and its products attained high prestige; but after the conquest of most of the peninsular territory by the Christians this industry declined and finally disappeared. That is why during the 13th century most of the high quality textiles 92 Diago Hernando, ‘El comercio de tejidos a través de la frontera’, p. 193. 93 A merchant from Valencia lost, before 1321, 48 pieces of cloth of Perpignan and Narbonne in

94

95 96 97

a robbery when he travelled to the fairs of Cordoba; Diago Hernando, ‘Introducción al estudio del comercio’, p. 81. Cristóbal Espejo and Julián Paz, Las antiguas ferias de Medina del Campo: Investigación histórica acerca de ellas (Valladolid: Imprenta Calixto F. de la Torre, 1908); Hilario Casado Alonso, ‘Medina del Campo Fairs and The Integration of Castile into 15th to 16th Century European Economy’, in Fiere e mercati nella integrazione delle economie europee secc. XIII–XVIII, ed. by S. Cavaciocchi (Prato: Istituto Internazionale di Storia Economica F. Datini, 2001) 495–517; Hilario Casado Alonso, ‘Comercio textil, crédito al consumo y ventas al fiado en las ferias de Medina del Campo en la primera mitad del siglo XVI’, in Historia de la propiedad: crédito y garantía, ed. by Salustiano de Dios (Salamanca: Universidad, 2007) pp. 127–60. ACA, C, reg. 181-52, Barcelona, 15-XII-1323. ACA, C, reg. 1059-118, Barcelona, 20-IV-1344. Vaz de Freitas, Mercadores, pp. 59–62.



Clot h T r ade in t he Iberi a n K i n g do m s 9 1

purchased in the Christian kingdoms of Iberia were imported from beyond the Pyrenees, especially the Low Countries, France and Italy, where the silk textiles of the highest quality and price were produced. However, in the course of the 14th century new centres of textile production developed in the Crown of Aragon. This production reduced the imports from other European countries, and its output was also exported on a large scale to other Iberian kingdoms like Castile and Portugal, where the manufacture of textiles of middle quality developed with delay. But despite the increase of imports of cloths from the Crown of Aragon from the 14th century, in Castile and Portugal the imports of cloths from other European countries beyond the Pyrenees continued to be significant. Yet over the course of the 14th and 15th centuries the regions of origin of these cloths partially changed, as increasing quantities arrived from England and Brabant.

Map 4.1  The Main States of the Crown of Aragon, drawn by Germán Navarro Espinach.

chapter 4

Textiles in the Crown of Aragon: Production, Commerce, Consumption Germán Navarro Espinach

I ntroductio n

T

he Crown of Aragon was an international system of states governed by the same monarchy from the 12th century onwards as a result of the marriage in 1137 between Queen Petronilla I of Aragon (r. 1157–1164) and Count Ramón Berenguer IV of Barcelona (r. 1131–1162). It later became ‘a singular Mediterranean empire’ following the conquests of Majorca, Valencia, Sicily, Athens and Neopatria, Sardinia and Naples. The last king solely of Aragon was Fernando II the Catholic (r. 1479–1516), for after him all its component states were governed as part of the Spanish Empire.1 This chapter examines the textile history of the Iberian kingdoms (Aragon, Catalonia and Valencia) and Majorca, the four largest states of the Crown of Aragon spanning a total area of about 100,000 km2. The population of these states of the Crown reached a peak before the Black Death in 1348−50. The number of taxed households stood at 312,518, a total of about 1,250,000 people, if we multiply each household by four. However, the epidemic of bubonic plague and other adverse circumstances – wars, outbreaks of disease, shortages and famine – caused a sharp population drop, so that by the end of the 15th century the total number of taxed households had fallen to 178,791 (a 42.8% decrease from 312,518), and the main cities were Valencia (8,840 taxed households in 1489),

1

The Crown of Aragon. A Singular Mediterranean Empire, ed. by Flocel Sabaté (Leiden and Boston: Brill, 2017). See my book review in Hispania, 78 (2018), pp. 849−57.

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Table 4.1. Population in the Crown of Aragon (14th–15th century). States of the Crown

Area km2

Taxed households after Black Death 14th century

Taxed households by the end of 15th century

Aragon

47,660

90,000

46,292

Catalonia

31,930

148,679

59,929

Valencia

23,235

61,500

63,894

Majorca

5,014

12,339

8,676

Barcelona (5,749 in 1497), Zaragoza (3,983 in 1496) and Majorca (2,055 in 1444) (Table 4.1, Map 4.1).2 Wool was the most important industry in the textile sector throughout the Crown of Aragon from the 13th century onwards. Later on, towards the end of the medieval period, beginning in the 15th century, international demand triggered a boom in the silk industry in a few cities such as Valencia. Cotton, linen and hemp did not have such a significant impact on the economy as the wool and silk trades. To understand these historical processes, it is necessary to examine the main types of fabrics identified to date in the medieval documents of the Crown of Aragon, as well as paying attention to clothing and ornaments of the period. It is also useful to study the predominant market consumption patterns through the copious data on the textile trade provided by the wealth of tax records for the Crown of Aragon. In addition, images of fabrics in surviving medieval paintings, textile pieces in museums and private collections, and linguistic studies on the meaning of names of fabrics – not to mention restoration and the application of new technologies for recovering historical techniques used to make the fabric – considerably broaden the scope of current research.

Th e W ool I nd u stry The first wool artisans’ guilds that coordinated the production process were called paratores pannorum lane in Latin, métier de pareur de drap in French, and paraires in Catalan, and first appeared in Languedoc, Roussillon, Cerdanya and northern Catalonia at the end of the 13th century. They were an expression of the new French wool industry that was then expanding into the Crown of Aragon from the south of France. For instance, around 1279 the craft corporation of Perpignan, represented by 44 of its members, bought some houses to use as workshops on 2

See studies in La Corona de Aragón en el centro de su historia 1208−1458: Aspectos económicos y sociales. Zaragoza y Calatayud, 24 al 26 de noviembre de 2009, ed. by José Ángel Sesma Muñoz (Zaragoza: Grupo CEMA, 2010).



T ex t iles in t he Cr ow n o f A ra g o n 9 5

the street called Carrer de les Payreries, though it did not acquire a property in which to establish its headquarters until April 1300, after being granted privileges by King Jaime II of Majorca (r. 1276–1311).3 Ninety-five wool craftsmen (pareurs, paraires) have been identified as being based in Narbonne in 1278, and by 1338 – sixty years later – the number of artisans of that trade had increased to 503.4 Similar ordinances were adopted by the wool guilds in Puigcerdà (1283), Girona (1330), Camprodon and Cervera (1343), as well as in Toulouse, where the first Statuta paratorum et textorum lane were adopted in 1327−41.5 The southward expansion of wool fabrics and their guilds continued. In fact, by 1250, inland cities such as Huesca (Aragon) and Lleida (Catalonia) were already producing the only cloths that had spread beyond the local area and into the trade routes of the internal market of the Crown of Aragon, which included artisans and merchants of Mudejar and Jewish descent. The first statutes of the paraires of the city of Majorca were granted in 1315 by its King Sancho I (r. 1311–1324), by which time there was already a street called La Parayria de la Ciutat. Before that, in 1257, the monarchy had attempted to introduce the textile technology of Narbonne in Majorca in 1257.6 The kingdom of Majorca was in fact independent from the Crown of Aragon during 1276−1349 and included the counties of Roussillon and Cerdanya, and the lordship of Montpellier. This important relationship between the Kingdom of Majorca and its lands in southern France during the 13th and 14th centuries accounts for their similarities with respect to the industrial and corporate development. Barcelona, also, had been producing textiles since the 13th century by its paraires, but the city was more specialised in the linen and cotton fabrics of fustanes (fustians).7 Ordinances of wool craftsmen and dyers were approved in 1383−87, and the Barcelona Council adopted new statutes in November 1416: the Ordinacions fetes sobre los officis dels parayres, tintorers e texidors de draps de lana. Meanwhile, the first statutes in the Aragonese cities were approved in Zaragoza in 1449, although there were actually existing 14th-century rules, called Ordinaciones

3

4 5 6 7

Antoni Riera Melis, ‘La aparición de las corporaciones de oficio en Cataluña (1200–1350)’, in Cofradías, gremios y solidaridades en la Europa medieval: Actas de la XIX Semana de Estudios Medievales, Estella, 20 a 24 de julio de 1992 (Pamplona: Gobierno de Navarra, 1993), pp. 285–318 (pp. 301−02, 305−06); and Antoni Riera Melis, ‘Els orígens de la manufactura tèxtil medieval a la Corona catalanoaragonesa (c. 1150−1298)’ in Actes del XVIII Congrés Internacional d’Història de la Corona d’Aragó, ed. by Rafel Narbona Vizcaíno (Valencia: Universitat de València, 2005), I, pp. 821–901 (pp. 831−32, 864). Gilbert Larguier, Le drap et le grain en Languedoc. Narbonne et Narbonnais 1300–1789, 3 vols (Perpignan: Presses Universitaires de Perpignan, 1996−1998), I, pp. 30, 38. Dominique Cardon, La draperie au Moyen Âge: essor d’une grande industrie européenne (Paris: CNRS Éditions, 1999), pp. 637−39. Margalida Bernat i Roca, Els “III Mesters de la Llana” a la ciutat de Mallorca (s. XIV–XVII) (Palma de Mallorca: Govern Balear, 1995), pp. 23, 62. Riera Melis, ‘Els orígens de la manufactura tèxtil medieval’, pp. 834−36.

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antigas que fueron dadas a los pelayres e texidores de la dita ciudat.8 The same is true of the Teruel guild of wool weavers and dyers in southern Aragon, which was founded by King Alfonso V ‘the Magnanimous’ (r. 1416–1458), but based on rules dating from the previous century.9 In the north of the kingdom of Valencia, another brotherhood called Almoina dels Paraires (Charitable Foundation of Wool Artisans) is documented as taking part in some religious processions in Castelló de la Plana in 1387 or 1416.10 Cloth merchants (drapers) and bruneta weavers (brunaters) were represented on Valencia Council in 1283, the same year the first statutes of blanket makers (flassaders) were approved. Bruneta was a thick wool cloth. New council ordinances of 1311 and 1316 indicate that the activities of paraires, weavers and dyers began to be regulated on the advice of some experts from Perpignan and Narbonne, who had mastered the art and had experience in the wool industry. In fact, tax records dating from the late 1200s to the early 1300s attest to the increasing dissemination of fabrics from the north of France and the constant presence of textiles from the Languedoc region, especially Narbonne and, later, Perpignan, sales of which were controlled by Christian merchants, mostly French.11 The first wool industry in Valencia was thus based on the French model, and the name paraires therefore derives from the linguistic influence of the larger-scale technological transfer that took place. Indeed, for the first time, the third part of the Valencian ordinances of 1311 regulated the work of paraires in preparing all kinds of wool cloths. Supervisors of their corporation were responsible for ensuring the high standard of the fabrics made in the city by placing their own mark on the cloths as a quality symbol before sending them to drapers’ mills.12 Many craftsmen (576 paraires) have been identified as being active in the city of Valencia between 1285 and 1350 through various documentary sources, and 37 of them stand out as an artisan elite.13 The Kingdom of Valencia and its capital city are the historical contexts that provide the most information about woollen fabrics in the Crown of Aragon during the Middle Ages. In the capital, new statutes regulated the production of 8 9 10

11

12 13

Germán Navarro Espinach, ‘La industria textil de Zaragoza antes de 1500’, Anuario de Estudios Medievales, 38/2 (2008), 673–705 (p. 680). Germán Navarro Espinach and Joaquín Aparici Martí, ‘La producción textil en Teruel medieval’, Teruel. Revista del Instituto de Estudios Turolenses, 88-89/2 (2002), 75–100 (p. 89). Germán Navarro Espinach, ‘Joan Santalínia i altres paraires de Castelló a la fi del segle XV’, in Actes del V Congrés d’Història i Filologia de la Plana (Nules: Ajuntament de Nules), pp. 155–77 (p. 164). Paulino Iradiel Murugarren, ‘En el Mediterráneo occidental peninsular: dominantes y periferias dominadas en la baja Edad Media’, Áreas. Revista de Ciencias Sociales (1986), 64–76 (p. 75). José Bordes García, Desarrollo industrial textil y artesanado en Valencia de la conquista a la crisis (1238–1350) (Valencia: Fundación Bancaja, 2006), pp. 109–111. Bordes García, Desarrollo industrial textil, pp. 291–323, 324–60.



T ex t iles in t he Cr ow n o f A ra g o n 9 7

textiles with lists, squares or figures called draps listats, esquaquats e figerats (1347), imitating brunetas or thick cloths from Lleida, Valls and Monzon with the same number of warp threads used in Carcassone (20 and 24 ligaduras or subdivisions of the loom reed = 2,000 and 2,400 threads), as the ordinances of 1351−52 also specified. Further rules recognised the production of textiles called palmelles i mesclats and draps forts de cordellat e listats in 1366 and 1371 respectively.14 They also stressed the considerable number of immigrant paraires and other craftsmen from the south of France in Valencia. Specific records held by the council show that 444 wool artisans registered as new residents of the city during the period from 1368 to 1500.15 There were two brotherhoods of paraires in Valencia in 1380. One of them was for masters (elemosina proborum mestrorum paratorum) and its patron saint was the Archangel Michael. The other corporation, for journeymen and apprentices (elemosina procerum mancipiorum), was dedicated to the Holy Trinity. Years later a third corporation for both categories of craftsmen was established.16 In Valencia, for example, the technical ordinances regulated the production of both cordellats (a kind of coarse cloth) and vervins and belvins (copies of fabrics from Wervicq and Brussels) even more strictly from 1379 onwards. Similar statutes were approved in Barcelona in 1383−87, including rules for the wool dyers like those adopted in Valencia in 1393.17 Antoni Riera states that after conquering the domestic market in the Crown of Aragon, locally made cloth (draps de la terra) began to gain a prestige comparable to that of its Flemish, northern French and Occitan counterparts, and increasingly cheap fabrics were produced. In fact, to boost domestic textile manufacturing, the Cortes Generales of Monzon in 1363 (General Parliament of all the States of the Crown of Aragon) not only banned all imports of cloth and wool, but also regulated the production of just medium-quality fabrics. The chosen models of products were not Occitan (Languedoc) but northern – from Wervicq, Courtrai, Chalons, Beauvais and Ostend – and the fabrics from Flanders and Brabant became the ‘new draperies’, which were brightly coloured and well-fulled but somewhat lighter and cheaper than those from Bruges, Ypres, Ghent and Mechelen. This trend, started by Catalan merchants, was intended to create a single domestic market for Catalan textiles and Aragonese wool and raw materials in the Iberian territories of the Crown. The plan was based on a ban on all imports of textiles and substantial customs duties to penalise exports of both wool and other raw 14 Germán Navarro Espinach, ‘Los negocios de la burguesía en la industria precapitalista

valenciana de los siglos XIV–XVI’, Revista d’Història Medieval, 11 (2000), 67–104 (p. 75).

15 Germán Navarro Espinach, ‘La organización del trabajo en la Corona de Aragón’, in Trabajar

en la ciudad medieval europea, ed. by Jesús Á. Solórzano Telechea and Arnaldo Sousa Melo (Logroño: Instituto de Estudios Riojanos, 2018), pp. 39–72 (pp. 59−71). 16 Paulino Iradiel Murugarren, ‘Corporaciones de oficio, acción política y sociedad civil en Valencia’, in Cofradías, gremios y solidaridades en la Europa medieval, pp. 253–84 (p. 271). 17 Iradiel Murugarren, ‘Corporaciones de oficio’, p. 261.

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materials. The price of luxury fabrics was also raised, though other hurdles to their consumption were removed.18 The reactivatived import of Franco-Flemish cloths and the capital amassed during decades of growth in production led artisans of the Crown of Aragon to embark on a process of technological innovation, and they began producing luxury fabrics around 1410, according to Antoni Riera. The most dynamic sector of each trade, with the support of the local administration, attempted to convince the other members that the time had come to allocate resources to producing high-quality textiles. The Valencian Cortes (Parliament) created, in 1417−18, new ordinances for the production of vervins with a width of 13 or 14 ligaduras (a total of 1,300 or 1,400 threads), as opposed to high-quality fabrics composed of 21 to 24 units (of 2,100 to 2,400 threads). In contrast, Barcelona Council carefully regulated textiles made of English wool, prescribing that the warp of the cloths had to range from 28 to 32 ligaduras (giving a thread count of 2,800 to 3,200) in keeping with northern models.19 The diversification of supply is also evidenced from notarial documents of the main cities of the Crown, which refer to both light fabrics (vervins and belvins) with a width of 14 to 16 ligaduras (1,400 to 1,600 threads per cloth) and heavy cloth with warps of 18 to 20 ligaduras (1,800 to 2,000 threads). Moreover, the cloth made in some rural areas spread beyond the Iberian borders of the Crown of Aragon to Sicily and Naples. The workshops of the middle valley of the River Ebro had mainly produced raw fabrics (blanquetas) and lower-to-medium-quality finished products (sargils) intended for the domestic market. It was not until the second half of the 15th century that Aragonese textiles first crossed the borders of the kingdom and Catalan merchants began to purchase small amounts of raw fabric, which were dyed and fulled in workshops in the Principality. Around the same time, artisans in Zaragoza began to produce textiles called cadins, vervins and frisons.20 In 1416, the Valencia Council approved the production of large cloths from Flanders with warps of 24 and 26 ligaduras (2,400 and 2,600 threads), and allowed the use of English wool. In 1438, the master paraires of Valencia monitored the work of the wool weavers, as used to be common practice in Barcelona, Majorca and Perpignan, putting a quality mark on the fabrics. The fact that wool weavers usually made cloths – called draps de peçols – from lower-quality yarn was detrimental to the paraires and to the Valencian textile industry’s reputation for quality. Another problem was international competition with wool fabrics from

18 Antoni Riera Melis, ‘The Growth and Diversification of Textile Making’, in Sabaté, The Crown

of Aragon, pp. 249−54 (p. 250).

19 Riera Melis, ‘The Growth’, p. 252. See also Germán Navarro Espinach, ‘La industria textil en

los reinos de Aragón y Valencia en la Edad Media’, in El món urbà a la Corona d’Aragó del 1137 als decrets de Nova Planta, Actes del XVII Congrés d’Història de la Corona d’Aragó, ed. by Salvador Claramunt Rodríguez et al. (Barcelona: Universitat de Barcelona, 2003), I, pp. 475−91. 20 Riera Melis, ‘The Growth’, p. 253; see also Navarro Espinach, ‘La industria textil de Zaragoza’.



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the Crown of Castile, France, Brittany and Gascony.21 Moreover, other published studies on the textile history of different regions of the Valencian kingdom show similar trends to the overall pattern detected here: El Comtat, Alto Palancia, La Plana and La Ribera.22 The history of wool fabrics in Valencia City has also been updated recently.23 Finally, the Kingdom of Majorca is the best example of a territory that lived off the wool industry at the end of the Middle Ages.24 In fact, rural industries expanded their production of textiles and other goods – for example, sugar and ceramics – to distant markets, contributing to the economic growth of some regions of the Crown of Aragon during the 15th century.25

Th e Si lk I ndu stry Islam’s expansion in the Mediterranean introduced silk manufacturing to Sicily and the Iberian Peninsula.26 During the 9th century, Emir Abd al-Rahman II (r. 822–852) created the silk workshops (Dār al-Ṭirāz) in Cordoba. Andalusi silk fabrics combined inscriptions and decoration in tapestry technique. The main products were the cloth known as spaniscum, tapestries with bird motifs and geometric 21 Navarro Espinach, ‘Los negocios de la burguesía’, pp. 75−76. 22 Paulino Iradiel Murugarren, David Igual Luis, Germán Navarro Espinach and Joaquín Aparici

23

24 25

26

Martí, Oficios artesanales y comercio en Castelló de la Plana (1371−1527) (Castelló, Fundación Dávalos-Fletcher, 1995); Joaquín Aparici Martí, Producció manufacturera i comerç a Vila-real (1360–1529) (Vila-real: Ajuntament de Vila-real, 1996); Joaquín Aparici Martí, El Alto Palancia como polo de desarrollo económico en el siglo XV. El sector de la manufactura textil (Segorbe: Ayuntamiento de Segorbe, 2000). See also Iván Martínez Araque, En els orígens de la indústria rural. L’artesanat a Alzira i la Ribera en els segles XIII–XV (Valencia: Universitat de València, 2012); and José Antonio Llibrer Escrig, Industria textil y crecimiento regional: La Vall d’Albaida y El Comtat en el siglo XV (Valencia: Publicacions de la Universitat de València, 2014). Germán Navarro Espinach, ‘El oficio de los pelaires de Valencia a través de sus asambleas de 1452−1481’, in El País Valenciano en la Baja Edad Media. Estudios dedicados al profesor Paulino Iradiel, ed. by David Igual Luis and Germán Navarro Espinach (Valencia: Publicacions de la Universitat de València, 2018), pp. 281–307. See also Juan Martínez Vinat, ‘La comunidad de “peraires” de la ciudad de Valencia: de la disgregación a la unión confraternal (1340−1511)’, En la España Medieval, 42 (2019), pp. 111–35. Miguel José Deyá Bauzá, La manufactura de la lana en la Mallorca del siglo XV (Palma de Mallorca: El Tall, 1997). Germán Navarro Espinach, ‘Les industries rurales dans la Couronne d’Aragon au XVe siècle’, in Les industries rurales dans l’Europe médiévale et moderne, ed. by Jean-Michel Minovez, Catherine Verna and Liliane Hilaire-Pérez (Toulouse: Presses Universitaires du Mirail, 2013), pp. 89−112; see also Germán Navarro Espinach, ‘Los sectores punta de la industria rural en la Corona de Aragón: azúcar, textil y otros’, in Industrias y mercados rurales en los reinos hispánicos (siglos XIII–XV), ed. by Germán Navarro Espinach and Concepción Villanueva Morte (Murcia: Sociedad Española de Estudios Medievales, 2017), pp. 175−202. Germán Navarro Espinach, ‘El arte de la seda en el Mediterráneo medieval’, En la España Medieval, 27 (2004), pp. 5−51.

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patterns made on vertical high-warp looms (tapis sarrazinois), fringed veils (holol), curtains, brocades, sendals and turbans. The types of silk weave used in al-Andalus would have been samite, taquete and lampas.27 The Islamic tradition of weaving fabrics from silk was continued throughout the Middle Ages thanks to Mudejar and Jewish merchants and craftsmen. In 1316, for example, a set of statutes for the silk industry adopted by Valencia Council referred to some people who practised the trade of making belts and other items from spun silk and silk filament, gold and silver thread (and sometimes blends of cotton thread and other fibres that swindled the buyers of these products). These people laid the foundations for the future Valencian silk industry, the fundamental offering of which was fine silk, trimmings and cotton blends. More than 50 specialised Jewish weavers have been identified in notarial and council records dating from the late 1300s to the early 1400s. The 1450−1512 records of prosopographic studies and the Tribunal of the Inquisition list 491 Jewish Christians (conversos) working in the sector.28 During 1465−70 the ordinances of the Valencian silk weavers (teixidors de vels de seda or velers), most of whom were of Jewish origin, authorised them to manufacture fine veils from a mixture of silk and cotton. In 1499 some municipal statutes of these weavers also permitted them to incorporate into their own offering typical cotton and silk cloths from Granada called rodeos, which were used to make women’s headwear and shoulder capes, as well as other traditional fabrics: beatilles (a Parisian fabric for Christian women’s veils), tercianeles (banners and ornaments for musical instruments), front panels of women’s clothing, wristbands and coloured trimmings.29 Finally, in 1497 silk dyers established their own brotherhood of the Archangel St Michael. The Book of Ordinances (1506−78), published in 2018, is an invaluable source of information (Fig. 4.1).30 The velvet weaving technique developed in the Iberian Peninsula during the 14th century as a result of Italian influence (artisans from Lucca and Venice 27 Silvia Saladrigas Cheng, ‘Los tejidos de al-Ándalus. Siglos IX–XVI. Aproximación técnica’, in

España y Portugal en las rutas de la seda. Diez siglos de producción y comercio entre Oriente y Occidente, ed. by Comisión Española de la Ruta de la Seda (Barcelona: Universitat de Barcelona, 1996), pp. 74−98. See also Laura Rodríguez Peinado, ‘La seda en la Antigüedad tardía y al-Ándalus’, in Las rutas de la seda en la historia de España y Portugal, ed. by Ricardo Franch Benavent and Germán Navarro Espinach (Valencia: Publicacions de la Universitat de València, 2017), pp. 15−38. 28 Germán Navarro Espinach, ‘Las familias de sederos judeoconversos de la Corona de Aragón en el siglo XV’, e-Humanista/Conversos, 8 (2020), 199–224. 29 Germán Navarro Espinach, El despegue de la industria sedera en la Valencia del siglo XV (Valencia: Consell Valencià de Cultura, 1992), pp. 56−61; Germán Navarro Espinach, Los orígenes de la sedería valenciana (siglos XV-XVI) (Valencia: Ajuntament de València, 1999), pp. 33−35. See also Germán Navarro Espinach, ‘Valencia en las rutas de la seda del Mediterráneo occidental (siglos XIII-XV)’, in Franch Benavent and Navarro Espinach, Las rutas de la seda en la historia de España y Portugal, pp. 99–128 (pp. 105−11). 30 Germán Navarro Espinach, Los tintoreros de seda de Valencia. Libro de ordenanzas y real cédula que creó su Colegio y Arte (siglos XV−XVIII) (Valencia: Colegio del Arte Mayor de la Seda, 2018).

Fig. 4.1  Initial page of Valencian Silk Dyers Ordinances (1506–1578) with the image of St Michael the Archangel, holy patron of their brotherhood. Valencia, Archivo del Colegio del Arte Mayor de la Seda (signature 4.1), parchment, 20 x 27 cm. © Valencia Silk Museum.

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especially); indeed, the world ‘velvet’ does not appear in the vocabulary of the silk trade before 1340.31 The production of Ligurian velvet, taffeta, damask and gold brocades thrived during the 15th century thanks to the widespread popularity of these cloths throughout the West. There is evidence that increasingly large numbers of Genoese craftsmen and merchants arrived in Valencia from the second half of the 15th century onwards, but no earlier: 2,000 velvet weavers are identified by different historical sources during 1450−1525 in the city, which then had 70,000 inhabitants.32 Forty percent of them were foreigners from outside the Valencian kingdom, and a significant number, 377, were artisans from Genoa and Liguria. The Genoese brought with them a great amount of technology that gave impetus to the new fashion for black velvet.33 The first guild of velvet weavers known in Spain, the Art de Velluters, was founded in Valencia in 1477−79 by Genoese and Valencian masters and consisted of 96 artisans with 172 looms based in the city.34 We have reconstructed prosopographic profiles of 716 velvet makers and more than 300 veil weavers during the period from 1474 to 1489. The Valencian silk industry became the most important production centre in the Iberian Peninsula from the 15th to the 16th centuries. It should be remembered that the Genoese guild Arte della Seta was founded in 1432. Various types of Genoese-style velvet with warps of 20 to 22 ligaduras (2,000 to 2,200 silk threads) were brought from Genoa to Valencia. The finest product was vellut senar or single-faced velvet with 2,200 silk warp threads, but there were also velvets with 2,100 threads and double-faced velvets with only 2,000. Many Castilian emigrants – silk craftsmen or apprentices – travelled to Valencia from Toledo, Seville and Granada to join its growing labour market. Moreover, the Art de Velluters was one of the oldest craft brotherhoods of Valencia. Under the

31 Germán Navarro Espinach, ‘Fifteenth Century Spanish Velvet Production’, in Velvets of the

Fifteenth Century (Riggisberg: Abegg-Stiftung, 2020), pp. 175–84. See also María del Carmen Martínez Meléndez, Los nombres de tejidos en castellano medieval (Granada: Universidad de Granada, 1989); María del Carmen Martínez Meléndez, Estudio de los nombres de los oficios artesanales en castellano medieval (Granada: Universidad de Granada, 1995). 32 Germán Navarro Espinach, ‘L’artisanat de la soie à Valence à la fin du Moyen Âge’, Razo. Cahiers du Centre d’Études Médiévales de Nice, 14 (1993), pp. 163–75. See also Germán Navarro Espinach, El despegue, pp. 151−55; and Los orígenes de la sedería, pp. 245−52. 33 Germán Navarro Espinach, ‘Velluteros ligures en Valencia (1457−1524): la promoción de un saber técnico’, in Le vie del Mediterraneo. Idee, uomini, oggetti (secoli XI-XVI), ed. by Gabriella Airaldi (Genoa: ECIG, 1997), pp. 201−11; and Germán Navarro Espinach, ‘Los genoveses y el negocio de la seda en Valencia (1457−1512)’, Anuario de Estudios Medievales 24 (1994), pp. 201−24; and ‘Valencia en las rutas de la seda’, pp. 115−23. 34 Germán Navarro Espinach, El privilegi del rei Ferran II per a l’Art de Velluters de València (1479) (Valencia: Institució Alfons el Magnànim, 2016); and Germán Navarro Espinach, Art de Velluters. El privilegio del rey Fernando el Católico [Valencia, 13 de octubre de 1479] (Valencia: Colegio del Arte Mayor de la Seda, 2017).



T ex t iles in t he Cr ow n o f A ra g o n 1 0 3

patronage of St Jerome, it was also the origin of the future silk guild, the Colegio del Arte Mayor de la Seda founded in 1686 by King Carlos II of Spain (r. 1665–1700).35 Genoese-type velvets (marca genovesa) always had more than twenty and a half ligaduras (2,050 silk threads) and during the 15th and 16th centuries they were included in the silk ordinances of Cordoba, Granada, Malaga, Seville, Toledo and, of course, Valencia, the leading velvet production centre in Spain.36 The transfer of technology and designs from Italy to Spain led to Genoese velvets becoming fashionable during the 15th century. They were patterned in exuberant arrays of natural motifs incorporating metal threads (pinecones, thistles or pomegranates), symbolising royalty, fertility and abundance. For example, a technical analysis of the Hispanic Society of America velvets shows us that they were woven with a supplementary warp (pile) that was wound around a number of separate bobbins on the loom and created a pile effect with the aid of several metal rods. The rods used for uncut loop pile velvet were cylindrical and those employed for cut pile velvet were rectangular with a lengthwise groove through which a blade could pass. Three varieties of these velvets have been found: voided, brocaded and uncut.37 Moreover, we have studied two manuscripts held in the Hispanic Society of America containing old ordinances from the Valencian silk guild (Fig. 4.2).38

M a i n t y pes of fab ri cs and the ir so cial f u nctio n Although we have already explained the main developments in the textile industries in the Crown of Aragon during the Middle Ages, a number of very important questions remain unanswered: What types of textiles were produced? What were their sizes and technical characteristics? How much did it cost to produce and distribute these fabrics on the market? What were the consumption patterns that drove local and international demand? What social significance was attributed to them? A few studies have begun cataloguing the 35 Germán Navarro Espinach, El Col·legi de l’Art Major de la Seda de València (Valencia: Consell

Valencià de Cultura, 1996); Germán Navarro Espinach and Juan Martínez Vinat, La Cofradía de San Jerónimo del ‘Art de Velluters’ de Valencia. Fundación y primeros años (1477−1524) (Valencia: Agència Valenciana del Turisme, 2016). 36 Germán Navarro Espinach, ‘La seda en Italia y España (siglos XV−XVI). Arte, tecnología y diseño’, Diálogos Mediterrânicos. Revista da Universidade Federal do Paraná, 10 (2016), pp. 71−91. 37 L’Art dels Velluters. Sedería de los siglos XV-XVI, ed. by María Victoria Liceras Ferreres and Gertrudis Jaén Sánchez (Valencia: Consorci de Museus de la Comunitat Valenciana, 2011), pp. 97, 111. 38 Germán Navarro Espinach, ‘Las ordenanzas más antiguas de velluters, 1479−1491. Auge del comercio sedero y edificación de la Lonja Nueva de Valencia’, in Liceras Ferreres and Jaén Sánchez, L’Art dels Velluters. Sedería de los siglos XV–XVI, pp. 23−48 (English translation pp. 85–92); and Germán Navarro Espinach, ‘La tecnología sedera en Valencia a la luz de unas ordenanzas inéditas del siglo XV’, Anuario de Estudios Medievales, 41.2 (2011), pp. 577–91.

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Fig. 4.2 Initial Page of the First Book of the Valencian Art de Velluters (Art of Velvet Weavers). Valencia, Archivo del Colegio del Arte Mayor de la Seda, (signature 2.1.3), parchment, 21 x 30 cm. © Valencia Silk Museum.

names of fabrics and the uses to which they were put in clothing of the period.39 Pooling the information provided by Martínez’s study of the names of textiles in 39 Martínez Meléndez, Los nombres de tejidos; Isidra Maranges i Prat, La indumentària civil

catalana. Segles XIII-XV (Barcelona: Institut d’Estudis Catalans, 1991); Marisa Astor Landete, Indumentaria e imagen: Valencia en los siglos XIV y XV (Valencia: Ajuntament de València, 1999); Cristina Sigüenza Pelarda, La moda en el vestir en la pintura gótica aragonesa (Zaragoza: Institución Fernando El Católico, 2000). See also Rosa María Dávila Corona, Montserrat Duran i Pujol and Máximo García Fernández, Diccionario histórico de telas y tejidos castellano-catalán (Salamanca: Junta de Castilla y León, 2004).



T ex t iles in t he Cr ow n o f A ra g o n 1 0 5

certain 11th- to 15th-century tax and notarial records of the Crown of Aragon, we have introduced the types and designations of origin for wool cloths on Table 4.2. In this table, we can also see the types of fabrics listed in the ordinances of the wool weavers of the main cities of the Crown of Aragon: blanqueta (Zaragoza), bruneta (Valencia), cadins (Zaragoza), cordellat (Valencia, Barcelona), frisón (Zaragoza), palmella (Valencia), sargil (Zaragoza) and Verví (Valencia, Barcelona, Zaragoza). A search for names of wool fabrics in medieval texts written in Catalan throws up equally interesting results for Table 4.2. Some of these woollen cloths, such as blanc, were produced for the social elites, whereas others – for example borra and pelada – were of much lower quality and fairly widely used. Be that as it may, the most common wool fabrics, especially draps de la terra, were consumed by most of society, who also wore hessian, hemp or linen fabrics in hot weather, while linen was nearly always used for underclothing. Table 4.2  Medieval Types of Wool Cloths in the Crown of Aragon. Wool Cloths

A

Albornoz

x

Aixalò (Xaló) or Chalón (Châlons-surMarne)

x

Alquicel

x

Aranya

x

Barragà or Barragán

x

Bifa

x

B

C x

x

Blanc

x

Blanquet

x

Blanqueta

x

x x

Borra Bristó or Bristol

x

Bruges

x

Bruixelles (Brussels)

x

Bruneta

x

Burell

x

Cadins

x

x

x

x x

x

Camellí

x

Camellot

x

Cordellat

x

x

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Wool Cloths

A

Coutray (Courtrai)

x

Doay (Douai)

x

Drap

x

Drap de la Terra

x

B

C

x

Drap Florentí Escarlata

x

Estam or Estambre

x

x

Estamenya

x

x

Estamfortz or Estanfort (Stanford)

x x

Felpa Feltre

x

x x

Ferret Frisó or Frisón

x

Galabrún

x

x

x x

Grana Herbatge

x

Ipre (Ypres)

x

Lana

x

Londres (London)

x

Llera

x

Màrrega

x

Melines (Mechelen)

x

Mescla

x x

Mitó Mostreuiller (Montivilliers)

x

Palmella

x

Panyo

x

Pardillo

x x x

Presset Raz (Arras)

x

x

Pelada Petabino

x

x



T ex t iles in t he Cr ow n o f A ra g o n 1 0 7 Wool Cloths

A

Salia (Saia) or Saya

x

Saial or Sayal

x

Sarga or Sarja

x

Sargil

x

Tornay (Tournai)

x

València

x

Verví (Wervicq)

x

Viado

x

Zaragoza

x

B

C

x

x

x

A = Martínez’s catalogue of textiles40 B = Ordinances of Wool Weavers in the Crown of Aragon C = Medieval Catalan Literature in Maranges’s study41

The Crown of Aragon records studied by Martínez in her search for fabrics made of cotton, linen, blends, goat hair, or hemp and hessian feature a considerable variety of names: alcotón or cotó, bocarán, camellí, camisalium, canyamàs, carisea, cendat or cendal, cerristopa, cotonia or cotonina, crera, drap de cotó, drap de lli, esterliz, estopa, estopazo, estopilla, filempua, fustán or fustany, lienço or llenç, panyo de lino, rançal, sarpillera, tela, tornasol and trapo de canyamiça.42 Cloths of this kind are also mentioned in medieval Catalan texts: bisso, bocaram, cànem, canemàs, cotonina, filempua, fustani or fustany, estopa, lli, orlanda, tela de França, tela de Reims.43 There are no specific studies on textiles other than wool and silk. Although there were textiles made of a mixture of silk and cotton – textores lane et lini – in cities and rural areas, they have scarcely been analysed by economic historians of the Crown of Aragon. Since completing my PhD thesis on silk, linen, hemp and cotton in Valencia during the 15th and 16th centuries, I have published only two papers on hemp textiles.44 A study of the cloth market has shown the growing distribution of linen, cotton and hemp fabrics by foreign merchants, especially 40 Martínez Meléndez, Los nombres de tejidos, pp. 17−238. 41 Maranges i Prat, La indumentària civil catalana, pp. 84−94.

42 Martínez Meléndez, Los nombres de tejidos, pp. 379−542. 43 Maranges i Prat, La indumentària civil catalana, pp. 103−09.

44 Germán Navarro Espinach, Industria y artesanado en Valencia, 1450−1525. Las manufacturas de

seda, lino, cáñamo y algodón (PhD Thesis) (Valencia: Publicacions de la Universitat de València, 1995); see also Germán Navarro Espinach, ‘El corder Joan Borrell (1467). Estudi de cultura material’, Butlletí de l’Associació Arqueològica de Castelló, 12 (1992), 77−96; and ‘Los huertos de sogueros de Valencia y Castellón: una larga tradición artesanal nacida en la Edad Media’, Estudis Castellonencs, 8 (1999), 303−45.

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French and German, in Valencia at the end of the Middle Ages.45 Although smaller compared to wool and silk textiles, this trade should not be overlooked in our analyses, as European historians stressed the importance of this new fashion for lightweight fabrics (draperies légères) some years ago.46 In the Crown of Aragon these products were known generically as telerarium et canemasserie diversarum sortium or telerarium et rauparum. The names of these textiles in Catalan were: fustanis, sayes, chamellots, ostedes, bordats, orlandes, teleria de drap de lli, canemasseries, lenç, cotonines and many others.47 Even so, the existence of draperies del lli (linen fabrics) woven on narrow looms and horts dels corders (hemp fabrics) in many parts of the Crown signify the continuity of the Muslim heritage during the Middle Ages. Only when these lightweight fabrics arrived from Europe did the local industries begin to change their textile offering in order to cater to the new market trend. The fact that the first brotherhood of linen weavers was not established in Valencia until 1531 shows that this sector was subordinate economically to the wool industry. The same is true of cotton weavers with respect to the silk industry. Interesting information on the types of silk fabrics produced in the Crown of Aragon can be gleaned from the ordinances of the Valencian silk industry of the 15th and 16th centuries, which was based on a two-pronged production system of undyed fabrics for veils and dyed pure silk for other clothing. This production structure was similar to the distinction between opera bianca dei veli and opera tinta dei drappi that existed in Bologna in the modern period.48 The main sector in the city of Valencia was that which produced the luxurious silk fabrics made by the Art de Velluters, the velvet weavers’ guild governed by ordinances of 1477−1518. Meanwhile, the founding ordinances of the silk weavers or veil makers, most of whom were Jewish conversos, took charge of the manufacture of fine veils made from a mixture of silk and cotton in 1465−70. In 1400 these weavers’ municipal by-laws likewise included in their own area of expertise rodeos, cotton and silk fabrics typical of Granada that were used to make women’s head wear and short capes, as well as other traditional textiles (Llenç de París or Paris cloth, thick corded silk, tercianelas for standards or adornments of musical instruments, front panels, wristbands and coloured trimmings). The guild of Valencian passementiers was established in 1515 and municipal ordinances were adopted the following year. To be admitted as a master of this trade it was necessary to pass an examination, 45 Enrique Cruselles Gómez, ‘El mercado de telas y “nuevos paños ligeros” en Valencia a finales

del siglo XV’, Acta Historica et Archaeologica Mediaevalia, 19 (1998), 245−72.

46 Patrick Chorley, ‘The “Draperies légères” of Lille, Arras, Tournai, Valenciennes: New Materials

for New Markets?’, in La draperie ancienne des Pays-Bas: débouchés et stratégies de survie (14e-16e siècles). Actes du Colloque tenu à Gand (1992 april 28), ed. by Marc Boone and Walter Prevenier (Leuven-Apeldoorn: Garant, 1993), pp. 151−66. 47 Cruselles Gómez, ‘El mercado de telas’, p. 253. 48 Navarro Espinach, Los orígenes de la sedería valenciana, pp. 101−16. See also Carlo Poni, ‘Per la storia del distretto industriale serico di Bologna (secoli XVI-XIX)’, Quaderni Storici, 73 (1990), pp. 93−167.



T ex t iles in t he Cr ow n o f A ra g o n 1 0 9

which entailed crafting a trimming on a decorative cloth for a Portuguese-style hat, and adorning a bag with its strings and buttons; aspirants were also required to know how to make a horse’s rope and a looped gold belt. Another trade related to this craft sector of silk made from undyed thread in Valencia was founded in 1519: weavers of patches and strips of cloth used as trimmings. According to their ordinances, they produced trimmings for shirts and cushions, and wider trimmings for curtains, bedspreads, bedheads and belts. All these silk trimmings were either white or kermes-dyed. See Table 4.3 with many types of silks identified in the Valencian silk weavers’ ordinances of the 15th and 16th centuries. The medieval documentation of the Crown of Aragon cited in Martínez’s catalogue of textiles allows us to add to this list further silk fabrics that were not included in the Valencian silk ordinances. Lastly, the references provided by Maranges about Catalan medieval texts point to the occasional use of luxurious silk fabrics. Table 4.3  Medieval Types of Silk Cloths in the Crown of Aragon. Silk Cloths

A

Aceituní or Atzeituní Albraxí Alquinal (Muslim veil)

B

C

x x

x

x x

Bagadell

x

Baldaquí Beatilla (Christian veil with a warp of 30 ligaduras in 3 palms)

x

Bord Brocat or Brocado (with a pattern weft of gold or silver thread)

x

Camelot (plain-weave silk of 17 ligaduras)

x

Camocà Çancaran Canells (wristbands, see Lligassa de Dona) Cendal or Sendal Cisclató or Siclató

Diaspre

x x

x

x x

x x x

x

Carmesí

Davanteres (front panels of chemises, see Lligassa de Dona)

x

x x

x x

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G er m án Navar r o Es pi n a c h

Silk Cloths

A

B

C

Domàs or Damasco (damask fabric of between 21 and 24 ligaduras)

x

x

x x x

Domasquí Drap d’Or i de Seda

x

Drap de Seda

x x

Escarlata Escarlatina

x x

Florentín or Florentí Imperial Llenç de París (white cloth of 20 ligaduras in 3 palms, comprised of 42 skeins of 25 threads each)

x

Lligassa de Dona (woman’s accessories with 20 ligaduras in 3 palms)

x

Llistes pintades (coloured trimmings, see Lligassa de Dona)

x

Marromat Picolat (satin of fewer than 20 ligaduras) Ras or Raso Rodeo clar (cloth of 12 ligaduras with 50 threads each, comprised of 25-thread skeins)

x

Saia (small plain-weave cloth for making footwear, of 20 and a half ligaduras)

x

Samit Seda Tafetà or Tafatà or Tafatán (taffeta or fabric with this type of weave) Tapet or Tapete

x x

x

x x x x

x

x x

Rodeo espès (cloth of 14 ligaduras with 50 threads each, comprised of 89-thread skeins)

Setí or Cetí (satin of 20 ligaduras)

x

x

Púrpura or Porpra Reixats (mesh, see Lligassa de Dona)

x

x x

x

x x



T ex t iles in t he Cr ow n o f A ra g o n 1 1 1 Silk Cloths

A

B

x

Tartarí

x

Taurís Tela de sedassos (fabric for making sifters, sievers or strainers)

x

Terçanell (cloth for standards and adornments of music instruments between 7 and 7 and a half varas long and between 2 and 2 and a half palms wide)

x

Vel (women’s veil made of a mixture of silk and cotton)

x

Vellut (velvet of 21 ligaduras)

x x x x

Vellut doble (doubled velvet of 20 ligaduras) Vellut senar (single velvet of 22 ligaduras) Vellut vellutat (velvety velvet)

C

x

x

x

x

A = Ordinances of Valencian Silk Weavers, 15th–16th century (1 ligadura = 100 threads; 1 Valencian alna or vara = 4 palms = 0,906 mm) B = Martínez’s catalogue of textiles49 C = Medieval Catalan Literature in Maranges’ study50

Silk symbolised power. In this respect, the ordinances of the court and household of King Pedro IV of Aragon (r. 1336–1387) – known as Pedro el Ceremonioso (Pedro the Ceremonious) – drawn up and adopted in 1344, carefully specified the fabrics that were to be used for the king’s clothing and ornaments down to the slightest detail. Every six years at Christmas-time a new bed was to be crafted for the monarch with a bedspread and five pillows made of cloth of gold (drap d’aur), velvet (vellut) and other sumptuous silk fabrics. Furthermore, the floor of the royal bedchamber was to be covered with wool cloths (draps de lana). In addition, every four years another bed was to be set up in the king’s privy chamber where his council met. It was to be fashioned of silk sendal (cendat) patterned with the royal emblem, and accompanied by six wool floor coverings, all in the same colour. Similarly, every four years, on the feast day of St Mary in August, three new curtains made of cendat or drap de seda and three cushions of vellut or drap de seda were to be put in place. The walls of the oratory were to be covered in another large piece of silk and two pieces of wool cloth were to be draped over the benches and the floor, all of them decorated with the royal emblem or that of St George. The ordinances likewise established that the walls of the royal bed49 Martínez Meléndez, Los nombres de tejidos, pp. 239−378. 50 Maranges i Prat, La indumentària civil catalana, pp. 94−103.

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chamber were to be hung with woollen cloths ‘with stories’ (narrative tapestries) to delight the king with their great beauty and solemnity. The table where the king ate his meals was to be provided with wool bench covers for him to sit on with gold and velvet cushions to match the colours of the bed, also displaying the royal insignia. When the sovereign had to grant audience, a bedspread of cloth of gold or velvet with ermine pelts was to be laid on his bed.51 The ordinances of King Pedro IV of Aragon also established how the chapels in the king’s palaces were to be decked out for the various feasts of the liturgical calendar with cloth of five different colours in accordance with the respective sacred symbolism attributed to them. Red fabrics (vermeyls) were to be used for the feasts of Our Lord Jesus Christ and those of martyred saints, because the colour vermell (red) symbolised the blood of their sacrifice. White signified the virginity of Mary and the female saints who lived in chastity. Green represented the triumph of Christ and the holy doctors or confessors who defended the Church. Blue was the colour of Fridays and feast days. Lastly, black was reserved for the office for the dead. Cloths of silk, gold or velvet in those five colours with stories and adornments were to be hung in the main chapel. The officiants’ liturgical vestments and the altar cloths were accordingly made of silks, velvets and gold in those five essential colours in keeping with the liturgical calendar.52 It is extremely interesting to read what King Pedro IV’s ordinances have to say about the textiles that the king was to present to twelve poor people, as an expression of piety and charity on the feast day of the Saviour, after washing their feet. They consisted of wool cloth for their gowns, hose and caps (caperó in Catalan) and linen cloth for their undershirts, in order to symbolise, with its whiteness, the purity of Our Lord Jesus Christ.53 These garments contrast with the textiles to be worn by the king at his coronation ceremony. According to the ordinances, at this solemn event the king dressed in white silk underclothes symbolising chastity. Over them he wore a tunic (gonella in Catalan) of vermella de scarlata (scarlet red) followed by a robe called garnatxa (garnacha in Castilian Spanish) made of red velvet and golden cloth with the royal insignia. This outfit was topped with a cloak also made of cloth of gold and red velvet with the same emblem and lined with ermine fur. He did not wear shoes but scarlet red (vermelles de scarlata) hose. The throne he sat on for his consecration at the cathedral altar on the Gospel side was likewise to be covered in cloth of gold and silk and accompanied by his royal standard, helmet and shield. In the bishops’ sacristy the king would again be decked out in a dalmatic de vellut vermell e de drap d’or de nostra senyal real decorada

51 Ordinacions de la Casa i Cort de Pere el Cerimoniós, ed. by Francisco M. Gimeno Blay, Daniel

Gozalbo and Josep Trenchs (València: Publicacions de la Universitat de València, 2009), pp. 165−67. 52 Gimeno Blay et al., Ordinacions de la Casa i Cort, pp. 203−07. 53 Gimeno Blay et al., Ordinacions de la Casa i Cort, p. 235.



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(an ecclesiastical vestment made of red velvet and cloth of gold decorated with our royal emblem).54 The luxury fabric par excellence in the 14th century was still double-faced wool cloth of Flemish origin; however, silks eventually took over as the most highly prized textiles. Cardinals began wearing scarlet silk soutanes with the typical red hat in the 13th century, after Pope Innocent IV established their use at the first council of Lyon in 1245, in accordance with the tradition of the red hats worn by the canons of the French city. Silk became an expression of the sacred power of the cardinals or princes of the Church. Indeed, in the 14th century this scarlet silk hat, the galero, began to appear in place of mitres in coats of arms. From this point onwards the growing popularity of silks with monarchs, nobility and bourgeoisie came to be associated with a display of power and distinction in contrast to most of society. Moreover, the most expensive dyestuffs were used for these costly silk cloths. Vivid colours, chiefly red, took over from the now outdated blues and greens that still prevailed in rural areas and smaller towns. In fact, the preference for silks and bright colours shown by the Church in liturgy and ceremonial imitated the ancient court of the Emperor Justinian, who wore purple and gold textiles as the last legacy of Rome. Two interesting examples in 15th-century documents of the Crown of Aragon are a good illustration of the care taken in the manufacture of silks for ecclesiastical purposes. In the first, drawn up in the presence of a notary in 1412, the sacristy of Valencia cathedral commissioned the Venetian master silk weaver Luigi di Giovanni to make 12 pieces of cloth of gold and silk for ornaments, specifying that he was to follow the design of a sample of blue cloth with a pine cone pattern which had been supplied to him on the orders of the bishop. Years later, another notarial document of 1426 refers to a private commission given to the same Venetian master silk weaver. A shopkeeper called Macià Martí hired him to fashion a cloth copying the design of some capes he had made for Valencia cathedral in order to sell it to churches in or outside the city. The cloth in question was made of gold silk brocade on a green ground with a pattern of large leaves in a circle of crimson in grain silk with a gold fleuron in the middle, and other fine gold fleurons that completed the design, secundum mostram illius panni quem feci pro duabus capis sedis carmisini, salvo que camperium istius panni debet essere viridum (after the sample of the cloth I made for two crimson capes for the cathedral, except that the ground of this cloth should be green) (Fig. 4.3).55 The designs of ecclesiastical cloths were thus imitated and their use spread in society as an expression of luxury, sacredness and, consequently, a symbol of upward social mobility, as the following example illustrates. Maidservants who worked in 15th-century Valencian bourgeois households generally completed their period of domestic service around the age of twenty, ready to marry. At this point, together with their wages in money, they received a dowry of new clothing 54 Gimeno Blay et al., Ordinacions de la Casa i Cort, pp. 244−46. 55 Navarro Espinach, Los orígenes de la sedería valenciana, pp. 111−12.

Fig. 4.3  Altarpiece of Saint Domingo de Silos parish church from Daroca (Zaragoza) by Bartolomé Bermejo (1474–1479). Oil on board, 242 x 130 cm. © Museo Nacional del Prado de Madrid.



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and footwear from their employers, consisting of a one-piece gown, a tunic and a cloak of woollen cloth costing 10 sueldos/vara, two chemises, hose, shoes, two cloth panels to cover their chests and, most significantly: a capell de seda (silk cap).56 This piece of silk headwear symbolised the new stage of their life on which they were embarking, a sort of coming of marriageable age. From kings to maidservants, the social status of silk as a symbol of prestige had thus relegated wool, linen, hemp and cotton to second place by the end of the Middle Ages.

C o n s um pti on patterns fou nd in taxe s o n trad e An appraisal of the trade in foreign textiles in the Kingdom of Aragon, drawn up at the Cortes Generales of Monzón in 1375−76 (General Parliament of the States of the Crown of Aragon), records a list of wool fabrics with 34 designations of origin.57 The most expensive are scarlet, kermes-dyed and striped and come from English, Flemish and French textile production centres. A total of 18 toponyms from these places are cited: Bristol, Bruxellas (Brussels), Carcassona (Carcassonne), Colcestre (Colchester), Cortray (Courtrai), Duay (Douai), Filafort (Vilforte), Gant (Ghent), Gascunya (Gascony), Limos (Limoges), Lohan (Louvain), Londres (London), Mellinas (Mechelen), Pamias (Pamiers), Perpenyan (Perpignan), Tolosa (Toulouse), Verví (Wervicq) and Ypres. The other 16 designations of origin that make up the list of 34 fabrics are nearly all Catalan: Barchinona (Barcelona), Campredon (Camprodon), Cardona, Girona, Lérida (Lleida), Montoliu, Moriella (Morella), Puycerdán (Puigcerdà), Ripol (Ripoll), Sant Johan de Ampurias (Sant Joan d’Empúries), Sant Johan de las Abadessas (Sant Joan de les Abadesses), Solsona, Valencia, Verga (Berga), Vilapenxa, and Villafranca (Vilafranca del Penedès). The document illustrates quite well the international situation of the woollen textile market in late 14th-century Europe.58 However, the information provided by the wealth of tax records of the Crown of Aragon gives an even bigger picture of developments in the production of textiles for the market after the 14th century. As was recently pointed out by Paulino Iradiel, one of the leading specialists in the history of the Spanish textile industries, an in-depth study based on taxation and manufactured goods has yet to be carried out in order to establish production indicators.59 Customs records relating to the tax called impuesto de generalidades in the kingdom of Aragon in the 15th century contain a wealth of information about 56 Navarro Espinach, El despegue de la industria sedera, pp. 109−11. 57 Acta Curiarum Regni Aragonum, IV, ed. by José Ángel Sesma Muñoz (Zaragoza: Gobierno de

Aragón, 2006), pp. 96−97.

58 Germán Navarro Espinach, ‘El comercio de telas entre Oriente y Occidente (1190−1340)’, in

Vestiduras ricas. El monasterio de las Huelgas y su época, 1170-1340, ed. by Mateo Mancini (Madrid: Patrimonio Nacional, 2005), pp. 89−106. 59 Paulino Iradiel Murugarren, ‘Fisco y política económica de la manufactura urbana’, in Fisco, legitimidad y conflicto en los reinos hispánicos (siglos XIII-XVII). Homenaje a José Ángel Sesma Muñoz,

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the textile trade conducted with the neighbouring kingdoms of the Spanish mainland. For example, at the land customs station of Barracas at the border of Aragon and Valencia, 526 imported bolts of cloth were declared in 1445−46, 131 in 1445−46 and 110 in 1446−47 – that is, a total of 767 textiles between 1445 and 1447. During the same period 250 bolts were exported via the Calatayud customs station and more than 400 via that of Zaragoza. The type of textile that stands out above all the rest is canvas, of which more than 24,000 varas are recorded (1 Valencian vara = 0.906 m) during the three periods studied: 7,716 varas in 1444−45, 7,992 varas in 1445−46 and 8,384 varas in 1446−47. In contrast, the declared amounts of textiles from Verdun (2,800 varas) and Bruges (1,518 varas) are relatively small, and silk fabrics amount to less than 1,000 varas in total (velvets, brocades). The trade conducted between Aragon and Valencia was primarily in low-quality fabrics of dark colours (dun, dark burgundy, purple, dark brown and grey) as opposed to more luxurious textiles in vivid colours. Many fabrics were exported from Aragon to be dyed and finished in Valencia. According to a municipal tax levied on local textile production in Barracas in 1434 – the Manifestación de la Bulla, which was common to many municipalities – most of the fabrics made there were cordellates (corded wools).60 The records of the customs station of Huesca, located in the north of the kingdom of Aragon, confirm that this city was one of the main markets for the distribution of Catalan textile production to Castile, Navarre, Guipúzcoa and the south of France. A considerable 391 bolts of fabric were declared during 1450, notably 165 from Sant Joan de les Abadesses, 59 from Girona, 45 from Vic, 32 from Camprodon and 24 from Ripoll. During the same year the customs point of Tamarite de Litera, situated southeast of Huesca close to the border with Catalonia, recorded 723 bolts of cloth: 225 from Puigcerdà, 165 from Bagà and 127 from Sant Joan de les Abadesses. European wools are almost completely absent from these customs records, though there are many references to cotton, linen and hemp fabrics and canvases from textile production centres in Germany, France, Holland and northern Italy. Slightly more than 3,000 Aragonese cañas (1 caña was equivalent to 2 and a half varas, just over a metre and a half) – that is, approximately 4,500 metres of fabrics – for underclothing, household linen, shirts and furnishings were recorded from Germany alone. In addition, it should be stressed that the Huesca customs station recorded some 450 cañas or varas of linen fabric from Holland (olandas) and more than 400 pieces of fustian or thick cotton and linen fabrics from a broad variety of places.61

ed. by Carlos Laliena Cobrera, Mario Lafuente Gómez and Ángel Galán Sánchez (Zaragoza: Prensas de la Universidad de Zaragoza, 2019), pp. 141−64. 60 Concepción Villanueva Morte, ‘El comercio textil a través de la frontera terrestre entre Aragón y Valencia en el siglo XV’, Aragón en la Edad Media, 18 (2004), pp. 163−201 (pp. 176−81). 61 José Ángel Sesma Muñoz, Huesca, ciudad mercado de ámbito internacional en la Baja Edad Media según los registros de su aduana (Zaragoza: Universidad de Zaragoza, 2005), pp. 23−27.



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There is also significant data for the economic region of the Aragonese Pyrenees bordering on the south of the kingdom of France. The Ribagorza customs records list several thousand varas of thick, coarse, woollen cloth woven from yarn from the native livestock of the region to be sold in Catalonia. This type of cloth is sometimes referred to as sarzil (sarcil, sargil) and must have been a sort of sayal or thick wool for outer garments woven on narrow looms in long strips of white, flecked, speckled and black cloth. Others are called burel and, judging by their higher price, appear to be of superior quality to the abovementioned fabrics.62 The records of the Jaca and Canfranc customs along the so-called Somport route or way in the Pyrenees specify two varieties of fabrics and cloths. The first to be listed are common linen and hemp fabrics for the mass consumption of the population of northern Aragon: canvases, hessians and sackcloths or sarpilleras. Every year more than 26,000 metres of materials of this kind from southern France – the great majority of them canvases – worth more than 25,000 Jaca sueldos entered the kingdom of Aragon via the Canfranc customs point alone. A further 1,100 metres of sayal made from low-quality wool in the Bearn region also entered via the same route. In contrast, among the finer quality woollen fabrics we find drap de Bristol (some 50 pieces) and, to a lesser degree, telas crudas de Bretanya (undyed fabrics from Brittany), telas de Flandes (fabrics from Flanders) and fustians from Milan. The Aragonese customs stations in the Pyrenees are thus magnificent sources for observing the patterns in the consumption of European and local textiles in mountainous areas across the border with their fairs and rural markets, far from the major Mediterranean cities.63 Aside from the Aragonese customs points that collected the tax called impuesto de generalidades, the most direct source we know of in the Crown of Aragon for analysing textile production for the market is undoubtedly the Tall del Drap del General in each kingdom. This tax was levied on textiles and linens that were cut and sold for consumption, as well as on imports and exports. It originated from the Cortes of 1362, where it was established as an extraordinary measure, and was maintained intermittently until 1404. That year it was granted de facto – though not de jure – ordinary status and continued to be collected with slight variations throughout the period of the modern era in which Aragon retained its own laws and institutions (fueros). It can therefore be included among the indirect taxes of the Generalidad de Aragón. Originally 1 sueldo per libra was paid on fabrics of gold, silk, camlet, wool, worsted, linen, cotton, hemp, hessian, hiniesta (a kind of esparto) and all other kinds (1 libra valenciana = 20 sueldos, 1 sueldo = 12 dineros). In 1406, it was lowered to 6 dineros per libra and the linen, cotton, hemp, hessian 62 José Ángel Sesma Muñoz, El tráfico mercantil por las aduanas de Ribagorza (1444−1450). Producción

y comercio rural en Aragón a finales de la Edad Media (Zaragoza: Universidad de Zaragoza, 2010), pp. 17−19. 63 José Ángel Sesma Muñoz, La vía del Somport en el comercio medieval de Aragón (Los registros de las aduanas de Jaca y Canfranc de mediados del siglo XV) (Zaragoza: Universidad de Zaragoza, 2006), pp. 34−37.

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and hiniesta trades were exempted from payment, but to offset these exemptions it was levied on fabric from Ostend, coarse corded wools (cordellates) and twills. In addition, 6 dineros for every libra-worth was payable on imported new tunics, hose, surcoats, caps and gowns. The tax records held in the Archivo del Reino de Valencia thus provide a closer and more direct insight into this tax. It was payable in the place where the cloth was cut, and if the cloth was purchased to be cut outside the kingdom, the tax was collected in the place where cloth was acquired. In 1405 tax collection began to be farmed out in three main organisational divisions: Valencia, Orihuela and Guardamar, and the rest of the kingdom. The farming of its collection meant that the area was divided into smaller and more manageable districts known as quarters and filloles, which made handling tax collection an easier task. In the kingdom of Valencia, the farming of the collection of the Tall del Drap was divided into 26 cuarteles or administrative areas to keep better control of textile production and inspect as thoroughly as possible the routes whereby fabrics entered or left the kingdom. The fiscal district of Valencia was undoubtedly the one that provided the highest tax revenues.64 As for the variety of fabrics recorded in the first book of the Tall del General of the town of Segorbe (in 1520), the declared volume of varas is 5,150, notably cordellates (1,340 varas), márfegas (linen or straw for mattresses, 900 varas), palmillas (238 varas) and worsteds (123 varas).65 Of the 2,013 entries for the tax year from 16 February 1520 to 23 February the following year, more than 40% are from Aragon (from what is now the province of Teruel, bordering on the administrative district of Alto Palancia). The Tall del Drap tax therefore shows how the Alto Palancia district, especially the town of Segorbe, was a hub of economic development owing to the thriving woollen textile industry and its capillary distribution throughout the territory. As a result, local producers based nearby but close to the border with Teruel relied on the services of Segorbe for finishing their own fabrics. In short, the various record books of the Manifest del Tall del Drap held in the Archivo del Reino de Valencia will make it possible to analyse in greater depth and quantify the types and variety of cloths produced, and this will enable us in future to establish parameters for comparison with the production recorded in the other fiscal districts of the kingdom where this tax was collected.66

64 María Rosa Muñoz Pomer, ‘Aproximació a una divisió comarcal a través del “Tall del Drap”

(1404)’, in Xè Col.loqui General de la Societat d’Onomástica (Valencia, 1985) (Valencia: Universidad de Valencia, 1986), pp. 530−34; and María Rosa Muñoz Pomer, ‘Aproximación al sistema impositivo de la Generalitat: el tall del drap en el área alicantina, siglos XIV y XV’, Anales de la Universidad de Alicante. Historia Medieval, 4−5 (1986), pp. 175−89. 65 Concepción Villanueva Morte, Hacienda y fiscalidad en el Alto Palancia durante el siglo XV: estrategias e impuestos comerciales en una comarca fronteriza (Segorbe: Ayuntamiento, 2007); see database on CD-ROM. 66 Aparici Martí, El Alto Palancia como polo de desarrollo económico. See also Joaquín Aparici Martí, ‘Paños, tintes y batanes. Mapa de la producción textil medieval en la zona septentrional del reino de Valencia’, Boletín de la Sociedad Castellonense de Cultura, 86 (2010), pp. 185−212.



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A great deal of information can be gleaned from studying the production and trade in silk fabrics in the Crown of Aragon in the late Middle Ages.67 Firstly, two tax registers of silk exports from the city of Valencia record 137 taxpayers in 1475 and 197 in 1512. A comparison of silk trade figures for these years shows a marked increase. The number of varas of specific silk fabrics exported in 1475 was 17,404 compared to 42,292 in 1512 (1 Valencian alna or vara is equivalent to 906 mm). The trade in black satin, velvet and damask in 1475 was 7,861 varas, that is, 45% of all textiles. In 1512, however, black velvet alone accounted for 56% of the total market with 23,788 varas. Only the 1512 tax register includes the prices, but we have not studied them here because we are currently conducting new research on the tax register of 1513 to complete our analysis for the forthcoming 52nd Settimana di Studi Datini (Prato, 2021): Fashion as an economic engine: process and product innovation, commercial strategies, consumer behaviour.68 Five varieties of black silk fabrics listed in the Valencian tax register of 1512 (Manifest de les Sedes) amounted to 35,950 varas between them, accounting for 85% of the total figure in 1512 alone. This percentage for Valencian silk fabrics gleaned from fiscal sources is consistent with available data on the Genoese silk industry, where black fabrics made up 60% of all those declared. This predominance of black not only reflects the international trend but also shows that the technology for dyeing silk black had been transferred from Genoa to Valencia.69 A number of studies of the patterns of the textiles depicted in Gothic and Renaissance paintings in the museums of the main countries of the Crown of Aragon have provided researchers with a great deal of information.70 In the Crown of Aragon, apart from Valencia, the silk industry has only been studied in Barcelona in a PhD thesis that has not yet been published.71

67 Germán Navarro Espinach, ‘La producción y el comercio de tejidos de seda en la Corona de

68 69

70 71

Aragón en el siglo XV’, in Mercados del lujo, mercados del arte. El gusto de las elites mediterráneas en los siglos XIV y XV, ed. by Sophie Brouquet and Juan Vicente García Marsilla (Valencia: Publicacions de la Universitat de València, 2015), pp. 415−34. See also Germán Navarro Espinach, ‘Los Ribas y el comercio de sedas de Valencia a Zaragoza (1493−1513)’, in Consumo, comercio y transformaciones culturales en la Baja Edad Media: Aragón, siglos XIV-XV, ed. by Carlos Laliena Corbera and Mario Lafuente Gómez (Zaragoza: Grupo CEMA, 2016), pp. 97−122. My research project accepted by the Settimana Committee together with Joaquin Aparici Martí is entitled: ‘The Colours of Valencian Silk Fabrics in the European Market (1475−1513)’. Carola Ghiara, L’arte tintoria a Genova dal XV al XVII secolo. Tecniche e organizzazione (Genoa: Centro di Studi per la Storia della Tecnica in Italia, 1976). See also Carola Ghiara, ‘La tintura nera genovese: la migliore di quante se ne facesse nel mondo’, in Seta a Genova 1491−1991, ed. by Valeria Cottini Petrucci (Genoa: Colombo, 1991), pp. 18−28. Sigüenza Pelarda, La moda en el vestir en la pintura gótica aragonesa. Ivanna Stojak, ‘La sederia a Barcelona al segle XV’ (unpublished doctoral thesis, Universitat de Barcelona, 2013).

Fig. 4.4  Altarpiece of the parish church of Saint Esteve at Granollers (Barcelona), dedicated to Princess Eudoxia’s exorcism by The Vergós (1495–1500). Painting 192.3 x 114.2 x 6.5 cm. © Museu Nacional d’Art de Catalunya.



T ex t iles in t he Cr ow n o f A ra g o n 1 2 1

Conclusio ns Textile production and trade was the most highly capitalised economic activity in the Crown of Aragon and made rapid technological progress. The institutional powers granted it advantageous tax and social conditions on account of the amount of employment and business it generated. Not only is textile production the best documented activity between the 12th and 15th centuries: analyses of the overall transformations that Western Europe’s economic and cultural structures underwent show that it is inseparable from feudal demographic and economic growth, social diversification and technological renewal.72 Sales of wool cloths provided 65% of the revenues from the Tall del Drap del General tax collected in the fiscal district of Valencia, whereas silks accounted for 30%, as occurred in other cities like Florence.73 Of all the medieval textiles, silks were the new luxury industry par excellence throughout late 15th-century Europe. These ‘new silk draperies’ are analysed by Sergio Tognetti in his book on silk and silk-mix fabrics in Quattrocento Florence.74 Their spread was made possible, among other things, by the migration of qualified technical masters from Italy to Spain (Genoese in Valencia) or France (Lucchese in Lyon). From 1550 onwards they even ventured as far as England, Germany and the Netherlands: a changing industrial geography with dissemination of techniques, according to Luca Molà.75 This luxury industry was concerned with producing quality goods and standardising them owing to the strong international demand from the elite classes, but also from the middle and petty bourgeoisie. More than a question of changing tastes in clothing, it was a very considerable source of long-term investments and profits for merchants and bankers that offered excellent margins, comparable to those they were already earning on the money market, for example. Nevertheless, this pre-capitalist market was often at odds with state policies (sumptuary laws) and fluctuated sharply in the short term. It was the realm of speculation and the unforeseeable. Huge profits one year 72 Antoni Riera Melis, ‘The Origins of Textile Production and Trade’, in Sabaté, The Crown of

Aragon, pp. 203–17 (p. 203). See also Germán Navarro Espinach, ‘La política de desarrollo de las manufacturas textiles en la Corona de Aragón’, in Il governo dell’economia. Italia e Penisola Iberica nel basso Medioevo, ed. by Lorenzo Tanzini and Sergio Tognetti (Rome: Viella Libreria Editrice, 2014), pp. 285−308. 73 Navarro Espinach, El Col·legi de l’Art Major de la Seda de València, pp. 53−54. See also Germán Navarro Espinach and Joaquín Aparici Mart, ‘El negoci de la seda i la Generalitat Valenciana (segles XV-XVI)’, in La Veu del Regne. Representació política, recursos públics i construcció de l’Estat: 600 anys de la Generalitat Valenciana (Congrés Internacional celebrat a València-Morella-Alacant, 21−28 octubre 2018), ed. by Antoni Furió (València: Generalitat Valenciana, forthcoming). 74 Sergio Tognetti, Un’industria di lusso al servizio del grande commercio. Il mercato dei drappi serici e della seta nella Firenze del Quattrocento (Florence: Leo S. Olschki Editore, 2002). 75 Luca Molà, The Silk Industry of Renaissance Venice (Baltimore and London: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 2000), pp. 3–51.

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could be followed by losses the following year. Awareness of this made it possible to adapt to its sudden changes, though the types of fabrics and their designs remained unchanged for decades.76

76 Germán Navarro Espinach, ‘El lujo de los tejidos de seda en la indumentaria valenciana de los

siglos XV-XVIII’, in Vestimenta tradicional valenciana, catalogue of the exhibition held at the Museo de Artes Decorativas de Montevideo from 4 December 1999 to 16 January 2000 (Valencia: Consorci de Museus de la Comunitat Valenciana, 1999), pp. 17−70.

chapter 5

The Textile Industry in al-Andalus 1 Adela Fábregas

Al- Andalus, a tex til e so cie ty

M

aurice Lombard, in his work about the textile industry in the Islamic world, declared that the importance of the textile sector for early Islamic communities was so central that they might be described as ‘textile societies’.2 Some years later, Vincent Lagardère demonstrated that silk production was one of the features setting al-Andalus apart from the medieval West.3 The central role played by textile production in al-Andalus is, therefore, beyond doubt, and is regularly mentioned, in generic terms, in all general histories of al-Andalus. The textile industry features as a prominent economic, social and cultural factor in the historical sources. Geographers and chroniclers described the regions of al-Andalus on which textile industries were based, and praised their production. These included textiles produced in the region since Antiquity, such as wool and flax,4 both of which were still major products in the Middle Ages.

1

This essay is included in the framework of the Research Project ‘Industria y Comercio en al-Andalus: siglos XII-XV. INCOME’ (A-HUM-040-UGR18/P18-FR-2046), funded by Junta de Andalucía. 2 Maurice Lombard, Les textiles dans le monde musulman VIIe-XIIe siècle (Paris: Mouton, 1978). 3 Vincent Lagardère, ‘Mûrier et culture de la soie en Andalus au Moyen Age (Xe–XIVe siècles’, Mélanges de la Casa de Velázquez. Antiquité et Moyen-Age, 26.1 (1990), 97–111 (p. 97). 4 Laura Rodríguez Peinado, ‘La producción textil en al-Andalus: orígen y desarrollo’, Anales de Historia del Arte, 22, Núm. Especial (II) (2012), 265–79 (pp. 266–68).

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W ool Wool was probably the most widely used fabric, as reported by the geographer and traveller Ibn Ḥawqal (d. after 988) who visited al-Andalus: ‘Wool fabrics (assüf) […] There are marvels with regard to dyes, obtained from grasses native to al-Andalus.’5 Wool was especially used among the humblest sectors of the population. Referring to North Africa in the 12th century, Idrīsī pointed out that ‘Common people dress in wool cadāwīr, and their hats are made with the same material; rich people wear cotton clothing and coats’.6 Ibn al Khaṭīb, the Nasrid writer (Granada, 1313–1374), claimed, however, that wool was used by all social classes: The most common dress among all social classes in winter is dyed wool. There are various qualities, depending on wealth and social class. In summer, the most used fabrics are flax, silk, cotton, fine goat fur, Ifriquiya capes, Tunisian veils and light wool mantles.7

Some degree of geographical specialisation existed, especially concerning wool, the production of which was especially intense in the area of eastern al-Andalus (Sharq al-Andalus), as reported by the Andalusi geographer Idrīsī (1100–1165), who talks about the importance of the sector in different cities of Sharq al-Andalus, such as Chinchilla, where ‘On y fabrique des tapis de laine qu’on ne saurait imiter ailleurs… ’ (wool carpets are made there that cannot be imitated anywhere else),8 or Cuenca, where ‘Les tapis de laine qu’on y fait sont d’excellente qualité’ (wool carpets of excellent quality are made).9 Strong specialisation would account for 5

6

7

8 9

‘Se fabrican diversos tejidos de lana […] En los tejidos de lana tintada y en otros tejidos, los cuales se aplican al tinte, hay maravillas obtenidas con hierbas especiales … ’; Ibn Ḥawqal, Configuración del mundo. Fragmentos alusivos al Magreb y España, trans. María José Romani Suay (Valencia: Anubar, 1971), p. 66; Francisco Franco Sánchez, ‘The andalusian economy in the times of Almanzor. Administrative theory and economic reality through juridical and geographic sources’, Imago temporis: medium Aevum, 2 (2008), 83–112 (p. 99). ‘Les personnes du commun se vêtent de cadāwīr de laine et portent sur leur têtes des carāzī de la même étoffe; les gens riches portent dès vêtements de coton et des manteaux (mizar)’; Idrīsī, Nuzhat al-muštāq fī iẖtirāq al-āfāq. Description de l’Afrique et de l’Espagne, ed. by R. Dozy and M. J. de Goeje (Leiden: Brill, 1864), p. 3 of the translation. ‘El vestido más usado por las distintas clases sociales y más propagado entre ellos es el paño de lana teñido en invierno. Son variadas las calidades de las telas, según la fortuna y la posición social. En verano se usan el lino, la seda, el algodón, el pelo fino de cabra, la capa de Ifriqiya, los velos tunecinos y los finísimos mantos de lana’; Ibn al Khaṭīb, Historia de los Reyes de la Alhambra. El resplandor de la luna llena acerca de la dinastía nazarí (Al-Lamḥa al-badrīya fī l-dawla al-naṣrīya), trans. by José María Casciaro Ramírez and Emilio Molina López (Granada: Editorial Universidad de Granada, 2010), pp. 126–27. Dozy and de Goeje, Idrīsī, Nuzhat, p. 237. Dozy and de Goeje, Idrīsī, Nuzhat, p. 237.



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the fact that, in the late medieval period, the remaining territories of al-Andalus, including the Nasrid Kingdom, in which wool production was no longer a major sector, had to import English, Valencian and Flemish products, as clearly reflected in the Datini records.10 The ledgers of Genoese merchants who operated in Granada also reflect the arrival of European cloths to Granada, including products from Valencia.11

Li nen Flax seems to have been a major production in al-Andalus, never being displaced by the introduction of new fabrics.12 This continued success may be explained by the high quality and quantity of Andalusi flax, which was favourably compared to Egyptian linen by such authors as Ibn Ḥawqal, who claimed that ‘Ordinary linen is made for dressing and it is exported in large quantities to Egypt. The blankets made there [Pechina, Almería] are exported to Egypt, Mecca, Yemen and other places’;13 or the Andalusi geographer al Bakrī (d. 487/1094), who wrote that ‘… their towns produce the best silk and flax, which is better in quality than Fayyum flax’.14 However, the main reason behind the continued importance of flax was its use in a wide range of products, from everyday garments to luxury articles: ‘For the people and the court linen cloth is made (that is) not inferior to the dabiqi. It is thick but light, of great quality.’15 10 Federigo Melis, ‘Malaga nel sistema economico del XIV e XV secolo’, in Federigo Melis,

11

12 13

14

15

Mercaderes italianos en España (siglos XIV–XV) (Seville: Publicaciones de la Universidad de Sevilla, 1976), pp. 3–65. Adela Fábregas, Un mercader genovés en el reino de Granada. El libro de cuentas de Agostino Spinola (1441–1447) (Granada: Grupo de Investigación Toponimia, Historia y Arqueología del Reino de Granada, 2002); Adela Fábregas, La familia Spinola en el reino nazarí de Granada. Contabilidad privada de Francesco Spinola (1451–1457) (Granada: Grupo de Investigación Toponimia, Historia y Arqueología del Reino de Granada, 2004). Vincent Lagardère, Campagnes et paysans d’Al-Andalus (VIIIe–Xve s.) (Paris: Maisonneuve et Larose, 1993), pp. 413–39. ‘En varias partes del país se fabrica lino ordinario para la vestidura que es exportado hacia diferentes lugares, y se llegan incluso a remitir grandes cantidades a Egipto. Los mantos confeccionados en Pechina son enviados a Egipto, a la Meca, al Yemen y a otros lugares’; Romani Suay, Ibn Ḥawqal, Configuración del mundo, p. 67; Franco Sánchez, ‘The andalusian economy’, p. 99. ‘… en sus pueblos se encuentra la seda de la mejor calidad, y lino que aventaja al lino del Fayyum’; Abū ‘Ubayd al-Bakrī, Geografía de España (Kitāb al-masālik wa-l-mamālik), trans. by Eliseo Vidal Beltrán (Zaragoza: Anubar, 1982), pp. 23–24. ‘Se fabrican para el público y para la Corte vestidos de lino, que no son en absoluto inferiores al dabiqi. Es de gran espesor, pero también de una gran ligereza, que es apreciada …’; Romani Suay, Ibn Ḥawqal, Configuración del mundo, p. 67.

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Both these uses of flax are also mentioned in Cordoban 10th–century fatwas, the legal opinions given by qualified jurists that give us historical information about economic, social and religious life.16 Flax was used in mixed fabrics, for instance serving as the warp of some silk fabrics, known as trasimirgos,17 or in middling silk-like fabrics called filosilks, which were very popular in Christian markets. The origin of these filosilks is, though, uncertain, and they may have been imported from Mudejar producers based in Castile.18 Written references to flax production are not limited to relatively generic mentions in geographical works, but are also found in urban marketplace regulations, the treatises of Ḥisba: [199] Cotton and flax threads must not be sold in bundles, to avoid fraud, since women put objects inside the bundles, in order to make them heavier.19 [138] Flax thread is different to silk at the loom, because the finer it is, the denser the mesh and the lighter the fabric. This is because silk comes in just one type, while flax comes in many.20 [140] … the neck of flax tunics are broad, so they look good hanging, but when worn, they become unbalanced.21 [141] Dyers must not dye red using brazilin, because it will not last, except for light colours on cotton and flax.22

16 Vincent Lagardère, Histoire et société en Occident musulman au Moyen Âge. Analyse du ‘Mi’yār’ d’Al-

17 18 19

20

21

22

Wanšarīsī (Madrid: Casa de Velázquez, 1995), pp. 101 (& 149), 102 (& 156); Luis María SerranoPiedecasas Fernández, ‘Elementos para una historia de la manufactura textil andalusí (ss. IX–XII)’, Studia Historica, 4 (1986), 205–29 (p. 218). Serrano Piedecasas, ‘Elementos para una historia’, p. 214. Cristina Partearroyo Lacaba, ‘Estudio histórico-artístico de los tejidos de al-Andalus y afines’, Bienes Culturales: revista del Instituto del Patrimonio Histórico Español, 5 (2005), 37–74 (pp. 63–64). ‘Los hilos de algodón y de lino no deben venderse ovillados, porque es ocasión de fraude, ya que las mujeres suelen meter en los ovillos cuerpos extraños, para que aumenten en peso’; Sevilla a comienzos del siglo XII. El tratado de Ibn ’Abdūn, ed. by E. Lévi Provençal and Emilio García Gómez (Madrid: Servicio de Publ. del Ayuntamiento de Sevilla, 1948), p. 169. ‘El hilo de lino difiere del de seda en el telar, pues cuanto más fino, mayor el número de casas y menor el peso de la tela. Esto es porque el hilo de seda es de una sola clase, mientras el de lino es de muchas variedades’; Al-Saqaṭī al-Mālaqī El buen gobierno del zoco, ed. by Pedro Chalmeta and Federico Corriente, trans. by Pedro Chalmeta (Almería: Fundación Ibn Tufayl de Estudios Arabes, 2014), p. 162. ‘… hacen muy anchos los cuellos de las túnicas de lino, de tal manera que parezcan cumplidos cuando se miden pero, al desdichado que la viste se le vencen hacia un lado’; Chalmeta and Corriente, Al-Saqaṭī El buen gobierno, p. 164. ‘Prohibirá a los tintoreros teñir de rojo con brasilete porque no dura y, quitando los colores claros del algodón y lino, los demás tampoco duran’; Chalmeta and Corriente, Al-Saqaṭī El buen gobierno, p. 164.



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Fatwas also frequently had to deal with the conflicts of what clearly was a very active industrial sector.23 The flax trade thrived to the final phases of al-Andalus (the so-called Nasrid period, 13th to 15th centuries), and one of the most important Christian sources for the transformation of the former Islamic territory after the Castilian conquest, the Libros de Apeo y Repartimientos (Christian land registers), attests to the growing of flax in Nasrid rural areas. These records make frequent reference to dyeing facilities in the form of cisterns, known as alberquillas del lino, in which the flax was steeped, as the Nasrid botanist Ibn Luyūn explained shortly before: When flax is ready, if you put it in water it sinks to the bottom, because the threads get loosened and become soft and easy to handle. As such, by putting them in water you can separate each thread into two or three … Flax is tempered by humidity, and then it can be coloured. When tempered in clear water, it goes white; if the water is muddy, it goes black; red comes from clear, stagnant water; and green from water that carries some mud.24

The Libros de Repartimientos often mention these cisterns (alberquillas del lino) in their description of Nasrid farmhouses, so they must have been a common feature in the rural landscape: ‘… there is a cistern for flax in the farmhouse of [Ynqueira, (Ugíjar)] […] An estate in Çaharich, made of three marjales25 of bad soil, bordering with the acequia (irrigation chanel) of Hamet Abulabiz, and the flax cistern.26 Geographical works also report the arrival of new plant- and animal-based fabrics, one of the outcomes of the Islamic Agricultural Revolution,27 a process of knowledge transmission that, through the dissemination of agricultural 23 Lagardère, Histoire et société, pp. 200 (& 393), 269 (& 169), 345 (& 225, 230), 351 (& 260), 369 (&

346), 371 (& 352), 421 (& 211).

24 ‘Cuando el lino está en su punto, si se echa en agua, baja al fondo del recipiente. Así ocurre

siempre que sus hebras se ponen lacias, blandas, sueltas y de fácil manejo, de tal manera que, al macerarlas en el agua, de una hebra se obtienen dos o más fibras … El curtido del lino se produce por la humedad, y el color será como lo desee el que se beneficia. Al curtirlo en agua corriente se pone blanco, y si es cenagosa, negro. Se da el color rojo en agua limpia estancada; cuando hay barro en ella se produce el verde’; Ibn Luyūn, Tratado de Agricultura, ed. by Joaquina Eguaras Ibanez (Granada: Patronato de la Alhambra y Generalife, 1988), p. 261. 25 Marjal: an old agrarian measure used in irrigated plantations and corresponding to 528.42m2. 26 ‘… çierta parte en el alverca del lino de la alcaria [de Ynqueira, (Ugíjar) […] Vna haça en el pago de Çaharich de tres marjales de mala tierra, linderos el açequia de Hamet Abulabiz e la poza del lino’; Archivo General de Simancas, C.M.C., 1ª época, leg. 131. Both reproduced by Carmen Trillo San José, La Alpujarra antes y después de la conquista castellana (Granada: Universidad de Granada, 1994) p. 220; Aurora Molina Fajardo, El espacio rural granadino tras la conquista castellana: urbanismo y arquitectura con funciones residenciales del Valle de Lecrín en el s. XVI (unpublished doctoral thesis, University of Granada, 2012). 27 Andrew M. Watson, Agricultural innovation in the Early Islamic world (Cambridge: University Press, 1983); Lucie Bolens, Agronomes andalous du Moyen-Age (Geneva: Librarie Droz, 1981); Lucie Bolens, ‘The use of plants for dyeing and clothing. Cotton and woad in al-Andalus: a

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techniques, allowed new species, such as cotton and the mulberry tree, to be adapted to Mediterranean conditions. The fact that these fabrics and related production activities are mentioned in geographical treatises is an indication of their economic relevance, as these works tended to focus on the economic potential of the regions they were describing, therefore only economically relevant activities were considered worth writing about. This economic focus is especially clear in some of these geographical accounts, for instance that of the Andalusi geographer al- ʽUdrī (Almería, 1003–1085), which even provides information about the tax revenue collected by textile production. Tax revenues in the district of Elvira during the reigns of Al-Ḥakam (770–822) and his son ʽAbd al-Raḥmān (792–852) were as follows: 109.603 dinars in weight (bī-l-wazina); 1.000 riṭl of silk …28

The Cordoba Calendar, an agronomical calendar of the 10th century, reveals that the state kept these industries under close scrutiny: it was during the month of May that letters were sent to the provincial tax officials who were to collect the taxes, to collect kermes, silk and fuller’s earth for the ṭirāz.29 Furthermore, that the textile industry was a profitable enterprise is suggested by its prominence in other type of sources which also have an important economic dimension, such as agronomic treatises. These treatises were produced in the agronomic schools founded around the taifa courts from the 11th century onwards. These schools explored the adaptation of new species, the commercial exploitation of which would be a source of revenue for the State. Such agronomic treatises as those of Ibn Wāfid (Toledo 1008–1074), Ibn Baṣṣāl (Toledo-Seville, late 11th century), Abū-l-Jayr (Seville, 1412–1468), Ibn Haǧǧāǧ (Seville, 1073), Ibn al-ʽAwwām (Seville, 1118–1265), al-Tignarī (Granada, 11th century) and Ibn Luyūn (Almería, 1282–1349), from the agronomic schools of Toledo, Seville, Almería and Granada, would contribute to the dissemination of knowledge of different crops, including industrial plants like the mulberry tree, flax and cotton. This is the environment in which the adaptation of new crops to al-Andalus, on which the growth of the new textile industry was based, took place (Table 5.1).30 thriving agricultural sector (5th/11th–7th/13th centuries)’, in The Legacy of Muslim Spain, ed. by S. K. Jayyusi (Leiden: Brill, 1994), pp. 1000–15. 28 ‘Los ingresos del Estado percibidos [en la Cora de Elvira] durante los emiratos de Al-Ḥakam y de su hijo ʽAbd al-Raḥmān fueron los siguientes: 109.603 dinares en peso (bī-l-wazina); 1.000 riṭl de seda …’; Manuel Sánchez Martínez, ‘La cora de Ilbīra (Granada y Almería) en los siglos X y XI, según al- ʽUdrī (1003–1085)’, Cuadernos de Historia del Islam, 7 (1976), 5–82 (p. 24). 29 ‘C’est durant ce mois que sont envoyées des lettres (aux agents provinciaux du fisc leur prescrivant de procéder à des réquisitions) du Kermès, du soie et de terre à foulen pour le ṭirāz’; Calendrier du Cordoue de l’année 961, ed. by R. P. A. Dozy, trans. by Charles Pellat (Leiden: Brill, 1961), p. 90. 30 Bolens, ‘The use of plants for dyeing’; Expiración García Sánchez, ‘Las plantas textiles y tintóreas en Al-Andalus’, in Tejer y vestir: de la Antigüedad al Islam, ed. by Manuela Marín (Madrid: Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Cientificas, 2001), pp. 417–51 (pp. 436–37).



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Table 5.1  Textile-related raw materials featured in Andalusi agronomic treatises. Flax

Wool

Kitāb fī tartīb…

Mulberry tree X

Ibn Wāfid

X

X

Ibn Baṣṣāl

X

X

Abū-l-Jayr

X

X

X

Ibn Haǧǧāǧ

X

X

X

Al Tignarī

X

X

Ibn al-‘Awwām

X

X

Ibn Luyūn

X

X

X

Naturally, the information provided by mercantile sources also reflects the success and evolution of this market-oriented industrial sector. Legal precepts – the famous fatwas, legal rulings based on real cases, and professional manuals, such as the treatises of Ḥisba, all of which established what should be normal practices for the guidance of administrative officials in the control of market activities and were applied on the market in everyday life – reveal that textile manufacturing processes were closely monitored and regulated. With regard to international transactions, the evidence for the earliest periods of the history of al-Andalus is scarce, but the record is a little more eloquent for the later periods, and this invariably reflects the central nature of the textile trade. These sources include the correspondence between various Jewish textile merchants from the 11th century onwards, currently held at the Genizah archive in Cairo,31 and additional correspondence between members of different Tuscan companies in the late Middle Ages, for instance the Datini records at the Archivio di Stato di Prato (Italy), which furnish vital information for the reconstruction of late medieval commercial activity. It is impossible in this context to provide more than a minimally representative selection of the bibliography which the study of these records has generated, beginning with Federigo Melis’s pioneering work.32 Detailed information 31 S. D. Goitein, Letters of Medieval Jewish traders (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1973);

S. D. Goitein, A Mediterranean society: the Jewish communities of the Arab world as portrayed in the documents of the Cairo Geniza, 6 vols (Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 1967–1993) I, Economic foundations (1999 edn); Olivia Remie Constable, Trade and Traders in Muslim Spain: The Commercial Realignment of the Iberian Peninsula, 900–1500 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1994). 32 Other major contributions include Federigo Melis, Aspetti della vita economica medievale: studi nell’Archivio Datini in Prato (Siena: Monte dei Paschi, 1962); Documenti per la Storia Económica dei secoli XIII–XVI, ed. by Federigo Melis (Florence: Olschki, 1972); Angela Orlandi, Mercaderies i diners: la correspondència datiniana entre València i Mallorca (1395–1398) (Valencia: Universitat de València, 2008).

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concerning the cargoes being delivered to and from Andalusi harbours was recorded by custom officials at different western ports such as Genoa; new practices of commerce such as insurances policies, ship commissions and commenda contracts, and the ledgers kept by foreign merchants with business interests in, or even based in, al-Andalus, bear witness to the international importance of the textile sector, one of the main economic powerhouses of al-Andalus throughout its history, the evolution of which is closely tied to that of trade.

T h e si lk : an unb alanc e d f ie l d o f stu d y Despite all of the above, the fact is that the scholarship that has evolved around the Andalusi textile industry presents not only well-defined trends, but also gaping lacunae. Studies on the textile industry have focused on the earliest periods of the history of al-Andalus, although the 13th century is always highlighted as a period of splendour for the industry, especially with regard to some areas, such as the silk industry; later phases, for instance the Almohad and Nasrid periods, have received a good deal less attention. Most efforts have concentrated on the study of luxury fabrics. Examples of the most luxurious fabrics, exclusively used by political elites, such as the pieces produced in the famous ṭirāz workshops (royal textile workshops), have survived until the present day. These pieces survive in museum collections, and have contributed to the tendency of many scholars to follow art-historical approaches. Different and promising approaches have been introduced in recent years, which are especially concerned with production techniques. Many projects which are helping to establish the study of Andalusi textiles from new viewpoints, such as the use of dyes, production techniques and tools, are currently being emphasized, and bringing new perspectives to the discipline.33

33 Some overviews are worth mentioning: Partearroyo Lacaba, ‘Estudio histórico-artístico’;

Cristina Partearroyo Lacaba, ‘Los tejidos de Al-Andalus entre los siglos IX al XV (y su prolongación en el siglo XV)’, in España y Portugal en las rutas de la seda. Diez siglos de producción y comercio entre Oriente y Occidente, ed. by Comisión Española de la Ruta de la Seda (Barcelona: Universitat de Barcelona, 1996), pp. 58–73; Rodríguez Peinado, ‘La producción textil en al-Andalus’; Laura Rodríguez Peinado, ‘La seda en la Antigüedad tardía y Al-Andalus’, in Las rutas de la seda en España y Portugal, ed. by Ricardo Franch and Germán Navarro Espinach (Valencia: Universitat de Valencia, 2017), pp. 15–38; Silvia Saládrigas Cheng, ‘Los tejidos de Al-Andalus entre los siglos IX al XVI. Aproximación técnica’, in España y Portugal, pp. 74–98. For a good example of the most recent contributions, see La investigación textil y los nuevos métodos de estudio, ed. by Laura Rodríguez and Ana Cabrera (Madrid: Fundación Lázaro Galdiano, 2014); Maria Barrigón, ‘Investigación y análisis de tejidos medievales: posibilidades para reconstruir algunos usos textiles en la Castilla del siglo XIII’, in Arte y producción textil en el Mediterráneo Medieval, ed. by Laura Rodríguez Peinado and Francisco de Asís García García (Madrid: Ediciones Polifemo, 2019), pp. 153–80.



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There are, however, many other aspects that need attention if the nature and evolution of the textile industry as an economic sector are to be fully understood. For instance, the fact that in the 13th and 14th centuries the sector appears to have veered decisively towards the processing of raw materials has gone virtually unnoticed. This is arguably a very significant change of production strategy, and it is thus worth more attention that it has been paid to date. The study of the Andalusi textile sector from a strictly economic perspective is crucial for complementing the (art historical and technical) research avenues that have been opened in recent years, and for achieving a comprehensive understanding of the significance of this industry in the history of al-Andalus.

New approach es to the stu d y o f th e texti le sector in al -And al u s If we approach the study of the Andalusi textile industry from an economic perspective, aspects which have been considered secondary to date, but which are important for the emergence and development of this all-important sector, come to the fore. Naturally, this approach needs to examine the rich luxury textiles that made the sector famous, but we must also try to go beyond their symbolic value as vehicles for conveying political and social meaning both at home and at foreign courts: for instance, their use as a means to accumulate wealth for the state, as already proposed by Lombard.34 We need to make sense of the efforts to store more and more first-rate textile pieces in the public warehouses. Al-Maqqarī recorded the delivery of 1000 pounds of silk and another 1000 of dyed silk to ʽAbd al-Raḥmān III in 939, which were deposited in the ṭirāz’s treasury,35 where they were to be considered a royal asset. Like the royal mint, the ṭirāz was both the recent creation and a monopoly of the state, according to Ibn ʽIḏārī.36 Stipends and rewards could be paid in money and ṭirāz pieces, as described in detail by the palatine annals of Caliph Al-Ḥakam,37 and al-Maqqarī recounts that the caliph’s men were rewarded in textile pieces. The ṭirāz workshops (Dār al ṭirāz) were part of the administrative structure of the state, and were directed by high officials:

34 Lombard, Les textiles, pp. 194–97. 35 Al-Maqqarī, Analectes sur l’histoire et la literature des arabes en Espagne, ed. by William Wright et

al. (Leiden: Brill, 1855–1859), p. 154. Information taken from Lagardère, ‘Mûrier et culture’, p. 105. 36 Ibn ‘Iḏārī, Histoire de l’Afrique et de l’Espagne intitulée al-Bayano ‘l-Mogrib par Ibn Adhári et fragments de la Chronique d’Arib (de Cordoue), trans. by R. Dozy, 2 vols (Leiden: Brill, 1849–1851), II, p. 93. 37 Anales palatinos del califa de Córdoba Al-Ḥakam II, por ‘Isā Ibn Aḥmad al-Rāzī (360–364 H.=971–975 J.C.), trans. by Emilio García Gómez (Madrid: Sociedad de Estudios y Publicaciones, 1967 [1977]), pp.166–68.

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Abd Allāh ibn Aḥmad, known as Ibn Iflīlī, was put in charge of the ṭirāz. Around that time, Muḥammad ibn al-Walīd was appointed by his peers as ṭirāz secretary, as he was one of the most efficient men in the trade.38 The caliph commanded Fāʽiq al-Siqlabī, first fatá, courier and chief of the ṭirāz, to ride from the castle in Córdoba to al-Zahrāʽ …39

And they were under direct orders from the Caliph: Caliph Al-Ḥakam rode to the Dār al ṭirāz, on a visit. When he entered, he was welcomed by the administration staff and the workshop managers, who paid him due respects. The Caliph asked about their work, and gave them useful advice.40

We have no evidence for the use of textiles as currency during the Cordoba Caliphate period, but we know that the stockpiling of cloth as an asset persisted for a long time. The use of textiles as storable wealth is attested among Jewish merchants from an early period, from Genizah records,41 and was still very much alive by the final years of Andalusi history. The final episode of this practice was the expulsion of the Morisco population, who were forced to leave most of their property in Spain, except for that which they could convert into easy-to-transport and highly valued bundles of silk.42 We must also try to understand better the role of textiles as a source of wealth, generally in connection with the commercialisation of the fabrics produced in the regional workshops of Cordoba, Almería, Pechina, Fiñana, Baza, Seville, Malaga, Murcia and Granada.43 In some cases, those workshops operated under the direct supervision of the state – which was not going to let slip this source of revenue from its purview; and they were referred to by using the same term (ṭirāz) used to designate public workshops.44 At the beginning, the activity of these workshops was limited to the production of highest quality products, both for the 38 ‘[…] fue ascendido ‘Abd Allāh ibn Aḥmad, conocido por Ibn Iflīlī, al cargo de alamīn del

39 40

41 42

43 44

ṭirāz. Por la misma fecha fue también ascendido, por elección entre sus colegas, al cargo de secretario del ṭirāz Muḥammad ibn al-Walīd, que era uno de los kātibes más sobresalientes y prácticos y delas gentes más capaces y duchas en su oficio’; Anales palatinos [77], p. 115. ‘[…] Mandó el Califa al gran fatá, correo mayor, y jefe del ṭirāz, Fāʽiq al-Siqlabī que fuese a caballo desde el alcázar de Córdoba al de al-Zahrāʽ…’; Anales palatinos [183], p. 209. ‘[…] fue el califa Al-Ḥakam a caballo a la Dār al ṭirāz, con objeto de visitarla. Al entrar en ella fue recibido por los directores administrativos y los directores de los talleres, que le rindieron el debido acatamiento. El Califa les pidió detalles de su trabajo y les favoreció con sus indicaciones’; Anales palatinos [78], p. 115. Goitein, A Mediterranean society, I, p. 101. Miguel Ángel Ladero Quesada, ‘Los judíos granadinos al tiempo de su expulsión’, in his Granada después de la conquista: Repobladores y mudéjares (Granada: Diputación Provincial de Granada, 1993), pp. 293–309. Serjeant, Islamic textiles, pp. 169–76. Dozy and de Goeje, Idrīsī, Nuzhat, p. 198 (original), p. 241 (translation).



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domestic and foreign markets, as suggested by the few but very valuable commercial records dated to the 10th and 11th centuries in the Genizah,45 or the custom records from northern Spain which reflect the circulation of Andalusi silk.46 These documents also confirm that the geographers’ reports on the value of textiles as sources of public revenue were not exaggerated. The value of the textile industry for the public accounts was not restricted to luxury textiles; raw materials and dyes were also subjects of a lively trade, as already pointed out by Lombard, although his work has been criticised and challenged.47 In spite of that, his conclusions set the foundation for the study of the textile sector from a strictly economic point of view, considering productive, commercial and social factors. In this regard, the study of al-Andalus lags far behind other regions and periods, in which this topic has been invested with good deal more attention from historians. Lombard already clearly distinguished the products made for the palace and those of the ṭirāz, the purpose of which was to satisfy political ends, beginning with the symbolic representation of power, and to produce high-quality products for customers other than the palace. These other products were especially numerous, and constituted the bulk of production (of which no absolute figures can be given), also being related to the introduction of pre-capitalist labour regimes, which were now beginning to proliferate in other Western regions as well.48 We should pay some attention to the fundamental shift involved in the generalisation of some productive activities, such as silk-weaving, and the involvement of increasingly wide sectors of Andalusi society in the sector. Idrīsī’s reference to the existence of over 800 looms in Almería alone, may be somewhat exaggerated: Almeria … was then a very industrious city, and, among other workshops, one could count eight hundred silk workshops where were made fabrics known as holla,49 dibādj, siglaton, ispahānī, djordjāni; curtains decorated with flowers, textiles decorated with nails[?], little carpets, fabrics known under the names attābī (tabis), mi’djar, etc … 50 45 Goitein, A Mediterranean society, I, p. 102; Mordechai Akiva Friedman, ‘An Indian trader’s

partnership in Almeria (1139)’, Sefarad, 76.1 (2016), 75–96.

46 Lombard, Les textiles, p. 198. 47 For instance, Mounira Chapoutot-Remadi, ‘Réflexions sur l’industrie textile dans le monde

musulman au Moyen Âge. À propos d’un livre récent’, Annales, 35.3–4 (Recherches Sur L’Islam: Histoire et Anthropologie) (1980), 504–11. 48 Lombard, Les textiles, p. 162; Goitein, A Mediterranean society, II, The Community (1999 edn), p. 275; Chapoutot-Remadi, ‘Réflexions sur l’industrie textile’. 49 Holla: an Arabic fabric, probably purple in colour and embroidered in gold; Jesusa Alfau de Solalinde, Nomenclatura de los tejidos españoles del siglo XIII (Mexico City: Instituto de Estudios Históricos y Documentos, 1981), pp. 43–44. 50 ‘Almeria … Elle était alors très-industrieuse et on y comptait, entre autres, huit cent métiers à tisser la soie, où l’on fabriquait des étoffes connues sous le nom de holla, de dibādj, de siglaton, d’ispahānī, de djordjāni; des rideaux ornés de fleurs, des étoffes ornées de cloous, de

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The spread of this activity in the 12th century is significant. With the increasing integration of al-Andalus into Mediterranean and European commercial networks, mulberry trees became more common in Andalusi fields. Testimonies that refer to whole regions dedicated to silk production begin to appear in the record, for instance in Jaen: It is called ‘Jaen of the silk’ because of the large number of people there who are engaged in producing silk … Among the things to be highlighted is saffron from Baeza (one of the province’s cities), which is exported by sea and land.51

and in Las Alpujarras: ‘in no other region is so much silk produced as in yabal Sulayr (Alpujarras)’.52 Cities full of looms are recorded: [Murcia] is alongside Almeria and Malaga, the third greatest producer of wasy. Specialities of the city include the al-Banyala table cloths, which are exported to the East, and beautiful tapestries for the walls.53

and Valencia’s fabrics were specially valued: ‘this city’s specialities include Valencia brocades which are exported to the Maghreb’.54 An enormous variety of silk fabrics is enumerated, which in most cases we are hard put to identify, but which were the objects of praise as trade goods. Therefore, the first thing to be emphasised is that this activity, which was fully integrated in commercial orbits, went far beyond the scope of court workshops, entering the domestic unit. The household was, therefore, not only a consumption unit, but also participated actively in the production process, one of the reasons for the strength of this sector in al-Andalus. The written records suggest that this activity took place in both cities and the countryside and among all social groups, and that it was quite evenly distributed geographically. The discovery of

51

52

53

54

petits tapis, des étoffes connues sous les noms de ‘attābī (tabis), de mi’djar etc ’; Dozy and de Goeje, Idrīsī, Nuzhat, p. 240. ‘Se le llama “Jaén de la seda”, por el gran número de gentes, tanto en el campo como en la ciudad, que se dedican en ella a la cría de seda … Entre las cosas de que se gloria se cuentan el azafrán de Baeza (que es una de las ciudades de su provincia), el cual se exporta por tierra y mar’; Emilio García Gómez, Andalucía contra Berbería. Reedición de traducciónes de Ben Hayyan, Saqundi y Ben al Jatib (Barcelona: Universidad de Barcelona, Departamento de Lengua y Literatura Àrabes, 1976), p. 130. ‘la región de yabal Sulayr (Alpujarras) es la que produce más seda del mundo’; Al-Zuhrī, s. XII; Dolors Bramon, El mundo en el siglo XII: estudio de la versión castellana y del ‘Original’ árabe de una geografía universal (Sabadell: Editorial Ausa, 1991), p. 165–66. ‘… Murcia con Almería y Málaga, es la tercera ciudad en la industria del wasy. Productos especiales suyos son los tapetes de Abanilla (al-Banyala) que se exportan a las tierras de Oriente, y los tapices que regocijan la vista, con que se cubren las paredes’; García Gómez, Andalucía contra Berbería, pp. 137–38. ‘entre los productos especiales de esta tierra está el brocado valenciano, que es exportado a las tierras del Magrib’; García Gómez, Andalucía contra Berbería, p. 138.



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loom weights is a constant feature in urban spaces such as Pechina (10th century), Mértola and Granada, and rural areas such as Yecla and Tirieza (11th to 13th centuries).55 They are found in domestic as well as in early Nasrid palatial contexts, for instance the Cuarto Real de Santo Domingo, in Granada.56 It is important that we understand this phenomenon from all angles.

Diversification of production and change of focus Production was diversified, and it was largely oriented, especially during the Nasrid period, to the production of highly-in-demand, lower-quality fabrics, and first and foremost to the processing of raw materials to feed the budding European textile industry. We have already noted the large number of varieties of silk products from the 12th century, and we also have ample evidence for silk production in the Nasrid period, especially in Granada, Malaga and Almería. According to Ibn al Khaṭīb, concerning silk production in Malaga: ‘they also make silk fabrics with embroidered motifs … the textile industry is of high quality, and they make such wonderful products that they are in high demand in ṣanaʽā’.57 He also refers to towns in the province of Almería, such as Berja, ‘La industria de la seda constituye la fuente de su economía y de su bienestar’ (The city’s wealth and well-being is based on the silk industry), Dalías, ‘Florece en ella la industria de la seda, que cualquiera que sea su calidad, se logra a bajo precio’ (the silk industry is thriving, and, regardless of quality, silk can be bought cheaply), Almería itself, ‘Posee materias primas para su industria’ (has raw materials for their industry), and Andarax, ‘Es fuente de tributos y madre de gente esforzada y altanera. Su seda vale tanto como el oro’ (is a source of revenue and it breeds hard-working and proud people. Its silk is worth as much as gold…).58 Ibn al Khaṭīb also describes the importance of silk production for towns in Las Alpujarras, for instance Jubiles: It is a magnificent source of silk, both for clothes and for carpets, for it is easy to embroider. In Jubiles they use silk as adornment of houses, furniture and clothes. Tax collection on each industry is easy for tax agents and reaches a considerable sum because of the great profits that silk provides to industrialists … No other 55 Jorge Eiroa Rodríguez, ‘El trabajo de la seda en Murcia durante la Edad Media’, in Seda.

Historias pendientes de un hilo, Murcia, siglos X al XXI, ed. by Mariángeles Gómez Ródenas and Jorge A. Eiroa Rodríguez (Murcia: Museo Arqueológico de Murcia, 2017), pp. 22–31 (p. 24). 56 Personal communication by the director of the excavations, Alberto Garcia Porras, whom I want to thank for the information. 57 ‘… Se fabrican también tejidos de seda con dibujos bordados… Su industria textil es también de excelente calidad y se confeccionan vestiduras de tal magnificencia que hasta desde ṣanaʽā los solicitan insistentemente’; Ibn al Khaṭīb, Mi‘yār al-ijtiyār fī d̩ikr al-ma‘āhid wa-l-diyār, Arab text, Castilian translation and study by Mohamed Kamal Chabana (Rabat: Instituto Universitario de Investigación Científica, 1977), p. 117. 58 Chabana, Ibn al Khaṭīb, Mi‘yār al-ijtiyār, pp. 122, 123, 124 and 129, respectively.

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trade is practiced in the city, other than silk, and for this reason no foreigners live there with the locals.59

Other travellers, such as Ibn Ṣabbāḥ, give similar accounts: ‘… the above mentioned city of Granada is the seat of the silk and taffeta industries.’60 In these luxury textiles, however, what was previously made of precious materials, like gold, was now crafted in coloured silks. We also know that these later products were of lower quality, and cheaper, imitations of older pieces. According to various authors, including Ibn al Khaṭīb, these fabrics were well known and thrived in both Muslim and Christian markets despite this drop in quality, but the fact is that other sources contradict these reports: according other information, Nasrid silks were nothing but a secondary product in Western commercial orbits. This is not to say that the silk industry had completely disappeared in the Nasrid Kingdom. The silk trade was still very important, and was strictly controlled by the Nasrid state, which created a network of tax offices in the main cities for collecting the silk revenue.61 Although luxury products were still being manufactured, these were secondary from the point of view of international trade. In fact, the Nasrid kingdom seems to have focused on the supply of raw silk bales to the main European silk manufacturing centres, which were already under the control of capitalist firms. In terms of revenue, raw silk was much the main export during the final phase of Andalusi history. We have records, most of which were generated outside the kingdom of Granada, that provide some information concerning the export of Nasrid products to Western markets, among which raw silk bales are by far the most prominent. Although foreign businessmen sometimes complained about its low quality, they did not hesitate to buy it: ‘E se non potessi aver di quella [seta di Granada] giante, sian contenti ne togliate due fardelli di quell’altra. Perche sia un pocho men fina non churiamo, ma che n’abiate buon merchato’ (And if I could not find [Granada silk] I’d still be happy with two bundles. Even if it is not the best, you still find buyers for it).62 59 ‘Es un espléndido manantial de magnífica seda, en su doble aspecto de tejidos para vestir

y para alfombras se enriquece fácilmente. Los de Jubiles usan la seda para el adorno de sus viviendas, de sus muebles y de su indumentaria. La recaudación de impuestos sobre cada industria es cosa fácil para los agentes del fisco y alcanza una suma considerable, en razón de las grandes ganancias que la seda proporciona a los industriales … Salvo el de la seda no hay otro comercio en la ciudad, por lo cual los forasteros no permanecen en ella y solo la habitan sus propios vecinos’; Chabana, Ibn al Khaṭīb, Mi‘yār al-ijtiyār, p. 130. 60 ‘la ya citada ciudad de Granada / es la sede de la artesanía del tejido de la tela de seda y del tafetán’; Francisco Franco Sánchez, ‘El reino nazarí de Granada según un viajero mudéjar almeriense: Ibn Aṣ-Ṣabbāḥ (m. después 895/1490)’, Sharq al-Andalus, 13 (1996), 203–24 (p. 208). 61 Adela Fábregas, ‘Aprovisionamiento de la seda en el reino nazarí de Granada. Vías de intervención directa practicadas por la comunidad mercantil genovesa’, En la España Medieval, 27 (2004), 53–75. 62 Archivio di Stato di Prato, Archivio Datini, Filza 994, Luca-Valencia, 1102195 (22-10-1400).



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When Nasrid silk (13th- to 15th-century) was identified as coming from Almería or Malaga (this indicates the harbour from which it was shipped, not necessarily the place where it was manufactured), it was not deemed to be of sufficiently high quality for the demanding Tuscan market, but was shipped to northern Europe – Bruges or Paris. Especially important were the silk hubs of Florence and Lucca; the latter in particular seems to have had a substantial demand for raw silk, some of which came from Granada. A supply system of silk for the Lucchese textile industry that was to become common among Tuscan merchants who operated in the Nasrid Kingdom, namely the exchange of European cloth for Nasrid silk, began to be tested at an early period: I send you 200 pieces of Choltrai and the rest of Vervi and other types. And even if you do not manage to sell them all for cash, get some Malaga silk and send it to Pisa…63

This arrangement was eventually also adopted by the Genoese, who were later to become the main customers for Nasrid silk, despite the efforts made by Catalonian merchants to monopolise the silk export sector.64 Elsewhere I have previously pointed out the Genoese involvement in the silk trade. As others had done before them, the Genoese supplied their factories with Nasrid silk, while redistributing also to other European silk-producing regions.65

Labour relations and systems In the context of a major market and export-oriented industry with a very significant output (although figures cannot, unfortunately, be provided), a sector which generated considerable profit among wide sectors of the population, both foreign and local, it is appropriate to analyse labour relations and systems. The strong demand posed by foreign markets was to have a direct effect on the local economy at large, including peasant economies. Mulberry trees became a common presence in some areas, and even the predominant tree in several regions, such as Las Alpujarras and some districts in the coast of Malaga, such as

63 ‘… vi mandrò pani 200, la metà di Choltrai, ressto Vervi e altri pani, li quali vorò ne faciate

fine a contanti. E si pure no ne poteste fare fine di tuti a contanti prendetene della seta di Malicha e mandatela a Pisa …’; Archivio di Stato di Prato, Archivio Datini, Filza 854, BrujasBarcelona, 416744 (1401/12/7). Other examples in ASP, AD, F. 854, Brujas-Barcelona, 416749 (1402/23/2), ASP, AD, F. 1060, Brujas-Mallorca, 121246 (1402/21/1). 64 Roser Salicrú, ‘Manifestacions i evolució de la rivalitat entre Gènova i la Corona d’Aragó a la Granada del segle XV, un reflex de les transformacions de la penetració mercantil’, Acta Historica et Archaeologica Medievalia, 23–24 (2002–2003), 575–96. 65 Adela Fábregas, ‘La seda en el reino nazarí de Granada’, in Las rutas de la seda en España y Portugal, pp. 39–63.

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Torrox, where almost all the landowners possessed mulberry trees.66 The plant became a fundamental part of the Nasrid peasant economic model – its cultivation was free from any form of monopolistic restraint – and the total output of silk was very high. Although silk production processes are imperfectly understood, we know that silk processing involved different phases and could take place in a variety of settings. López de Coca referred to rural and urban phases in silk processing.67 In the early stages of the care of silk worms, which involve growing the mulberry tree on which the worm feeds, different agents collaborated in various ways, as reflected in fatwas.68 One such collaborative formula was the širka fī-l-­ ‘ulūfa contract, an agreement in which the owner of the trees and that of the silk worms worked together, and which also made provision for the hiring of waged labourers.69 This contract is historically important insofar as it reveals that different sectors/agents worked in close association from the very beginning of the production chain. As pointed out by Lagardère, silk production involved a large number of actors, who could interact with one another in various ways,70 for example a lone owner of mulberry trees who also possessed silk worms, or associations of multiple individuals, who separately owned trees, worms and spinning facilities for the early processing of the silk (which must be distinguished in these associations from the weaving process per se). Although nothing prevents the entire chaîne opératoire of silk processing from being conducted in the countryside, it seems that in later periods, the spinning, dyeing and weaving of the silk were commonly carried out in urban areas. The study of this topic is riven with difficulties, but needs to be addressed in the future.71 Only with the arrival of Genoese mercantile capital to Granada’s textile industry does the variety of production arrangements come to an end, when these businessmen became involved in the production of silk, as well as in its redistribution. The sector entered a new phase of growth, which almost drove it to the point of productive collapse; foreign demand for Nasrid silk, which was considered to be of good quality, grew ceaselessly, straining internal supply chains, but the details of this process go well beyond the scope of the present work. 66 Trillo, La Alpujarra; Virgilio Martínez Enamorado, Torrox. Un sistema de alquerías andalusíes en el

siglo XV según su libro de repartimiento (Granada, THARG, 2006).

67 José Enrique López de Coca, ‘La seda en el reino de Granada (siglos XV y XVI)’, in España y

Portugal, pp. 33–57 (pp. 34–36).

68 Lagardère, Campagnes, pp. 391–411; Lagardère, Histoire et société; López Ortiz, ‘Fatwas

granadinas de los siglos XIV y XV’, Al-Andalus: revista de las Escuelas de Estudios Árabes de Madrid y Granada, 6 (1941), 73–128 (p. 113). 69 Salud Domínguez Rojas, ‘La economía del reino nazarí a través de las fetuas recogidas en el Mi‘yār de Al-Wanšarīsī’, Anaquel de Estudios Árabes, 17 (2006), pp. 77–107 (86–87). 70 Lagardère, Campagnes et paysans, p. 396. 71 Maya Shatzmiller, Labour in the medieval Islamic world (Leiden: Brill, 1994).



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In conclusion, the textile industry played a central, and poorly known, role in the history of al-Andalus. It became a highly dynamic economic factor, and substantial auxiliary industries emerged around it, for example the dyeing industry. It operated within a framework of complex labour systems, and became, after its introduction into international commercial orbits, a veritable powerhouse for the economic projection of some regions of al-Andalus.

chapter 6

Flax, Wool and Silk: Textile Industries in Medieval Portugal 1 Joana Sequeira

I ntroductio n

P

ortugal was certainly not one of Europe’s largest, most significant fabric manufacturers in the Middle Ages. Nevertheless, the country benefitted from a number of conditions which enabled its textile industry to develop products with unique features. Raw materials such as flax, wool and silk were available domestically, as were dyestuffs. Like most of the Iberian Peninsula, parts of the Portuguese territory were under Muslim occupation from the 8th to 13th centuries. As might be expected, that period of almost five and a half centuries left behind an important cultural legacy, which found its way into textile industries. A significant share of Portuguese textile-related terms has Arabic etymology, certainly not by accident.2 Those historical circumstances also facilitated the early

1

This work was financed by Portuguese funds through the Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia (FCT), in the framework of the project MedCrafts, ‘Crafts regulation in Portugal in the Late Middle Ages: 14th–15th centuries’, Ref.ª PTDC/HAR-HIS/31427/2017. During the elaboration of this work, the author benefitted at first from a Junior Researcher contract financed by FCT, at CITCEM, Faculty of Arts and Humanities, University of Porto (DL57/2016/ CP1367/CT0005) and then by an Assistant Researcher contract financed by FCT at Lab2PT, University of Minho (2020.02528.CEECIND). 2 António H. de Oliveira Marques, ‘O “Portugal” Islâmico’, in Portugal das Invasões Germânicas à ‘Reconquista’, ed. by António H. de O. Marques (Lisbon: Editorial Presença, 1993), pp. 117–249 (p. 167). This is the case with alfaiate (al-haiiat), which means tailor or almofada (al-mukhaddâ), which means cushion.

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adoption of the most important technological innovations for this industry, such as the horizontal loom.3 According to research on urban history, textile crafts were among the most important medieval economic activities in Portugal.4 During the early 15th century, the municipality of Porto, an important city and port, imposed fixed wages for the various occupations. Weaving was one of the eight regulated activities, a testimony to its relevance within the city.5 In Alenquer, an average-sized town (43 km north of Lisbon), in the 15th century 104 people were employed as skilled artisans – 15% of the population. Of those 104, fifteen were weavers; only shoemakers (26) were more common.6 In her study on Évora, which featured statistics on the manufacturing sector’s economic agents between 1260 and 1500, Ângela Beirante compiled references to 106 weavers, an amount surpassed only by tailors (202) and shoemakers (193).7 Jewish workers played a prominent part in the production of fabrics, garments and accessories,8 with 187 Jewish weavers identifiable by name between 1440 and 1455, mostly in towns of the Além-Tejo comarca such as Estremoz, Elvas and Évora. 9 In spite of our relatively in-depth knowledge of textile fibre production (raw materials) and the significant percentage of labourers employed in this activity, traditional historiography has played down the role of domestic textile production.10 This, in turn, has led to an almost complete absence of references to the medieval Portuguese textile industry by foreign historians.11 This flawed per3 4 5

6 7 8 9 10

11

Manuel Retuerce Velasco, ‘El templen. ¿Primer testimonio del Telar Horizontal en Europa?’, Boletín de Arqueologia Medieval, 1 (1987), 71–76. António H. de O. Marques, Portugal na crise dos séculos XIV e XV (Lisbon: Editorial Presença, 1987), p. 120. António Cruz, Os Mesteres do Pôrto: subsídios para a história das antigas corporações dos ofícios mecânicos, I (Porto: Sub-Secretariado de Estado das Corporações e Previdência Social, 1943), pp. 84 and 86; Arnaldo Sousa Melo, ‘Trabalho e Produção em Portugal na Idade Média: Porto c.1320–c. 1425’, 2 vols (unpublished doctoral thesis in History, University of Minho, 2009), II, p. 220. João Pedro Ferro, Alenquer Medieval (séculos XII–XV): subsídios para o seu estudo (Cascais: Patrimonia Historica, 1996), pp. 156–58. Ângela Beirante, Évora na Idade Média (Lisbon: Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian/Junta Nacional de Investigação Científica e Tecnológica, 1995), p. 500. Maria José Ferro Tavares, Os Judeus em Portugal no século XV, 2 vols (Lisbon: Universidade Nova de Lisboa, 1982–84), I (1982) pp. 300–09. Maria José Ferro Tavares, Os Judeus em Portugal no século XV, II (1984), pp. 527–39. Ana Maria Ferreira, A importação e o comércio têxtil em Portugal no século XV (1385 a 1481) (Lisbon: Imprensa Nacional-Casa da Moeda, 1983), pp. 15–18; António H. de Oliveira Marques, ‘Indústria’, in Dicionário de História de Portugal, ed. by Joel Serrão (Porto: Livraria Figueirinhas, 1984), pp. 301–04; António H. de Oliveira Marques, A sociedade medieval portuguesa, 5th edition (Lisbon: Livraria Sá da Costa Editora, 1987), pp. 58–60. For instance, see the complete absence of Portugal in the map ‘Textile centres in Europe in the thirteenth century’, in Roberto Sabatino Lopez, The Birth of Europe (London: J. M. Dent & Sons. Ltd., 1966), p. 279.



T ex t ile Indu st r ies in M edi eva l Po rtug a l 1 43

spective is based on the insufficient sources which had previously been available for studying trade, and resulted in a very incomplete portrait of reality. Indeed, when no direct sources are available for studying medieval industry sectors,12 the examination of road toll regulations, customs records, and any other commercial documents will ultimately lead to the erroneous conclusion that almost every piece of fabric distributed in Portugal during the 13th, 14th and 15th centuries had been produced abroad.13 This may be ascribed to the fact that these records focused mostly on international trade and the taxes associated with such trade, rather than textiles made in Portugal. An inspection of consumption-related sources helps balance out this misconception of complete dependence on imports. The first sumptuary law passed in Portugal, in 1340, provides an interesting example.14 It imposed a limit on the number of garments of a particular fabric each person might order per year, according to their social standing. All the fabrics mentioned were manufactured abroad, especially in Flanders. It is, however, also true that each person was only allowed to order a specific number of complete outfits made of those particular fabrics. In contrast to the restrictions, the same law allowed everyone to order as many garments as they wished, as long as their fabric was less expensive than the reference price established in the law. This was a protectionist measure, imposing limits on the high-end, expensive fabric market, which did not include native, Portuguese textiles. Simultaneously, it provided a market share for the mediumto-low quality fabric sector, where domestic production might thrive. This chapter will focus on that industrial output, unexpressed in many official documents, yet essential for the daily life of the population. Most of the data and ideas presented are taken from my PhD research project based on the systematic analysis of evidence gathered from diverse sources, allowing for an identification of the different fabric types produced in Portugal between the 13th and 15th centuries.15 Other than the commercial documents traditionally employed by economic historians, sources examined include municipal decrees, statutes, royal laws, capítulos de Cortes (petitions submitted in parliament), letters of pardon, deeds of release, chronicles, travel books, forais (privilege charters), asset registers, theatre plays by Gil Vicente,16 cantigas de amigo (medieval songs), inventories and wills. Priority was given to an analysis of the vocabulary related to fabrics 12 Few direct sources can be relied upon for studying Portuguese productive sectors in the

13 14 15

16

Middle Ages, since only limited notary records survive. On the other hand, corporatism had a late awakening, and most regulations for the various productive activities did not surface before the late 16th century; Melo, ‘Trabalho e Produção’, I, pp. 405–08. Note the sources used in Ferreira, A importação e o comércio têxtil, pp. 20–33. António H. de O. Marques, ‘A Pragmática de 1340’, in António H. de O. Marques, Ensaios da História Medieval Portuguesa, 2nd edn (Lisbon: Editorial Vega, 1980), pp. 93–119. Published as Joana Sequeira, O Pano da Terra. Produção Têxtil em Portugal nos finais da Idade Média (Porto: U. Porto Edições, 2014). The PhD project was financed by the Portuguese Foundation for Science and Technology between 2008 and 2011 (SFRH/ BD/35775 /2007). Gil Vicente (c. 1465–c. 1536) is considered the first Portuguese playwright.

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and its repeated usage over time. Branded products (with or without toponymic names) were also identified, in addition to the commonplace fabrics of the period. The following pages aim to provide a synthesis of medieval textile production in Portugal for each fibre type and culminate in an observation on their consumption patterns. The survey will be conducted region by region for each fibre. The regions referenced correspond to the medieval administrative divisions named comarcas. In the 14th-15th centuries, six comarcas existed: Entre-Douro-e-Minho, Trás-os-Montes, Beira, Estremadura, Além-Tejo17 and Algarve.18 All comarcas and most of the cities, towns, villages and rivers mentioned in the text are identified in the maps (Maps 6.1-3).

Flax and He mp Flax (linum usitatissimum) was certainly the most widely produced and distributed fibre in medieval Portugal. A vegetable fibre, it was grown in Portuguese territory from very early times, most notably during the Roman occupation. This association is reflected in the vernacular language: most Portuguese words related to flax cultivation and use are derived from Latin.19 Though hundreds of flax cultivars exist, only three were historically grown in Portugal. They are mentioned in the 13th-century (common law compilation) Costumes (‘Customs’) from Santarém: galego, mourisco and alcânave.20 Galego flax, the most common, is a spring variety, planted in April or early May, and harvested in June. It thrives in the north, requiring a cool, moist climate (Fig. 13.2). The darker mourisco flax is a winter variety, planted in October or November, and harvested in May. It was commonly seen in Santarém and the regions to the south of the River Tagus (Tejo), as it grows well even in the local poor soil. Documentary sources also mention alcânave flax, identified by some authors as a variety closely related to hemp.21 Owing to the word’s ambiguity, we can postulate that it could be either flax (Linum usitatissimum) or hemp (Cannabis sativa). Studies on later historical periods confirm that some of the regions where so-called alcânave flax was 17 This region is now designated as Alentejo. 18 According to the map published in António Henrique de Oliveira Marques and João José Alves

Dias, Atlas Histórico de Portugal e do Ultramar português (Lisbon: Centro de Estudos Históricos, 2003), p. 108. 19 Alberto Sampaio, Estudos Económicos. As vilas do Norte de Portugal, I (Lisbon: Editorial Vega, 1979), p. 88. That is the case of estopa (stuppa), which means tow. 20 Zeferino Brandão, Monumentos e lendas de Santarém (Rio de Janeiro: David Corazzi Editor, 1883), p. 406. 21 Francisco Galhano, Ernesto Veiga de Oliveira and Benjamim Pereira, Tecnologia tradicional portuguesa: o linho (Lisbon: Instituto Nacional de Investigação Científica, 1978) pp. 6, 7, 13; Armando de Castro, Evolução económica de Portugal nos séculos XII a XV, III (Lisbon: Portugália, 1965), pp. 333–35.

Map 6.1  Flax/Hemp production centres in Portugal in the Late Middle Ages. Cartographer: Miguel Nogueira, Infografia, Faculty of Arts and Humanities, University of Porto.

Map 6.2  Wool production centres in Portugal in the Late Middle Ages. Cartographer: Miguel Nogueira, Infografia, Faculty of Arts and Humanities, University of Porto.

Map 6.3  Silk production centres in Portugal in the Late Middle Ages. Cartographer: Miguel Nogueira, Infografia, Faculty of Arts and Humanities, University of Porto.

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produced in the Middle Ages indeed produced hemp at a later time. The town of Torre de Moncorvo is an example, with hemp production thriving there between the 15th and 20th centuries.22 Hemp was employed for specific needs such as rope making, fishing nets and the weaving of sails, thanks to its durability in saltwater conditions.23 The geographical distribution of flax and hemp cultivation is mostly related to soil fertility and the availability of water. Since the terms employed in the Middle Ages were imprecise, I chart the geographic distribution of the main flax and/or hemp production centres together (Map 6.1).24 Flax was planted alongside cereals and wine grapes.25 As an agricultural product, it was often incorporated in land rents, and might be charged for at different production stages.26 In the 13th century, those dwelling on the lands belonging to the king were required to pay rent in the form of 1/3 or ¼ of flax production. The most profitable of such regions were in the Entre-Douro-e-Minho comarca: Braga, Porto and Viana do Castelo.27 The same principle applied to lands owned by the clergy. In the lands belonging to the important Cistercian Alcobaça monastery, the most common levies during the 14th and 15th centuries were ¼ and 1/5 of production.28 Guimarães was one of the most prestigious linen production hubs in the country. According to a 1014 document, weavers specialising in lenço fabric29 already existed at the time and were known as lenzarios.30 King Sancho I (r. 1185–1211) bequeathed ‘panos meos de Vimaranes’ (‘my fabrics from Guimarães’) which

22 Telmo Verdelho, ‘A cultura do cânhamo em Moncorvo’, Brigantia. Revista de Cultura, 1 (1981),

23 24 25 26 27

28 29 30

pp. 7–15; Hirondino Fernandes, ‘Da cultura do linho cânhamo em Moncorvo’, Brigantia. Revista de cultura, 2 (1981), 136–41. Moncorvo: da tradição à modernidade, ed. by Fernando de Sousa (Porto: CEPESE, 2009); Rui Leal Leonardo, ‘O Baixo Vale da Vilariça entre o Antigo Regime e o Liberalismo. Território, Propriedade e Culturas’ (unpublished MA Dissertation in Archaeology, University of Porto, 2013). Ricardo Córdoba, ‘Le travail du chanvre et ses applications à la navigation et à la pêche dans l’Espagne médiévale’, Annales de Bretagne et des pays de l’Ouest, 127.3 (2020), pp. 33–47. Hemp-producing areas will be referred to specifically in this chapter infra. Castro, Evolução económica de Portugal, III, pp. 330–32. Castro, Evolução económica de Portugal, III, pp. 330–32. Maria Rosa Ferreira Marreiros, ‘Os proventos da terra e do mar’, in Portugal em definição de fronteiras: do condado Portucalense à crise do século XIV, ed. by Armando Luís de Carvalho Homem and Maria Helena da Cruz Coelho (Lisbon: Editorial Presença, 1996), pp. 400–75 (p. 418). Iria Gonçalves, O património do Mosteiro de Alcobaça nos séculos XIV e XV (Lisbon: Faculdade de Ciências Sociais e Humanas da Universidade Nova de Lisboa, 1989), pp. 287–88. Very fine linen (Sequeira, O Pano da Terra, pp. 227–30). Document published in Vimaranis Monumenta Historica a saeculo nono post Cristum usque ad vicesimum, I (Guimarães: Câmara Municipal, 1908), p. 26.



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shows the prestige of fabrics produced in the region.31 During the 13th century, those dwelling on the King’s lands in Guimarães paid part of their levy with bragal, a type of thick linen.32 This proves that the fibre was planted in the region, and in addition, was woven by family-based production units. Several records from the 13th, 14th and 15th centuries mention the presence of male and female linen weavers at village fairs. They also highlight the predominance of women in tasks such as spinning and weaving.33 Naturally, the local market did not consume all of Guimarães’s textile output. A considerable share was dispatched to Porto, en route for subsequent shipping into other markets.34 Indeed, the Entre-Douro-e-Minho region was highly productive, manufacturing fabrics with considerable commercial viability. In the 1498 Cortes (parliament), the inhabitants of Viana do Castelo sought the king’s permission to ship their fabrics via the River Lima directly to the archipelagos of Madeira and the Azores, thus bypassing Porto altogether.35 Vila do Conde, another town in the Entre-Douro-e-Minho region, was also renowned for textile manufacture. Itself a port, it was producing linen fabrics for ship sails (the so-called pano de treu) from at least the 14th century. In 1377, the Portuguese King Fernando I (r. 1367–1383) issued a mandate stating his wish to purchase such fabrics for his galleys. Their required width was one span and two fingers (24–25 cm).36 This type of fabric, narrower and resilient, was suitable for ships with triangular lateen sails or for the smaller sails in larger vessels.37 The 31 Document published in António Caetano de Sousa, Provas da História Genealógica da Casa Real

Portugueza, I (Lisbon: Officina Sylviana da Academia Real, 1739), p. 18.

32 Document published in Vimaranis Monumenta Historica a saeculo nono post Cristum usque ad

vicesimum, II (Guimarães, Câmara Municipal, 1929), pp. 149–50.

33 Several documents: Vimaranis Monumenta Historica, II, pp. 218–19; A. L. de Carvalho, Os Mesteres

34

35

36

37

de Guimarães, II (Barcelos: Edição patrocinada pelo Ministério da Economia, 1941), p. 34; ‘Capítulo especial de Braga apresentado às Cortes de Lisboa de 1455’, in Arquivo Municipal de Braga (AMB), Armário dos Pergaminhos, no. 24. My thanks to Raquel Oliveira Martins for sharing this document with me. For detailed discussion of gendered labour in textile production in Portugal, see Joana Sequeira and Arnaldo Melo, ‘A mulher na produção têxtil portuguesa tardo-medieval’, Medievalista, 11 (2012), 1–26 . Document published in Corpus Codicum Latinorum et Portugalensium, VI, fasc. 4 (Porto: Câmara Municipal do Porto / Gabinete de História da Cidade, 1957), pp. 58–60; Melo, Trabalho e Produção em Portugal, I, pp. 193, 201. Document published in Cortes Portuguesas: Reinado de D. Manuel I (1498), ed. by João José Alves Dias, A. H. de Oliveira Marques, João Cordeiro Pereira and Fernando Portugal (Lisbon: Centro de Estudos Históricos da Universidade Nova de Lisboa, 2002), p. 555. Document published in Descobrimentos Portugueses. Documentos para a sua História, ed. by José da Silva Marques, 2nd edn, I (Lisbon: Instituto Nacional de Investigação Científica, 1988), pp. 156–57. Amélia Polónia, ‘A tecelagem de panos de tréu em Entre-Douro-e-Minho no século XVI. Contributos para a definição de um modelo de produção’, in A Indústria Portuense em Perspectiva Histórica, ed. by Jorge Fernandes Alves (Porto: CLIC-FLUP, 1997) pp. 11–23 (p. 11); Amélia Polónia, A Expansão Ultramarina numa perspectiva local. O porto de Vila do Conde no século XVI, I (Lisbon: Imprensa Nacional – Casa da Moeda, 2007), p. 309.

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monarch’s demands stimulated mass production of a type of fabric with constant, easily recognisable features. From the 14th century onwards, the pano de Vila do Conde (fabric from Vila do Conde) appellation would become synonymous with pano de treu, demonstrating the prominence of this textile production hub along with its hinterland, in regard to these fabrics.38 During the 14th and 15th centuries, this sailcloth was produced for local shipyards and for the largest shipyards of Porto and Lisbon. In the 16th century, it was also sold as far away as in the trading posts of Mozambique (East Africa) and Kochi (India).39 Whether the panos de Vila do Conde were made of flax or hemp remains unknown, though the latter option appears more likely, since hemp is the more common for maritime use. In several regions of the Estremadura and Beira comarcas, the cultivation of linho alcânave was particularly abundant. In the lower River Mondego area, between Coimbra and Montemor-o-Velho, farmers grew both galego and alcânave flax.40 The ground rent of one reguengo (land owned by the King) from the region of Santarém was due in alcânave flax (ten pedras).41 Galego and alcânave seeds, as well as combs especially designed for flax processing, were traded in Lisbon during the 15th century.42 To the north-east of the kingdom, in Torre de Moncorvo (Trásos-Montes), locals went so far as to claim that alcânave cultivation was ‘infimdo’ (endless).43 In 1439, the municipality’s representatives voiced a complaint in the Lisbon Cortes, claiming that alcânave processing in the Vilariça stream had caused the illness and death of several labourers.44 Hemp cultivation was known to be prejudicial to human and animal life and for contaminating the water sources.45 From the 14th century onwards, the municipal authorities of some towns in the kingdom began to regulate various professional sectors, including the textile one, setting prices for the goods and services provided. Such regulations provide evidence of the role and prominence in urban scenarios of textile labour. These documents also showcase the diversity of fabrics produced and the growing trend 38 The first record with specific mention to the appellation ‘pano de Vila do Conde’ dates from

39 40

41 42 43

44 45

1417–1436 (Lisbon, Arquivo Nacional Torre do Tombo (ANTT), Chancelaria de D. Afonso V, liv. 25, fols 10v–12). Polónia, ‘A tecelagem de panos de tréu’, p. 14. Maria Helena da Cruz Coelho, ‘O Baixo Mondego nos finais da Idade Média (Estudo de História Rural)’, 2 vols (unpublished doctoral thesis in History, University of Coimbra, 1983), I, pp. 181–88; now published as Maria Helena da Cruz Coelho, O Baixo Mondego nos finais da Idade Média, 2 vols (Lisbon: Imprensa Nacional, Casa da Moeda, 1983). One pedra (stone) being equal to 2.86 kg; ANTT, Ordem de Cister, Mosteiro de Santa Maria de Alcobaça, 1.ª incorporação’, Documentos particulares, mç. 23, no. 21. Document published in Documentos para a História da Cidade de Lisboa: Livro I de Místicos de Reis, Livro II de D. Fernando (Lisbon: Câmara Municipal de Lisboa, 1947) pp. 74–75. Document published in Francisco Manuel Alves (Abade de Baçal), Memórias ArqueológicoHistóricas do Distrito de Bragança, 2nd edn, VII (Santa Maria da Feira: Câmara Municipal de Bragança/Instituto Português dos Museus – Museu do Abade de Baçal, 2000), p. 297. ANTT, Chancelaria de D. Afonso V, liv. 2, fol. 28. Córdoba, ‘Le travail du chanvre’, p. 35.



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towards specialisation and social division of textile labour.46 The Porto case provides a clear example, where prices were fixed in 1413 for the various types of linen and also burel.47 Price lists were also established for linen fabrics in Loulé, during the 15th century,48 and in Évora, in the 14th and 15th centuries.49 The Évora authorities also produced a list of workers assigned to the various early stages of flax fibre treatment.50 This ‘urbanisation’ phenomenon notwithstanding, flax production would remain on the whole an agrarian, low density, family-based venture. Markets lacked centralisation and no commercial integration model was in place. Still, production surplus was high enough to warrant exports. The situation is evident in two documents from the mid-15th century describing two of the King’s initiatives. He sent some of his officials in search of linen, focussing on the comarcas of Beira and Entre-Douro-e-Minho.51 The officials acquired large amounts of fabric, yet almost always in small quantities, from family-based production units. One of these purchasing missions targeted the Medina del Campo (Castile and Leon) fair, where the monarch wished to sell the linen and finance the payment of some debts. Portuguese merchants were usually present in the fair, where they purchased wool cloths and sold linen fabrics. Portugal is actually described as a lenzeria (linen fabrics) supplier in a list of the goods available in Medina del Campo,

46 On the regulations of textile activities, see Joana Sequeira, ‘A regulamentação dos ofícios

têxteis no mundo urbano em Portugal, séculos XIV–XV’, Mirabilia Journal, 31–2 (2020), 835–72.

47 Burel is ‘a kind of coarse woollen cloth […] [which] seems to have been a three-shaft twill,

48

49

50 51

with the warp predominating on the outer face and a softer matted weft face worn on the inside’; Mark Chambers and Elizabeth Coatsworth, ‘Burel’, in Encyclopedia of Medieval Dress and Textiles of the British Isles c. 450–1450, ed. by Gale R. Owen-Crocker, Elizabeth Coatsworth and Maria Hayward (Leiden and Boston: Brill, 2012), p. 103. The Porto document is published in Cruz, Os Mesteres do Pôrto: subsídios para a história das antigas corporações dos ofícios mecânicos, p. 86. Document published in Actas de Vereação de Loulé (séculos XIV–XV), ed. by J. A. Machado, Luís Miguel Duarte and Maria Cristina Cunha (Loulé: Arquivo Histórico Municipal, 1999–2000), pp. 126–27. The price table for 1375–95 can be found in Fátima Farrica, Miguel Meira and Ana Sesifredo, eds, ‘Livro das posturas antigas de Évora’, in Posturas Municipais Portuguesas (séculos XIV–XVIII), ed. by Filomena Barros and Mário Viana (Ponta Delgada: Centro de Estudos Gaspar Frutuoso/ Centro Interdisciplinar de História, Culturas e Sociedades, 2012), pp. 27–110 (p. 60). That for Évora in the 15th century is incomplete, as price indications are missing: Os Regimentos de Évora e de Arraiolos do Século XV, ed. by Hermínia Vilar (Évora: CIDEHUS, 2018) [accessed 25 May 2022]. Sequeira, ‘A regulamentação dos ofícios’, p. 851. Documents published in Iria Gonçalves, Pedidos e empréstimos públicos em Portugal durante a Idade Média (Lisbon: Ministério das Finanças, Centro de Estudos Fiscais da Direcção-Geral das Contribuições e Impostos, 1964), pp. 246–57; Documentos das Chancelarias Reais anteriores a 1531 relativos a Marrocos, ed. by Pedro de Azevedo, I (Lisbon: Academia das Ciências, 1915), pp. 415–16.

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with their corresponding sources.52 The other linen purchasing mission was destined for Rio do Ouro, in the Western Sahara (Africa), where it would probably be traded for gold, luxury goods and/or slaves.53 In addition to the generic linen designation (linho) and those fabrics with specific appellations, the kingdom produced bragal, estopa54 and lenço. Despite the availability of domestically produced linen in the market, higher quality products were imported from abroad, such as lenço, from the Netherlands and France, cambrai (from Cambrai, France) and toalhas francesas (‘toiles’ from France).55 The quality of local linen was still comparable to its foreign equivalent, at least within certain categories. The most expensive and luxurious bed in the 1439 ruling for innkeepers – which established prices for various types of accommodation – might be made with French, Breton or da terra (domestic) sheets.56 Favourable natural resources ensured an abundance of raw materials, so the domestic textile industry had ample supplies and labour to develop successfully, even in a scenario heavily biased towards imports.57

W ool The different types of fleece employed in the industry during the Middle Ages had already been established since the period of the Roman Empire.58 Three major traditional breeds of sheep are reared in Portugal: churra – the most ancient and common one – with wool of longer staple, very thick, straight (no curls) and dull; merino, bearing very fine, short staple and curly fibres (Figs 13.3, 13.4); and bordaleira, with soft, yet longer staple and thicker fibres than the merino variety, with looser crimp.59 The use of fine wool in Portugal, shorn from bordaleira or 52 Maria Isabel del Val Valdivieso, ‘Mercaderes Portugueses en Medina del Campo (siglo XV)’,

53

54 55 56

57 58 59

in Actas das II Jornadas Luso-Espanholas de História Medieval, II (Porto: Instituto Nacional de Investigação Científica, 1987), pp. 591–608 (pp. 604–05). Vitorino Magalhães Godinho, Os Descobrimentos e a Economia Mundial, 2nd edn, I (Lisbon: Editorial Presença, 1984), pp. 145–47; John Vogt, ‘Notes on the Portuguese Cloth Trade in West Africa, 1480–1540’, The International Journal of African Historical Studies, 8–4 (1975), 623–51. A fabric that results from combing the thicker threads of flax. For a detailed definition, see Sequeira, O Pano da Terra, pp. 212–16. Ferreira, A importação e o comércio têxtil, pp. 128–30. Document published in M.J. da Cunha Brito, ‘Os pergaminhos da câmara de Ponte de Lima’, O Archeologo Português, 15 (1910), 5–25 (p. 10). The words ‘da terra’ are commonly used to establish contrast between domestic production and imports, while simultaneously highlighting the product’s own specificity. For instance, ‘pano da terra’ may refer to a linen or wool fabric, but its defining feature is local production (Sequeira, O Pano da Terra, p. 185). Sequeira, O Pano da Terra, pp. 56–57. Dominique Cardon, La draperie au Moyen Âge (Paris: CNRS, 1999), pp. 44–48. Alice Bernardo, Churras. Bordaleiras. Merinas (Porto: Saber Fazer, 2016) [accessed 2 July 2019].



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merino sheep, was only documented from the 15th century onwards,60 although the possibility of their prior existence cannot be discarded. The use of softer wool fibres certainly benefited from some technological advancements, such as carding. Portugal was among the first European regions to adopt carding in the first half of the 13th century,61 which reduced fibre preparation costs.62 It is thought that the application of carding to the wool industry derived from equivalent technologies ‘imported’ from the Muslim cotton industries in the Iberian Peninsula and in Sicily.63 This technique was suitable for shorter and curly fibres, such as those from merino and bordaleira sheep. Fulling mills also facilitated the finishing process of woollens. The installation of these kinds of devices was first mentioned during the 13th century in some regions of Além-Tejo and Algarve.64 The construction of fulling mills drew the attention of local elites and the powerful who were looking for good investment opportunities. One such investor was Beatriz, Duchess of Beja (1429–1506), who obtained the monopoly on the building of fulling mills in Beja.65 It appears that the periodic movement of herds to higher pasture, known as transhumance, had been practised regularly ever since the 12th century. This was most frequent in the mountain chain of Serra da Estrela,66 in the south part of Beira and in Além-Tejo.67 Sometimes, in summer, shepherds in Além-Tejo would guide their herds to Estremadura, thus avoiding the Castilian border, especially 60 Joana Sequeira, ‘Fatores de inovação na produção têxtil em Portugal (séculos XIII–XV)’,

61 62

63

64

65

66 67

in Arte y producción textil en el Mediterráneo medieval, ed. by Laura Rodríguez Peinado and Francisco García García (Madrid: Editorial Polifemo, 2019), pp. 319–46 (p. 334–35). Paolo Malanima, ‘The first European textile machine’, Textile History, 17 (1986), 115–28 (pp. 123, 127); cf. Sequeira, O Pano da Terra, pp. 86–87. Paulino Iradiel Murugarren, Evolución de la industria textil castellana en los siglos XIII–XVI: fatores de desarollo, organización y costes de la producción (Salamanca: Universidad de Salamanca, 1974), p. 223; Cardon, La draperie au Moyen Âge, pp. 195–200. John Munro, ‘Textile Technology in the Middle Ages’, in John H. Munro, Textiles, Towns and Trade: Essays in the Economic History of Late-Medieval England and the Low Countries (Aldershot: Variorum, 1994), pp. 1–27 (pp. 3–4); John Munro, ‘Medieval Woollens: Textiles, Textile Technology and Industrial Organisation, c. 800–1500’, in The Cambridge History of Western Textiles, I, ed. by David Jenkins (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003), pp. 181–227 (p. 198); Cardon, La draperie au Moyen Âge, p. 189. Documents published in Portugaliae Monumenta Historica. Leges et consuetudines, ed. by Alexandre Herculano, I (Lisbon: Academia das Ciências, 1856–1868), pp. 679, 719, 734, 736, 737–38. Document published in Francisco de Sousa Viterbo, ‘Artes industriaes e industrias portuguezas: industrias textis e congeneres’, O Instituto, 51 (1904), 283–89; 376–82; 442–48; 505–10; 568–74; 637–40; 686–91 (pp. 380–81). The highest mountain chain in mainland Portugal, it included the wool centres of Celorico da Beira, Guarda and Covilhã (Map 6.2). Maria José Lagos Trindade, ‘A Vida Pastoril e o Pastoreio em Portugal nos séculos XII a XVI’, in Maria José Lagos Trindade, Estudos de História Medieval e outros (Lisbon: Faculdade de Letras de Lisboa/Cooperativa Editora História Crítica, 1981), pp. 1–96 (pp. 37–38).

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in times of war.68 Castilian flocks also grazed in Portuguese lands, but their owners had to pay a fee, normally in the form of sheep.69 During the Middle Ages, the inner belt of Além-Tejo (Map 6.2) became an important producer of wool fabrics – not just ordinary items, such as burel, but also toponymically-named textiles, such as the manta do Alentejo (blanket made in Além-Tejo) or the manta de Évora (blanket made in Évora). The term manta do Alentejo surfaces for the first time in a 14th-century document.70 It has been produced without interruption until today, having survived numerous industrial cycles and stages of Portuguese history. The patterns in these blankets are related to decorative principles underlying the textile and ceramic items made by North African shepherd societies (Fig. 6.1).71 Islamic occupation, while it may not have been solely responsible for the introduction of these decorative patterns in the Fig. 6.1  Mantas do Alentejo (blankets from Peninsula, at least greatly helped crysAlentejo) produced at the Cooperativa Oficina tallise their enduring presence. Indeed, de Tecelagem de Mértola, Portugal, in 2014. several ceramic fragments found in Photo: Joana Sequeira. Mértola, which date from the occupation period, display decorative patterns similar to those in the blankets which were – and still are – produced in the region.72 The inland part of Beira, especially the region around the Serra da Estrela, was another prominent area in terms of wool production. According to the available 68 Trindade, ‘A Vida Pastoril e o Pastoreio’, pp. 37–42; Maria José Lagos Trindade, ‘Problemas do

69 70 71 72

Pastoreio em Portugal nos séculos XV e XVI’, in Trindade, Estudos de História Medieval e outros, pp. 97–116 (pp. 100–01). Trindade, ‘A Vida Pastoril e o Pastoreio’, p. 43. ANTT, Colegiada de Santa Cruz do Castelo de Lisboa, mç. 4, no. 17; Sequeira, O Pano da Terra, pp. 245–49. Ângela Luzia, Isabel Magalhães and Cláudio Torres, Mantas tradicionais do Baixo Alentejo (Mértola: Campo Arqueológico de Mértola/Câmara Municipal de Mértola, 1984), p. 56. Luzia, Magalhães and Torres, Mantas tradicionais, pp. 54–58; Sequeira, ‘Fatores de inovação’, p. 327.



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documents, sheep flocks were constantly circulating in the region, which was dotted with numerous fulling mills, most of them owned by the Order of Christ.73 In addition to burels, this area was renowned for the production of pano meirinho, a type of cloth made of fine wool. Documents refer to the production of such cloth from the 15th century, particularly in the Guarda and Covilhã regions.74 The word ‘meirinho’ suggests association with merino wool variety, but in reality, the fibre used to produce it may have come from bordaleira sheep, which were and still are common in the region.75 Although the wool produced by these sheep was not as fine as that from merino sheep, it was fine enough to produce the panos finos (fine cloths) from Covilhã, as alluded to by playwright Gil Vicente,76 whose reference demonstrates how much wool production had grown in this region since the end of the 15th century. Since the Estremadura was one of the alternative routes for winter transhumance, a number of important textile production hubs were developed in the region. Documents from the Alcobaça monastery, from the first half of the 15th century, disclose the presence of a fulling mill and the production of burel.77 Also, in 1459, Alcobaça inhabitants requested exemption from tithes for some panos de cor – dyed cloths that they claimed to have manufactured there for over fifty years.78 According to them, the high quality of the local wool had boosted demand for a new wave of production. A few years later, royal officers were consistently assigned for the collection of taxes on the production of such cloth, which had

73 Sequeira, O Pano da Terra, p. 44. The Order of Christ was a military order created in Portugal

74 75

76

77 78

in 1319 by King Dinis as a successor of the Order of the Temple, previously extinguished by the Council of Vienne. The Order of Christ inherited the properties of the Temple knights in Portugal and was based in the extreme south of the reign, in Castro Marim, in the Algarve region. The appearance of religious and military orders in Europe is directly linked to the Crusades movement, which began in the 11th century, with a particular focus on defending the Christian faith in the Holy Land and also in the Iberian Peninsula. Their members were knights who took monastic vows, thus uniting the profiles of both a warrior and a religious man. Owing to their military conquests, these Orders accumulated enormous land properties; Luís Adão da Fonseca, ‘Ordens militares’, in Dicionário de História Religiosa de Portugal, III, ed. by Carlos Moreira Azevedo (Lisbon: Círculo de Leitores, 2000), pp. 334–45 (pp. 334–39). Sequeira, ‘Fatores de inovação’, pp. 334–35. It is believed that there is a corruption of the word meirinha, which was used to describe all sheep except the churras variety. It therefore applied to the bordaleira sheep of Entre-Douroe-Minho, as well as to the bordaleiras sheep of the Serra da Estrela; Alice Bernardo, ‘O ciclo da lã’, in Mulheres de Bucos (Cabeceiras de Basto): o trabalho da lã, ed. by Isabel Maria Fernandes (Cabeceiras de Basto: Câmara Municipal, 2016), pages unnumbered. Theatre play from 1537 named Tragicomédia Pastoril da Serra da Estrela, published in Gil Vicente [c. 1465–c. 1536], As Obras de Gil Vicente, II, ed. by J. Camões (Lisbon: Centro de Estudos de Teatro da FLUL e Imprensa Nacional-Casa da Moeda, 2002), p. 71. Gonçalves, O património do Mosteiro de Alcobaça, 122–23. ANTT, Ordem de Cister, Mosteiro de Santa Maria de Alcobaça, liv. 1a, fols 4v, 158, 249v–250, 290v. ANTT, Chancelaria de D. Afonso V, liv. 36, fol. 200.

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meanwhile expanded to neighbouring localities.79 In the early 16th century, Gil Vicente employed the expression pano d’Alcobaça (cloth made in Alcobaça) in one of his plays – evidence of the widespread adoption of this fabric, which had become noteworthy.80 Another highlight from the Estremadura comarca was the pano de Leiria (cloth made in Leiria), an appellation from the 14th century. At the time, a weavers’ hospital and confraternity were already operating in the town.81 Later, in the 15th century, some cereal mills were converted into other uses, namely a paper mill and a fulling mill for burel.82 In Santarém, documents dating back to the 14th century mention several fulling mills, some of which were owned by the Order of Aviz.83 These fulling mills were most certainly used for producing burels and also the pano de Santarém (cloth made in Santarém), an appellation again found in a document from the beginning of the 15th century.84 Though wool and wool fabric production were most prominent in these regions, the industry itself had ramifications throughout the kingdom, following a household consumption, family-based model. The expression manta da terra (blanket made in the land) evidences the widespread nature of wool fabric production.85 In the urban workshops, male and female weavers produced wool fabrics and blankets. In Tomar, during the 15th century, some weavers specialised in manufacturing coloured (dyed) cloth and blankets, while others focussed exclusively on weaving burel.86 During the 14th and 15th centuries, the townships of Évora87

79 ANTT, Chancelaria de D. Afonso V, liv. 1, fol. 10. ANTT, Chancelaria de D. João II, liv. 6, fol. 51v;

Viterbo, ‘Artes industriaes e industrias portuguezas’, pp. 509–10.

80 Theatre play from 1527 named Farsa dos Almocreves, published in Vicente, As obras de Gil

Vicente, II, pp. 330–31.

81 Fernando da Silva Correia, Origens e Formação das Misericórdias Portuguesas (Lisbon: Livros

Horizonte, 1999), p. 399.

82 Saul António Gomes, ‘Notas sobre a produção de sal-gema e de papel em Leiria e em

83

84 85 86

87

Coimbra durante a Idade Média’, Revista Portuguesa de História, 31 (1996), 431–46 (pp. 440–41); Chancelarias Portuguesas: D. João I, ed. by João José Alves Dias, vol. III, t. II (Lisbon: Centro de Estudos Históricos da Universidade Nova de Lisboa, 2006), pp. 256–57. Pedro de Azevedo, ‘Um inventário do século XIV’, O Archeologo Português, 7 (1902), 223–34, 259–65, 305–08 (p. 225). The Order of Aviz was a Religious and Military Order founded in Portugal in the 13th century with a particular presence in the lands of the North region of Além-Tejo; Fonseca, ‘Ordens militares’, pp. 338–39. Sequeira, O Pano da Terra, pp. 263–64. Sequeira, O Pano da Terra, p. 238. Document published in Monumenta Henricina, ed. by António Joaquim Dias Dinis, 13 (Coimbra: Comissão Executiva das Comemorações do V Centenário da Morte do Infante D. Henrique, 1972), p. 111. Document published in Farrica et al., ‘Livro das posturas antigas de Évora’, p. 60.



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and Porto88 deemed it necessary to establish fixed fees for the men and women who wove burel. Felt, and the coarse wool cloths, almáfega and saial, were also produced in the kingdom.89 Portuguese wool fabrics were not luxury items, and were thus unable to compete with Flemish, English and even Castilian textiles. They were, however, vital for daily life in the Middle Ages, as they were used for a multitude of purposes. Thanks to this, domestic production always found its way into the market, with robust, durable items sold at a relatively low price.90

Si lk According to several authors, the silk industry was introduced to the Iberian Peninsula during the Muslim occupation.91 There is no evidence of large production centres in Portugal, at least not at the level found in the neighbouring kingdoms. Documentary evidence, however, reveals that silk was processed in Lisbon at the time. In 1154, chronicler Otto of Freising described the arrival of ambassadors from Genoa to the court of Holy Roman Emperor Frederik I (r. 1155– 1190).92 The ambassadors brought with them gifts recently looted in Almería and Lisbon, cities the chronicler described as ‘renowned for the production of silk cloths’.93 Though no other accounts are available for this period, Muslim influence on Lisbon’s silk craft became quite clear in the following centuries, supporting claims of Islamic heritage.94

88 Document published in Cruz, Os Mesteres do Pôrto: subsídios para a história das antigas corporações

de ofícios mecânicos, p. 84.

89 For a more detailed description of almáfega and saial see Sequeira, O Pano da Terra, pp. 190–93,

272–74.

90 For a comparison of textile prices in Portugal during the Middle Ages see Sérgio Ferreira,

91

92 93 94

‘Preços e Salários em Portugal na Baixa Idade Média’ (unpublished MA dissertation in Medieval History, University of Porto, 2007) pp. 250–54. Maurice Lombard, Les textiles dans le monde musulman du VIIe au XIIe siècle (Paris: Mouton, 1978), pp. 95–100; Germán Navarro Espinach, Los orígenes de la sedería valenciana (siglos XV– XVI) (Valencia: Ajuntament de Valencia, 1999), pp. 33–34; Bruno Dini, ‘L’industria serica in Italia. Secc. XIII–XV’, in La seta in Europa, secc. XIII–XX, ed. by S. Cavaciocchi (Florence: Le Monnier, 1993), pp. 91–123 (pp. 91–92); Anna Muthesius, ‘Silk in the medieval world’, in Jenkins, The Cambridge History of Western Textiles, I, pp. 325–54 (pp. 325–31); Sophie Desrosiers, Soieries et autres textiles de l’Antiquité au XVIe siècle (Paris: Éditions de la Réunion des musées nationaux, 2004). Sequeira, O Pano da Terra, p. 58. Both Lisbon and Almería were taken for Christendom in 1147. Joana Sequeira, ‘A indústria da seda em Portugal entre os séculos XIII e XVI’, in Las Rutas de la seda en la Historia de España y Portugal, ed. by Ricardo Franch Benavent and Germán Navarro Espinach (Valencia: Publicacions de la Universitat de València, 2017), pp. 343–73 (pp. 353–57).

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The earliest solid and undisputed information on silkworm breeding in Portugal mentions the Trás-os-Montes region. It occurs as part of the Ervededo (nowadays Chaves) foral (official founding document), issued in 1233.95 Twenty years later, a trade law setting the price of domestically produced, thick, silk rope demonstrates that silk items were indeed produced in Portugal.96 Documented since the 13th century, Portuguese silk production expanded significantly during the 15th century, mostly owing to a number of measures introduced by the sovereign and the lords. King Afonso V (r. 1438–1481) ordered the planting of mulberry trees throughout the whole kingdom,97 in an attempt to take advantage of the replacement of existent tree varieties. This action was met with some resistance from the populace and several complaints were voiced at the end of the century in different regions.98 Among other reasons, this controversy kept the silk industry from spreading geographically as did the flax and wool sectors. It only became visible in the most important cities of the kingdom and in the Trás-os-Montes region (Map 6.3).99 Even though the Moorish population in Lisbon was decreasing after the Christian conquest of 1147, the Moorish artisan community was still vibrant in the city in the 13th century, having produced the cendal branco mourisco de Lisboa (white Moorish sendal100 made in Lisbon), which was inventoried in the household of King Dinis (r. 1278–82).101 The inventory of the 14th-century Portuguese infanta Dona Leonor, Queen of Aragon (r. 1347–1348), also included a number of references to silk veils ‘obra de Lisbona’, meaning they had been manufactured in the city.102 Various documents provide evidence of the continuous production of silk fabrics during the 15th and 16th centuries. They also show how the Islamic

95 Document published in João Parente, Idade Média no Distrito de Vila Real: Documentos desde o ano

569 ao ano 1278, I (Lisbon: Âncora Editora, 2013), pp. 402–04.

96 Document published in Aristides Pinheiro and Abílio Rita, Lei de Almotaçaria (26 de dezembro de 1253), 2nd edn (Damaia: Banco Pinto & Sotto Mayor, 1984), p. 17. 97 Document published in José Acúrsio das Neves, Obras completas de José Acúrsio das Neves.

Variedades sobre objectos relativos às artes, comércio e manufacturas, consideradas segundo os princípios da economia política (tomos I e II), III (Porto: Edições Afrontamento, 1983), pp. 542–43. 98 Documents published in Dias et al., Cortes Portuguesas: Reinado de D. Manuel I (1498), pp. 129, 130, 176, 383. 99 Sequeira, ‘A indústria da seda’, 351. 100 Sendal was ‘a costly fabric, possibly a lightweight silk […] During the 14th century, sendal/ cendal seems to have been used interchangeably with sindon(e) (Latin sindo, sindon), which originally meant linen but was used in the 13th and 14th centuries for silk’; Mark Chambers and Elizabeth Coatsworth, ‘Sendal’, in Owen-Crocker et al., Encyclopedia, p. 500. 101 Document published in Anselmo Braancamp Freire, ‘Inventário e Contas da Casa de D. Denis (1278–1282)’, Archivo Historico Portuguez, 10 (1916), 41–59 (p. 48). 102 Archivo de la Corona de Aragón, Real Patrimonio, Maestre Racional, Volúmenes, No. 2.256; ‘Libros de cuentas de las reinas Dª Leonor de Portugal y Dª Leonor de Sicilia’, pp. 99–102. My thanks to Adriana Almeida for this reference.



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tradition survived, even after the 1496 decree, which banished both Moors and Jews from the kingdom.103 In the mid-15th century, a silk thrower from Seville settled in Évora with his wife, enjoying rights granted by the King.104 Though little is known about silk production in Évora, the skilled artisan’s choice of location was significant. Other, similar, cases were recorded: several foreign artisans – mostly from the neighbouring Iberian kingdoms – chose to live in Portugal. This trend, evident throughout the 15th century, grew exponentially by the end of that century and also during the 16th century, mostly because of the banishing of Jews from Spain, as decreed by the Catholic Monarchs.105 With this influx of specialised labour, Portugal inherited considerable technical expertise. In Porto, some indirect evidence sheds light on the silk industry; it pertains to a planned building which probably never existed. It features in a 1449 document concerning the leasing of a house located in a street running along the River Douro. Another house, which faced it, stood on the site where someone wished to build a silk mill (‘onde queriam fazer o moinho da seda’).106 Even though no evidence exists to prove that it was actually built, the very intention is a symptom of how active silk production was in the city, and how its development required the embracing of technological innovations.107 It was the Trás-os-Montes region, however, that spearheaded silk production, becoming one of the largest industry hubs in the country. In 1475, King Afonso V granted the silk monopoly in the Trás-os-Montes and Beira comarcas to Dom Fernando (1430–1483), Duke of Guimarães and future Duke of Bragança, for a period of two years. No one else was allowed to install looms or produce silk cloth in the area.108 The Duke chose to hire two foreign merchants – one Castilian and the other Genoese – to manage his silk business. As one of their first actions, they requested the King’s permission to import raw material from Almería, claiming that Portuguese silk filament was too coarse. The King granted their request,

103 Sequeira, ‘A indústria da seda em Portugal’, pp. 352–57.

104 Document published in Viterbo, ‘Artes industriaes e industrias portuguezas: industrias

textis’, p. 637.

105 Several examples given in Sequeira, ‘A indústria da seda em Portugal’, passim. 106 ANTT, Leitura Nova, Além-Douro, liv. 5, fols 184v–185v.

107 The silk mill was a technological innovation that appeared in Italy in the 14th century. It

significantly improved the speed of silk spinning and the quality of the yarn, by giving it a more regular thickness; Susanne Lassalle, ‘La filière de la soie à Florence au XVe siècle. Construction d’un outil analytique ou “chaîne opératoire” – permettant d’intégrer des sources très diverses’ (unpublished MA Dissertation in Social Sciences, w. expertise in History and Societies, École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales, Paris, 2013), pp. 18–19; Florence Edler de Roover, ‘Lucchese Silks’, Ciba Review, 80 (1950), 2902–30; Flavio Crippa, ‘Il torcitoio circolare da seta : evoluzione, macchine superstiti, restauri, Quaderni Storici, 73 (1990), 169–212. 108 ANTT, Chancelaria de D. Afonso V, liv. 30, fol. 173v.

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along with a twenty-year tax exemption.109 The duration of this fiscal benefit clearly shows that all interested parties were certain of the business’s longevity. However, after only two years, the merchants went to court over a dispute, culminating in the ultimate failure of this first venture.110 From 1483 onwards, as a result of Duke Fernando’s death sentence,111 the administration of all assets belonging to the ducal family of Bragança was taken over by the crown. During that period, the silk business was once again entrusted to a foreign merchant, a Genoese who lived in Valladolid.112 Documents dealing with these two pioneering enterprises show the existence of a central physical location, in Bragança, referred to as the Casa dos Sirgos (silk house).113 The house was a production site for complex luxury fabrics such as satin and velvet. With 40 looms, it was a remarkably large production unit. The presence of a strong Jewish community, including skilled labourers, partly reinforced by Jewish immigration from Castile, may have played a significant role in the onset of Bragança’s silk industry, just as it would later bolster the sector’s development in the 16th century. In fact, the merchants in the first enterprise hired a local Jewish feitor (agent).114 All the fabrics produced were shipped to Castile and the business generated hefty revenues. It is worth mentioning that King Fernando of Castile115 became personally involved in the matter at least twice, to ensure the safety of his kingdom’s traders – who were managing the Bragança silk business – and to claim for justice on their behalf, such was the importance of silk in the Castilian market.116 The Casa dos Sirgos, established in the last quarter of the 15th century, provided a unique example of industrial consolidation in Portugal, at a time when most fabrics were produced by family ventures. In spite of the ducal monopoly, foreign 109 Document published in Viterbo, ‘Artes industriaes e industrias portuguezas’, p. 506. 110 Sequeira, ‘A indústria da seda em Portugal’, pp. 367–68.

111 The duke was accused of conspiracy against King João II (r. 1481–1495). He faced a trial and

was condemned to death by decapitation in 1483. For more information on his judgment, see Humberto Baquero Moreno, ‘A conspiração contra D. João II: o julgamento do Duque de Bragança’, Arquivos do Centro Cultural Português, II (1970), 47–103. 112 Sequeira, ‘A indústria da seda em Portugal’, p. 369. For a more detailed description of the first ventures on the silk industry in Bragança, see Joana Sequeira, ‘Reis, duques e mercadores no negócio das sedas: a criação da Casa dos Sirgos de Bragança no século XV’, in Os têxteis e a Casa de Bragança: entre a utilidade e o deleite (séculos XV–XIX), ed. by Maria João Ferreira (Lisbon: Scribe, 2018), pp. 35–49. 113 A great part of the documents has been published by Violeta Medrano Fernández, Un mercado entre fronteras: las relaciones comerciales entre Castilla y Portugal al final de la Edad Media (Valladolid: Universidad de Valladolid, Secretariado de Publicaciones e Intercambio Editorial, 2010), passim. 114 Sequeira, ‘A indústria da seda em Portugal’, pp. 363–71. 115 As Fernando II he was King of Aragon from 1479 to 1516. As Fernando V he was King of Castile and Leon during his marriage to Queen Isabel I from 1475 to 1504. They were known as ‘The Catholic Monarchs’. 116 Sequeira, ‘Reis, duques e mercadores’, pp. 41–43. King Fernando granted a safe–conduct to his merchants in 1478, a time when there was a conflict opposing Portugal to Aragon: the War of the Castilian Succession (1475–1479).



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merchants were allowed to own workshops and raw material. They also managed business affairs. This was part of an attempt to attract foreign technical, human and financial resources. Virgínia Rau claims that granting these privileges worked as a way of attracting foreigners and, subsequently, channelling local production towards the external market.117 By the early 16th century, control over the silk industry had returned to the Duke of Bragança. Business was dwindling, after the failure of the first production ventures. It would, however, expand throughout the 16th century, reaching its peak in the 18th and 19th centuries.118

Consum ptio n Portuguese fabrics, though often inferior in quality when compared to their European counterparts, were worn by people of all social standings, including monarchs. They were not meant exclusively for the poor. A treasury record from the reign of King Duarte (r. 1433–1438) mentions the purchase of an impressive 725 varas119 of da terra (locally produced) linen and 688 varas of lenço (fine linen) da terra while only 119 varas of lenço francês (French fine linen) were acquired in the same period.120 The burel and almáfega (coarse woollen cloths) were chosen for occasions of mourning, regardless of social standing. When a king or prince passed away, the entire kingdom wore burel, including the nobles and the royal family. When the death of King Fernando I of Portugal was formally commemorated in Toledo in 1383, his daughter Dona Beatriz, who was Queen of Castile (r. 1383–1390), wore garments made of black almáfega.121 In 1438, monks from Alcobaça monastery purchased a great amount of burel, so they could mourn King Duarte.122 When King Afonso V died in 1481, his son João wore burel, as did the entire kingdom.123 117 Virgínia Rau, ‘Privilégios e legislação portuguesa referentes a mercadores estrangeiros

(séculos XV e XVI)’, in Fremde Kaufleute auf der iberischen Habinsel, ed. by Hermann Kellenbenz (Cologne: Böhlau Verlag, 1970), pp. 15–30. 118 For the history of the silk industry in the region during the 18th century, see Fernando de Sousa, História da Indústria das Sedas em Trás-os-Montes, 2 vols (Porto: Edições Afrontamento, 2006) and Fernando de Sousa, ‘A seda na região de Trás-os-Montes durante o Antigo Regime’, in Las Rutas de la seda en la Historia de España y Portugal, ed. by Ricardo Franch Benavent and Germán Navarro Espinach (Valencia: Publicacions de la Universitat de València, 2017), pp. 401–32. 119 1 vara being equivalent to 1.10 metres. 120 Record published in Chancelarias Portuguesas: D. Duarte, ed. by João José Alves Dias, II (Lisbon: Centro de Estudos Históricos da Universidade Nova de Lisboa, 1999), pp. 62–75. 121 Fernão Lopes [c. 1380–1460], Crónica del Rei dom João I da boa memória, I (Lisbon: Imprensa Nacional – Casa da Moeda, 1977) p. 94. 122 ANTT, Ordem de Cister, Mosteiro de Santa Maria de Alcobaça, liv. 1a, fols 249v–250. 123 Garcia de Resende [1470–1536], Vida e feitos d’El-Rey Dom João Segundo, ed. by E. Verdelho (Coimbra: CELGA/ Faculdade de Letras da Universidade de Coimbra, 2007), ch. 22.

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However, domestically produced items were most popular as bedclothes and household items. A woman’s will from 1352 featured a number of references to imported fabrics, which included French towels and sheets, but also locally produced items, such as mantéis da terra (furniture covers), da terra sheets and pieces of bragal.124 A widow of a packsaddle maker from Braga, in the 15th century, owned a blanket from Flanders, one from Aragon, and yet another from Évora.125 The 15th century inventories of the Loulé orphans often mention Portuguese clothing among the household items.126 That is the case of Constança Anes, who owned blankets from Évora and an old, tattered Flemish blanket.127 Carpenter João Gonçalves (1475) also owned a blanket from Évora, and a new one from Flanders.128 The estate of Rui Lourenço (1479), a knight, included white and red curtains, one quilt from Flanders and a blanket from Évora.129 From the above, it becomes clear that domestically produced textiles existed side by side with imports among the every-day soft furnishings of individuals as varied as the King himself, a knight, and a humble carpenter. Though medium-to-low quality textiles were occasionally used by people of every social standing, they were unquestionably omnipresent in the daily lives of the poorest strata. Examples go as far back as the 13th century. A trade law from 1253 defined the salaries of eleven types of rural labourers. These were paid partly in money, and partly in clothes, shoes, cereal, or animals. Nine of those workers were paid with a certain quantity of burel or bragal, so they could commission their own garments.130 According to a study of the textile items featured in the wills of clergy from Portuguese cathedrals (1280–1325), lower quality fabrics, such as almáfega, burel and bragal were exclusively reserved for servants of the clergy or for the impoverished.131 According to documents licensing the granting of clothes to labourers and individuals of King João II’s court in 1493, stable workers were

124 ANTT, Colegiada de Santa Maria da Oliveira de Guimarães, Livro de D. Mumadona (parchment

fragments bound on the inside of the cover). My thanks to Pedro Pinto for drawing my attention to this document. 125 José Marques, ‘O testamento de Mor Esteves e despesas com o seu cumprimento (1452)’, Fórum, 41 (2007), 38–70 (p. 63). 126 Documents published in Maria de Fátima Machado, Fundos dos Órfãos de Loulé, séculos XV e XVI (Loulé: Câmara Municipal – Arquivo Municipal de Loulé, 2016). 127 Machado, Fundos dos Órfãos, pp. 86–90. 128 Machado, Fundos dos Órfãos, pp. 100–05. 129 Machado, Fundos dos Órfãos, pp. 106–10. 130 Pinheiro and Rita, Lei de Almotaçaria, pp. 17–18. 131 Joana Sequeira, ‘O fim da linha: legados têxteis nos testamentos do clero catedralício português (1280–1325)’, in O clero secular medieval e as suas catedrais: novas perspectivas e abordagens, ed. by Anísio Saraiva and Maria do Rosário Morujão (Lisbon: Centro de Estudos de História Religiosa, Universidade Católica Portuguesa, 2014), pp. 337–68.



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given doublets made of fustian,132 as well as three shirts made of flax tow. Female servants were entitled to a few Bristol cloth items, and two shirts made of either da terra cloth or tow. Their children received surcoats lined with Irish or Castilian cloth, as well as tow shirts.133 In the 1481–82 Évora Cortes, the people’s representatives asked the King to rule that farmers, breeders and such like (‘lavradores, criadores e gente desta sorte’) should only wear burel, pardo134 or fustian on workdays, with Bristol cloth reserved for holy days.135 We can conclude therefore, that the day-to-day textiles were mostly domestic products, da terra cloths. Such examples show that Portuguese textiles reached every sector of society, which highlights their commercial and economic relevance. In Portugal, linen or burel were most likely purchased in much larger quantities than luxury fabrics. The markets, and trade in general, were mostly fuelled by basic needs, with mediumto-low quality products sold at reasonable prices. Of course, not all types of fabrics required the same number of imports: it was not as necessary to import linen fabric as it was wool, which indeed made up the largest share of textile imports.136 Some Portuguese textiles were also marketable abroad. Linen is a good example; as previously mentioned, it was sold at the Medina del Campo fairs. Similarly, Bragança’s Casa dos Sirgos produced silk exclusively for the Castilian market. Textiles were also crucial for the development of trade on the West African coast, from the 15th century onwards. Even though Portugal had to resort to English and Flemish suppliers for some of the fabrics it traded to West Africa, cloths made in Portugal were also shipped to Africa. The blanket from Alentejo (Além-Tejo) is a prime example, as it was one of the five most traded goods in Arguin (North-West Coast of Africa)137 in the 15th century and used to buy slaves there.138

132 Fustian ‘is now used to describe a class of hard-wearing, heavily wefted clothing fabrics,

usually made of cotton. In the past it was used to describe a variety of fabrics made from a combination of natural fibres. In medieval Europe, notably Italy […] it was woven with a cotton weft and linen warp, as it had been earlier in Egypt. In medieval England, it may have described a cloth, not necessarily coarse or of poor quality, which could be made from any two of cotton, flax or wool’ (Elizabeth Coatsworth, ‘Fustian’, in Owen-Crocker et al., Encyclopedia, pp. 222–23) Fustian was often imported into Portugal, but it is possible that some of it was domestically produced; Sequeira, O Pano da Terra, p. 222. 133 Documents published in João Pedro Ribeiro, Dissertações Chronologicas e Criticas sobre a Historia e Jurisprudencia ecclesiasticas e civil de Portugal, II (Lisbon: Academia Real das Sciencias, 1811– 19), pp. 306–18. 134 A dark fabric made from the wool of brown or black sheep. 135 Document published in Visconde de Santarém, Alguns documentos para servirem de provas à parte 2ª das Memórias para a História e Theoria das Cortes Geraes que em Portugal se celebrarão pelos tres estados do reino (Lisbon: Impressão Régia, 1828), p. 165. 136 Ferreira, A importação e o comércio têxtil, p. 16. 137 Vogt, ‘Notes on the Portuguese Cloth Trade’, pp. 623–51. 138 Sequeira, O Pano da Terra, pp. 245–46.

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Conclusio n Often portrayed as a fabric importer, the Portuguese kingdom, on the contrary, produced fabrics from several different fibres. Flax and hemp were clearly the most prominent. They were produced all over the Portuguese territory, particularly in the north, most notably in the Entre-Douro-e-Minho comarca. Other important centres were in Torre de Moncorvo, Coimbra and Santarém. Wool fleeces and yarn, and the production of wool cloth itself, coincided with the main zones of pastureland, most notably the inland region, from the Beira to the Alentejo, and also the Estremadura – particularly in the Alcobaça region. Silk thrived in the kingdom’s main cities. As an example, Lisbon produced silk from very early, thanks to the presence of specialised Muslim labourers. Household production was the most common system, with the notable exception of Bragança’s Casa dos Sirgos, a unique example of industrial consolidation. Nevertheless, the output was not necessarily destined for household consumption, as textiles circulated considerably both inside and outside the kingdom’s borders. Toponymic cloth names, like manta do Alentejo, cendal de Lisboa and pano de Leiria began to surface in the 13th century. They became very popular in the 15th century, giving credence to the possibility of an actual industry – mass-produced items with consistent quality levels. Disclosing the item’s provenance, such appellations highlighted its specific, recognisable features, which set it apart from the rest. Simultaneously, they brought regional specialisation into play. The inherently multicultural Iberian context was also a major factor in the liveliness of the industrial sector in the Middle Ages. Islamic occupation and its lasting legacy provided privileged access to technical and technological innovation. In addition, Portugal benefitted from the financial capital and technical knowledge of long-standing Jewish communities and foreign residents. Even though textile imports remained steady throughout all of the Middle Ages, domestically produced textiles – particularly low and medium quality items – were able to meet a significant share of internal demand. Indeed, they presented competitive advantages in terms of price and/or durability. The production of raw materials, threads and fabrics still engaged considerable resources, from rural areas to the most specialised urban workshops. In the light of all these elements, it is safe to claim that a versatile textile industry, with specific features, flourished in the region during the Middle Ages. Portugal was never one of medieval Europe’s great producers of luxury fabrics. However, the country had a significant role in the medium-to-low quality fabric sector – by producing the items that met the largest share of daily consumption needs in medieval villages and towns.

part III

Social Context

chapter 7

Dress as a Language: A Survey of Arabic Texts from al-Andalus Manuela Marín

W

hen Abu Hayyan al-Tawhidi (d. 1023), the great Arab philosopher and belle-lettrist, discussed the relative merits of Baghdad and Isfahan in his al-Risala al-Baghdadiyya (The Epistle from Baghdad) he claimed that in the latter city one could not see, as in the former, the best textiles then produced in Islamic countries, for example, the small rugs manufactured in al-Andalus and more specifically, in Cordoba.1 In his own way, al-Tawhidi, who was writing a piece of ironic and sophisticated prose, acknowledged the high prestige achieved by Andalusi textile productions, sold in places as distant from their origins as was Baghdad, the capital city of the Abbasid Caliphate. Material remains of these textiles are preserved in considerable number; recent research estimates that there are about 700 pieces extant in Spain, mainly because they were used as shrouds for the medieval Christian kings and their families, and for other religious purposes (as in ecclesiastical vestments, or linings for relic boxes and coffins).2 Such a treasure trove has naturally attracted the interest of antique dealers and collectors, but also of historians and more specifically art historians. Andalusi textiles have been the object of numerous studies, for the most part focused on their artistic and technical features, and their places of

1

Abu Hayyan al-Tawhidi, Al-Risala al-baghdadiyya, ed. by Abbud al-Shalji (Beirut: Dar al-Kutub, 1980), p. 135. 2 Miriam Ali-de-Unzaga, ‘Embroidered Politics: A Case Study between al-Andalus and Castilla’, in Textiles and Politics: Textile Society of America 13th Biennial Symposium Proceedings (Washington, DC, 18–22 September 2012) [accessed 27 September 2020]. There is not yet a unified and complete catalogue of all the Andalusi textiles preserved in many museums, churches, and cathedrals in Spain.

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production and role in international trade.3 More recently, another trend in the study of historical textiles stresses their social and cultural meaning. In Andalusi studies, this approach has explored the fruitful field of shared cultural patterns between the Christian kingdoms of the Iberian Peninsula and al-Andalus.4 These common cultural developments provide significant insights into the role of Andalusi textiles in the ‘formative process of the medieval Iberian aesthetic vocabulary’,5 and the formation of Castilian cultural identities. Although authors interested in this subject usually claim that their vision is one of shared cultural areas between Islamic and Christian medieval Iberian entities, their main aim is the analysis of how the latter incorporated the former’s cultural signs into the mainstream of their own society. The same trend can be identified in studies of a later period, when al-Andalus as a political independent body had disappeared yet the Andalusi legacy was preserved, to some extent, first by the Mudejars and afterwards by the Moriscos.6 While there is a considerable amount of research on Andalusi textiles, clothing in al-Andalus has not attracted a similar interest.7 The reason is probably that primary sources for this kind of research are scarce and not easy to deal with. Moreover, the rich iconographic repertoire of medieval Europe – miniatures, 3

4

5 6

7

Teresa Pérez Higuera, Objetos e imágenes de al-Andalus (Madrid: Instituto de Cooperación con el Mundo Árabe, 1994); Ana Cabrera Lafuente, ‘Telas hispanomusulmanas. Siglos X-XIII’, in V Semana de Estudios Medievales. Nájera, 1 al 5 de agosto de 1994, ed. by José Ignacio de la Iglesia Duarte and José Angel García de Cortázar y Ruiz de Aguirre (Logroño: Instituto de Estudios Riojanos, 1995), pp. 199–207; Cristina Partearroyo, ‘Estudio histórico-artístico de los tejidos de al-Andalus y afines’, Bienes Culturales. Revista del Instituto del Patrimonio Histórico Español, 5 (2005), 37–74; Laura Rodríguez Peinado, ‘La producción textil en al-Andalus. Origen y desarrollo’, Anales de Historia del Arte, 22 (2012), 265–79; Louise W. Mackie, Symbols of Power. Luxury Textiles from Islamic Lands, 7th–21st Century (Cleveland, OH: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 2015). María Judith Feliciano, ‘Muslim Shrouds for Christian Kings? A reassessment of Andalusi Textiles in Thirteenth-Century Castilian Life and Ritual’, in Under the Influence. Questioning the Comparative in Medieval Castile, ed. by Cynthia Robinson and Leyla Rouhi (Leiden: Brill, 2005), pp. 101–31; María Martínez, ‘Influencias islámicas en la indumentaria medieval española’, Estudios sobre Patrimonio, Cultura y Ciencias Medievales, 13–14 (2012), 187–222; Cynthia Robinson, Medieval Andalusian Courtly Culture in the Mediterranean. Hadith Bayad wa Riyad (London: Routledge, 2007). Feliciano, ‘Muslim Shrouds’, p. 105. Rachel Arié, ‘Le Costume des Musulmans de Castille au XIIIe siècle d’après les miniatures du Libro del Ajedrez’, Mélanges de la Casa de Velázquez, 2 (1966), 59–66 (reprinted in Rachel Arié, Études sur la civilisation de l’Espagne musulmane (Leiden: Brill, 1990), 80–87; Rachel Arié, Miniatures hispano-musulmanes (Leiden: Brill, 1969); Javier Irigoyen García, ‘Moros vestidos de moros’. Indumentaria, distinción social y etnicidad en la España de los siglos XVI y XVII (Barcelona: Edicions Bellaterra, 2018). See, however, Rachel Arié, ‘Quelques remarques sur le costume des musulmans d’Espagne au temps des Nasrides’, Arabica, 12 (1965), 244–61 (reprinted in Arié, Études, 91–120), and Manuela Marín, ‘Signos visuales de la identidad andalusí’, in Tejer y vestir: de la antigüedad al islam, ed. by Manuela Marín (Madrid: CSIC, 2001), 137–80.



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sculptures, and paintings – is not paralleled in al-Andalus. An appraisal of the sources is therefore needed as a preliminary step to careful research in this area. As in the great majority of Arab-Islamic lands in medieval times, very few archival documents from al-Andalus have been preserved. The only exceptions are the documents from the last phase (15th-century) of Nasrid Granada, kept by Christians for a variety of reasons.8 Such documents provide information on clothing and textiles, but in a very laconic way, usually restricted to names of garments or textile pieces registered in wills, commercial transactions, or donations. Terminology is important for any discussion on clothes in medieval times, and the rich lexicographical legacy from al-Andalus has proved to be a productive field of research.9 In this paper, however, other kinds of Andalusi texts will be the basis for a general discussion on several aspects related to the uses and meaning of clothing in al-Andalus. Representations (written or iconographical) and actual practices of dressing did not always correspond. Treatises on morals and good manners yield profuse information on what to wear or what not – with special attention to women – but, as will be seen, not all these recommendations were closely followed. Those texts should be taken into account, however, as a portrait of social values: the treatise on the decorum of women by ʿAbd al-Malik ibn Habib (d. 853), or the treatises of hisba (market regulations and rules for proper individual and social behaviour) by Ibn ʿAbdun (11th to 12th centuries) and by al-Saqati (early 13th century) will be used in this paper as testimonies on norms socially accepted yet not always put into practice – just as the sumptuary laws in medieval Christian countries attempted to regulate extravagance but were difficult to enforce. Information regarding the actual use of clothing can be recovered from other kinds of written sources (juridical, literary, historical, geographical, biographical), always with the caveat that none of these texts intended to describe clothing for future historians; when an item of clothing appears in these sources, it is always to elucidate some information of a very different nature. The uneven coverage afforded by this kind of data does not help to establish definitive conclusions but does enable a new reading of the information collected, going beyond a mere accumulative approach. In what follows, I shall try to illustrate this assertion by focusing on a selection of issues closely related to individual and social usages of clothing in al-Andalus, considered as a system of communication, a language through which persons and communities defined themselves to other groups or external observers. Religious requirements played a role in this complex structure of self-definition, but religion was just one among many other factors 8

Amalia Zomeño, ‘From Private Collections to Archives: How Christians Kept Arabic Legal Documents in Granada’, Al-Qantara, 32 (2011), 461–79. 9 The classic dictionary on the Arab vocabulary related to dress is R. P. A. Dozy, Dictionnaire détaillé des noms des vêtements chez les arabes (Amsterdam: Jean Müller, 1845). For a more contemporary approach, see Dolores Serrano-Niza, Glosario árabe español de indumentaria según el Kitab al-mujassas de Ibn Sidah (Madrid: CSIC, 2005).

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affecting clothing, and not always the most prominent, no matter how intensely its superiority was claimed by clerics and the most pious members of the Muslim community.

M usli m s, Ch ri sti ans and Je ws Throughout the Middle Ages, the Iberian Peninsula was a shared space between the Christian-ruled entities in the north, and the Muslim ones in its central and southern regions, those progressively diminishing until reduced only to the south-eastern kingdom of Granada. This sharp political division was accompanied by a mutual awareness of the ‘other’ and the permeability of the frontiers separating Andalusis from their northern neighbours, that allowed the circulation of goods, as well as cultural products arising from them: linguistic loans, artistic styles, or other shared intellectual pursuits. All of these are widely recognised by contemporary research as a characteristic of medieval Iberian culture and society. Dress as a social code was part of an encompassing world-view. Notwithstanding, people in the Andalusi part of Iberia were acutely conscious of how dress was a way of differentiating between the various strata of populations living in the Peninsula or in the parts of it regulated by an Islamic political entity. A well-known text recorded by the Andalusi scholar Abu Ubayd al-Bakri (d. 1094) who was reproducing excerpts from the travel account by the Jewish merchant Ibrahim ibn Yaʿqub al-Turtushi (10th century), describes concisely the sartorial practices of the so-called ‘Galicians’, that is, the inhabitants of the northern parts of the Iberian Peninsula.10 They never wash their clothes, he states, and wear them day and night, until they are ragged; moreover, emphasizes the traveller, the gowns Galicians wear are tight fitting and have openings showing the greater part of the torso.11 The dress of the Christians in the northern region of the Iberian Peninsula is defined here by contrast with the Andalusi uses, and so a neutral reader would deduce that in al-Andalus, well-bred people changed their clothes often and washed them accordingly; and that they wore relatively loose garments that concealed their bodies. Other written sources and the scant examples of art still preserved confirm that long tunics were the basic attire of Andalusi women and men. This can be observed, for example, in the courtly scenes carved in the Caliphal ivory pyxes 10 On al-Turtushi, Mariano Gómez-Aranda, ‘Ibrahim Ibn Yaqub de Tortosa’ [accessed 27 September 2020].

11 Al-Bakri, Jughrafiyat al-Andalus wa-Urubba min Kitab al-Masalik wa-l-mamalik, ed. by ʿAbd

al-Rahman ʿAli al-Hajji (Beirut: Dar al-Irshad lil-tibaʿa wa-l-nashr wa-l-tawziʿ, 1968), p. 81. The same text, in al-Himyari, Kitab al-Rawd al-miʿtar fi khabar al-aqtar, partial ed. and trans. by E. Lévi-Provençal, La Péninsule Ibérique au Moyen Âge (Leiden: Brill, 1938), no. 69; Ana María Carballeira Debasa, Galicia y los gallegos en las fuentes árabes medievales (Madrid: CSIC, 2007), p. 194.



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(10th to 11th centuries), where long tunics with belts and long sleeves are chiselled in great detail, showing the design of collars and the embroidered bands adorning parts of the dress.12 The Mozarabic miniatures of the northern regions of the Peninsula show similar bands on sleeves, cuffs and shoulders, a fashion obviously brought from the southern Andalusi regions.13 At least in well-off and aristocratic circles, this kind of attire was a mark of elegance, and became a part of the Andalusi identity as recorded in Arabic texts. The contrast with the tight garments favoured by ‘Galicians’ could not be more striking, as extreme as the difference between the Roman toga and the trousers worn by Germans or Gauls. This identity marker functioned throughout the history of al-Andalus. It has to be remembered that, in the 13th century, when Christian kings and noblemen were actively purchasing rich textiles manufactured in al-Andalus, several Muslim sovereigns were accused by some literati and historians of adopting Christian fashions and, in the specific case of Ibn Mardanish, ruler of the Eastern Andalusi territories, of wearing tight garments.14 It was precisely in this same century that in the Christian kingdoms, the use of tight and even stiff clothing became the most fashionable way of presenting the self, in open conflict with what Muslims were expected to wear.15 Cultural cross-dressing is recorded in a period of political instability for al-Andalus, when the Almohads – the powerful dynasty originating from North Africa (12th to 13th centuries) – were trying to assert their domination. At this time several local rulers, prominently among them Ibn Mardanish, resisted the impact of the new Maghribian sovereigns and situated themselves in a grey area where Christian polities played a determinant role.16 Thus, the adoption by Ibn Mardanish (and probably the members of his close circle as well) of Christian fashions was a step with a heavily loaded political meaning, insofar as by doing so the ruler of an Andalusi entity was siding with other Iberian powers against the Almohads.17 Shifting from ample garments to tight-fitting ones could be interpreted as a sign of the desire to be incorporated into the more powerful Christian entity, acknowledging its superior stance or, and this is much more difficult to identify, as a movement to assert a kind of Iberian shared identity, against the new North-African invaders (a point however that would need deeper consideration). 12 This can be observed in the so-called ‘Ziyad pyx’ in the Victoria and Albert Museum, London,

13 14 15 16

17

and in the ‘casket of Leyre’ from the Museo de Navarra, Spain (reproductions in Pérez Higuera, Objetos e imágenes, pp. 28, 37, 39, 137). Carmen Bernis Madrazo, Indumentaria medieval española (Madrid: CSIC, 1956), p. 14. Marín, ‘Signos visuales’, p. 144. Juan Vicente García Marsilla, ‘La moda no es capricho. Mensajes y funciones del vestido en la Edad Media’, Vínculos de Historia, 6 (2017), 71–88. Ignacio González Cavero, ‘Una revisión de la figura de Ibn Mardanis. Su alianza con el reino de Castilla y la oposición frente a los almohades’, Miscelána Medieval Murciana, 31 (2007), 95–110. Marín, ‘Signos visuales’, p. 144.

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There is another and later case of Andalusi rulers adopting a garment deriving from Christian fashions. Nasrid kings represented in the mural paintings on leather located in the Sala de los Reyes of the Alhambra palace are illustrated wearing, over their ample tunics, a kind of overcoat identified by Carmen Bernis as the garnacha, a cassock generally used in many European countries during the 13th and 14th centuries.18 This garment could have been easily adopted by Andalusi sovereigns, as it followed closely the characteristics of their own gowns, long and ample as they were. Other examples of cultural cross-dressing practices among the elites are known in historical situations similar to those of al-Andalus, such as the Christian kings of Armenia, subjects of the Abbasids, who adopted a public image copied from that of the Caliphs of Baghdad; or the crusader Henry of Champagne, who asked Saladin to send him Muslim attire which he planned to wear as a sign of his regard for the Ayyubid sultan.19 The parallels with al-Andalus lie in the locations of the actors of these cross-dressing practices: at the interface of cultural boundaries, where political conflicts were dealt with through assimilation and integration as well as through violence. In the case of al-Andalus, it has to be noted that the cultural cross-dressing practised by Ibn Mardanish (and according to Ibn Khaldun, by many other Andalusis who imitated the ways of Christians)20 was not reciprocated by Christian rulers or magnates. They did acquire precious Andalusi textiles, but used them for fashioning their own clothing or soft furnishings such as pillows and curtains. In other words, the valuable materials manufactured in al-Andalus were radically transformed and incorporated into a totally different system of visual signs, that of Christian society, in the central centuries of the Middle Ages. No trace of cultural cross-dressing can be found in the surviving garments made of Andalusi textiles, such as those preserved in the Museum of Las Huelgas, in Burgos, and in other monasteries and museums in Spain.21 The case of Ibn Mardanish may have been exceptional; indeed, he was harshly criticised by Andalusi chroniclers for his alliance with Christian rulers against the Almohads. But the question of adopting Christian fashions had been a subject of 18 Carmen Bernis, ‘Las pinturas de la Sala de los Reyes de la Alhambra. Los asuntos, los trajes, la

fecha’, Cuadernos de la Alhambra, 18 (1982), 21–50 (p. 32).

19 Finbarr B. Flood, Objects of Translation. Material Culture and Medieval Hindu-Muslims Encounter

(Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2009), pp. 73–74.

20 Marín, ‘Signos visuales’, pp. 144–45. 21 Vestiduras ricas. El monasterio de las Huelgas y su época 1170–1340, ed. by Joaquín Yarza Luaces and

Matteo Mancini (Madrid: Patrimonio Nacional, 2005). Later on, it was said of several Castilian princes and noblemen that they adopted Islamic dress to some extent: for instance, King Enrique IV of Castile (r. 1454–1474) is described by a foreign traveller as wearing ‘moorish dress’ and having adopted Muslim habits of food and drink (Rachel Arié, ‘El traje musulmán de España en tiempos de los nazaríes de Granada’, in A la luz de la seda. Catálogo de la colección de tejidos nazaríes del Museo Lázaro Galdiano y el Museo de la Alhambra, ed. by Amparo López Redondo and Purificación Marinetto Sánchez (Madrid: TF Editores, 2012), pp. 33–39 (p. 37).



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discussion among jurists and religious scholars since the earliest times of Islam, when it was established that Muslims should be clearly distinguishable from people of other creeds, referring primarily to Christians and Jews.22 This general rule was not strictly followed, as we have seen in the case of the higher strata of society, and probably the same could be said of less privileged social groups, for whom dress was above all a question of price and availability. Notably, a jurist of the 14th century, Ibn al-Mawwaq, in Granada, took a very tolerant stance in this regard, and considered that everything not explicitly contrary to Islamic law could be accepted as a legitimate item of clothing.23 It would seem that there were not great differences between the dress of different Andalusis, whether they were Muslims, Christians or Jews. There is insufficient information on the dress of Christians or Jews residing in al-Andalus; however, it is worthy of mention that under the Almohads, Jews were required to wear a sign on their clothing to identify themselves or to put on specific kinds of garments in a given colour.24 This kind of discriminatory measure indicates that Jews were not previously easily to be recognised as such or, in other words, that their attire, as that of Christians, was not so different from the clothing generally worn. Therefore, non-Muslims seemingly might have been identified by more subtle characteristics, such as headdresses, hair styles, and ornament.

E x pectati ons of Andalusi Mu sl ims’ d re ss For people belonging to the upper social levels, dress was, above other considerations, a way of identifying their place in society. They were also expected to follow a dress code based upon an ideal of modesty implying that the human body should be covered as much as possible.25 This was more acutely felt in the case of women but affected men likewise. As noted before, ample tunics were the basic feature of male attire, to which other items of clothing were added, such as capes and veils (for male veils see below). In the resultant image of men, only the face, the hands and occasionally the feet were visible. Nudity was discouraged in Andalusi society, even in the private space of the house or in the public baths: a

22 Marín, ‘Signos visuales’, p. 145; Yedida K. Stillman, Arab Dress. From the Dawn of Islam to Modern

Times. A Short History (Leiden: Brill, 2000), pp. 101–19.

23 Marín, ‘Signos visuales’, pp. 145–46. 24 Manuela Marín, ‘La vida cotidiana’, in Historia de España Menéndez Pidal. El retroceso territorial

de al-Andalus: Almorávides y Almohades, coordinated by María Jesús Viguera Molins (Madrid: Espasa-Calpe, 1997), pp. 383–433 (pp. 393–94); Stillman, Arab Dress, p. 109; David Corcos, ‘The Nature of the Almohad rulers’ treatment of the Jews’, Journal of Medieval Iberian Studies, 2 (2010), 259–85. 25 ‘Le corps dans l’espace islamique medieval. Dossier’, Annales Islamologiques, 48.1 (2014), ed. by Pauline Koetschet and Abbès Zouache.

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saying attributed to the Prophet Muhammad asserted that women should not see other women naked, nor should men see other men naked.26 There were religious and moral elements, of course, in this cautious approach to the nude body, perceived as a potential cause of individual and social disorders and chaos. Mistrust and fear of the sexual capacity of humans when deprived of any restraint caused nakedness to be condemned by moralists and religious scholars. People were expected to wear gowns loose enough to conceal the outline of the body, and to abstain from wearing transparent fabrics.27 The social concept ruling the limits of nakedness was linked to the Arabic term ʿawra, applied to the pudenda of the human body that should never be exposed to an observer’s gaze. ʿAwra and its boundaries were the subject of careful moral and legal discussions among Muslim jurists, applying this concept primarily to the female body, to the extent that some of them declared that the whole of a woman’s body was ʿawra, and therefore, should be hidden from view from head to foot.28 However, nakedness, or at least the exhibition of parts of the body that should be covered, such as the torso, was considered from other perspectives. It was also thought of as a mark of uncivilised behaviour, and people so attired might be considered primitive and savage. In al-Andalus, the chief of a Berber contingent fighting for ʿAbd al-Rahman ibn Muʿawiya (r. 756–788, the first Umayyad ruler of al-Andalus) against Yusuf al-Fihri bore the name of ʿAsim al-ʿUryan, that is, ‘ʿAsim the naked’. One of the chronicles narrating this episode explained the epithet of ʿAsim on the grounds that he used to fight wearing only his underwear; it may be added that there are other similar descriptions of North African warriors shortly before and after the Islamic conquest of the region.29 Moreover, the 11th-century warriors who invaded al-Andalus, the Almoravids, were described in some Arab texts as not wearing shirts, another indication of the link between nakedness and a low or non-existent level of civilisation.30 There exists in Andalusi (and Maghribian) historical literature a notable corpus of texts deprecating the Berbers and qualifying them as near-savages unable to understand the niceties of civilised life and culture; ʿAsim, although a partisan of

26 Ibn Habib, Kitab adab al-nisa’, ed. by Abdelmagid Turki (Beirut: Dar al-Gharb al-Islami, 1992),

p. 205.

27 Ibn Habib, Kitab adab al-nisa’, p. 212. 28 Ibn Habib, Kitab adab al-nisa’, pp. 182 and 216.

29 Eduardo Manzano Moreno, ‘Beréberes de al-Andalus: los factores de una evolución histórica’,

Al-Qantara, 11 (1990), 397–428 (pp. 420–21); Ramzi Rouighi, ‘Berbers of the Arabs’, Studia Islamica, new series 1 (2011), 67–101 (p. 78). 30 Helena de Felipe, ‘“Camelleros saharianos”: la caracterización de los almorávides en las fuentes árabes’, in Al-Murabitun (Los almorávides): un imperio islámico occidental. Estudios en memoria del Profesor Henri Terrasse, ed. by María Marcos Cobaleda (Granada: Patronato de la Alhambra y Generalife, 2018), pp. 64–80 (p. 71).



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the Umayyads, would embody the image of the naked warrior as a threat to the established order of life – or of war, as is the case.31 Nakedness thus played a decisive role in the sartorial styles of Andalusis, and more importantly in public appearances. The urban and cultured knew that showing part of their bodies – other than faces, hands and feet – on formal occasions or in their usual dealings with other members of society was not socially approved of. Women, for their part, were subjected to a stricter modesty code, as will be shown. In addition to this generic and accepted way of dressing among at least the welloff social groups, other identity marks expressed through dressing can be identified in Andalusi texts. In this respect, it is relevant to consider how dress would differentiate social backgrounds, and how professions were visually defined by their dress. It is unfortunate that Arabic sources only occasionally address this kind of question, but when they do, it is easy to see how people were defined by what they were wearing in urban spaces; on rural areas our information in nearly non-existent. The 13th-century author of a hisba treatise, al-Saqati, describes the attire of a miller, emphasising that he wears a long shirt tightly wrapped by a belt, and above it, an outer garment or jubba. Additionally, al-Saqati prescribes that millers and all workers dealing with different kinds of food in the market should wear a tashmir (pl. tashamir), a short, sleeveless garment.32 It is also of interest to note that in the courtly scenes depicted in the Cordoban ivory pyxes, young attendants to the Caliph or other princely characters wear short tunics occasionally.33 This probably means that princes could wear this kind of tunic in their private space, but also that these garments were characteristic of menial workers. Manual labourers, such as millers or food manufacturers, were supposed to wear them to facilitate their work and to comply with hygienic requirements: tashamir, as al-Saqati observed, absorbed sweat and should be washed daily. Similarly, the peasants carrying offerings represented in the ‘basin of Játiva’ (an 11th-century marble sculpture) wear short tunics with their knees uncovered.34 Beyond class differences, dress could identify specific social groups. The army was clearly one of them, if only because weapons were its trade-mark. But soldiers 31 Helena de Felipe, ‘The Butr and North African Ibadism: Praise and Criticism of the Berbers’,

in L’ibadisme dans les sociétés islamiques médiévales. Modèles et interactions, ed. by Cyrille Aillet (Berlin and Boston: De Gruyter, 2018), pp. 88–110. 32 Al-Saqati, Kitab fi adab al-hisba. El buen gobierno del zoco, ed. and trans. by Pedro Chalmeta and Federico Corriente (Almería: Fundación Ibn Tufayl, 2014), pp. 46 (Arabic text), 103 (translation); R. P. A. Dozy, Supplément aux diccionnaires arabes (Leiden: Brill, 1927), s.v. Other examples in Marín, ‘La vida cotidiana’, p. 393. 33 As in the Ziyad pyx (Pérez Higuera, Objetos e imágenes, p. 37); but see in ibidem, p. 39, an image of a drinking scene with both the courtiers and the sovereign wearing long tunics. 34 Jerrilyn D. Dodds, ‘Pila de Játiva’, in Al-Andalus. Las artes islámicas en España, ed. by Jerrilyn D. Dodds, pp. 260–63 (p. 262); for the ivory pyxes, Daniel Walker, ‘Bote de Sayf al-dawla’, in ibidem, pp. 202–03 (p. 202).

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were also characterised by their attire and their headdresses. The wall paintings preserved in the house of the Partal, in the Alhambra, although deteriorated, display the Nasrid army as it appeared in the 14th century: soldiers wore a tunic and a jacket with its tails tied up in the front through the belt, as hunters usually did.35 Andalusi texts describe other characteristics of the soldiers’ attire, such as the use of turbans, associated with the presence in the Andalusi army of Berber contingents brought to al-Andalus during the reign of the second Umayyad Caliph, al-Hakam II (r. 961–976).36 Perhaps influenced by army clothing, an 11th-century police chief of Almería is said to have worn a short tunic, along with which he carried a stick, as a symbol of his authority.37 Scholars (ʿulama’) were a privileged segment of Andalusi society. Some of them were the authors of a great number of biographical dictionaries recording the names and deeds of generations of men (and a few women) who specialised in the Islamic sciences. In doing so, they were able to build a self-constructed image based upon their own world-view. In the biographical dictionaries, scholars, the living transmitters of the Islamic ideology and orthodox practices, were in fact the embodiment of the virtues preached to believers as norms of individual and social behaviour. Scholars were expected to deny themselves any form of ostentation in food, clothing, and other sensory pleasures. Modesty in clothing was a prized characteristic of the ʿulama’ and other pious Muslims, as well as those fulfilling positions such as judges and imams. Scholars were required to abstain from wearing silk clothing, this being a material considered only suitable for women, and then only in the privacy of their homes. Silk, according to Muslim moralists, was a luxury item and as such, to be avoided by the pious members of the community.38 This restrictive view of the use of textiles was not observed by the richest classes of society, and especially by rulers and court members. As indicated above, Andalusi silk textiles were employed by the Christian royal families in a variety of ways; al-Saqati describes a supposedly high-class Andalusi female slave who was wearing ‘a tiraz silk tunic of the kind the wives of the Christian kings use to wear’.39 Silk production was a thriving trade in Nasrid Granada, where well-off people used this material in summer, alternating it with flax and cotton, while in winter the majority of the 35 Manuel Gómez-Moreno, “Pinturas de moros en el Partal (Alhambra)”, in ‘Textos de Gómez-

36 37 38 39

Moreno sobre la Alhambra musulmana’, Cuadernos de la Alhambra, 6 (1970), 155–64 (originally published in 1916); Jesús Bermúdez López, La Alhambra y el Generalife. Guía oficial (Granada: Patronato de la Alhambra, 2010), p. 165; a hunter in Renata Holod, ‘Arqueta de Leyre’, in Dodds, Al-Andalus. Las artes islámicas en España, pp. 198–201 (p. 201). Marín, ‘Signos visuales’, pp. 148–49; Pérez Higuera, Objetos e imágenes, pp. 105–06 (on Nasrid warriors wearing turbans). Marín, ‘Signos visuales’, p. 154. Dolores Serrano-Niza, ‘Los vestidos según la ley islámica: la seda’, Boletín de la Asociación Española de Orientalistas, 29 (1993), 155–65. See also Serrano-Niza’s contribution to this volume. Al-Saqati, Kitab fi adab al-hisba, pp. 80, 150.



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population wore wool, the quality of which varied according to the financial means of the customers.40 Not all the ʿulama’, in any case, were so ascetic as to abstain from wearing clothing of high quality. Several cases of this behaviour were registered in biographical dictionaries as exceptions to the expected behaviour of a religiously oriented man.41 A story located in North Africa illustrates this point adequately: The renowned Andalusi judge Abu l-Baraqat al-Balafiqi (d. 1366 or 1372) lived for a while in Béjaïa (on the coast of what is now Algeria) when he remarked that a teacher from the Moroccan town of Fez, known as Ibn al-Haddad, was attracting a great number of disciples although he lacked, in the opinion of Abu l-Barakat, the adequate knowledge for performing the task of teaching. When he asked those who attended the courses taught by Ibn al-Haddad about that, this was their answer: ‘When he arrived in Béjaïa, we did not know him. He was well-dressed and had a servant, and so whoever saw him could suppose that he was the son of one of the dignitaries in his place of origin […] we asked him if his father belonged to the class of scholars, and he told us that, on the contrary, he was a slave-trader.’ And it was precisely for this reason, they added, that we appreciated him more than other more prominent scholars.42 This story illuminates the capacity of dress to define a reputation: Ibn al-Haddad was first accepted because his visual representation accorded him a good position in society. He was obviously dressed as a well-off individual, and the company of a servant underlined that standing. Those who saw him thought that his appearance corresponded to that of a member of a scholar’s family – and this explains how well ʿulama´ had built their social prestige and the signs projecting it to the observers. Scholars’ attire was characterised by another sartorial detail: they wore sleeves ending in very ample openings, so that many used them as a kind of pouch where they kept papers, notes, and even books. This is attested to by many references in Andalusi biographical dictionaries, and also in the sculptured capitals found in the Church of Santa María del Rivero in the Spanish province of Soria.43 40 Ibn al-Khatib, Al-Lamha al-badriyya. Historia de los reyes de la Alhambra, trans. and introductory

study by José María Casciaro Ramírez and Emilio Molina López (Granada: Editorial Universidad de Granada, 2010), pp. 126–27. See also the contributions of Adela Fábregas and Naḥum BenYehuda in this volume. 41 Marín, ‘Signos visuales’, p. 166. For the genre of biographical dictionaries, see María Luisa Ávila, ‘El género biográfico en al-Andalus’, in Biografías y género biográfico en el occidente islámico. Estudios onomástico-biográficos de al-Andalus, VIII, ed. by María Luisa Ávila and Manuela Marín (Madrid: CSIC, 1997), pp. 35–52. 42 Manuela Marín, ‘Movilidad social y ciencias islámicas: ejemplos biográficos andalusíes de la Baja Edad Media (siglos XII–XIV)’, in Categorias sociais e mobilidade urbana na Baixa Idade Média. Entre o Islão e a Cristandade, ed. by Hermínia Vasconcelos Vilar and Maria Filomena Lopes de Barros (Lisbon: Edições Colibri), 2012, pp. 1–34 (pp. 33–34). 43 Islamic influences in the capitals of Christian churches in this northern Spanish region have been researched by Inés Monteira Arias, ‘La influencia islámica en la escultura románica

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In Umayyad times turbans were, as noted above, favoured by soldiers, especially by the Berber contingents. Scholars and high officials, for their part, wore caps (qalansuwa). A well-known episode shows how ʿAbd al-Rahman Sanchuelo, the last of the ʿAmirid rulers at the end of the 10th century, obliged the Cordoban dignitaries – including the most prominent scholars of the time – to attend a certain court ceremony wearing turbans instead of their usual headwear, and many had to ask their Berber neighbours to lend them turbans.44 However, by the 13th century things had changed, and according to the great writer Ibn Saʿid, judges and jurists of Western al-Andalus wore turbans, while their colleagues in the Eastern parts of the Peninsula did not.45 By this time, evidence from art shows that members of the higher social classes were wearing turbans. This can be seen in the illustrations of the Hadith Bayad wa-Riyad: men depicted in this richly illuminated manuscript wear very big turbans.46 The Nasrid kings of Granada, as reflected in the painting of the ‘Sala de los Reyes’ in the Alhambra, have adopted the turban, the ends of which they tie under the chin.47 However, according to Ibn al-Khatib, in Granada only military chiefs, judges, scholars, and soldiers of the North-African army wore turbans.48

T h e g endered b ody and ho w to d re ss it The miniatures of the Hadith Bayad wa-Riyad offer a unique visual document of how men and women of high social status dressed (or were represented) in al-Andalus in the 13th century, and could probably be applied to other periods of Andalusi history.49 In Islamic medieval times, fashion underwent only subtle changes. Thus the observer of these representations would not find them very different from other images depicting women and men in other periods of the Islamic

44 45 46

47 48 49

de Soria. Una nueva vía para el estudio de la iconografía en el románico’, Cuadernos de Arte e Iconografía, 14 (2005), 8–244. For the capitals in Santa María del Rivero, see Elisa Mesa Fernández, El lenguaje de la indumentaria. Tejidos y vestiduras en el Kitab al-Agani de Abu l-Faray al-Isfahani (Madrid: CSIC, 2008) pp. 503–04. Marín, ‘Signos visuales’, p. 149. For an extensive study on the use of turbans in al-Andalus, see Maribel Fierro, The Turban in al-Andalus (forthcoming). Marín, ‘Signos visuales’, p. 158; Stillman, Arab Dress, p. 91. Cynthia Robinson, ‘Preliminary Considerations of Qissat Bayad wa Riyad [VAT. AR. R15.368]. Checkmate with Alfonso X?’, in Al-Andalus und Europa. Zwischen Orient und Okzident, ed. by Martina Müller-Wiener and others (Petersberg: Michael Imhof, 2002), 285–96. See also Sabiha Khemir, ‘Manuscrito del Hadith Bayad wa-Riyad’, in Dodds, Al-Andalus. Las artes islámicas en España, pp. 312–13. Arié, ‘Quelques remarques’, p. 101; Stillman, Arab Dress, p. 95. Ibn al-Khatib, al-Lamha al-badriyya, p. 127. For a complete description of the miniatures in this manuscript, see Robinson, Medieval Andalusian Courtly Culture.



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Middle Ages: people usually wore very similar ample and flowing garments, covering their bodies and showing only faces, hands, and feet. Men are recognised because they wear turbans. The faces of men and women did not greatly differ, often only differentiated from each other by men’s moustaches or beards.50 This means that, to an inexperienced observer, men could pass easily as women – and vice versa – with only small adaptations in their outward appearance. Andalusi history shows some examples of this ambiguity, of which two would be enough to underline the possibilities offered by the dress style adopted in al-Andalus. Lubb ibn Musa, a member of the Banu Qasi (rulers of the regions around Tudela, in the north of the Iberian Peninsula) decided to enter by stealth a fortress occupied by his enemies and in which his wife was being held. He wore a face veil to hide his masculine features. However, he was identified by one of the guards, who recognised Lubb’s gaze – and was killed instantly.51 This dramatic story shows that the only thing differentiating men and women in a public space was the wearing of a veil covering women’s faces, with the exception of eyes. A similar episode is related to the Umayyad emir Muhammad I (r. 852–886), who wanted to gain access secretly to the royal palace after the death of his father, the emir ʿAbd al-Rahman II. He donned the dress of one of his daughters who had habitually visited the emir, and made the guards believe that he was ‘the girl who comes usually to see her grandfather’.52 In both of these cases, adopting female attire was an extreme device, imposed by the circumstances. A literary version of this forced cross-dressing is found in the Hadith Bayad wa-Riyad, when the masculine hero of the story, Bayad, goes in and out the residence of his beloved Riyad disguised as one the slave girls living there.53 Men were prohibited from wearing women’s clothes, and Ibn Habib relates, in his book of moral advice to women, how the Caliph ʿUmar ibn al-Khattab (r. 634– 644) used to forbid men from wearing tunics dyed red with safflower (Carthamus tinctorius), as those were typical of women.54 Adopting this kind of garment was restricted to the marginal world of the mukhannathun, the transvestites who, according to Ibn Saʿid, were found in one of the neighbourhoods of Cordoba.55 It was women who were more strictly prohibited from wearing men’s clothing, and Ibn Habib concentrates his attention on this point, giving several examples 50 Robinson, ‘Preliminary Considerations’, p. 289. 51 Fernando de la Granja, La Marca Superior en la obra de al-‘Udrí (Zaragoza: CSIC, 1967), p. 27.

52 Ibn Hayyan, al-Muqtabis min anba’ ahl al-Andalus, ed. by M. A. Makki (Beirut: Dar al-Kitab

al-ʿArabi, 1973), p. 117 (for other Arab sources, see Manuela Marín, Mujeres en al-Ándalus (Madrid: CSIC, 2000), p. 188. 53 Robinson, Medieval Andalusian Courtly Culture, pp. 35 and 67. 54 Ibn Habib, Kitab adab al-nisa’, p. 212. 55 Ibn Saʿid, al-Mugrib fi hulà al-Maghrib, ed. by Shawqi Dayf, I (Cairo: Dar al-Kutub al-ʿIlmiyya, 1953), pp. 171–72.

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of the misconduct implied by so doing. The Prophet Muhammad, according to Ibn Habib, had recommended that women wear jewels and dye their hands and eyes with antimony powder, with the express intention of looking unlike men.56 These religiously approved rules were not followed by all social levels. The Umayyad court, a privileged space of power and sociability, practised patterns of behaviour contradictory to the norms established by religious scholars. During the reign of the second Umayyad Caliph, al-Hakam II (r. 961–976), there is information on the presence in the royal palace of the ghulamiyyat, slave-girls dressed as young boys (the name given to these young women is derived from the Arabic word ghulam, meaning a young man or boy). They were also expert singers and musicians, and as such, could participate in the drinking parties organised for the sovereign and the members of his entourage. This was not a phenomenon original to al-Andalus: ghulamiyyat were introduced in the Abbasid court of Baghdad during the reign of the Caliph al-Amin (r. 809–813) and, like many other Eastern fashions, this was a custom keenly adopted by Andalusi rulers.57 The presence of these girls dressed as boys in the court raises a question about some of the characters carved in the Cordoban ivory pyxes: could some of them be ghulamiyyat rather than young male attendants?58 Women should not wear, says Ibn Habib, transparent fabrics revealing the outlines of the body.59 The same author notes that this prohibition applies to women in public space or even in the private premises of their homes when a male visitor is present, but it would be allowed in the intimacy of the connubial relationship.60 With that in mind, the images reproduced in the Libro de los juegos by Alfonso X (r. 1252–1284), where Muslim women are depicted wearing long and transparent tunics, should perhaps be reassessed. Instead of the traditional interpretation of these images, that is, an indication of the supposed freedom of Andalusi women, it could be proposed that they are represented in a private setting and that they were slave-girls.61 This hypothesis may be supported by al-Saqati, who describes 56 Robinson, Medieval Andalusian Courtly Culture, pp. 35 and 67. Ibn Habib, Kitab adab al-nisa’,

p. 207.

57 Marín, Mujeres en al-Ándalus, p. 679; on ghulamiyyat in Baghdad, see Everett K. Rowson,

58

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‘Gender Irregularity as Entertainment: Institutionalized Transvestism at the Caliphal Court in Medieval Baghdad’, in Gender and Difference in the Middle Ages, ed. by Sharon Farmer and Carol Braun Pasternak (Minneapolis, MN: University of Minnesota Press, 2003), pp. 45–52 (pp. 47–52). These figures have been always interpreted as ephebes (Cynthia Robinson, ‘Love in the Time of Fitna. “Courtliness” and the “Pamplona” Casket’, in Revisiting al-Andalus. Perspectives on the Material Culture of Islamic Iberia and Beyond”, ed. by Glaire D. Anderson and Mariam RosserOwen (Leiden: Brill, 2007), pp. 99–112), but thinking of them as girls dressed in masculine garments may reflect other cultural ambiguities, such as the use of the term habib (‘beloved’, a masculine word) by poets when addressing indistinctly male or female lovers. Turki, Ibn Habib, Kitab adab al-nisa’, pp. 212 and 218. Ibidem, p. 219. Pérez Higuera, Objetos e imágenes, p. 142.



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how slave traders dressed white-skinned girls with transparent and rose-coloured clothes, to be presented before purchasers.62 The gendering of women’s attire was manifested through the use of two specific garments. First, Ibn Habib recommended the wearing of an undergarment (sirwal) to protect the modesty of women in the event of a fall or some similar incident;63 no corresponding measure is suggested for men. This under-garment was tied up with a belt (tikka) made of a woven material. Tikka and sirwal were used by both women and men, but in the case of women its meaning is strongly related to sexuality; poetry and other texts treat the sirwal and the tikka as symbols of the access to their bodies.64 Secondly, Andalusi women, when out in public, wrapped their legs with textile bands, similar to bandages. There are three good witnesses to this attire, one from a written source and the other two found in depictions of Muslim women in Christian context. The oldest testimony, as far as I know, comes from the hisba treatise by Ibn ʿAbdun who, at the beginning of the 12th century, censured how women in Seville used cloth remnants to make strips for their legs.65 Shortly afterwards, in the 13th century, miniatures in the Libro de los juegos show women wearing this kind of garment.66 Finally, two of the illustrations by the German artist Cristoph Weiditz, who travelled to Spain in 1529 and drew images of Morisco women in different situations, clearly show that these strips were a regular part of a woman’s appearance whilst outside her home.67 It would seem that this peculiar custom was, according to Ibn ʿAbdun, an innovation of women themselves; perhaps they introduced this habit as a way of embellishing their legs’ appearance, as fatness was a praised characteristic of women’s bodies in the Islamic Middle Ages; or perhaps they used these textile bands as a protection against physical accidents whilst outside their homes. Centuries later, in northern Morocco, where Andalusi influence remained strong long after the

62 Al-Saqati, Kitab fi adab al-hisba, pp. 78/146. This was a recommendation taken by al-Saqati

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65 66 67

from a treatise on slaves by Ibn Butlan al-Baghdadi (d. 1066); see Pilar Coello, ‘Las actividades de las esclavas según Ibn Butlan (s. XI) y al-Saqati de Málaga (ss. XII–XIII)’, in La mujer en al-Andalus. Reflejos históricos de su actividad y categorías sociales, ed. by María Jesús Viguera (Madrid and Seville: Universidad Autónoma de Madrid, 1989), pp. 201–10 (p. 202). Ibn Habib, Kitab adab al-nisa’, p. 218. Wilhelm Hoenerbach, ‘La granadina’, Andalucía Islámica, 2–3 (1981–1982), 9–31, (p. 14). On tikka, see Dozy, Vêtements, pp. 95–99, with many examples of the word in Eastern sources. See Joaquina Albarracín de Martínez Ruiz, Vestido y adorno de la mujer musulmana de Yebala (Marruecos) (Ceuta: Instituto de Estudios Ceutíes, 2002), pp. 43–44, on the use of sirwal and tikka in northern Morocco in the mid-20th century. Ibn ʿAbdun, in Sevilla a comienzos del siglo XII. El tratado de Ibn ʿAbdun, trans. by E. Lévi-Provençal and Emilio García Gómez (Madrid: Moneda y Crédito, 1948), p. 181. Pérez Higuera, Objetos e imágenes, p. 149. See Figs 9.1, 9.5 in the present volume. There is a good reproduction of Weiditz’s images in Irigoyen, ‘Moros vestidos de moros’, figs 13 and 14. See also Arié, ‘Quelques remarques’, p. 94.

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disappearance of al-Andalus, women still used the same kind of covering for their legs, and it was still practised, though by then uncommon, up to the 1950s.68 The moralists’ recommendations for women’s dress were always reiterated more frequently that those reserved for men. While women were required to hide their bodies as much as possible and, in order to achieve that, to avoid wearing transparent or close-fitting dress, men enjoyed a more relaxed dress code, in which one of the few constraints they were expected to follow was to abstain from wearing bright hues, considered to be a characteristic of feminine clothing. Although, as was shown above, there was little outward difference between women’s and men’s clothing, a constant concern appears in the normative discourses on gender and dress, which require that a sharp definition of gender should be expressed in the outward looks of people. In other words, no man should be dressed as a woman, and, more importantly, no woman should be dressed as a man. Gender ambiguity was sternly condemned, as it was in the Christian kingdoms. Notably, one of the worst sins committed by the 15th-century soldier-saint Joan of Arc, and for which she was put to death, was her wearing of men’s attire.69

B odi es b eh i nd ve il s It is generally believed that the appearance of women in the public space was characterised by the use of a veil. In the eyes of Western observers, Muslim women of all periods and lands have been defined by this article of clothing, and the controversies around it in the present time are far from being closed. However, it can be seen that in al-Andalus – as in other Islamic parts of the world at this time – the veil was not a widespread phenomenon and was related more to the social and economic position of women than to religious regulations. Moreover, wearing a veil was not, in certain periods of Andalusi history, exclusively for women, as will be shown. The veil was a characteristic of the way Andalusis dressed, but it did not always condition women – and men – in the same way. Women had been wearing veils since classical Antiquity, and it was not a rare phenomenon in medieval Christian lands; but the veil acquired an added meaning in Islamic countries, where it became a symbol of well-bred families, careful to protect their womenfolk from any blemish on their reputation that would, inevitably, fall back on the masculine lineage and its honour. Criteria used by men to impose the use of veil upon women varied both accordingly to chronology and space. In the earliest times of Islam, and according to sayings recorded by Ibn Habib, the second Caliph, ʿUmar ibn al-Khattab, asserted that only beautiful women should wear this garment, while ugly ones were exempt 68 Albarracín, Vestido y adorno, p. 61. According to Albarracín, women in rural areas around

Tetuan used to wear leather protections on their legs when working in the fields or moving around in the mountainous areas. 69 Colette Beaune, Jeanne d’Arc. Vérités et légendes (Paris: Perrin, 2012), pp. 230–31.



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from this obligation.70 Similarly, old women whose age was beyond their fertile years could appear publicly without a veil.71 Clearly, imposition of the veil was intended to isolate young and beautiful women from having any sexual encounter which could interfere with the genealogical purity of the lineage. Therefore, the veil would not be needed by women outside the upper social circles. Peasant women, for instance, did not have to wear a garment that would encumber their movements while working in the fields. On the other hand, in urban areas, the veil was forbidden to female slaves, the reason being that they would be differentiated from free, supposedly more modest women – members of respectable families. Ibn Habib, in one of the few personal remarks found in his book, says: ‘In Medina, I only saw female slaves, even of the more exquisite class, going out in the streets with their heads uncovered, showing their braids or their short hair after a cut, and with nothing over their head […] A female slave must go with her head uncovered, to show that she is different from a free woman.’72 It is interesting to compare these dictums from the text by Ibn Habib with later representations of women such as those found in the Hadith Bayad wa-Riyad. Feminine images are plentiful in this illuminated manuscript, and they are frequently depicted without veils, with their unbraided hair covering their backs. The text accompanying those images explains that these women are the female slaves of the sayyida, a lady who is the daughter of a magnate and who normally appears wearing not a veil, but a kind of tiara. The scenes in which all these women are so represented are located in private spaces, mainly gardens, of what is presumed to be a great house. The only instances when women wearing veils appear are in public locations, on a riverbank, for example. In a similar way, Muslim women in the miniatures adorning the Libro de los juegos show their loose hair, only partially covered by a headdress, or tied with a ribbon. These women, dressed in semi-transparent tunics, are barefooted and hold musical instruments, all of which identify them as qiyan, the slave singing girls so characteristic of the courtly culture of medieval Islam and specifically of al-Andalus, and who later became popular at several Christian courts. A textile representation of a woman singer (on the so-called ‘pillow’ of Queen Berenguela), shows a similar image: ‘a girl with her long black hair, barely held by a narrow ribbon, flowing over her shoulders’.73 Slaves’ bodies were a commodity, and as such, could be viewed by male observers in a way that was impossible with free women. Al-Saqati observed that slave merchants occasionally required slave women to reveal ‘their beauty’ to the purchaser or – contrarily – to cover it, probably answering the requests of the 70 Ibn Habib, Kitab adab al-nisa’, pp. 187–88. 71 Ibidem, p. 215.

72 Ibidem, p. 228. 73 Concha Herrero Carretero, ‘Almohada de Berenguela, reina de León y Castilla’, in Yarza

Loaces, Vestiduras ricas, pp. 232–33; Robinson, Medieval Andalusian Courtly Culture, p. 86.

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possible buyers. In any case, this exhibition of the slaves’ bodies seems to have been performed in private spaces (the merchant’s or the purchaser’s residence).74 Prostitutes, according to Ibn ʿAbdun, should not go around in the city with their heads uncovered, a sure indication that this was their habit in Seville at the beginning of the 12th century; neither should dancers go around with faces revealed.75 This strict moralistic message of Ibn ʿAbdun is linked to the need to define the place of women in the public space, and, perhaps more interestingly, that the use of the veil was determined by several and sometimes contradictory sets of social rules. Thus, for women of good upbringing it was a necessary mark of distinction, while moralists claimed that prostitutes and dancers must use the veil to hide the marks of their profession such as make-up, flashy jewels, and garments.76 In their eagerness to hide the ‘public exhibition’ of prostitutes, these moralists did not perhaps realise that wearing a veil equated their appearance to that of honest women. Women who worked as public mourners would apparently show their faces while performing this role in funeral ceremonies. This can be deduced from the recommendation of al-Saqati that forbade them to present themselves on such occasions with their heads and faces visible and without wearing a veil.77 It has to be noticed that professional women mourners did not enjoy a good social reputation, and that their job, although widely performed, was regarded with great suspicion by the representatives of religious orthodoxy.78 Several scenes described in Andalusi texts help understanding of the subtleties involved in the use of veils by women. In one of them, the public notary Abu Bakr al-Tujibi (d. 1018) is praised for his goodness and kindness, which had made him a favourite among the ‘veiled (muhtajabat) women of high position living in seclusion’.79 To illustrate this point, Abu Bakr’s biographer describes how a veiled lady, who needed his services for a legal document, was identified by her own son, a small boy, as his mother; in this way the notary could certify the document without asking the lady to unveil her face. In another and more well-known text, the Cordoban poet al-Ramadi (10th century) followed a woman whom he had spotted in the streets of the city. He was attracted by her physical appearance and after a while he began a conversation with her. His first question was whether she was a free woman or a slave. It is noteworthy that the poet was not able to ascertain the woman’s status by her appearance. According to this scene, and making allowances for the literary 74 Al-Saqati, Kitab fi adab al-hisba, pp. 78/146. 75 Ibn ʿAbdun, Sevilla, p. 156. 76 Ibidem. 77 Al-Saqati, Kitab fi adab al-hisba, pp. 99, 174.

78 Nadia Maria El Cheikh, ‘Mourning and the Role of the Na’iha’, in Identidades marginales, ed. by

Cristina de la Puente (Madrid: CSIC, 2003), pp. 395–412.

79 Manuela Marín, ‘Mujeres veladas: religión y sociedad en al-Andalus’, Arenal: Revista de Historia

de las Mujeres, 4.1 (1997), 23–38 (pp. 35–36).



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setting of the story, a woman could walk around the urban space of a city like Cordoba without openly displaying her position in society. If she was wearing a veil, and therefore dressed as a free woman, why would al-Ramadi have to ask his question? Were slaves using the veil as a disguise of their own status? Was the woman bare-faced and without a veil, but her deportment gave al-Ramadi the impression that she was a free woman? The difficulty of giving definite answers to these questions proves that the veil was worn – or not worn – in many different ways and for various reasons, and that women were perhaps using it for their own purposes. (Later in the story, the woman who had been followed by al-Ramadi was in fact identified as a free lady.)80 In Nasrid Granada, at the end of the Islamic history in the Iberian Peninsula, the well-known polymath Ibn al-Khatib (d. 1374) points out that women in several cities of the kingdom (Malaga, Baza and Ronda) go around with their faces unveiled, while in Almería, their veils do not hide eyes of a great beauty.81 It is not easy to assess the plausibility of these observations, as Ibn al-Khatib’s florid style is far from any realistic description, as can be observed in the rest of the travel account. There can be found other notes on these women dressed, he adds, in sumptuous clothing of different colours and embroideries.82 Two years after Granada was conquered by the Catholic Monarchs in 1492, the German traveller Hyeronimus Münzer visited the city, in which a substantial Muslim population was living and still keeping their own religious and cultural traditions. According to Münzer, women in Granada, when walking in the streets, wore over their garments a very fine white veil, draped in such a way that only their eyes were visible.83 Integration of these texts shows that veiling was a general phenomenon in al-Andalus, and that there were many ways in which women could utilise this item of clothing, either to follow religious and social rules or to transgress them, or to take advantage of the possibilities of hiding their true class-identity from indiscreet observers when going about in the urban space.84 This does not mean, however, as some traditional historians have stated and some others have uncritically followed, that there is ample evidence that al-Andalus was an exception in ‘the absolute ubiquity of urban female veiling in the 80 Ibn Hazm, Tawq al-hamama, ed. by I. ʿAbbas (Beirut: al-Safir, 1993), p. 39; El collar de la paloma,

trans. by E. García Gómez (Madrid: Sociedad de Estudios y Publicaciones, 1952), pp. 100–01.

81 Ibn al–Khatib, Miʿyar al–ikhtiyar fi dhikr al–maʿahid wa–l–amsar, ed. and trans. by Mohammed

Kamal Chabana ([Rabat]: Instituto Universitario para la Investigación Científica, 1977); a more reliable translation can be found in Hoenerbach, ‘La granadina’. 82 Hoenerbach, ‘La granadina’, pp. 13 and 29. 83 Jerónimo Münzer, ‘Viaje a España y Portugal en los años 1494 y 1495’, trans. by Julio Puyol, Boletín de la Real Academia de la Historia, 84 (1928), 32–119 (p. 107). 84 In her survey of Turkish society, Lady Mary Wortley Montagu made a similar observation: Mary Wortley Montagu, Embassy to Constantinople, ed. by Christopher Pick, intro. by Dervla Murphy (London: Century Hutchinson, 1988), p. 111.

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medieval Arab world’, and deduce from it that Andalusi women, perhaps from Christian influence, enjoyed a freedom not known by other medieval Muslim women.85 Far from that, what we can ascertain through the Andalusi texts and iconographical remains is a complex picture, where veiling is present but not always used, and when that is the case, its use depends on the social origins of women and their position in society, and on the context – urban/rural, public/ private space – where women were going around outside their homes.

M en’s veil s This survey of the veil’s uses in al-Andalus would be incomplete without mention of the veil worn by men. Scholars and other members of Andalusi social elites wore the taylasan, a kind of scarf that could be worn over the shoulders or covering the head in a loose way. However, it never hid the face of the wearer, and so it is difficult, if not impossible, to confuse the taylasan with the veil for women, designed to conceal their facial identity. At the end of the 11th century, however, the arrival on the Iberian Peninsula of a new wave of Berber conquerors, this time under the banners of the Almoravids, altered the perceptions of the Andalusis as to who, women or men, would be expected to cover their faces with a veil. Almoravids, of Saharan origins, belonged to the Sanhaja group of Berber tribes who settled in these desert regions; their wearing of the veil was a cultural practice necessitated by the harsh climatic conditions of their indigenous environment. One of the propagandistic weapons employed by the Almohads, Almoravid’s opponents and successors in the power of Western Islamic lands, was to emphasize how Almoravid men permitted their women to go around with their faces unveiled, while they hid their own faces with veils.86 The presence of veiled men in the cities of al-Andalus where sultans, governors, and members of the Almoravid elites were established, probably did not affect the dress customs of the local Andalusis. A very much quoted text by Ibn ʿAbdun, in his hisba treatise, differentiates between the Almoravids of pure Berber extraction (namely the Sanhaja, Lamtuna and Lamta), who had the right of wearing the veil (the litham that caused Almoravids to be called in Arabic chronicles by the name of mulaththamun), from other members of the Almoravid army. The latter, says Ibn ʿAbdun, such as Andalusi mercenaries or black slaves, should be forbidden to wear the litham, because they did so in order to impersonate members of the political

85 Marín, Mujeres en al-Ándalus; for the traditional view, see Stillman, Arab Dress, pp. 93–94 and

145–46.

86 Marín, ‘Signos visuales’, p. 150.



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elite and subsequently be treated with the respect and consideration they did not deserve on their own.87 The presence of high-ranking men hiding their faces behind a veil was a shortlived phenomenon and did not leave a mark on the Andalusi manner of dressing. It was, however, a singular occurrence that shows to what extent the dress codes in al-Andalus (and the Maghreb) were affected by many factors – or resisted, as in this case – external influences that were felt as foreign to the socially accepted rules. But probably the sight of veiled men in the urban space of al-Andalus challenged the immutability of these rules, as the chief of the Almoravids was the amir al-mu’minin (the prince of the believers) and, therefore, the leader of the Muslim communities under his command.

Conclusio ns This study of clothing in al-Andalus is based upon written Arabic texts, whose descriptions help our understanding of how Andalusi women and men dressed and how dress was a significant way of presenting the self in different social contexts. A comparison of these texts with the scant preserved art evidence shows that written descriptions of clothing are essential for recovering the meaning of dress in a great variety of situations. Dress could define social position, ethnic origin, professions, personal status (free or slave) and, of course, gender. The more religiously oriented authors established a normative discourse that social practices frequently disregarded; moreover, a sharp distinction existed between the appearance of men, and especially women, in the public or the private space. Thus, the position of women (free or slave, of a high- or low-class family, respectable or libertine) determined their use of the veil in the public space.

87 Ibn ʿAbdun, Sevilla, pp. 98–99.

chapter 8

Muslim Dress in Medieval Portugal: Textual Evidence in the Context of the Iberian Peninsula †Maria Filomena Lopes de Barros

I ntroductio n

I

n the Iberian Peninsula from the 13th to the 16th centuries – when Muslims and Jews were eradicated from Iberian society – the most visible symbol of the distinction between Jews, Muslims and Christians was the body itself, dressed in distinctive clothing, or wearing a special badge. Clothes made visible a hierarchy in which the Jewish and Muslim population were inferior to Christians, a social order the Christians believed to be divinely established. This development was part of a broader process, the making of a res publica christiana, under the sway of the papacy: Christian-Latin ethnocentrism is also defined by opposition to the alterity of Jews and Muslims. The badge of Jews and the dress of Muslims therefore proclaimed them as ‘Other’. Clothing is just one dimension of the process, for which primary sources are often scarce and provide incomplete information. Sumptuary laws were also designed to maintain the social hierarchy, preventing inferior groups from imitating the luxurious dress of the nobility – even if this intended social order often overlapped with that of Muslims and Jews, manifesting the social differences within the minority groups. Therefore, the presence of dress codes and the almost immediately perceptible match between referent and sign visually identified the hierarchy of medieval society. Nevertheless, the process of establishing ‘Muslim dress’ was gradual and differentiated over the res publica christiana as a whole. This text focuses on Portugal, in comparison with the realms of Castile and Aragon, in order to find common trends throughout the medieval period. The first part of this chapter

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will synthetize and, at the same time, analyse the process, supported by the very significant bibliography on dress codes and other characteristics that involved Muslim bodies in Castile and Aragon. The second, based on primary sources, complements this data with facts concerning the Portuguese realm, which has its own individual features, on the specific issue of how Muslims dressed. In fact, if ‘Moorishness’ was a common goal of the Iberian Monarchies (as was ‘Jewishness’), the process of achieving it was different through time and space. A limitation, however, constrains this text: without any visual representation of ‘the Moor’ in Portugal, the only sources available are the written ones, which necessarily restricts the perception of ‘Otherness’ and the scope of the analysis.

Sh api ng M oorishne ss In 1215, the 68th canon of the Fourth Lateran Council argued that, ‘in certain provinces’, Jews and Muslims could be distinguished from Christians by their attire, but in other places there was much confusion. For this reason, and ‘by mistake’, Christians engaged in union with Jewish or Muslim women, and men from the minorities did the same with Christian women. In order to avoid these reprehensible unions (damnatae commixtionis), it was decided that, ‘throughout the whole province of the Christians, and all the time’, such persons, whether men or women, should be publicly differentiated from Christians by their garments.1 The anxiety over interreligious sexual contacts led to the definition of the body as a boundary, requiring immediate visual identification between the members of the three religions. This requirement was realised in different ways and at different times throughout Christendom. England was the first kingdom to apply it to its Jews. On 28 March 1218 (only about three years after the Fourth Lateran Council), a mandate was issued in the name of the king, ordering that the members of the Jewish minority wear, on their outer garments, a badge in the form of two white tablets.2 As far as Muslims and the Iberian Peninsula are concerned, the norm began to take shape only later in the 13th century. In this period, Castilian laws tended to emphasize social hierarchy, expressed in terms of colours of clothing and fabrics, distinctive hairstyles, and the wearing of beards by Muslim men, in fact the main targets of the political discourse.3 1

Joaquim de Assunção Ferreira, Estatuto Jurídico de Judeus e Mouros na Idade Média Portuguesa (Lisbon: Universidade Católica Editora, 2006) p. 146; Gregory IX, Decretals (1234), Book V, Ch. XV [accessed 7 August 2021]. 2 John Tolan, ‘The first imposition of a badge on European Jews: the English royal mandate of 1218’, in The Character of Christian-Muslim Encounter, ed. by Douglas Pratt, Jon Hoover, John Davis and John Chesworth (Leiden: Brill, 2015), p. 145. 3 Olivia Remie Constable, To Live like a Moor: Christian perceptions of Muslim identity in medieval and early modern Spain, ed. by Robin Vose (Philadelphia, PA: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2018), p. 30.



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At the Cortes (parliament) of Seville, in 1252, it was ordered that ‘wherever there are Moors who live in towns that are also inhabited by Christians, they must be sure that their hair was clipped all around their heads and parted in the middle without any longer pieces [sin topet]’. They should wear beards, as it was mandated by their own law, and they may not wear any item made of cendal (silk),4 no white, green, or dark red fabrics, nor white or gold shoes.5 These rules were repeated in royal documentation in 1253 and 1256. At the Cortes of Valladolid, in 1258, similar legislation was imposed, as well as in 1268, at the Cortes of Jerez. Until this point the rules had only related to men’s clothing and appearance. Now an additional clause was imposed, stating that Muslim women (mouras) as well as their Jewish counterparts, were allowed to wear coloured or white clothing, with otter-fur trim, but not scarlet or orange, or ermine-trimmed items and other expensive adornments, golden shoes, or sleeves made of gold and silk.6 The distinctive haircut (also described as being ‘cut short all around the head’) was the most discriminatory feature of these rules. Colours, fabrics and ornaments applied to a broader sector of society, the most prized being the monopoly of the upper nobility and clergyman and, of course, royalty.7 The haircut could not be hidden and therefore was subject to immediate visual perception. Curiously enough the manipulation of the hair pattern is complemented by the immutability of that characteristic Muslim feature, the beard, which was to be worn in accordance with ‘their own law’. Thus the prescriptions of the Fourth Lateran Council were put in motion, if not exactly throughout the definition of different costume (which did not seem necessary, at least in the 13th century) through the differentiation by hairstyle and beard. Throughout the late 13th and 14th centuries, reiterated laws of the Crown of Aragon were published regarding the specific hairstyle of Muslim men. In the late 1290s, the Customs of Tortosa echoed Castilian rules about the haircut, to be short all around the head, and also referred to long beards. But for the first time obligatory dress is also mentioned, specifically long, loose tunics with sleeves (aljubas) and other loose-sleeved garments (almeixias or almejías) for men (unless they were working physically), and the aldifara8 for Muslim and Jewish women alike.9 In 1293, after complaints by the bishop of Lérida, King Jaume II (r. 1291– 1327) ordered that Muslims of the city wear their hair long (in contrast with the 4 5 6 7

8 9

Joana Sequeira, O pano da Terra. Produção têxtil em Portugal nos finais da Idade Média (Porto: Universidade do Porto, 2014), p. 208. Constable, To Live Like a Moor, p. 30. Constable, To Live like a Moor, p. 30. See, for instance, about the prohibition of such ornaments, textiles and colours for the squires of Castile: Cortes de Leon y de Castilla, I (Madrid: Real Academia de la Historia, 1861), p. 59 (Cortes de Valladolid, 1258, item 22). A type of shirt or tunic; Federico Corriente, Diccionario de Arabismos y voces afines en Iberorromance (Barcelona: Gredos, 2003), s.v. Constable, To Live like a Moor, p. 35; José Hinojosa Montalvo, Los mudéjares: La voz del Islam en la España cristiana, I, Estudio (Teruel: Centro de Estudios Mudéjares, 2002), p. 294.

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Castilian Muslims and those of Tortosa) but without the garceta,10 in order to distinguish themselves from Christians. However, in 1301, in Aragon, the haircut – short all around the head – was imposed and reiterated in 1341 by the prohibition of the Valencian Muslims from wearing the garceta.11 A twist occurred, nevertheless, in September 1347, with Pedro IV of Aragon (r. 1336–1387), requiring Muslim Valencian men instead to wear the garceta – a reversal of the earlier prohibition – revealing a change in fashion within the majority population.12 This abrupt modification caused problems, especially because laws in Aragon had in fact continued to insist that Muslims must not wear it, and immediately precipitated a flurry of court cases and appeals involving Mudejars, their lords, urban administrators, and royal officials.13 Nevertheless, the obligation of wearing the garceta was, in 1386, extended, by the same king, to the whole of the Aragonese Muslims, and the rule was repeated in 1390 and 1394.14 The confusion and inconsistency of these controversial laws gave rise to the resistance of Muslims and even rebellions.15 These rules testify to the major importance of hairstyle in shaping Moorishness, through the differentiation between members of the minority and Christians, in a kingdom with a substantial regional diversity of Muslim, Jew and Christian subjects as Aragon had. For instance, in 1301, at the Cortes of Lérida, the king not only reemphasized different Muslim hairstyles in that city (this time, contrary to what was established in 1293, requiring the hair to be cut short all around the head) but he also reminded Christians that they should not wear Muslim dress.16 In the final decades of the 14th century a major alteration occurred in the political discourse on Moorishness. Legislation, in Castile, in Aragon and even in Portugal, focused rather on costume and distinctive signs, this time actually in line with the rulings of the Fourth Lateran Council. In Castile, from, at least, the Cortes of Jerez (1268) Muslims and Jews (as well as prostitutes), were forbidden to wear high-quality clothes and fabrics, legislation that would be expanded throughout the 14th and the 15th centuries.17 For instance, at the Cortes of Valladolid, in 1351, 10 In this style the hair grew in locks on either side of the face, in front of the ears, and falling to

11 12 13 14 15 16 17

about half-way down the ears, then pushed back behind to reveal the ears; Constable, To Live like a Moor, p. 34; Maria Teresa Ferrer i Mallol, Els sarraïns de la corona catalano-aragonesa en el segle XIV: Segregació i discriminació (Barcelona: Consell Superior d’Investigaciones Cientifíques, 1987), pp. 45–55. Constable, To Live like a Moor, p. 36. Constable, To Live like a Moor, p. 36. Constable, To Live like a Moor, p. 37. Constable, To Live like a Moor, p. 37; Ferrer i Mallol, Els sarraïns, pp. 52–55. Constable, To Live like a Moor, p. 37; Hinojosa Montalvo, Los mudéjares: La voz del Islam, I, p. 295. Constable, To Live like a Moor, p. 35. Miguel Angel Ladero Quesada, ‘Los Mudéjares de Castilla en la Baja Edad Média’, in Los mudéjares de Castilla y otros Estudios de Historia Medieval Andaluza (Granada: Universidad de Granada, 1989), pp. 63–64.



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Muslims over the age of 13, as well as Jews, were forbidden not only to wear high-quality imported woollen cloth, but also half-length cloaks or any garments ornamented with gold or silver. The justification was that those features made them indistinguishable from Christians.18 Yet the first references to an obligatory badge for Muslims in Castile appear in the Cortes of Palencia, in 1312 and in the Synod of Zamora, in 1313. Henrique II, in 1408, ordered Muslim men and women to wear a badge of cornflower blue over the right shoulder and men to wear a greenish yellow hood.19 In 1408, a new series of sumptuary laws was issued by Queen Catalina of Castile, reaffirming the same legislation: Castilian Muslim men were to wear a cowl made of yellow cloth over their coats; and men and women must wear on the right shoulder a certain size badge of cornflower blue in the shape of a crescent moon (regulations reaffirmed in 1437 and repeated in the Cortes of Toledo in 1480).20 In January 1412, the same queen enacted new legislation about textiles, styles of clothing and length of garments, to be applied to Muslims and to Jews, with sole reference to hair and beards (both of which should henceforth be worn long and uncut). The difference between the two minority communities lay in the badges, the yellow star for Jews and blue moon for Muslims.21 The two minority groups continued to be the target of subsequent regulations throughout the 15th century, being ordered to wear public markers on their clothing, to dress differently from Christians and to avoid luxury textiles and adornments like pearls, silver or gold.22 In the Crown of Aragon, in 1373, Valencian Muslims were required to wear aljubas (as in the Customs of Tortosa a century earlier), to cover their heads with a blue cloth and Muslim women to veil their faces.23 In March 1391, at the Cortes of Monzón, King Juan I (r. 1387–1396) ordered that all Muslims in Catalonia over the age of 10 must wear a yellow badge on their right sleeve or, if the garment was yellow, a red one.24 The provision was extended to all Muslims in the Crown of Aragon in June of the same year, causing the intervention of an ambassador of Granada in behalf of the Muslims, who reacted against this disposition.25 The rule was not uniformly applied: the Muslim communities of Catalonia appealed against this legislation and received freedom from wearing the badge in 1397.26 Legal records from the 13th to the 15th centuries repeatedly insisted on the confusion of visual identity between Christians and non-Christians all through 18 Cortes de Leon y de Castilla, II (Madrid: Real Academia de la História, 1863), p. 19, item 32. 19 Ladero Quesada, ‘Los Mudéjares de Castilla en la Baja Edad Media’, p. 64. 20 Constable, To Live like a Moor, pp. 40–41. 21 Constable, To Live like a Moor, p. 41.

22 Constable, To Live like a Moor, p. 40. 23 Hinojosa Montalvo, Los mudéjares: La voz del Islam, I, p. 295; Ferrer i Mallol, Els sarraïns, p. 54. 24 Hinojosa Montalvo, Los mudéjares: La voz del Islam, I, p. 296. 25 Hinojosa Montalvo, Los mudéjares: La voz del Islam, I, p. 296. 26 Ferrer i Mallol, Els sarraïns, p. 57.

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the Iberian Peninsula. The often disorderly and contradictory rules, urgently implemented in order to shape a Moorishness and a Jewishness, challenged what were in effect regional sartorial differences, insisting on a legal homogeneity that clashed with the actual dissimilarity of clothing. The permeability of boundaries meant that dress styles crossed social groups: at the Cortes of Madrigal in 1476, the Catholic Monarchs complained that ‘it is not possible to tell if the Jews are Jews, or if they are clerics or letrados [men of letters] of great state and authority, or if the Moors are Moors, or if they are gently bred courtiers’.27 It was not a question of the nonexistence of Christian or Moorish costume: people both understood and manipulated the expectations of visual identity. In some cases, Muslims or Jews were accused of consciously dressing like Christians (generally to visit Christian prostitutes).28 Christians in some regions also adopted Muslim clothing, as testified by the inhabitants of Lérida being forbidden to wear it in 1293,29 and even nobility, such as King Enrique IV of Castile (r. 1454–1474) and his constable, Miguel Lucas de Iranzo, were known for wearing Moorish garb.30 Clearly an intermingling of styles existed. In his Breviario Sunni, Iça Gidelli (Isā ibn Jābir) wrote in the 15th century that ‘it is abhorrent to wear clothing in Christian styles for prayer’.31 The porous boundaries of ethnic clothing extended as far as the Muslim kingdom of Granada, where the first members of the Nasrid dynasty (13th century) seemed to dress as Christian Castilians and, in the same century, the equipment of the Grenadine soldiers was very similar to their Christian counterparts, specifically the scarlet cloak of its officers.32 Moreover, for the Christian elite to wear luxury Moorish clothing (‘trajes a la morisca’) for special events was a trend that appeared in the later Middle Ages and extended into the 16th and part of the 17th century. In the popular juego de cañas, an equestrian event popular in 15th- to 17th-century Iberia ‘which was regarded as a ceremonial space for the display of aristocratic status’,33 all the participants (Christians) dressed as Moors in leather boots (borceguíes), a Moorish tunic (marlota), a hooded cap (capellar) and a turban, as well as holding the leather shield 27 Apud Constable, To Live like a Moor, p. 41. 28 In 1304 and 1334, two Muslims of Zaragoza had tried to pass as Christians in order to have sex

29 30

31 32 33

with a Christian prostitute; Constable, To Live like a Moor, p. 43. In 1466, the Jew from Lisbon, José Amado, was accused of visiting the prostitution quarters, dressed as a Christian; Maria José Pimenta Ferro Tavares, Os Judeus em Portugal no Século XV, II (Lisbon: Instituto Nacional de Investigação Científica, 1984) p. 839. Constable, To Live like a Moor, p. 35. María Isabel del Val Valdivieso, ‘Moros y moras en el entorno de Isabel la Católica’, in Vivir en Minorías en España y América (siglos XV al XVIII), ed. by Rica Amrán and Antonio Cortijo Ocaña (Santa Barbara, CA: eHumanista Publications, 2017), p. 86. Constable, To Live like a Moor, p. 42. Rachel Arié, ‘Quelques remarques sur le costume des musulmans d’Espagne au temps des Naṣrides’, Arabica, 12 (1965), 244–61 (p. 245). Javier Irigoyen-García, Moors dressed as Moors. Clothing, Social Distinction, and Ethnicity in Early Modern Iberia (Toronto-Buffalo-London: University of Toronto Press, 2018), p. 145.



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known as an adarga34 and threw light spears at each other while riding horses in complex patterns to demonstrate their equestrian prowess. Other elements of Muslim features permeated almost every aspect of the game’s organization, as riders were supposed to hurl and shout in a distinctive way that allegedly evoked the way Muslims went to war.35 These luxury Moorish clothes served as a mark of nobility and as expression of power and social hierarchy, in which naturally the Muslims themselves and, later, the Moriscos (new Christians of Muslim ancestry) did not participate. The ceremonial use of that clothing constituted a mark of differentiation between commoners and elites, in any case Christians, and ‘it became a privileged locus for social confrontation and for negotiating nobility’.36 In Portugal, a narrative from 1491, involving the future King Manuel I, brother of Queen Leonor (and then Duke of Viseu and Beja), illustrates this aspect. When the entourage of King João II (r. 1481–1495) took their place in the fields of Alvisquer (Santarém), Manuel simulated an attack, with 12 of his noblemen, ‘all dressed in brocades and rich silks and very gallant in the Moorish style, with their spears in their hands and flags and the adargas on their arms, with great Moorish shouts’. All of them had come from the juego de cañas, in the Tomar region. ‘A gallant skirmish’ took place between the two forces, one commanded by the king and the other by the Duke, Manuel. The chronicler concludes: ‘the canas were extremely rich and very well played, and many men fell […] but there were no disasters or dangers.’37 However, this display of luxury Moorish garments at the games has no relation to the real clothing used by the actual Muslim subjects of the Iberian Kings. It was only a Christian feature, defined by cross-cultural influences or, as Barbara Fuchs puts it, a facet of the maurophilia that was so prevalent in the 15th and 16th centuries in Spain.38 So it is possible to distinguish between two different and separate aspects of Moorish clothing, which enacted distinctive subjects and aims: the ceremonial display of Christian aristocracy in the jogos de canas, on the one hand; and the assumed shaping of Moorishness, applied to the attire of Muslim subordinates, on the other.

34 Irigoyen-García, Moors dressed as Moors, p. 8. 35 Irigoyen-García, Moors dressed as Moors, p. 9.

36 Irigoyen-García, Moors dressed as Moors, p. 15. 37 Garcia de Resende, Vida e Feitos d’El Rey Dom João Segundo, ed. by Evelina Verdelho, Corpus

Electrónico do CELGA (Coimbra: Universidade de Coimbra, Centro de Estudos de Linguística Geral e Aplicada – CELGA, 2007), p. 191 [accessed 25 May 2022]. 38 Barbara Fuchs, Exotic Nation. Maurophilia and the Construction of Early Modern Spain (Philadelphia, PA: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2009).

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Dressi ng M oors in Po rtu gal In the broader context of the Iberian Peninsula, the Portuguese kingdom presented some peculiarities of its own. In the first place, there is no documentary evidence about the imposition of specific styles of hair and beard, as in the other Iberian kingdoms.39 Secondly, the definition of male dress was the main target of political and legal discourses, apparent from a negotiating process that extended throughout the 14th and 15th centuries. The first mention of both Jewish badges and specific Moorish clothing dates to the kingdom of Afonso IV (r. 1325–1357). An elegiac poem points out that he ‘did good to his servants, honoured his private servants and obliged all Jews to wear distinguishing signs, and Muslims to wear almexias, so that they could be recognized as such’.40 The almexias, outer, loose-sleeved garments, had also been mentioned in the Customs of Tortosa (Catalonia), by the end of the 13th century. It was, however, with Afonso’s son Pedro I (r. 1357–1367) that negotiations on this issue began to appear in the written sources, although with a different vocabulary. By a royal letter of 18 February 1359, the monarch responded to the claims of the Muslims of Moura (in the region of Alentejo, South Portugal), whose theme was effectively clothing. Presenting themselves as ‘men of great labour and eagerness’, Muslims complained that they could not perform their tasks because of the aljubas the monarch had ordered all Muslims to wear, especially the two-footwide sleeves which were too large and impractical. The sovereign authorized the sleeves to be narrowed. He reiterated, nevertheless, the obligation of wearing the aljubas and albornozes of any cloth, according to people’s rank, with signs on the chest over the garments, so that they were recognized as Moors. Apart from the sleeves, another compromise was granted: they could remove this attire when they arrived at the workplace and while working there. The aljuba (al-ğubba) and the albornoz (al-burnūs), as their Arabic names denote, constituted the characteristic dress of the Islamic West, and they are also mentioned for the Aragonese Muslims. The aljuba consisted of a long loose tunic, generally with narrow sleeves,41 while the albornoz was a cloak, sometimes hooded, generally put over it.42 Both conform to the tradition of al-Andalus and North 39 Only an apocryphal chronicle from the 17th century notes that Afonso IV ordered Muslims

to shave their hair with a razor and Jews to cut it with scissors; José Rivair Macedo, ‘Os sinais da infâmia e o vestuário dos mouros em Portugal nos séculos XIV e XV’, Bulletin du centre d’études médiévales d’Auxerre | BUCEMA, Hors-série n° 2 (2008) (para. 25 of 53) [accessed 25 May 2022]. It is not repeated by any other documentary source. 40 ‘fez bem aos criados seus | e grão honra aos privados | e fez a todos os judeus | trazer sinaes divisados | e os mouros almexias | que os pudessem conhecer’; apud Macedo, ‘Os sinais da infâmia’ (para. 29 of 53). 41 Yedida Kalfon Stillman, Arab Dress. From the Dawn of Islam to Modern Times, ed. by Norman A. Stillman, rev. 2nd edn (Leiden: Brill, 2003), p. 12. 42 Stillman, Arab Dress, pp. 17, 88.



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Africa, where long tunics were the basic attire of women and men.43 The whole tone of this royal letter points to the innovative nature of the law that very possibly modernized the one of King Afonso IV (r. 1325–1357). It seems that under King Pedro I (r. 1357–1367), Muslim men were forced to wear not only an outer cloak, as before, but a tunic and a cloak, completely covering them. It is possible that the terms aljuba and albornoz were used as synonyms and that the law refers only to the large exterior tunic/cloak. Nonetheless, those garments were too heavy and awkward, especially for agricultural work, as the Muslims of Moura pointed out, features exacerbated by the excessive width of the sleeves – a clear sign of discrimination that involved a specific posture through gesture and inhibited accessibility to objects.44 Moreover, they were required to wear a badge on their chests, though the nature of that badge is not specified. This imposed garment raises a question: whether the king really enforced this attire or simply made mandatory the clothing that was already used by Portuguese Muslims. The complaint of the Muslims of Moura seems to imply the first assumption, for their grievance was about the aljubas decreed by the monarch to apply ‘to all the Muslims of his realm’, the large sleeves being only an addition to their protest. It is true that in 1436, about 77 years after this petition, Lisbon Muslims claimed that the albornozes they wore over their clothes had always been worn by them and furthermore that they were the usual attire worn in the Land of Moors.45 Even so, at least two generations had passed from the time the law of Pedro I was passed, and the memory could have been constructed since then. One point is clear: this garment was commonly used in Granada as in North Africa. The characteristic costume of the Muslim West was therefore imposed on Portuguese Muslims, even though it is not clear whether they already used it or, perhaps, particular items of it. It is most probable that, as in Castile and Aragon, there were regional differences in dress, corresponding in the 14th century to an attempted standardisation, which, in Portugal, developed more tangibly in the realm of Pedro I. There were many underlying reasons for these changes. On one hand, the progressive affirmation of Christian ethnocentrism and the subsequent evolving discrimination of Jews and Muslims. It was also under Pedro I, in 43 ‘The Muslim West, called in Arabic simply al-Maghreb (the West), which in the Middle

Ages included Spain and Sicily as well as North Africa, belongs generally to the AraboMediterranean vestimentary system, whose common unifying factors are rectangular tunics and loose outer wraps’; Stillman, Arab Dress, p. 86. 44 There is older evidence of sleeves used as a means to humiliate and discriminate minority groups, in measures taken by the Almohad caliph al-Mansûr (1198/1199) who, according to chronicles, compelled the Jews of his land to wear a specific blue outfit, with ‘very long sleeves that nearly touched the feet’; Manuela Marín, ‘La vida cotidiana’, in El Retroceso Territorial de Al-Andalus – Almorávides y Almohades – siglos XI al XIII, ed. by María Jesús Viguera Molíns, Historia de España Ramón Menéndez Pidal, 8.2 (Madrid: Espasa-Calpe, 1998), pp. 385 to 436 (p. 393). 45 Ordenações Afonsinas, ed. by Martim de Albuquerque (Lisbon: Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian, 1984), Livro II, tit. CIII, p. 537.

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1361, that the people’s representatives demanded physical separation from Jews and Muslims, invoking the ‘scandal and disgust’ that Christians suffered in living together with the members of those religious groups. The king determined that in places where more than ten Muslims or Jews lived, they should have separate quarters.46 Later, in 1366, Pedro I also prohibited Muslims and Jews circulating in towns after sunset.47 The enclosure of clothing was echoed in the enclosure of quarters and limitation of movement. On the other hand, the insistence on the different visual perception of Muslims suggests that, as in Castile and Aragon, there was a mixed situation, in which, in some regions Muslims effectively dressed, at least in part, like their Christian (and Jewish) counterparts, or even vice versa – which is quite likely in areas, if not with a majority, at least with a significant percentage of Muslims, such as in the Algarve. Moorishness was not an easy target to be achieved in the whole of the Iberian Peninsula. Yet, in the later periods, Portuguese Muslims had already internalized a self-referential dress code, that arose from the laws of Pedro I or, at least, it was standardised through them. All through the 15th century, the social order inscribed a subsystem of clothing, Moorish dress (traje de mouros), though still open to negotiation, silencing for a long period the issue of the specific badge: a semantic system of dress that finally shaped Moorishness. In 1435, a conflict opposed the Muslims from Lisbon to the authority of the alcaide pequeno of the city (an officer in charge of maintaining order, a kind of police chief). They claimed ‘that they had always used’ over their clothes albornozes, escapularios (head coverings) and balandraus (the same as aljubas). For some inexplicable reason, the alcaide pequeno had forbidden them to wear albornozes, which, they argued, was against their ‘good uses and habits’, namely because said albornozes were the usual clothing in the Land of the Moors. King Duarte (r. 1433–1438), after consulting the alcaide pequeno and checking the written legal documents on this issue, judged in favour of the Muslims: they could wear the attire ‘they have always worn’, especially because it was quite different from the Christians’, and they ‘always wear it like that’.48 The debate changed radically from 1359, when the Muslims of Moura protested against the imposed dress code, to 1435 when those from Lisbon defended it as their own, and the king recognized its almost fundamental character: in his argument, Muslims had always dressed that way. Thus an imposed attire became, in the 15th century, an intrinsic part of the identity of the group, expanding a visual Moorishness which some Muslims accepted as their own and outsiders took as a mark of Muslim ‘otherness’.

46 Cortes Portuguesas. Reinado de D. Pedro I (1357–1367), ed. by A. H. de Oliveira Marques and Nuno

José Pizarro Pinto Dias (Lisbon: Instituto Nacional de Investigação Científica, 1986), p. 52.

47 Chancelarias Portuguesas. D. Pedro I (1357–1367), ed. by A. H. de Oliveira Marques (Lisbon:

Instituto Nacional de Investigação Científica, 1984), doc. 1131, pp. 534–35.

48 Albuquerque, Ordenações Afonsinas, II, tit. CIII, pp. 536–38.



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In the reign of King Afonso V (r. 1438–1481), the General Ordinances of the Realm regulated Muslim dress in further detail. The outer garments were defined as aljubas with aljubetes (hoods), the sleeves of which should be 0.70 m (2 feet 3½ inches) wide.49 The albornozes, which should be closed and sewn with escapulários (hoods), and the balandraus (long-sleeved vest), that should also have a hood ‘as they always did’. The penalty applied to offenders would be the loss of their clothing and prison indefinitely or for a period of fifteen days if wearing the clothing but not in the specified way. However, the requirements of the ordinance were not strictly followed.50 Despite the semantic diversity, Moorish costume was always characterized by a long hooded and closed tunic (aljuba, albornoz or balandrau), including, in the case of the aljubas, excessively large sleeves. The body as well as the head were to be totally covered. This issue was by no means over. In 1454, the Muslims of Lisbon complained once more, protesting against the use of the closed garments that all Muslims in the kingdom were obliged to wear. They claimed that these garments were very difficult to work in. They pleaded with the monarch for the restoration of their traditional form, which was granted: the king gave permission for the cloaks to be open at the front.51 Even so, the popular representatives in the Cortes argued that a visual confusion persisted between members of the three religions. At the Cortes of Santarém, in 1451, they took issue with the appearance of ‘some Muslims’, who wore silk cloth and other luxury fabrics, calling on the king to forbid Muslims and Jews from wearing garments of silk, and cloth with a value greater than 50 reais, ‘so that the nobility of the ones and the others might be recognized by their clothing’. The proposal was accepted by the monarch. However, in the case of social events at which the king and other royalty were present, minorities would be allowed to wear fabrics otherwise forbidden to them.52 The same protagonists insisted on this issue once again at the Cortes of ÉvoraViana de Alvito, in 1482. ‘The people considered’, they argued, that Muslims and Jews, as well as their wives, should be publicly recognized by their signs and attire, ‘as they once were’. The text’s danada dissoluçom directly references the damnatae commixtionis (damned commingling) of Jews, Saracens and Christians mentioned in canon 68 of the Fourth Lateran Council, from 1215. Canon law was clearly invoked in these arguments, which moved the king to make some decisions. In this sense, he reiterated the prohibition for Jews to wear silk and the imposition of the visibility of the badge and forced them to dress, from then on, only in 49 The sleeves should correspond to ‘huma alda de medir pano’. The alda is possibly the alna

or côvado, matching three spans (palmos) and a half, i.e. 0.70 m; A. H. de Oliveira Marques, ‘Pesos e Medidas’, in Dicionário da História de Portugal, ed. by Joel Serrão, 6 vols (Porto: Livraria Figueirinhas, 1963–1971), V (1981), pp. 67–72 (p. 68). 50 Albuquerque, Ordenações Afonsinas, II, tit. 103, pp. 538–39. 51 Arquivo Nacional da Torre do Tombo (henceforth ANTT), Chancelaria de D. Afonso V, vol. 10, fol. 119v. 52 ANTT, Suplemento de Cortes, maço 2, fol. 44v.

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closed clothing. Similarly, Muslims must also wear their cloaks closed (revoking the decision of 1454) or, if they used them open, they must add a red (crescent?) moon on the shoulder.53 The intended social closure of Muslims and Jews finds its most conspicuous symbolization in this dress code, which henceforth totally enclosed the body of the ‘Other’. It was not just a question of visual religious identification. It should be questioned whether, in the last quarter of the 15th century, a growing perception of the impurity of the Other’s body54 led to the total veiling of the impure flesh of Jews and Muslims, which supposedly prevented their contact with the outside. Even the possibility of the open outer clothes of Muslims was discouraged through the alternative imposition of a badge. Considering the anxiety over the theme of inter-religious sex in medieval Christianitas (punishable by death),55 the imposing of a de-sexualized male body, by hiding its anatomy, may have been one of the targets of this legislation. For Muslims, nevertheless, some precepts coincided with Christian rules. From the earliest times of Islam, it was established that Muslims should be clearly distinguishable from people of other creeds. They were also expected to follow a dress code based upon an ideal of modesty implying that the human body should be covered as much as possible.56 The long and ample tunics they wore (already a characteristic from al-Andalus), met this objective, concealing the anatomy. The visual difference could not be more striking between Christians and Muslims in this late medieval period. The fashion for Christian males was for progressively tighter clothing, which in the second decade of the 14th century evolved into what 53 Idem, fols 172v–173. The Latin text of the 4th Lateran Council may be found in Decrees of the

Ecumenical Councils, Volume One Nicaea I to Lateran V, ed. by Norman P. Tanner, S.J. (London: Sheed & Ward and Georgetown University Press, 1990), p. 266. The editors thank Christine Meek and Brenda Bolton for this reference and Anne Duggan for her helpful interpretation, which in the context of the previous sentence damnatae commixtionis means ‘censured commingling [of the sexes]’. The relevant text of canon 68 from an earlier edition may be found in Chapter 14, note 13 of the present book. 54 About the dichotomy pure/impure in the canon law particularly affecting discourses concerning the relationship between Christians and Jews, see James A. Brundage, ‘Intermarriage between Christians and Jews in Medieval Canon Law’, Jewish History, 3.1 (1988), pp. 25–40. 55 David Nirenberg, discussing the boundaries between the religious communities, observes that, ‘No matter where these boundaries were drawn, they were sexual in the sense that they justified themselves as safeguards against sexual danger’; David Nirenberg, ‘Conversion, sex and segregation: Jews and Muslims in Medieval Spain’, American Historical Review, 107.4, October 2002, pp. 1065–93 (p. 1073). See also on this theme: David Nirenberg, Communities of Violence. Persecution of Minorities in the Middle Ages, 2nd edn (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1998), Ch. 5, pp. 127–65; Simon Barton, Conquerors, Brides and Concubines. Interfaith Relations and Social Power in Medieval Iberia (Philadelphia, PA: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2015), Ch. 2, pp. 45–75. 56 See the chapter by Manuela Marín, ‘Written and Visual Images of Dress in al-Andalus’, in this book.



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Marques designates as the ‘X line’, with the gradual shortening of upper clothing that simultaneously became more tightly fitted to the body, revealing its shape.57 However, this distinction could be nuanced somewhat: an important aspect of the Moorish clothing subsystem is that the ample tunics and cloaks constituted an exterior garment to be used in the public space – visibility was the target of the legal rules. Inside these exterior garments the dress seems to have been, at least in some cases in the 15th century, identical to that of Christians, with the use of the camisa (an inner garment usually falling to the knees, open at the sides, with long sleeves)58 and other outfits.59 Thus Brafome, a Muslim of Setúbal, received royal permission to wear silk, in gibões (doublets) as in other clothing, as long as he wore them under the Moorish costume ‘and not otherwise’.60 That explained, perhaps, why a badge was required when Muslims wore open cloaks, because of the similarity of the inner clothing with that of Christians, and, as mentioned before, as a means to discourage open dress. The issue of the badge, described as a red moon placed on the shoulder, was reintroduced by the Cortes of Évora-Viana of 1482, after a single mention of specific signs in 1359, under Pedro I. Between the two dates there is documentary silence about this feature, indicating that free Muslims were no longer subject to it, at least from the end of the 14th century and, in the aforementioned Cortes of 1482, only under specific circumstances. The Moorish costume was in itself quite distinctive. Nevertheless, in the 15th century, the badge was imposed as both a religious and a legal marker, for captive/slave Muslims. At the Cortes of Coimbra, in 1472, the popular representatives stated that white and black Moors (as a synonym of non-free) who were found without the respective moons (luas) were subjected to the penalty of twenty lashes and their owner had to pay a fine.61 The sanctions changed later, as in 1468, at the Cortes of Santarém, it was specified that the punishment consist of ten lashes and a fine of 300 rs, seemingly paid by the slave himself.62

57 Antonio Henrique Rodrigo de Oliveira Marques, ‘O traje’, in his A Sociedade Medieval Portuguesa,

58 59

60 61 62

3rd edn (Lisbon: Livraria Sá da Costa, 1974), pp. 33–62 (p. 34). In al-Andalus, the contrast between the wide tunics of Muslims and the tighter garments of ‘Galicians’ was also a marker in dress code; Manuela Marín, ‘Written and Visual Images of Dress in al-Andalus’. Marques, ‘O traje’, pp. 33–62 (p. 35). Maria Filomena Lopes de Barros, Tempos e Espaços de Mouros A Minoria Muçulmana no Reino Português (Séculos XII a XV) (Lisbon: Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian / Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia, 2007), pp. 190–91. Barros, Tempos e Espaços de Mouros, p. 191. Henrique da Gama Barros, ‘Judeus e Mouros em Portugal em tempos passados’, Revista Lusitana, 35 (1937), 161–238 (p. 232). ANTT, Chancelaria de D. Afonso V, vol. 28, fol. 102.

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Th e i nvi si b i li ty o f wo me n Though the sources are silent about it, presumably the badge was imposed on female slaves/captives as well as males. Dress, however, was another matter. All the legal discourse and negotiations of the 14th and 15th centuries were addressed exclusively to males. Not a single reference is made to women’s attire. Moorishness was a male attribute, as social perception was limited to the representation of men in the public sphere. In fact, it was both a Christian and a Muslim perception, as Islamic principles concerning the role of women are predicated on their exclusion from public life. In the reign of the Portuguese King João I (r. 1385–1433), a document revised and signed by the Lisbon notary, Yūsuf Ibn Ibrāhīm Ibn Yūsuf al-Laḥmī, provided a systematic description of taxes charged to the Muslims of the kingdom, following the basic lines of Islamic law. A clause concerning women stated that they were not subject to taxes that depended on remunerated economic activities, because ‘women didn’t work’.63 Nonetheless, the sources bear witness to different levels of social integration of Muslim women in Portugal as active artisans. Some cases attest that only widows were women perceived by society as economic production units, thus being integrated into the former fiscal status of their late husbands – as, for instance, in Santarém, where Ymena and Moreima, Moorish potters, received this designation and were taxed as such after the death of their husbands.64 However, for some other female artisans it seems that dependence on a husband or other male from the family was virtually non-existent: in 1471 Luza, a Moorish potteryware maker (moura louceira), declared that she was 80 years old and that she had practised this activity for 50 or 60 years.65 In any case, references to Muslim and Jewish women are scarce in written sources when compared to Christians. The issues of purity/impurity inherent in Judaism and Islam naturally focused on the female condition, tended towards a reclusive treatment of their women, in what was perhaps a defensive position in relation to their contact with Christian society and particularly Christian males. Even so, inter-faith sexual relations involving Muslim and Jewish women with Christian men are documented.66

63 Barros, Tempos e Espaços de Mouros, p. 195. 64 See for Ymena: ANTT, Mosteiro de Chelas, caderno L, doc. 6, fols 3–3v; Idem, maço 52, doc. 1036;

for Moreima, Idem, maço 45, doc. 887.

65 ANTT, Chancelaria de D. Afonso V, vol. 16, fol. 14. For all these elements, see Maria Filomena

Lopes de Barros, ‘A Mulher muçulmana no Portugal medieval’, Clio, Nova Série 16–17 (2007), 105–17 (pp. 114–15). 66 An example is Fotes Carota, a married Muslim woman from Santarém, who engaged in carnal relations with a Christian, Álvaro Vaz. Her husband pardoned her ‘the sin and error which she deserved by her law’ and therefore she received royal forgiveness in exchange for the amount of 500 rs; ANTT, Chancelaria de D. João II, vol. 4, fol. 27v.



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This scarcity of sources makes for a lack of evidence for their dress. Only one document provides some information. In 1474, a marriage contract for Lisbon Muslims described the items that a bridegroom gave as alfadia (al-hadiyya – bridal gift) to his future wife: a Galician and a red Moorish aljuba, silver hoops, a linen alfame (al-lifām – veil), with silk ornamentation, a Tunisian alambuz (al-lubūs – dress) and a Moorish enxeravia (head cover).67 The garment names themselves, expressed in Arabic or through adjectives like ‘Moorish’ or ‘Tunisian’ (with the sole exception of ‘Galician’), indicate that Muslim women’s dress was differentiated from that of Christian women. For Muslims, as for Christians, gender was expressed in people’s outward appearance: as Manuela Marin has said ‘gender ambiguity was sternly condemned’.68 Yet the dichotomy between male and female dress in medieval Islam was concerned more with fabrics and colours, rather the tailoring of clothes,69 as the aljubas clearly prove for the members of the Muslim minority since the aljuba was worn by both sexes. The veil (alfame) was the indicative element of female gender at least in public areas, perceived generally as any piece worn by women to hide their body, or at least part of it.70 The exceptional importance of the veil became ‘a true theology of female purity maintenance’, metaphorically projected on to the Muslim household, which was a ‘veil in stone, replacing the cotton- or wool-made veil’.71 There is no description about the use of this outfit, and one could only speculate whether it covered the woman’s body totally or only partially. A poem from the 15th century seems to justify the latter hypothesis, by stating the surprise at the sight in Portugal of a Muslim woman from North Africa who was fully covered, ‘as no one else’, as the poet stressed.72 As far as adornments are concerned, the Lisbon marriage contract already mentioned alluded only to silver hoops, though it is likely that none of the items bestowed by the future husband were to be used in everyday life, but only on special occasions or even reserved for future needs as, if not luxury, at least valuable goods. In fact, dress and jewellery constituted a reserve of capital acquired during the economic exchanges that formalized marriage contracts, allowing the woman to survive in the event of divorce or widowhood. The legislation 67 ANTT, Mosteiro de S. Vicente de Fora (2ª incorporação), caixa 20, doc. 18. 68 Manuela Marín, ‘Written and Visual Images of Dress in al-Andalus’ in this book.

69 Manuela Marín, Mujeres en al-Andalus (Madrid: Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas,

2000), p. 187.

70 Marín, Mujeres en al-Andalus, p. 188. 71 Abdelwahab Bouhdiba, La sexualité en Islam, 2nd edn (Paris: Presses Universitaires de France,

1979), pp. 49–50.

72 ‘Mas vos yreis embuçadas | dalfareme de çendal | de tres moços agoardada, | muy olhada,

| poys nom vay nenhuma tal.’ (But you will go completely covered | with the sendal veil | awaited by three young men | because you are as no one else.); Cancioneiro Geral de Garcia de Resende, ed. by Aida Fernandes Dias, 4 vols (Lisbon: INCM – Imprensa Nacional Casa da Moeda, 1993), IV, p. 176.

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for Muslims in Portugal, following Islamic law, considered that all jewellery belonged to married women: ‘abotoaduras [buttons] and chapas, and hoops, and aljofar [pearls] strings, and rings and all other ornaments’ which were ‘for women’s use’.73 Nevertheless, mentions of Muslim women are rare in written sources, conveying their near-invisibility in society.

Conclusio n In the Iberian Peninsula dress code created a hierarchy, singularising the categories of the Muslim and the Jew within the urban human landscape. And if the phenomena applied, in a certain measure, to the whole of society, in this specific case it conveyed a level of intentional discrimination: Jews were not subject to a different dress code but to a badge visibly affixed on the outer clothing; Muslims used their own subsystem of clothing, the Moorish costume, but, in medieval Portugal, there was a bias towards excessively large sleeves. In Aragon and Castile, the diminishing measures included a particular haircut applied only to Muslims. In any case, visual perception crudely appealed to the superiority of Christians over minorities, and their subsequent differentiation, as advocated by canon law. This dimension of clothing distinction was necessarily subject to a procedure, contextualized in time and space. While, for example, the badge of Jews was enforced for the first time in England as early as 1218, in Portugal it was only in the 14th century that such a measure was applied. This development inscribed itself in a broader process, the making of a res publica christiana, under the sway of the papacy: Christian-Latin ethnocentrism is also defined by opposition to the alterity of Jews and Muslims. Clothing is just one dimension of the process, for which primary sources are often scarce and provide incomplete information. However, as Iberian Christian powers tried to shape a recognizable Moorishness, this intended homogeneity clashed with regional and interiorized identity parameters of Muslim communities. The expectations of a visual identity were achieved by the defining appearance of Otherness marked both by hair style and beard (in Castile and Aragon), and by specific signs and clothing. In Portugal, the sub­ system of Moorish garments, with its bias towards loose sleeves, became an identity feature of the group. Nevertheless, it endured a process of intense negotiation between the monarch and his Muslim subjects from the second half of the 14th century, although focusing only on the male element. The dichotomy between open and closed garments – the first defended by Muslims, and the last forced by Christian powers – finally resolved itself in the last quarter of the 15th century, with the final imposition of closed garments, for both Muslims and Jews, resulting in a de-sexualized male body, totally hiding the underlying anatomy. The closing

73 Albuquerque, Ordenações Afonsinas, II, tit. 27, p. 238.



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of the social order was completed with ‘its most conspicuous symbolization in this dress code’.74 This social order ignored Muslim women, considering them apart from the public sphere, the only social scenario relevant for the discourses of power.75

74 Cornelia Bohn, ‘Kleidung als Kommunikationsmedium’, in Cornelia Bohn, Inklusion, Exklusion

und die Person (Konstanz: UVK, 2006), p. 110.

75 This work was funded by national funds through the Foundation for Science and Technology

and the European Regional Development Fund (FEDER) through the Competitiveness and Internationalization Operational Program (POCI) and PT2020, under the UID / HIS project / 00057 - POCI-01-0145-FEDER-007702.

chapter 9

Medieval Castilian Garments and their Arabic Names 1 Dolores Serrano-Niza

I ntroductio n

T

he study of Castilian garments bearing Arabic names requires starting with some historical context that cannot be overlooked, even if it is well known already. I refer specifically to the fluctuating border between the Kingdom of Castile and the Nasrid Kingdom of Granada, particularly from the 13th century onwards. In this period the Castilian Kings Fernando III (r. 1217 in Castile, from 1230 in both Castile and Leon to 1252) and Alfonso X (r. 1252–1284) managed to consolidate the boundaries that separated the Christian and Islamic kingdoms, or perhaps it would be more precise to say that they ‘demarcated’ them because, as we shall see, they had many things in common despite their origins as two different societies with conflicting political interests and different religious systems. This border between the two entities maintained, throughout the following centuries, a reflection in which each one could see itself, as an ‘other’ through which their own identity could be reinforced. In any case, I believe that it is appropriate to talk about a ‘border of influence zones’ when referring to the Castilian-Nasrid frontier that acted for centuries as an area for cultural exchange that was mutually enriching. This was undoubtedly a permeable division for which there is a large body of evidence of cultural transfer. Within the evidence, and as an example, 1

This publication is part of the project ‘Vestir la casa: espacios, objetos y emociones en los siglos XV y XVI’ (Dressing the house: spaces, objects and emotions in the 15th and 16th centuries) (Ref. PGC2018-093835-B-I00), funded by the Ministerio de Ciencia e InnovaciónAgencia Estatal de Investigación and FEDER ‘Una manera de hacer Europa’ (Principal Investigator: María Elena Díez Jorge).

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we can find both clothing and the words used to refer to it, which is the main focus of this work. With regard to garments, scholarly literature has increased over the last decades, but much research remains to be carried out. There is also a lack of interdisciplinary research, considering the complex nature of the data that needs to be examined in this field, particularly regarding the dress of the period under discussion.2 Nevertheless, we have access to the language in which these clothes were named, and this is the most difficult part of this study, because the evolution of a garment and that of the word that describes it do not always follow a similar path, as we shall see below. It seems clear that clothing bears witness to the scene of the Iberian Peninsula during the Middle Ages, a cultural crossroads fostered by the territory of al-Andalus and the various Christian kingdoms. This was the cradle of what was in later centuries referred to as ‘Spanish culture’. As a result of that rich cultural exchange among three religions and three cultures under the shared name of ‘Andalusi’, we can see a permanent mark in the existence of Arabic expressions or words with an Arabic origin in the Romance languages of the Iberian Peninsula. Their study based on conceptual fields reveals a strong presence in different significant aspects of daily life, such as food, home furniture and the focus of our study, clothing. I have identified garment-terms in the relevant specialist dictionaries3 and compared the results with documentary references in which those words are 2

Rachel Arié, ‘Acerca del traje musulmán en España desde la caída de Granada hasta la expulsión de los moriscos’, Revista del Instituto de Estudios Islámicos, 13 (1965–1966), 103–117; Rachel Arié, ‘Le costume des musulmans de Castille au XIIIe siècle d’après les miniatures du Libro del Ajedrez’, Mélanges de la Casa de Velázquez, 2 (1966), 59–66; Carmen Bernis Madrazo, ‘Modas moriscas en la sociedad cristiana española’, Boletín de la Real Academia Española, 144 (1959), 199–239; María Martínez, ‘Indumentaria y sociedad medievales (ss. XII–XV)’, En la España Medieval, 26 (2003), 35–39; María Martínez, ‘La creación de una moda propia en la España de los Reyes Católicos’, Aragón en la Edad Media, 19 (2006), 343–80; María Martínez, ‘Influencias islámicas en la indumentaria medieval española’, Estudios sobre patrimonio, cultura y ciencias medievales, 13–14 (2011–2012),187–222; Dolores Serrano-Niza, Glosario árabeespañol de Indumentaria según el Kitāb al-Mujaṣṣaṣ de Ibn Sīdah (Madrid: Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas, 2005); Dolores Serrano-Niza, ‘El léxico castellano medieval se viste con palabras árabes. Algunos arabismos de indumentaria’, in Sacrum Arabo-Semiticum. Homenaje al profesor Federico Corriente en su 65 aniversario, ed. by Jordi Aguadé, Ángeles Vicente and Leila Abu-Shams (Zaragoza: Instituto de Estudios Islámicos, 2005), pp. 439–52; Dolores Serrano-Niza, ‘Para una nomenclatura acerca de la indumentaria islámica en al-Andalus’, in Across the Mediterranean Frontiers: Trade, Politics and Religion 650–1450, ed. by Dionisius A. Agius and Ian Richard Netton (Turnhout: Brepols, 1997), pp. 333–45; Tejer y vestir: de la Antigüedad al Islam, ed. by Manuela Marín, Estudios árabes e islámicos. Monografías 1 (Madrid: Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas, 2001). 3 Contemporary dictionary: El vocabulario de Pedro de Alcalá, ed. by Elena Pezzi (Almería: Editorial Cajal, 1989); Dictionary based on contemporary documentary sources: Diccionario de Autoridades (Madrid: Real Academia Española, 1969); Etymological dictionaries: Federico Corriente, Diccionario de arabismos y voces afines en iberorromance (Madrid: Gredos, 2003);



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present as direct witnesses of a historical moment, namely the Documentos aráb­ igo-granadinos4 and the Inventarios de bienes moriscos del reino de Granada (siglo XVI).5 These bilingual documents examined by Juan Martínez Ruiz were among the inventories of goods of the Moors in the Alhambra Archives. These inventories account for the discovery of unpublished terms with an Arabic origin, which have enormous historical and philological value. These documents become ‘ethnological surveys’ of great interest for our study. In fact, it is very useful that scribes in the 16th century had to ask Arabic translators to tell them the names of the goods that the Moors left behind, as well as to translate the documents written in Arabic. These findings by Professor Martínez Ruiz, which were published years later with the title Inventarios de bienes moriscos del reino de Granada (siglo XVI)6 have been an essential source for this chapter, to which we have added the new terms with an Arabic origin related to clothing that he unearthed, together with those listed by Federico Corriente.7 This work also includes an analysis of those words that addresses their existence, disappearance or partial usage, since I believe that these are methodological data of great significance. The different garment terms extracted from these corpora were classified for their study according to use: headdresses, cloaks and outer garments, tunics, underwear and footwear. Other important sources for this study are the visual images of the period. Given the scarcity – or even the lack – of iconographic sources for Andalusi and Moorish content, it is interesting to use the iconographic support provided by the 13th-century miniatures that are featured in the Cantigas.8 These representations are invaluable in spite of the centuries that separate the texts discussed here and the illustrations. The Cantigas illustrations reveal meticulous detail about the clothes and the interiors of houses that are extremely useful for this

4 5 6 7 8

Reinhart Dozy, and Willem Herman Engelmann, Glossaire des mots espagnols et portugais dérivés de l’arabe (Amsterdam: Apa-Oriental Express, 1982); Joan Corominas and José Antonio Pascual, Diccionario crítico etimológico castellano e hispánico (Madrid: Gredos, 1980–81) and Arabic Dress Dictionary: Reinhart Dozy, Dictionnaire détaillé des noms des vêtements chez les arabes (Amsterdam: J. Muller, 1845). Luis Seco de Lucena Paredes, Documentos arábigo-granadinos (Madrid: Instituto de Estudios Islámicos, 1961). Juan Martínez Ruiz, Inventarios de bienes moriscos del reino de Granada (siglo XVI) (Madrid: Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas, 1972). Martínez Ruiz, Inventarios de bienes moriscos del reino de Granada. Corriente, Diccionario de Arabismos. The Cantigas are songs dedicated to praising the Virgin Mary, commissioned by King Alfonso X (d. 1284) and containing an extraordinary number of miniatures depicting contemporaneous clothing. I have consulted Códice Rico de las Cantigas de Santa María de D. Alfonso el Sabio, Edición facsímil del Códice T.I.1 de la Biblioteca de San Lorenzo el Real de El Escorial Siglo XIII, 2 vols (Madrid: Edilan, 1979).

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research. In addition, we have pictures by Cristoph Weiditz for the book of travels by Hieronymus Münzer, who travelled in the Iberian Peninsula in 1494 to 1495.9 Last but not least, we shall also include the inconsiderable material legacy offered by the remaining fragments of fabrics and clothes preserved in different collections and institutions, for example the abbey of Las Huelgas, the burial place for part of the royal family during the 13th and 14th centuries.10 Based on all of these sources we will only focus on some items of clothing that are representative of the different categories in which they were included, and they are: almaizar, alhareme, almalafa, adorra, aljuba, marlota and alcandora, the evolution of which are discussed in this paper. The time frame of this study falls within the chronological boundaries established by the written documents: the second half of the 15th century and the first half of the 16th century. The ultimate focus of this chapter will be the clothing that has now disappeared but was once part of the wardrobe of the Iberian Peninsula. From this perspective, this study has two aims: to identify the lexical terms referring to clothing or home furnishings in the literature, and to analyse and describe the garments. Finally, we will focus on the corpus of terms related to clothing that other researchers have brought to light. We must also take into account the fact that the history of Arab costume in al-Andalus, as we have mentioned before, lacks an essential source of information – visual sources – because it is evident that the data provided by paintings and sculptures of that period are first-rate ways to visualise the garment itself and its possible evolution. Consequently, and as a replacement for those iconographic sources, words with an Arabic origin are used here. This work will attempt to offset the lack of contemporary evidence from art with words, that is, with terms having an Arabic origin. We will undertake the task of outlining the characteristics of the garment they refer to so that we can contribute to the knowledge of medieval costume. This purely linguistic task is divided into at least four stages: from the record of the Classical Arabic language to the dialectal variety of Andalusi Spanish, to the words with a Romance origin within it and, finally, the words with an Arabic origin.11 It seemed, ultimately, that 9

Jerónimo Münzer, Viaje por España y Portugal (1494–1495) (Madrid: Ediciones Polifemo, 1991).

10 Manuel Gómez-Moreno, El pantéon real de las Huelgas de Burgos (Madrid: CSIC, 1946). 11 In the study of the Andalusi dialect, it is essential to read the work by Federico Corriente,

Árabe andalusí y lenguas romances (Madrid: Mapfre, 1992), which complements his work A Dictionary of Andalusí Arabic (Leiden, New York, Cologne: Brill, 1997). For more information about Romance terms within the Andalusi dialect, see, for example, Ignacio Ferrando Frutos, ‘Los romancismos de los documentos mozárabes de Toledo’, Anaquel de Estudios Arabes, 6 (1995), 71–86. With regard to the words with an Arabic origin, the most recent studies that have reviewed them in the different languages of the Iberian Peninsula have been carried out by Federico Corriente, and his Diccionario de Arabismos y voces afines en iberorromance, which remains the most comprehensive text available. Also, by the same author, ‘Hacia una revisión de los arabismos y otras voces con étimos del romance andalusí o lenguas medio-orientales en el Diccionario de la Real Academia Española’, Boletín de la Real Academia Española (BRAE), 76.267 (Jan–April 1996), 55–118; BRAE 76.268 (May–August 1996), 153–95;



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the border that separated both societies acted as a mirror in which they could look at themselves in mutual fascination and reassert their own identities.

W eari ng th e cloth es o f the ‘ o the r’ Undoubtedly, al-Andalus had an influence on what could be called ‘Spanish culture’.12 We recall that the Christian kingdoms settled in previously Islamic territories. More specifically, the Crown of Castile bordered the Nasrid Kingdom of Granada for a couple of centuries. Therefore, we may assume that daily customs crossed that permeable frontier. Christians were captivated by ‘the exoticism’ that emanated from the look of their Muslim adversaries, and a process of imit­ ation and adaptation of the way of dressing and living took place among the highest classes. The clothes, fabrics, footwear, textile techniques, headdresses, furniture and adornments of the Andalusi inhabitants (and of the Mudejar and Moorish) started to enter Christian houses and wardrobes and created an original style that was dissimilar to anything in the rest of medieval Europe. In this regard, we can easily imagine the cultural exchanges that must have taken place since it is evident that Christians increasingly adopted a taste for Oriental styles and imitated a style of dressing and even a way of living that was similar to that of their Muslim neighbours. It was not by chance that some images in the Cantigas show King Alfonso X sitting in the Moorish style, surrounded by cushions or almadraques. Similarly, centuries later, a beautiful portrait (kept in the Royal Palace of Madrid) of Isabel I of Castile (r. 1474–1504) featured the Queen, fascinated by Moorish clothes, wearing an alcandora (a type of shirt).13 In addition, around the same period, the well-known account by Hieronymus Münzer revealed how the Captain General of Granada, Íñigo López, Count of Tendilla, gave him an enthusiastic welcome and ‘made us sit on silk carpets’.14 There are many such exchanges, which took place from a very early stage.15 For example, we can mention two very similar scenes which are considerably separated in time and space. The first of them comes from Abū l-Faraĝ al-Iṣfahānī’s Kitāb al-Agānī (Book of songs,

12 13 14 15

BRAE 76.269 (Sep–Dec 1996), 371–415. These works expand his previous study: ‘Apostillas de lexicografía hispano-árabe’, Actas de las II Jornadas de cultura árabe islámica (1980) (Madrid: Instituto Hispano-Arabe de Cultura, 1985), pp. 119–62; ‘Los arabismos del portugués’, Estudios de dialectología norteafricana y andalusí (Edna), 1 (1996), 5–86; ‘Arabismos del catalán y otras voces de origen semítico o medio-oriental’, Estudios de dialectología norteafricana y andalusí (Edna), 2 (1997), 5–81. María Martínez, ‘Influencias islámicas en la indumentaria medieval española’, p. 200.

[accessed 1 December 2021]. Münzer, Viaje por España y Portugal, p. 93. Ruth Matilda Anderson, Hispanic Costume, 1480–1530 (New York: Hispanic Society of America, 1979), p. 92.

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9th/10th-century,) which includes an anecdote that took place at the beginning of Islam, when in order to give an honourable reception to a guest, the host had laid the carpets on the floor.16 The second scene is set in the 14th century and is presented by Juan Ruiz, a 14th-century poet and Archpriest of Hita. He describes a group of knights who, before sitting to play a game of dice, covered the floor with ‘grandes alfamares, ponen luego tableros’ (large alfamares [a type of headdress], and then placed boards on them).17 This attraction to ‘exotic’ items, however, coexists with a historic context that had been dominated, since the 13th century, by what Mercedes García Arenal describes as the ‘spirit of the Crusades, whose chronicles reveal the most extreme feelings of hostility towards Muslims’. In fact, Christian culture became the dominant force after the 13th century and it brought a new form of social and political organization. Therefore, its capacity ‘to exploit, adopt, reject or assimilate different aspects of the Arabo-Islamic and the Jewish culture would not only determine the nature of Spanish civilization over the next centuries, but also the attitudes of the Christian majority towards the Muslim and Jewish minorities in its territories’.18 Consequently, Spanish cultural heritage is based on those elements that were exchanged from one culture into another, and yet, it is interesting to observe how the ‘admiration’ felt by some Christian rulers and by the high classes towards Andalusi cultures coexisted with the harshness with which the Jewish and Muslim minorities were treated. In the words of Ramón Menéndez Pidal: the inhabitants of Castile, far from feeling revulsion towards the few Muslims that had found refuge in their last safe haven in Granada, were attracted to that exotic civilisation, to the oriental luxury of their wardrobes, the splendid decoration of their buildings, their strange way of living, their way of riding horses, arming themselves and fighting, the beautiful agriculture in the meadows of Granada […] maurofilia, in sum, came into fashion.19

This so-called maurofilia was the end of a long process of cultural exchange, the most visible impact of which could be seen in topics related to identity, such as the clothes that were worn and the furnishings with which a house was decorated. That is, this maurofilia or fascination with Moorishness emerges from the coexistence of the two cultures, and it leads to the imitation, not only of a way of dressing, but also of a way of living, including activities such as sitting on cushions on the 16 Elisa Mesa Fernández, El lenguaje de la indumentaria. Tejidos y vestiduras en el Abū Kitāb al-Agānī

de Abu l-Faraĝ al-Iṣfahānī (Madrid: Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas, 2008), p. 144. 17 Gonzalo Menéndez Pidal, La España del siglo XIII leída en imágenes (Madrid: Real Academia de la Historia, 1986), p. 119. 18 Mercedes García Arenal, ‘Los moros en las Cantigas de Alfonso X el Sabio’, p. 134. 19 España y su Historia, ed. by Ramón Menéndez Pidal, 42 vols (Madrid: Minotauro, 1935–2004), II (1957), p. 276.



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floor or making the bed with bedspreads adorned with Arabic inscriptions. This unique Castilian approach showed some very specific characteristics that could be seen mainly on luxury clothes, because, as mentioned earlier, the imitation of Oriental tastes was used as a sign of identity and distinction among privileged groups. Furthermore, the social differentiation of people based on their attire could be established ‘either through the type and shape of their garments, or through the fabrics, the colours and the trimmings used on them’.20 This second category is the one in which the Oriental influence left its mark. This feeling, which Menéndez Pidal called maurofilia, the impact of which was very evident in clothing styles, led Carmen Bernis Madrazo to use the idea of maurofilia to refer to the admiration that Castilians felt for their Muslim neighbours, particularly with regard to their attire. Her work on Moorish fashion in Christian society tries to show how Spanish dress – which had been, in spite of some individual features, completely ‘European since the Romanesque period’21– was influenced by Arab clothing in everything that had to do with luxury, especially since the 13th century.22 Indeed, Bernis Madrazo described, how on more than one occasion, Christian monarchs imitated the ostentation of their Muslim opponents, and she discussed some garments of great interest, both for the history of clothes and for the history of language, thanks to the wealth of terms with an Arabic origin they have left us.23 This is the origin of the so-called ‘Spanish fashion’. This fascination, while undeniable, was not available for everybody, but was rather a distinguishing feature of the privileged classes. Accordingly, the furnishings and the clothes of Queen Isabel I of Castile reveal the appeal of the adornments, texture, embroideries and general look of the fabrics with an oriental style. The immediate consequence was that texts were flooded with Moorish clothes, the names of which were still Arabic. For example, the testamentary documents of Queen Isabel list a series of Moorish garments made with Tunisian cloth, such as zaragüelles (a kind of wide and pleated hose), Moorish shirts, aljaremes (gauze head coverings) and almexias (tunics) ‘con vnas mangas anchas que diz ques de

20 Menéndez Pidal, La España del siglo XIII, p. 53. 21 Carmen Bernis Madrazo, ‘Modas moriscas en la sociedad cristiana española’, p. 200.

22 We must point out that Carmen Bernis Madrazo defends one of several historiographic

trends that characterize the study of al-Andalus. In this case, she favours the theory that there was an uninterrupted Europeanness in Spain, in spite of the Islamic presence, even with regard to clothes, and that Islamic influence could only be seen in sumptuous matters, which means that most of the population would be dressed in the European style. 23 On this topic, see the pages dedicated to Spanish words with an Arabic origin in Dolores Serrano-Niza, ‘El léxico castellano medieval se viste con palabras árabes. Algunos arabismos de indumentaria’, pp. 439–52.

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alfaquí’ (with broad sleeves, which they say belongs to an alfaquí [a wise man and a judge]).24 Sometimes, and odd as it may seem, the cultural exchange was a result of ransom money, because the exquisite Islamic fabrics were accepted as a form of payment. This seems to be the origin of the conical chasuble of St Juan de Ortega (1080–1163), created by reusing a piece of Andalusi cloth with circles and lions addorsed holding deer, as well as an inscription in Arabic that says: ‘The glory of God for the Emir of Muslims.’25 The originality of Castilian clothing in the Middle Ages was characterized by the high quality and the bright colours of its fabrics, as well as by the trimmings that were used to decorate the garments. Those trimmings mainly included embroidery in coloured silks, silver- and gold-work on the cuffs, the front openings or the bustline and, in some cases, the lateral openings of the garments.26 In addition, buttons began to be used, notwithstanding that sumptuary laws forbade their use, together with the use of trimming and colourful fabrics.27 These features of costume were only adopted by the privileged groups of society. In comparison, ordinary people were mostly dressed in cloth of natural colours, because of the high cost of dying the fabrics. These undyed fabrics were commonly referred to as ‘cloth’; and they were the pieces destined for dowry items too. The dyeing industry was a luxury service, and the more colourful a piece was, the more distinguished it became. One of the most appreciated colours was red – with its different hues, maroon or scarlet – because it was very difficult to obtain,28 although garments with two colours (each half of the garment being different) were also used. This type of clothing was called in Spanish ameatada or a metad (in halves),29 and it was highly popular in the court of Alfonso X.

24 María del Cristo Gonzáles Marrero, La casa de Isabel la Católica. Espacios domésticos y vida

25

26 27 28

29

cotidiana (Ávila: Institución “Gran Duque de Alba de la Excma. Diputación Provincial de Ávila, 2005), p. 245. Dolores Serrano-Niza, ‘Casulla de San Juan de Ortega’, in Camiño (A Orixe) ([Santiago de Compostela:] Xunta de Galicia, 2015), pp. 188–90; Cristina Partearroyo ‘Los tejidos de al-Andalus: los talleres de la Almería almorávide’, in La Alcazaba. Fragmentos para una historia de Almería, ed. by Ángela Suárez (Almería: Consejería de Cultura, 2005), pp. 220–34. The fragment of the chasuble is now in the Iglesia de Quintanaortuño, Burgos. Menéndez Pidal, La España del siglo XIII, p. 55. Menéndez Pidal, La España del siglo XIII, p. 55. Gonzalo Menéndez Pidal and Carmen Bernis Madrazo, ‘Las Cantigas. La vida en el s. XIII según la representación iconográfica. (II) Traje, aderezo, afeites’, Cuadernos de la Alhambra, 15–17 (1981), 89–145 (p. 93). On the dye, see Ana Cabrera Lafuente, ‘Telas hispanomusulmanas: siglos X–XIII’, in V Semana de Estudios Medievales. Nájera, 1–5 August, 1994, ed. by José Ignacio de la Iglesia Duarte (Logroño: Instituto de, 1995), pp. 199–207; Ana Cabrera Lafuente, ‘Caracterización de las producciones textiles en al-Andalus (siglos IX al XIV): estudios sobre tintes’, in Marín, Tejer y vestir, pp. 395–417, and Expiración García, ‘Las plantas textiles y tintóreas en al-Andalus’ in Marín, Tejer y vestir, pp. 417–51. Menéndez Pidal, La España del siglo XIII, p. 54.



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The most significant aspect of these garments, however, was their protracted use over the ages, as can be seen in the illustrations of Moorish people made by Weiditz, who drew a woman dressed in a two-coloured dress called marlota, one of the words with an Arabic origin that have become part of the Spanish language as a sign of that cultural exchange (Fig. 9.1)

Fig. 9.1  Moorish woman with a dress in two colours. Trachtenbuch, 103. Trachtenbuch des Christoph Weiditz (1530-1540) © Germanisches Nationalmuseum Nürnberg, Hs. 22474. Image from the repository [accessed 29 March 2022] .

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W ords w i th an Ar abic o rigin: th e m ark of cultu ral e xchange The study of medieval clothing in the Iberian Peninsula requires an interdisciplinary alliance between history and linguistics with supplementary evidence from art, as seen in the introduction to this chapter. For this reason, words with an Arabic origin are used as a tool for analysis. In these pages an ‘Arabic origin’ includes all the words that belong to the corpus of a language such as Spanish but owe their origin to Arabic, either because they were created in that language or because they used Arabic as a carrier, as is the case with some words with a Greek origin that reached Spanish after a long journey through Arabic. In addition, a chronological limit is added: the words included must have entered the language of study in the moment of this interaction between Arabic and Romance languages, that is, not far from the Middle Ages (8th to 14th centuries). Yet it must be said that the process by which an Arabic term became a Spanish word with an Arabic origin varied enormously depending on the population being discussed. In this regard, it is interesting to analyse bilingual documents (codeswitching), such as the ones found by Juan Martínez Ruiz, who warns us that ‘the same Arabic words may enter the documents with different formulas, depending on the place and the scribe who wrote them’.30 This may be due to the fact that, when they are written down, these words have an uneven frequency of distribution and usage and therefore different forms of expression are required. For example, the formula ‘que se dize’ (which is called) appears before a word of Arabic origin: guecheceril (bed canopy); sometimes the formulas are juxtaposed to create a semantic distinction for Moorish garments or objects: ‘calças de muger jauras’ (women’s loose-fitting hose, jauras), or the Arabic name is defined if the writer suspects that it may not be yet accepted as a Spanish word with an Arabic origin: ‘çapatos de mochachas, colorados, rehihas’ (girls’ red shoes, rehihas). The bilingual documents examined by Juan Martínez Ruiz were among the inventories of goods of the Moors in the Alhambra Archives, and bear witness to the fact that the Arabic of Granada was still alive during the first half of the 16th century, both in its oral form and in bilingual writings. With regard to clothing, we know that there were ordinances designed to prohibit the Islamic language, clothes and customs that still existed in the 16th century in the Christian territories of the Iberian Peninsula.31 As a result of these prohibitions and the rejection of anything that evoked an Arab Islamic past, 30 Juan Martínez Ruíz, ‘Escritura bilingües en el reino de Granada (siglo XVI) según documentos

inéditos del archivo de la Alhambra’ in Actas del Primer Congreso de la Asociación Internacional de Hispanistas celebrado en Oxford del 6 al 11 de septiembre de 1962, ed. by Frank Pierce and Cyril A. Jones (Oxford: The Dolphin Book, 1964), pp. 371–74 (p. 374). 31 An edict issued in 1516 by Cardinal Cisneros forced Moors to abandon their garments and habits; see Luis de Mármol y Carvajal, Historia de la rebelión y castigo de los moriscos del reino de Granada, 2 vols (Madrid: Editorial Atlas, 1946), II, p. 161.



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many words which referred to garments were replaced by words of Latin origin to describe the same items (for instance zaragüelles would be replaced by pantalón). In other cases, these regulations caused the word to disappear, together with the item of clothing it referred to (for instance marlota). These events are very interesting for the history of costume. In fact, this is one of the most complicated areas in the historical research of fashion, since the evolution of a piece of clothing and the word that refers to it do not always follow a parallel path. It is not uncommon for the garment to transform itself over time, since it is subject to changes in customs and fashion, while the word remains unaltered. Conversely, there are times in which the opposite happens, and the same type of garment is referred to throughout history with multiple different words. In addition, there is also a significant number of items which have become extinct and whose name is only known because they are recorded in texts and dictionaries but, unfortunately, their description is now missing. This is the most difficult occurrence we may find in our research but, in return, it is also one of our most interesting challenges. Tackling the study of the word itself is not a complete task unless accompanied by a tracking-down of the piece of clothing. And our intention is precisely to discuss those garments that are no longer used but which were part of the wardrobe of Iberian society in the Middle Ages, in order to offer a brief outline of costume in that geographical and chronological context, of the style of those clothes used by Christians and Muslims – in most cases, at the same time and in the same cities.

C hri sti an cloth es and t he ir Arabic name s The influence of Arab clothes on the inhabitants of the Iberian Peninsula was a slow and gradual process that can be clearly seen between the 8th and the 10th centuries. The information about this process comes from the iconographic wealth of miniatures that portrayed mozárabes (mozarabic) clothes.32 Thanks to these illuminations, we now know what costumes were used by the Mozarabs, as well as the great variety of outer garments they used: alifafe, barragán, zurame, mobatana. Moreover, we know that they wore different types of tunics: aljuba, adorra and almexía; and we also know about their footwear: ballugas and albarcas, and about their headdresses: almaizar and alfiniame. The latter was used only by women. There is evidence that shows that all these garments – and their names – were in use until the Renaissance. It is true that, as time went by, the number of garments with an Arabic name worn in the Iberian Peninsula increased. In the 13th century, 32 Mozárabe means arabised. It refers to the Christian population that lived under Islamic rule in

the Iberian Peninsula. They played a significant role in cultural exchanges; Claudio Sánchez Albornoz, Estampas de la vida en León en el siglo X (Madrid: Espasa Calpe, 1943) and María Concepción Casado Lobato, ‘Indumentaria en la España cristiana del siglo XI’, Revista de Dialectología y Tradiciones Populares, 32 (1976), 129–53.

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Fig. 9.2  Timeline showing the arrival of words with an Arabic origin © Dolores Serrano-Niza.

the aljuba and the almexía were in fashion, together with new garments such as the gonela, the pellote, and the gabán. However, the years between the 14th and the 16th centuries comprise the most fruitful period for research, when Christians were particularly attracted by the richness and the refinement of the clothes worn by their neighbours in Granada. Therefore, they include garments in their wardrobe such as the marlota, albornoz, alfareme, almaizar and alcandora (Fig. 9.2) and capellar (a word of vulgar Latin origin). Since the words with an Arabic origin are intended to be used as tools for our research, this period is also relevant from a linguistic perspective, since it is a time in which most of those words entered the Spanish language, and coincides with the information gleaned in the historical chronicles that record the vast expansion of Castile across the Islamic territories of the Iberian Peninsula in this period. This process involved not only a conquest of the territory and political dominance, but also the use of words with an Arabic origin within a language which was first an ‘invading language’ and then became a ‘language of repopulation’. This was combined with the work of Mudejars in the transfer of words of Arabic origin into the Spanish language and, in this regard, the dates we discuss here mark a crucial age. This was likewise a period in which there was an abundance of terms of Arabic origin related to clothing, and this study will show only a small sample of them. The following examples present an attempt to systematize the most significant words with an Arabic origin in the conceptual field of clothing into different categories, trying to combine the description of the garment referred to by the root of the word and its evolution as a word with an Arabic origin.



Me d ieval Cast ilian G ar m ent s a n d thei r A ra b i c N a m es 2 1 9

Headdresses According to the documents that we have consulted, we can observe that the garments with an Arab origin that caught on the most among Christians were the headdresses. As on other occasions, the piece is adopted together with the Arabic name it has, such as the almaizar and the alhareme/alfareme.

Almaizar and Alhareme (or Alfareme) The almaizar could be described as a piece or a strip of fine, high-quality cloth, usually narrow, with a very simple rectangular shape, to cover or wrap the head. The word almaizar comes from the Arabic word mi’zar. This last word could be described as a type of piece of clothing used for wrapping, which was probably used by both men and women. Reinhart Dozy points out that it was a veil used to wrap the head,33 which could lead to the hypothesis that it could have had different sizes, depending of the amount of fabric used. Moreover, in my opinion, it could be the case that the mi’zar used by men had a different form over time from the one used by women, with the latter being much larger, so as to cover and wrap the entire body, whereas the former became a long, thin strip of cloth that was used as a turban. This evolution could explain the definitions of almaizar found in different sources, such as the following: toca morisca o velo, a manera de savanilla, con que se cubren las moriscas; es de seda delgada y listado de muchos colores con rapacejos en los extremos (…) y los moros se rodean a las cabeças estos almaizares, dexando colgar las puntas de los rapacejos sobre las espaldas. (a Moorish headdress or veil, as a small sheet, with which Moorish women cover their heads; is made of fine silk and with stripes of many colours, with fringes at the ends […] and men wrap their heads with these almaizares, and the ends with fringes hang on their backs).34

Sebastián de Covarrubias Orozco’s definition has been much cited in later publications. Therefore, for Bernis Madrazo, men used the so-called ‘tocas de camino’, which were also referred to with a name with an Arabic origin, alhareme.35 Ruth Matilda Anderson provides similar information and supports it with images from the stairway ramp from Salamanca University and the description of an alhareme seen in a Christian inventory from 1503 that describes its

33 Dozy, Dictionnaire détaillé des noms des vêtements, p. 46. 34 Sebastián de Covarrubias Orozco, Tesoro de la lengua castellana (Barcelona: Editorial Alta Fulla,

1987), p. 94.

35 Bernis Madrazo, ‘Modas moriscas en la sociedad cristiana española’, p. 205.

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dimensions: 14¼ yards long by 2/3 yard wide, made in fine linen. Both hems are decorated with white silk.36 Ultimately, according to the existing documents on this term, it seems that this was a garment used in both Muslim and Christian dress. In this last group, and in accordance with the traditional pattern in which all trends start in the powerful classes, Christian monarchs and nobles wore almaizares on their heads, followed by the ordinary people, until this item became a characteristic piece in the Iberian Peninsula, described by Covarrubias in the definition mentioned above. Yet previous studies on costume never consider the possibility that this term may refer to something other than an item of clothing. By this I refer to the major challenge of historians of costume, namely that of addressing the traditional conflict in the word-garment duality – for the evolution of both elements is not always the same. One of the problems that may arise is the fact that a word can refer simultaneously to a garment and to the furnishings of the home. According to the documents consulted, this seems to be the case with almaizar. Although it is true that the almaizar37 is well known as a ‘Moorish headdress’, it could also refer to a ‘bed sheet’, as we know it today. In order to document this hypothesis, we need to refer to the description of ‘the interior of the house’ made by Gonzalo Menéndez Pidal and Carmen Bernis Madrazo, who point out that only the beds of the wealthy had a piece of fabric that protruded from the blanket, that is, a sheet.38 This fabric was made of cloth, cotton, linen or a similar material and it was large, or at least large enough to cover the bed on which people slept. In Spanish, the definition of the word sábana (sheet) has narrowed to its current meaning, but it was not always the case, because the Diccionario de la Lengua Española includes a definition saying that it was a ‘cape used by Hebrews and other people from the East’,39 and this meaning is perfectly in line with what Juan Martínez Ruiz states when he points out, based on the Moorish files he analyses, that there is a clear difference in the texts between ‘bed sheets, head sheets or women’s sheets’.40 Returning to the Arabic root of the word, mi’zar, according to Ibn Sīdah, 11th-century Andalusi lexicographer, has a synonym in Arabic: izār. Both words are defined as a ‘piece of fabric to wrap oneself’, that is, a ‘cloak’.41 If we return now to the word almaizar, with an Arabic origin, I suggest considering the possibility that the almaizar was a large piece of fabric that could be used both as a ‘cloak’ 36 Anderson, Hispanic Costume, p. 44. 37 From the Andalusi almayzár, which comes from the Classical Arabic mi’zar. See Corriente,

38 39 40 41

Diccionario de Arabismos, p. 185. See the entry for this word in Dozy and Engelmann, Glossaire des mots espagnols et portugais dérivés de l’arabe, p. 152 and Dozy, Dictionnaire détaillé des noms des vêtements, p. 142. Menéndez Pidal, Las Cantigas, p. 122. DLE (Diccionario de la Lengua Española) [accessed 8 August 2021]. Martínez Ruiz, Inventarios de bienes moriscos del reino de Granada, p. 174 Serrano-Niza, Glosario árabe español de indumentaria, p. 71.



Me d ieval Cast ilian G ar m ent s a n d thei r A ra b i c N a m es 2 2 1

to cover the body before going out or as a ‘sheet’ to cover the body while sleeping (Fig. 9.3). In this regard, we can find a proposal in the documents from Granada by Luis Seco de Lucena Paredes, who describes the word izār as a ‘sheet of cloth’,42 which implies that this meaning could probably be applied to the almaizar. Other authors such as Juan Martínez Ruiz consider both meanings: ‘headdress’ and ‘cloak’, and the latter could be compared Fig. 9.3  An almaizar used as a sheet © Dolores SerranoNiza. Published in Dolores Serrano-Niza, ‘Textiles para to a furnishing piece of fabric. In el sueño. Ropa y ajuar morisco para hacer una cama’, fact, the variety of colours, matein Vestir la casa. Objetos y emociones en el hogar andalusí y rials and sizes described is vast: morisco, ed. by Dolores Serrano-Niza (Madrid: Consejo ‘rough’, ‘large, with gold at the Superior de Investigaciones Científicas, 2019), pp. ends’, ‘made of striped fustian’, 127–58 (p. 148). ‘made of wool’, ‘with green hems’, or ‘made of silk’.43 In summary, my proposal is to expand the meaning of almaizar with a new interpretation by adding the concept of ‘sheet’ to those of cloak and headdress,44 and interpreting that, during the period under study, it must, originally at least, have been very common for the same piece to be a garment and a home textile product, with the same name based only on the way it was used. Similar to this hypothesis, we can find another interesting term for our study: the ‘almalafa’ (see below).

42 Seco de Lucena Paredes, Documentos arábigo-granadinos, p. 151. 43 Martínez Ruiz, Inventarios de bienes moriscos del reino de Granada, p. 50.

44 This idea is supported by the documents recovered by María Isabel Álvaro Zamora in her

work, ‘Los inventarios notariales como fuente para el conocimiento de la arquitectura doméstica del Quinientos en Zaragoza. Espacios, funcionalidad y ajuar’, in Vestir la casa. Objetos y emociones en el hogar andalusí y morisco, ed. by Dolores Serrano-Niza (Madrid: Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas, 2019), pp. 55–99. In the post mortem inventory written in 1535 for the houses of the Moorish man Pedro de Albaquí, there is a list of the fabrics found in a walnut chest. The description provided shows that all the items are part of the home furnishings, and the author focuses on the finding of ‘un almaizar de seda blanca y amarilla, con sus franjas de la dicha seda’ (an almaizar in white and yellow silk with stripes of that same silk), p. 88. In fact, the presence of a headdress or a cloak among the sheets, towels and ornaments would not make much sense unless, as I posit here, the almaizar was really another element of the home furnishings, such as a sheet or a light bedspread that was still referred to with the original Arabic name.

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Cloaks or outer garments The use of cloaks or outer garments has been a characteristic trait not only of Arab Islamic costume, but also of medieval Christian attire. Many names refer to a type of garment of which the main characteristic is the lack of tailoring. They are often large pieces of cloth to wrap or cover the body. With the passage of time, they were cut in the shape of a cloak to adjust them to the shape of the shoulders, with a semi-circular design; they became smaller, among other details.

Almalafa The garment known as milḥafa or liḥāf in Classical Arabic was a large piece of cloth to cover the body that was worn over the rest of the clothes. There is no evidence to support the theory that this was originally an exclusively female garment. However, we can find references to this feature in the documents from the Moorish period. The drawings by Christoph Weiditz that accompanied the chronicles of the traveller Hieronymus Münzer show the Moorish women of Granada wrapped themselves in wide cloaks of white linen called almalafas.45 This image of the white linen cloaks is also included in the lexicographic documents, as Covarrubias points out: Ropa que se pone sobre todo el demás vestido y comúnmente es de lino (…) El padre Guadix dize que almalafa es una savanilla con que se cubren las moriscas de Granada y malafa significa manto. (This garment is worn over the rest of the clothes and it is generally made of linen. […] Father Guadix says that the almalafa is a small sheet used by the Moorish women of Granada, and ‘malafa’ means ‘cloak’).46

Undoubtedly, the garment must have been very conspicuous in Christian context, probably as an inheritance of the Granada of Ibn al-Jaṭīb, a 14th-century Andalusi historian,47 and it must have been used to reinforce the deeply rooted identity of the Islamic world that was disappearing. However, in 1513, Queen Juana of Castile (r. 1504–1555) issued a royal dispatch to confirm the prohibition of using and tailoring Moorish garments, but this prohibition also encompassed Christian women with neither Jewish nor Moorish ancestry (also known as Old Christians), as is apparent in another royal dispatch which established the following:

45 Münzer, Viaje por España y Portugal, p. 104, Lámina 84, hoja 97 in the original manuscript. 46 Covarrubias Orozco, Tesoro de la lengua castellana, p. 94.

47 ‘The most widely used dress among different social classes and the one they wear the most

is the woollen cloth (malf) which is dyed in winter’, in line with Ibn al-Jaṭīb, Historia de los Reyes de la Alhambra, ed. by Emilio Molina and José María Casciaro (Granada: Universidad de Granada y El legado andalusí, 1998) p. 32.



Me d ieval Cast ilian G ar m ent s a n d thei r A ra b i c N a m es 2 2 3 It has come to my attention that some Old Christian women who live […] in the city of Granada and the other cities and towns of this kingdom, ignoring the orders we have issued […], wear Moorish clothes and cover themselves with almalafas.48

This curious text by Queen Juana also reveals that the cultural and social exchange between Old Christians and Muslims, which we mentioned at the beginning of this work, was one of the characteristics of that period, because the former were heavily influenced by the habits and customs of the latter. The almalafa seems to have shared the evolution of the almaizar (above), and at some point, it may have been used to refer to a type of cloak and to a bed sheet. In fact, there are many words of which the definition refers to fabrics used to cover the body and keep it warm in bed at night. Fig. 9.4  An almalafa used as a blanket © Dolores SerranoSeco de Lucena, according to his Niza. Published in Dolores Serrano-Niza, ‘Una habitación documents (mostly 15th-century) con telas. El mobiliario textil de origen andalusí en una from Granada, suggests the word casa morisca’, in De puertas para adentro. La casa en los siglos XV–XVI, ed. by María Elena Díez Jorge (Granada: alifafe, with an Arabic origin, as Editorial Comares, 2019), pp. 365–96 (p. 386). the most adequate term to refer to a ‘bedspread’ or a ‘bed blanket’.49 This term comes from the Andalusi Arabic alliḥáf, which is derived, in turn, from the Classical Arabic liḥāf.50 We can assume that there was a wide range of fabrics that acted as blankets: made with thick or thin cloth, embroidered, made of linen, cotton or silk. There 48 Antonio Gallego y Burín and Alfonso Gámir Sandoval, Los moriscos del reino de Granada, según el

sínodo de Guadix de 1554 (Granada: Universidad de Granada, 1968), p. 179.

49 Seco de Lucena Paredes, Documentos arábigo-granadinos, p. 151. 50 Corriente, Diccionario de Arabismos, p. 177.

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were even blankets made with luxurious fabrics and decorated with stripes and Arabic inscriptions, as we can see in many illustrations of the Cantigas. The common characteristic of these fabrics must have been their large size. Likewise, other warm clothes similar to the ‘cloaks’ must have been used as blankets in bed. In the specific case of the almalafa, the meaning of this word with an Arabic origin seems to have become more specialized in the Moorish Granada, according to Leopoldo Eguílaz y Yaguas: ‘a piece of cloth or a sheet made of cotton, linen, linen and silk, or cotton and silk, that was used by Moorish women instead of a cloak’.51 Given their nature, the lexicographic sources do not generally discuss in greater depth the meanings of this word. However, texts provide very interesting information, as in this case, in which a document for the distribution of an inheritance points out the following: ‘The daughter received, as per the instructions of the document […] an almalafa for her bed […] an almalafa for her head.’52 As we can see, even though the same noun is used, it refers to two completely different items. The first one is a bed blanket, a bedspread or, depending on the fabric, a bed sheet (Fig. 9.4). On the other hand, the ‘almalafa for her head’ must have been some sort of women’s headdress or cloak which was probably not so large as to wrap the entire body but a smaller piece to cover the head and shoulders of the woman, or even down to her waist (Fig. 9.5). Along the same lines, a document written in Granada in 1563 includes many examples of the expression almalafa çerir (with different variants), and the following is the most informative: otra almalafa de mujer, de cobijar, de algodón e lino e seda, usada (…) dos sábanas de lienzo que dicen malafas çerir, labradas con seda de colores, a la morisca nueva. (… another almalafa for women, to cover the body, made of cotton and linen and silk, used […] two cloth sheets, the ones they call malafas çerir, made with silk of different colours, in the new Moorish fashion).53

This piece of home furnishing, after the lexical integration of almalafa – one of the most stable and best known words of Arabic origin for clothes – is particularly interesting, not only because of the variant it shows, malafa, but because of its collocation with the word çerir (bed), which Juan Martínez Ruiz interprets as a ‘bed sheet’.54 It is difficult to know for sure whether it is a cloak or a sheet-blanket, as it would be necessary to know first what it was made of: when made of linen or cotton it would be translated as ‘sheet’, when made of wool, as ‘blanket’ or ‘cloak’. 51 Leopoldo Eguílaz y Yaguas, Glosario etimológico de palabras españolas (castellanas, catalanas,

gallegas, mallorquinas, portuguesas, valencianas y vascas) de origen oriental (árabe, hebreo, malayo, persa y turco) (Madrid: Atlas, 1974), pp. 211 and 236. 52 Seco de Lucena Paredes, Documentos arábigo-granadinos, p. 145. 53 Martínez Ruiz, Inventarios de bienes moriscos del reino de Granada, p. 270. 54 Martínez Ruiz, Inventarios de bienes moriscos del reino de Granada, p. 49.

Fig. 9.5  Moorish woman with an almalafa. Trachtenbuch des Christoph Weiditz (1530–1540), 97–98. © Germanisches Nationalmuseum Nürnberg,Hs.22474.Imagefromtherepository [accessed 29 March 2022].

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But its appearance here is further evidence that the same item was at at once a garment and part of the bedclothes, with a different name based only on its use. The name of this Moorish cloak or bed blanket alternates in the documents with the following words of Arabic origin.

Tunics and garments The generic term ‘tunic’ refers to a type of outer dress which is more elaborate than a cloak, because it is tailored. This type of garment involves social learning, being a characteristic of urban communities that have been trained in the art of sewing. In the medieval Iberian Peninsula we can find at least three names for tunics that the Christians inherited from their Muslim neighbours: adorra, aljuba and marlota.

Adorra The Arab garment called durrā‛a was a tunic characterized by an opening from the neck to the chest, decorated with buttons and buttonholes and used by men and women alike. They were made in different colours and some of them were likely to have been lined to ward off the cold. As with other clothes with an Arab origin, the passage of time and the preference for a refined style – as a result of contact with Persian and Byzantine cultures – led to a situation in which these pieces were made with more valuable fabrics and were offered as presents among monarchs and nobles. The Christian wardrobe received this garment with the characteristic feature of an opening on the front down to the chest, with buttons. This detail is particularly interesting because, according to Bernis Madrazo, documentation of this garment would be the oldest known reference to buttons in medieval clothing.55

Aljuba One of the most widely used outer garments in the Arab Islamic world is the piece known as the ĝubba, one of the garments which was rapidly incorporated as part of the attire of the Iberian Peninsula. It was made with all sorts of fabrics, in different colours and also with striped cloth. As a tunic or an overgarment, it required a loose-fitting cut and the sleeves were optional. It was also one of the garments used by men and women alike and was soon adopted by Christians. There is evidence that Christians made aljubas, as they are featured as part of the ransom of captives around the 13th century, ‘as payment, doblas [gold coins],

55 Carmen Bernis Madrazo, Indumentaria medieval española (Madrid: Instituto Diego Velázquez

del Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas, 1956), p. 12.



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knives from Pamplona and aljubas, which could be green, dark red, scarlet or dark blue’.56 The aljuba is an example in which the name prevailed over the shape adopted by the object itself through time and changes in fashion. In fact, we know that the aljuba was, according to Covarrubias ‘Género (un tipo de) vestidura morisca’ (a type of Moorish garment).57 This lexicographic information does not contribute much to our research or to what we know about this piece, which was a type of tunic. Moreover, the documents we have examined not only fail to describe it accurately, but also present it sometimes as synonymous with the marlota, which makes it very difficult to establish the actual differences between them. They often use both words (aljuba and marlota) to describe the same garment, and since our study intends to analyse the description of the clothes, I believe that this confusion may have originated in a quotation that is often used in research on medieval costume in order to classify the garment. This quotation is taken from a narration by the ambassador of the Catholic Monarchs, Pedro Mártir, after his journey across Egypt: ‘su traje de encima se diferencia poco del que vuestros granadinos llaman algiubbas y los españoles marlotas’ (their outer garments are not very different from what the inhabitants of Granada call algiubbas and the Spaniards marlotas).58 The journey took place in 1501, but it is striking that in an inventory dated between 1549 and 1568 this word coexists peacefully with the one that seems to be its next logical evolutionary step: jubón (doublet): ‘a jubón of cloth, white, with buttons’ (24 May 1562).59 The truth is that it is difficult to distinguish between a marlota and an aljuba. However, these are two different garments, as we can see from the following text by Ginés Pérez de Hita (a Spanish writer, 1544–1619): ‘all these knights, the Zegris, Maças and Gomeles, were two hundred and eighty. All of them were fine-looking and gallant, and they all wore aljubas and marlotas of Tunisian cloth, half of them green and the other half red’.60 We could wonder whether the author meant that both the aljubas and the marlotas were each two-colour garments (green and red mi-parti), but the truth is that he is describing two different items based on their shape. This seems to be the key to differentiate between them because, like marlotas, aljubas had buttons or some other kind of fastener such as laces, as we can see in the following text: ‘And after saying this, he unfastened the brocade aljuba he was wearing, and he pulled out a letter from inside it.’61 56 Menéndez Pidal and Bernis Madrazo, ‘Las Cantigas (II)’, p. 106. 57 Covarrubias Orozco, Tesoro de la lengua castellana, p. 91.

58 Andrés Bernáldez, Historia de los Reyes Católicos don Fernando y doña Isabel (Seville: Imprenta de

D. José María Geofrin, 1870), p. 645.

59 Martínez Ruiz, Inventarios de bienes moriscos del reino de Granada, p. 270. 60 Ginés Pérez de Hita, Guerras Civiles de Granada (Granada: Universidad de Granada, 1998),

p. 164.

61 Pérez de Hita, Guerras Civiles de Granada, p. 288.

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Bernis Madrazo suggests an interesting distinction between the Moorish aljuba, a formal dress used by Christians in the second half of the 15th century, and the Christian aljuba, a garment used by men and women in the 14th and 15th centuries which was subject to changes in fashion.62 However, based on its name, I think that the Christian aljuba is a garment derived from a piece of clothing used by Muslims in the Iberian Peninsula. In fact, according to José Guerrero Lovillo, it was basically the same type of garment used by Muslims which was adapted later on by Christians.63 The name and the item were already present in the 10th century and at the beginning of the 12th century, as shown by Manuel Gómez-Moreno, who created a list of garment names based on Latin documents,64 including different tunics that are analysed here, such as the algupa or aljuba and the adorra. We can assume that, as with all the clothes of Arab Islamic origin, these tunics would have a simple design and were used by both men and women, perhaps with slight variations, such as the ones pointed out by Reinhart Dozy (with broad sleeves and cuffs as feature for women) although he is referring to 19th-century Egypt and, from a methodological perspective, this is merely one illustrative piece of evidence to consider and very late in time.65 In any case, Muslims and Christians shared many similar clothes as part of their attire, as stated earlier, so that many Christian prisoners included aljubas and pellotes as payment for their ransom, which proves that these garments were used by Moors and Christians alike.66

Marlota Although it is described in dictionaries as ‘a type of smock for women’,67 this must actually have been, as in the case of the aljuba, a rather loose-fitting overgarment, contrary to what is mentioned in some sources, which describe it as ‘a tight-fitting dress’.68 It had a flared cut, as can be seen in the pattern published by Juan de Alcega, a 16th-century tailor (Fig. 9.6).69 The sleeves were optional and, when it 62 Carmen Bernis Madrazo, Trajes y modas en la España de los Reyes Católicos. II. Los hombres (Madrid:

Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas, 1979), p. 57.

63 José Guerrero Lovillo, Las Cántigas. Estudio arqueológico de sus miniaturas (Madrid: Consejo

Superior de Investigaciones Científicas, 1949), p. 185.

64 Manuel Gómez-Moreno, Iglesias mozárabes (Granada: Universidad de Granada, 1998), pp.

127–28.

65 Dozy, Dictionnaire détaillé des noms des vêtements chez les arabes, pp. 114–15. 66 The references to the specific Cantiga can be found in Menéndez Pidal and Bernis Madrazo,

‘Las Cantigas (II)’, p. 106.

67 Corriente, Diccionario de arabismos, p. 381. 68 Covarrubias Orozco, Tesoro de la lengua castellana, p. 790.

69 Juan de Alcega, Libro de Geometría, pratica, y traça para el oficio de los sastres (Madrid: Guillermo

Drouy, 1580).



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Fig. 9.6  The pattern of a marlota. Juan de Alcega, Libro de geometría, práctica y traça el cual trata de lo tocante al oficio de sastre (Madrid: Guillermo Drouy, 1580) © Biblioteca digital hispánica. Image of the digitised book [accessed 29 March 2022].

became part of the Christian wardrobe, it retained the shape of the Islamic dress (we discuss a surviving example below), together with the name, although this design changed over time. In the history of the word-garment duality of the marlota, we can say that this is one of the cases in which a garment term moved from one language into another with barely any variation, both regarding the root of the word and the item it describes. The term comes from Arabic, which in turn comes from the Greek mallotê, and, in fact, the Arab version still features one of the characteristics of the Greek garment, that it is made of wool. In addition, as an overgarment, it could be worn over another one, such as an actual smock; but the only thing that could be worn over it was the cloak. The marlotas used by Christians could have been of different lengths and they were usually luxury products. This characteristic – being a luxury piece of clothing – is confirmed by the data in the documents regarding the fabrics they were made of. In general terms, these were precious textiles, such as velvet, brocade, camlet or gold brocade, and gold and silverwork was used, particularly on the sleeves. The red velvet so-called marlota of King Boabdil (Muhammad XII, the last Nasrid Sultan of Granada, r. 1482–92) survives in the Army Museum of Toledo (inv. number 24702).70 It seems that the marlota was certainly a garment worn by men, since Christians used it specifically (its flared shape being convenient for riding) for their juegos de cañas, mock battles fought on horseback. But it was also a women’s garment as shown by a catalogue from 1485 which lists a purchase for the Queen that included ten yards of purple silk for a marlota, and eleven and a quarter yards

70 [accessed 23 November 2021].

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of green silk for the lining.71 A garment of this name was also part of the dowry of a woman in Illescas in 1551, and Isabel of Portugal also brought marlotas from Portugal in 1526.72 Therefore, it seems that this garment was used by both men and women, with its characteristic flared shape and loose-fitting cut that was appropriate for riding. In the case of men, it was mainly used by Christians in their juegos de cañas.73 Marlotas are a magnificent example of imitation in Christian costume, as Bernis Madrazo points out in her analysis of the marlota compared with a similar garment called the quezote.74 The author points out that this is ‘Moorish dress’, a ‘piece of cloth or fine linen or cotton which is almost always white’,75 registering the number of times that these garments appear in the account books of the treasurer of Queen Isabel of Castile, commissioned by the Royal Household between 1477 and 1504.76 Her detailed study of both garments concludes that the information collected is enough to prove that they were indeed Moorish clothes used by Christians.77 According to the documents surveyed by Juan Martínez Ruiz,78 marlotas could be made in different colours (blue, green, crimson, purple, black) and also with a combination of colours (green and blue; red and purple; crimson and black, etc.). The fabrics could also be very different: wool, velvet, damask, camlet, silk or serge. They could have a wide range of adornments, with stripes, buttons, golden fringes, gold stripes on the front, a trimming with a different fabric, or cuffs with goldwork and seed pearls. However, there is still a gap in the history of this garment, because dictionaries such as the earlier one by Pedro de Alcalá or the more recent one by Corriente, describe it as ‘a woman’s tunic’,79 that is, they consider that this garment was only used by women. This last definition fits best with the paradigmatic illustrations

71 Bernis Madrazo, Trajes y modas en la España de los Reyes Católicos. II, p. 105. 72 Carmen Bernis Madrazo, Indumentaria española en tiempos de Carlos V (Madrid: Instituto Diego

Velázquez del Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas), p. 29.

73 Javier Irigoyen, ‘Moors Dressed as Moors’, Clothing Social Distinction, and Ethnicity in Early Modern

74 75 76

77 78 79

Iberia (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2017), pp. 50–64 and in its Spanish version, ‘Moros vestidos de moros’. Indumentaria, distinción social y etnicidad en la España de los siglos XVI y XVII (Barcelona: Bellaterra, 2018), pp. 62–75. Carmen Bernis Madrazo, ‘Modas moriscas en la sociedad cristiana española’, Boletín de la Real Academia Española, 144 (1959), 199–239 (pp. 211–19). Bernis Madrazo, ‘Modas moriscas en la sociedad cristiana’, p. 21. Bernis Madrazo, ‘Modas moriscas en la sociedad cristiana’, p. 213. On the costumes of Queen Isabel of Castile and the members of her household, see González Marrero, La Casa de Isabel la Católica, pp. 212–313. Bernis Madrazo, ‘Modas moriscas en la sociedad cristiana’, p. 213. Martínez Ruiz, Inventarios de bienes moriscos del reino de Granada, pp. 140–42. Corriente, Diccionario de arabismos, p. 64.



Me d ieval Cast ilian G ar m ent s a n d thei r A ra b i c N a m es 2 31

of this dress, created by Weiditz in his journey to Granada. Yet these images, in contrast with the Christian examples, do not have sleeves.80

Underwear The concept of ‘underwear’ in the Middle Ages must be interpreted as the clothes worn beneath the tunic. This group of garments is made up by two essential pieces: shirt and hose. Although they were worn inside, the sleeves of the shirts and the lower part of the hose were shown in that period. The fabric with which they were usually made was a fine cotton or linen cloth and, in the case of hose, sometimes wool cloth. The sleeves of the shirt were usually adorned with beautiful embroidery or braids. One of the garments in this group for which we can often find a word with an Arabic origin in medieval texts is the alcandora.

Alcandora As in the case of the marlota, this is one of the words of Arabic origin that has made a long journey from the Greek, qandúrah, to the Arabic, qandūrah, and from there to the Spanish term alcandora. This word refers to a garment with a similar design to the aljuba, although it is worn inside; that is, this was a type of inner shirt with sleeves, worn beneath other clothes. This may seem an evolution compared with the Greek meaning, because in that language it referred to a type of cloak, which means that it did not go through the tailoring process that took place in the Arab Islamic context. We know that the qandūrah was worn as underwear and, consequently, that it was made of simple fabrics, such as linen, cotton or wool, and it was not usually dyed, so it was generally white. In fact, it could be said that the difference between the aljuba and the alcandora is based on the materials they were made with and the way they were worn. It seems that the term entered the Spanish language with similar features, although the sources suggest that it could have been a more distinguished garment among the Moorish inhabitants of Granada. In fact, Martínez Ruiz mentions a reference to an alcandora made of silk, with coloured stripes, and there may have been examples made in different colours.81 The most characteristic features, though, were the adornments and the embroidery which reflect above all its Arab origins, as seen in the quotation from María Martínez: ‘with stripes of silk sewn onto the cloth (either on the cuffs, along the sleeves or down the front) of the “rich” Moorish shirts or alcandoras that are in fashion, adorned with stripes, lace trimming, letters, edges or hems.’82 80 Bernis Madrazo, ‘Modas moriscas en la sociedad cristiana’, p. 218. 81 Martínez Ruiz, Inventarios de bienes moriscos del reino de Granada, p. 44.

82 María Martínez, ‘Influencias islámicas en la indumentaria medieval española’, p. 199.

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In the medieval Peninsula, the name must have been used in some cases to mean a shirt. The medieval contexts in which we can find references suggest that this was a garment worn by men and women alike.

Conclusio ns According to the documents analysed here, Christian dress borrowed many items from Muslim dress and, together with the garment itself, it absorbed the name into its linguistic system. This explains the large number of words of Arabic origin that have entered the Spanish language. Therefore, by studying Arabic loanwords related to clothing we realize that Muslims and Christians shared many elements of their daily life in the same space, including their way of dressing: alcandoras, aljubas, almalafas, almaizares and marlotas were included in the wardrobes of both. Naturally, some clothes took root more than others. This was the case of headdresses, because monarchs and knights included them in their attire, and their use spread and became a characteristic trait of the attire in the Peninsula at that time, in contrast to the rest of Europe. This headdress remained popular for a long time in traditional Spanish costume. An analysis of the history of language reveals that there was a time when words with an Arabic origin were introduced into the Spanish language, reaching their peak of absorption, with regard to clothing, in the 14th to 15th centuries. It is very difficult, however, to pinpoint the decline of usage of those same words. The truth is that many of them, which referred to specific garments, were replaced by other words with a Latin root referring to the same clothes, and texts exist in which different pairs coexist, such as adorra and saya or aljuba and jubón. These two examples illustrate our point, but show different aspects. In the first example, a word of Arabic origin was replaced with a word of Latin origin, while in the second aljuba evolved into jubón: both terms have the same root, but the second one loses the clear Arabic sign of the prefix al-. In my view, the reason for the disappearance of Arabic words referring to clothes have historical causes rather than linguistic ones. This analysis, focusing on words with an Arabic origin for the study of the Castilian costume, has thus sought to reveal how those terms progressively disappeared from the Christian wardrobe.

chapter 10

Clothing , Furnishings and Ceremonies at the Castilian Court (c. 1214−c. 1332) María Barrigón

I ntroduct io n

O

ver the course of history, textiles have played a clear role in society as transmitters of a broad variety of signifiers and as vehicles for the expression of luxury and comfort, especially in royal and courtly contexts. Typical sources of information in research of historical textiles include documentary sources and accessions. In our context, unfortunately, the lack of a well-preserved royal archive makes it very difficult to piece together a detailed picture of court costume in the Crown of Castile in the 1200s and early 1300s as documentary references are fairly scant.1 However, there is a marvellous quantity of surviving textiles linked to the court.2 1

José Luis Rodríguez de Diego, ‘El Archivo Real de la Corona de Castilla (siglos XIII–XV)’, in Monarquía, crónicas, archivos y cancillerías en los reinos hispano-cristianos, siglos XIII-XV, ed. by Esteban Sarasa Sánchez (Zaragoza: Institución Fernando el Católico, 2014), pp. 277–308. 2 The use of chronologically later documentary sources may throw light on the topic, but this will not be addressed in the present chapter. Prominent among historical studies focusing on 14th-century Castile are: María Martínez Martínez, ‘Los gastos suntuarios de la monarquía castellana: aproximación a los aspectos técnicos y económicos a través del ejemplo de Juan I’, in IX Jornadas d’Estudis Historics Locals. La manufactura urbana i els menestrals (ss. XIII–XVI), ed. by María Barceló Crespí (Palma de Mallorca: Editorial Prensa Universitaria, 1991), pp. 115–40; María Martínez Martínez, ‘La imagen del rey a través de la indumentaria: el ejemplo de Juan I de Castilla’, Bulletin Hispanique, 96 (1994), 277–87; Francisco de Paula Cañas Gálvez, ‘La casa de Juan I de Castilla: aspectos domésticos y ámbitos privados de la realeza castellana a finales del

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The accounts of King Sancho IV (r. 1284–1295) are essential sources on Castile during the period covered by this study. Dating from 1292 to 1294, the accounts were studied by Mercedes Garibrois Ballesteros and later by Asunción López Dapena, and set in a royal context by Fernando Gutiérrez Baños, who focused on the King himself. More recently, Teófilo Ruiz examined them in connection with textile consumption in late medieval Castile.3 Further documentary references can be found both in ecclesiastical inventories of the period and in literary texts. The – relatively – abundant material evidence of surviving garments comes chiefly from royal entombment related to the period studied here, notably found at the Abbey of Santa María la Real de Las Huelgas in Burgos and the Cathedrals of Toledo and Seville. Further examples are the grave-goods of the tombs of members of the royal family in the Church of Santa María la Blanca in Villalcázar de Sirga (Palencia), the Convent of San Pablo (Valladolid) and the Monastery of Santo Domingo de Caleruega (Burgos).4 Lastly, salient examples of visual sources (in addition to sculptures and stainedglass windows such as those of the Cathedrals of Burgos and Leon) are the miniatures illuminating several codices of the period, such as the Cantigas de Santa

siglo XIV (ca. 1370–1390)’, En la España Medieval, 34 (2011), 133–80 (pp. 150–52); David Nogales Rincón, ‘Un año en la corte de Enrique III de Castilla (1397–1398)’, En la España Medieval, 37 (2014), 85–130. 3 Mercedes Gaibrois de Ballesteros, Historia del reinado de Sancho IV de Castilla I (Madrid: Tipografía de la Revista de Archivos, Bibliotecas y Museos, 1922); Mercedes Gaibrois de Ballesteros, Historia del reinado de Sancho IV de Castilla II (Madrid: Talleres Voluntad, 1928); Mercedes Gaibrois de Ballesteros, Historia del reinado de Sancho IV de Castilla III (Madrid, 1928); Asunción López Dapena, Cuentas y gastos (1292–1294) del rey d. Sancho IV el bravo (1284–1295) (Cordoba: Publicaciones del Monte de Piedad y Caja de Ahorros de Córdoba, 1984); Fernando Gutiérrez Baños, Las empresas artísticas de Sancho IV el Bravo (Burgos: Junta de Castilla y León. Consejería de Educación y Cultura, 1997); Teófilo F. Ruiz, ‘Textile consumption in Late Medieval Castile: the social, economic and cultural meaning of clothing’, Erasmo. Revista de Historia Bajomedieval y Moderna, 2 (2015), 101–14. 4 For the earliest descriptions of the grave-goods found in them, see Manuel Gómez-Moreno, El Panteón Real de las Huelgas de Burgos (Madrid: CSIC, 1946); Manuel Gómez-Moreno, ‘Preseas reales sevillanas (san Fernando, doña Beatriz y Alfonso el Sabio, en sus tumbas)’, Archivo hispalense, 2ª época, 27–32 (1948), 191–204; Rodrigo Amador de los Ríos y Villalta, ‘Restos del traje de infante don Felipe, hijo de Fernando III el santo, extraídos de su sepulcro de Villalcázar de Sirga y conservados en el Museo Arqueológico Nacional’, Museo Español de Antigüedades, 9 (1878), 100–26; Juan Francisco Rivera Recio, ‘Los restos de Sancho IV en la catedral de Toledo (Crónica retrospectiva)’, Real Academia de Bellas Artes y Ciencias Históricas de Toledo (1983), 127– 37; Saturnino Rivera Manescau, ‘Una urna sepulcral y unos tejidos del Museo Arqueológico de Valladolid’, Memorias de los Museos Arqueológicos provinciales, 5 (1944), 150–56; Milagros Burón Álvarez, Pilar Pastrana García and Pilar Vidal Meler, ‘Proyecto cultural sepulcro de la infanta doña Leonor de Castilla. Un modelo de revalorización patrimonial’, in Actas del IX Congreso internacional AR&PA. Sociedad y Patrimonio (Valladolid: Junta de Castilla y León. Consejería de Cultura y Turismo, 2015), pp. 323–35; María Barrigón, ‘El ajuar de la infanta Leonor de Castilla (†1275) en el Monasterio de Caleruega’, in El sepulcro de la infanta Leonor de Castilla (Valladolid: CCRBC, forthcoming), pp. 95–123.



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María, the Libro del Axedrez, Dados y Tablas (also known as Libro de los Juegos) and the Libro de la Coronación de los reyes de Castilla y León.5 The combined data culled from all of these sources allows us to carry out a survey of textiles themselves, how they were preserved in the king’s private quarters, and how they were used in both clothing and furnishings to express social distinction. In addition, insight is provided into the concept of magnificence in the two realms of power of the period – royal and ecclesiastical. These we will examine in regard to the garments’ use in some of the ceremonies of the day. This chapter concentrates on the Kingdom of Castile during a period that spans approximately from the death of King Alfonso VIII (1214) to the coronation of Alfonso XI (1332).

Th e c á ma r a (roy al ward ro be ) : p reservati on of g arm e nts and te xtil e s Throughout the 13th century, the structure of the king’s household and its officials, as well as the functions of royal servants, were in constant evolution, which has been analysed generally and specifically by scholars.6 The existence of these officials is justified in the Siete Partidas (the code of law compiled by Alfonso X, r. 1252–1284), which states: 5

Both the Cantigas and Libro de los Juegos were commissioned by King Alfonso X (d. 1284) and contain an extraordinary number of miniatures that depict contemporaneous clothing. The Cantigas are songs in praise of the Virgin Mary. Of the surviving four codices of the Cantigas de Santa María, three are illuminated: Códice Rico, MS T. I.1, Real Biblioteca Monasterio de San Lorenzo de El Escorial (henceforth RBME), Códice de los Músicos, MS B. I.2, RBME and Códice Florentino, MS B.R.20, Biblioteca Nazionale Centrale di Firenze. The Libro del Axedrez, Dados y Tablas, is RBME, MS T. I.6. This codex explains several games and depicts different people playing them. These manuscripts have been studied by, among other scholars, Amparo García Cuadrado, Las Cantigas: El códice de Florencia (Murcia: Universidad de Murcia, 1993); also Alfonso X el Sabio (1221–1284). Las Cantigas de Santa María. Códice Rico MS-I-1. Real Biblioteca del Monasterio de san Lorenzo del Escorial, ed. by Laura Fernández Fernández and Juan Carlos Ruiz Souza, I (Madrid: Patrimonio Nacional y Testimonio Compañia Editorial, 2011). Regarding the codex Libro de la Coronación de los reyes de Castilla y León (RBME, MS & III.3), which focuses on a coronation ritual, see José Manuel Nieto Soria, ‘Los libros de ceremoniales regios en Castilla y Aragón en el siglo XIV’, in Ceremonial de la coronación, unción y exequias de los reyes de Inglaterra. Estudios complementarios, ed. by Eloísa Ramírez Vaquero (Pamplona: Gobierno de Navarra. Departamento de Cultura y Turismo-Institución Príncipe de Viana, 2008), pp. 177– 93; Olga Pérez Monzón, ‘Ceremonias regias en la Castilla medieval. A propósito del llamado Libro de la coronación de los reyes de Castilla y León’, Archivo español de Arte, 83 (332) (2010), 317–34; Eduardo Carrero Santamaría, ‘Por las Huelgas los juglares. Alfonso XI de Compostela a Burgos, siguiendo el Libro de la coronación de los reyes de Castilla’, Medievalia, 15 (2012), 143–57. 6 Jaime de Salazar y Acha, La casa del rey de Castilla y León en la Edad Media (Madrid: Centro de Estudios Políticos y Constitucionales, 2000), p. 100.

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… emperors, kings and other great lords should have officers to serve and assist them in those things which they have to do. […] the King should have officers to serve him in the three following ways: some in matters of secrecy; others for the protection, government, and sustenance of his body; others for the honour, defence and assistance of his country.7

The position most directly related to caring for clothing was that of the camarero or chamberlain, who falls into the second category of officers, those responsible for the protection, government and sustenance of the king’s body. His profile and specific services for the king are likewise described in the Siete Partidas: … and this also applies to the chamberlain, who is so called because he should have charge of the chamber where the king lodges, and of his chests, his clothing, and his papers and, even if he knows how to read, he should not read those papers, or permit anyone else to do so; and, in addition to all these things, he must not be a tattletale or one who reveals what he sees and hears, but he should be discreet and silent, and endowed with a good talent for secrecy.8

According to Jaime de Salazar, the origin of the post of camarero can be traced back to the Visigothic comes cubiculi. In the last third of the 13th century this official was clearly responsible for attending to the king. As his duties entailed a great degree of intimacy with the monarch, the importance of the post increased enormously from the following century onwards. Juan Matheo (1294) and Gonzalo Díaz de Ceballos (1296) were camareros mayores (chamberlains) at the end of the 13th century for Sancho IV.9

7

‘… oficiales deben haber los emperadores et los reyes, e los otros grandes señores, de que se sirvan et se ayuden en las cosas que ellos han de facer. […] debie el rey tener oficiales quel sirviesen en estas tres maneras, los unos en las cosas de poridat, et los otros a guarda et a mantenimiento et a gobierno de su cuerpo, et los otros en las cosas que pertenescen a honra et a guardamiento et a amparanza de su tierra.’ Partida II, Título IX, Ley I: RAH, Las Siete Partidas, editadas y cotejadas con varios códices antiguos por la Real Academia de la Historia. Tomo II Partida Segunda y Tercera, (Madrid: Imprenta Real, 1807), pp. 56–57. English translation cited from Robert E. Burns, ed., Las Siete Partidas, II: Medieval Government: the world of kings and warriors, translated by Samuel Parsons Scott (Philadelphia, PA: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2001), pp. 310–11. 8 ‘et esto mesmo del camarero, que ha asi nombre porque debe guardar la cámara o el rey alverga, et su lecho, et los paños de su cuerpo, et las arcas, et los escritos et todas las otras cosas que hi toviere; et non debe catar los escritos del rey, maguer sepa leer, sin su mandado, nin dexar a otro que los lea. Et sobre todas estas cosas ha meester que non sea mesturero nin descobridor de lo que hobiere et oyere, mas debe ser cuerdo, et calantio et de buena poridat’. Partida II, Título IX, Ley XII: RAH, Las Siete Partidas, editadas y cotejadas con varios códices antiguos por la Real Academia de la Historia. Tomo II Partida Segunda y Tercera, p. 69. English translation is that of Scott, from Burns, Las Siete Partidas Volume Two, pp. 318–19. 9 Gaibrois de Ballesteros, Sancho IV de Castilla I, p. 43; Gaibrois de Ballesteros, Sancho IV de Castilla II, pp. 281–83; López Dapena, Cuentas y gastos, p. 525; Salazar y Acha, La casa del rey de Castilla y León en la Edad Media, pp. 51–54.



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The significance the post had gained by the first third of the 1300s is expressed in El Libro de los Estados of the nobleman Don Juan Manuel, who also provides a more detailed explanation of the duties involved: … in their households, lords have another official who is indispensible, and is called ‘chamberlain’. He must keep all the lord’s jewels that are made of gold and silver and precious stones, and cloth and all the things that pertain to the furnishings and adornments of the lord’s private rooms. […] And his men must sleep in the chamber where the lord sleeps, and must guard the door after the lord goes inside, and they must dress and undress the lord and know of all the confidential matters which other people must not know about. And given the chamberlain’s great familiarity with the lord, if he is of good intelligence and loyal and a good keeper of secrets, and of good manners and customs, he can be expected to play a very great role in the lord’s confidential matters and advice.10

It is safe to assume that the king’s clothing was kept in closed furniture (such as chests or trunks) which was located in the same bedchamber, which itself may have been decorated with sumptuous textiles and pillows like those depicted in a few miniatures in the Cantigas de Santa María (209 and 235 of the Códice florentino).11 Despite the luxurious appearance of some of the textiles portrayed in these images, including those displaying the heraldic emblems of Alfonso X, we know from the records that a few years later, in 1294, his son Sancho IV’s bed was covered in a blanket of verdescur, a wool fabric of lower quality than those depicted in the above-mentioned illustrations, but warmer. This, however, may have been due to the illness from which the king was then suffering.12 10 ‘los señores an en sus casas otro oficial que non puede[n] escusar, que á nombre camarero.

Et éste á de tener et guardar todas las joyas del señor que son de oro et de plata et piedras preciosas, et paños et todas las cosas que pertenecen para complimiento et apostamiento de la cámara del señor. […] Et sus omnes deven domir en la cámara do durmiere el señor, et deven guardar la puerta de la cámara desque el señor y entrare, et ellos deven vestir et desnugar al señor et saber todas las privanças encubiertas que non deveb [sa]ber las otras gentes. Et por el grant afazimiento que el camarero á con el señor, si fuere de buen entendimiento et leal et de buena poridat et de buenas maneras et de buenas costumbres, non se puede escusar que non aya muy grant parte en la privança et en los consejos del señor’; Obras completas de don Juan Manuel, ed. by Carlos Alvar and Sarah Finci (Madrid: Fundación José Antonio de Castro, 2007), pp. 628–29. All translations are the author’s unless otherwise stated. For the changes in the cámara and a description of it during Juan I’s reign, see Cañas Gálvez, ‘La casa de Juan I de Castilla’. 11 Gonzalo Menéndez Pidal, La España del s. XIII leída en imágenes (Madrid: Real Academia de la Historia, 1986), pp. 119–22; García Cuadrado, Las Cantigas: El códice de Florencia, pp. 238–39; Francisco Corti, ‘Retórica visual en los episodios biográficos reales ilustrados en las Cantigas de Santa María’, Historia. Instituciones. Documentos, 29 (2002), 59–108 (pp. 76–96). 12 The blanket on the king’s bed is mentioned in Gaibrois de Ballesteros, Sancho IV de Castilla I, p. CVI; López Dapena, Cuentas y gastos, p. 548; Gutiérrez Baños, Las empresas artísticas de Sancho IV el Bravo, p. 92. The term verdescur referred to a dark green (verde oscuro in Spanish) cloth of fine quality; Jesusa Alfau de Solalinde, Manual de tejidos españoles o nomenclatura de tejidos españoles en el s. XIII (Mexico: Instituto de estudios y documentos históricos, 1981), p. 181;

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Although there were many positions related more or less directly to the clothing stored in the royal chamber, there is scant information about their duties with respect to the Castilian court of the 13th century.13 Tending to the king’s personal garments and many other objects was a task that required not only keeping perfect control of purchases and inventories, but also preserving them in the best possible condition. The fact that the flowers of the henna plant (Lawsonia inermis) were used in Muslim Spain to scent and protect clothes from moths14 may help explain their presence on sale at the gates of Castilian cities.15 Another form of garment preservation is found in a 14th-century inventory of Toledo cathedral which describes how the most sumptuous garments were wrapped in linen, presumably to help preserve them.16 As the royal court was itinerant, logistics required trunks loaded on mules to transport the king’s possessions and the entire entourage from one place to another. One of the Cantigas de Santa María (RBME, MS T. I.1, fol. 173r, Fig. 10.1) features an illustration of the journey made by Queen Beatriz of Swabia (d. 1235) from Toledo to Burgos to take her sick daughter, the Infanta Berenguela, to Las Huelgas. Accompanied by a group of people and mules, the queen and her daughter travelled in a sedan chair richly decorated with a purple fabric and stripes of gold.17 Of the staff whose duties were related to transport, we know the names of Pero Martínez, chief muleteer to Sancho IV, and Pero Ferrans, who held the same position in the household of Sancho’s wife, Queen María de Molina

13

14

15

16

17

Mª del Carmen Martínez Meléndez, Los nombres de los tejidos en castellano medieval (Granada: Universidad de Granada, 1989), p. 183. For a detailed survey of the composition of the cámara and related posts in later periods, see Miguel Ángel Ladero Quesada, ‘La Casa Real en la Baja Edad Media’, Historia. Instituciones. Documentos, 25 (1998), 327–50 (pp. 336–42). Expiración García, ‘Las plantas textiles y tintoréas en Al-Andalus’, in Vestir y vestir. De la Antigüedad al Islam, ed. by Manuela Marín (Madrid: CSIC, 2001), pp. 417–51 (p. 438). Henna could also be used in combination with madder as a dyestuff to obtain reddish tones, though these colours soon faded. At the Alarilla gate (Guadalajara, early 13th-century) 3 denarii (silver coins) were paid for each arroba (weight measuring equivalent to 11 kg) of henna : José Luis Martín Rodríguez, ‘Portazgos de Ocaña y Alarilla’, Anuario de historia del derecho español, 32 (1962), 519–26 (p. 525). According to the 13th-century fueros (codes of laws) of Alcaraz and Alarcón (in Albacete and Cuenca respectively), two denarii were paid for each libra (weight measuring equivalent to 0.4 kg.); Jean Roudil, Les fueros d’Alcaraz et d’Alarcón. Édition synoptique avec les variantes du Fuero d’Alcazar. Introduction, notes et glossaire (Paris: Klincksieck, 1968), p. 574. ‘Item a very rich archbishop’s cape […] wrapped in a sheet. Item another cape of red xamete adorned with gold and silk […] wrapped in a sheet’ (‘Item una capa de arçobispo muy rrica […] en buelta en una sauana. Item otra capa de xamete bermejo estoriada de oro e de seda […] enbuelta en una sauana’); Luis Pérez de Guzmán, ‘Un inventario del siglo XIV de la Catedral de Toledo (La Biblia de san Luis)’, Boletín de la Real Academia de la Historia, 89 (1926), 373–419 (p. 385). Menéndez Pidal, La España del s. XIII leída en imágenes, p. 208; Corti, ‘Retórica visual’, I, p. 65.



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Fig. 10.1  Cantiga CXXII, fol. 173r, MS T. I.1, RBME. © Patrimonio Nacional.

(d. 1321), earning 150 maravedíes18 a month.19 Another is Johan Martines, who was responsible for ‘keeping the king’s clothes’ (‘guarda los pannos del rey’); Gutiérrez Baños has proposed that he might have been in charge of the ‘mules that carry the clothes’ (‘azémilas que trahen los pannos’).20 However, bearing in mind the records referring to the various textiles (blanqueta, blao, viado) that were given to him, some specifically for the King,21 perhaps his duties were more closely related to the safekeeping of the textiles in the chamber. 18 Originally the maravedí or morabitino of Alfonso VIII copied the dinar from Almoravids. However, as the 13th century goes on, it was employed as money of account: Mercedes Rueda,

Primeras acuñaciones de Castilla y León (Salamanca: Junta de Castilla y León, 1991).

19 Gaibrois de Ballesteros, Sancho IV de Castilla I, pp. 30, XXXIII, XXXV, XLI; López Dapena, Cuentas

y gastos, pp. 422, 24 and 34. Between 1293 and 1294 some 40 mules were used for movements of the court. See Sophie Coussemacker, ‘Nourrir et loger la cour de Sanche IV (1292–1294)’, in e-Spania [accessed 9 March 2010]. The number of mules used to transport the cámara in the late 14th century is reported in Nogales Rincón, ‘Un año en la corte de Enrique III de Castilla (1397–1398)’, pp. 92–94. 20 Gaibrois de Ballesteros, Sancho IV de Castilla I, pp. 43, LXXVII, and LXXVIII; López Dapena, Cuentas y gastos, p. 499; Gutiérrez Baños, Las empresas artísticas, p. 90. Several names related to the cámara appear in the accounts, but not always in connection with a specific function. 21 Gaibrois de Ballesteros, Sancho IV de Castilla I, p. 107; López Dapena, Cuentas y gastos, pp. 549– 50. Blanqueta and blao were woollen fabrics of which there were different qualities; they could

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One of the tasks related to clothing and textiles was laundering. María Pérez, a laundress in the household of King Fernando III the Saint (r. 1217–1252, King of both Castile and Leon from 1230), was granted two yugadas22 of land as part of the resettlement of Seville following its conquest; another, Doña Marquesa, was paid 90 maravedíes for firewood and coal from October to December 1294.23 A more important official was the shoemaker of that King’s household. His importance was reflected by the fact that he was granted the same amount of land that knights received in the above-mentioned resettlement.24 Notably, for his meeting with Philippe IV of France in Bayonne in 1286, Sancho IV chose to be accompanied by 46 members of his court in order to convey a fitting royal image. Among these were the usual clergy and minor nobility, three troubadours, and his alfayate (tailor),25 a profession that already enjoyed considerable recognition during the period.26 Nicolás Pérez (documented in 1286) was an alfayate at the courts of Alfonso X and Sancho IV,27 and Pero Johan or Pedro Juan, alfayate to Sancho IV, was paid a wage of 120 maravedíes between 1293 and 1294. He was in charge of two seamers who were paid 40 maravedíes each.28 The fact that

22 23

24 25

26

27 28

also refer to the colours white and blue; viado must have been a woollen fabric too, though it could also refer to any striped material: Alfau de Solalinde, Manual de tejidos, pp. 57–59, 181–82; Martínez Meléndez, Los nombres de los tejidos, pp. 38–48, 231–36. The size of land that two oxen could plough in a day. The actual measure varied considerably in different time periods and locales. Julio González, Reinado y diplomas de Fernando III, I, Estudio (Cordoba: Publicaciones del Monte de Piedad y Caja de Ahorrosde Córdoba, 1980), p. 123; López Dapena, Cuentas y gastos, pp. 589 and 598. González, Reinado y diplomas de Fernando III, I, p. 123. Francisco J. Hernández, ‘Ascenso y caída de Gómez García, abad de Valladolid y privado de Sancho IV de Castilla’, in Ecclesiastics and political state building in the Iberian monarchies, 13th–15th centuries, ed. by Herminia Vasconcelos Vilar and Maria João Branco (Evora: Cidehus, 2016), pp. 113–28. In this connection it is interesting to note an explanation provided in the 14th century: ‘A tailor, for example, who habitually performs the task of sewing, who has the skill and has been fully trained in it, cannot subsequently become skilled in carpentry or bricklaying in a similar way. Should he do so, it denotes that he did not yet completely master the first skill, and that it had not been firmly established’ (‘Un sastre, por ejemplo, que ejerce hábilmente la facultad de coser, que la posee bien y se ha adiestrado en ella íntimamente, no podrá adquirir luego, de una manera cabal, la facultad de la carpintería o de la albañilería. Si acaso lograra, denota que no poseía aún completamente la primera facultad, y que ésta no había tomado un carácter firme.’); Ibn Haldun ‘ Al-Muqaddimah’, in Introducción a la Historia Universal, ed. by Elías Trabulse (Mexico [City]: Fondo de cultura económica, 1977), pp. 727–28. Juan Vicente García Marsilla reports the ordinances enacted in Valencia by Jaime I, which advise buyers to go to textile shops accompanied by a tailor to avoid being deceived: ‘La moda no es capricho. Mensajes y funciones del vestido en la Edad Media’, Vínculos de Historia, 6 (2017), 71–88 (p. 75). Gaibrois de Ballesteros, Sancho IV de Castilla I, p. 52; Gaibrois de Ballesteros, Sancho IV de Castilla III, p. LXXXIV, doc. 135. Gaibrois de Ballesteros, Sancho IV de Castilla I, pp. CII, CXX, CXXI, CXXVII and CXXVIII; López Dapena, Cuentas y gastos, pp. 539, 579, 591, 600; Gutiérrez Baños, Las empresas artísticas, p. 90.



C l othing, F ur nishings and Cer em o n i es a t the C a s ti l i a n C o urt 2 41

Fig. 10.2  Cantiga CXVII, fol.167r, MS T. I.1, RBME. © Patrimonio Nacional.

Pablo Pérez is also documented as holding this position in 129429 indicates that there would have been several alfayates working at the same time, grouped into workshops, of which they were in charge. Pedro Miguelles is also documented that year.30 The accounts of Sancho IV refer to men performing these tasks, and alfayates (masculine gender) are also mentioned several decades earlier at the Cortes of Jerez of 1268 (during the reign of Alfonso X the Wise).31 Yet the Cantigas de Santa María (RBME, MS T. I.1, cantiga CXVII, fol. 167r, Fig. 10.2) mention several women (referred to as alfayatas) cutting cloth to make the pieces for a particular garment and then decorating it with embroidery. This reference shows that the profession was not restricted to men.

29 Gaibrois de Ballesteros, Sancho IV de Castilla I, pp. 52, CVIII, CIX; López Dapena, Cuentas y gastos,

p. 550, 552; Gutiérrez Baños, Las empresas artísticas, p. 91.

30 López Dapena, Cuentas y gastos, p. 621. 31 Assemblies (Cortes) of Jerez, 1268: ‘and the tailor [alfayate] who is paid more than previously

established for these things shall be fined for the value of the cloth’ (‘et el alfayate que mas tomare por estas cosas sobre dichas que peche otro tanto como valen los pannos’) in RAH, Cortes de los antiguos reinos de León y Castilla. Tomo primero (Madrid: Imprenta y Estereotipia de M. Rivadeneyra, 1861), p. 69.

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The queen, together with the infantes (royal children), had their own households and servants.32 Among the staff documented as holding these posts was the alfayate Alfonso Domínguez, who belonged to the household of the Infante Fernando (son of Sancho IV and María de Molina) in 1288.33 During the 13th century, the quality and importance of clothing was determined by the textiles from which they were made and their standard of craftsmanship in terms of colour and weave.34 Subsequently, the patterns and shapes of garments grew extraordinarily complex in the 14th century.35 Already in the 13th century, the idea of dressing in layers and leaving the under-layers visible, or showing, became an expression of luxury, reflected in the display of the various sumptuous components of the outfit.36 An additional innovation, closer fit in garments, was progressively achieved during the 13th century thanks to the work of tailors, who introduced ‘gores’ in their patterns.37 These triangular inserts made clothing more comfortable, as well as adding fullness only where necessary, enabling the rest of the garment to be very tight.38 Deliveries of materials and finished clothing products for making clothes were carefully recorded. During the course of 1294, Pedro Juan (alfayate), Ferrán Perez and Martín García received various quantities of pelts and escarlata (scarlet: a very 32 The king and queen gave the Infante Don Felipe 4,000 maravedíes for the upkeep of his

33 34

35

36 37 38

household in 1294; Gaibrois de Ballesteros, Sancho IV de Castilla I, pp. 43–44, XLIX; López Dapena, Cuentas y gastos, p. 448. Gaibrois de Ballesteros, Sancho IV de Castilla I, pp. 80, 81, 85; López Dapena, Cuentas y gastos, p. 550. García Marsilla, ‘La moda no es capricho. Mensajes y funciones del vestido en la Edad Media’, p. 75; María Barrigón, ‘La cultura de las ricas telas en época de Alfonso VIII: proyección del lujo, del estatus y de la imagen’, in Alfonso VIII y Leonor de Inglaterra: confluencias artísticas en el entorno de 1200, ed. by Marta Poza Yagüe and Diana Olivares Martínez (Madrid: Ediciones Complutense, 2017), pp. 143–67. Tailors were among the most geographically mobile professions during these centuries. German, French, Italian and Burgundian tailors are documented in the Iberian Peninsula in the 1300s and 1400s; García Marsilla, ‘La moda no es capricho’, p. 88. The Relación de efectos que Pedro Fernández recibía y entregaba de orden del rey (Archivo General de Simancas, Patronato Real, Legajo 29, documento 28), gives a full account of the garments and textiles used in Castilian court costume in 1393−94 as described in Nogales Rincón, ‘Un año en la corte de Enrique III de Castilla (1397–1398)’, pp. 95–102. Carmen Bernis Madrazo, Indumentaria medieval española (Madrid: Instituto Diego Velázquez, CSIC, 1956), p. 26. Christina Frieder Waugh, ‘Well-cut through the body: fitted clothing in twelfth-century Europe’, DRESS. The Journal of the Costume Society of America, 26 (1999), 3–16. Etelvina Fernández González, ‘Que los reyes vestiessen paños de seda con oro e con piedras preciosas. Indumentarias ricas en la Península Ibérica (1180–1300): entre la tradición islámica y el occidente cristiano’, in El legado de Al-Andalus: el arte andalusí en los reinos de León y Castilla durante la Edad Media, ed. by Manuel Valdés Fernández (Valladolid: Fundación del Patrimonio Histórico de Castilla y León, 2007), pp. 367–408 (p. 373); García Marsilla, ‘La moda no es capricho’, p. 76.



C l othing, F ur nishings and Cer em o n i es a t the C a s ti l i a n C o urt 2 43

fine quality, woollen cloth we will return to below) to make a number of garments for King Sancho IV: sayas (tunics), calzas (hose), almuzas (hoods), tabardos (tabards) and a sobretabardo (over-tabard).39 The delivery of blanqueta for the king is also documented.40 In contrast to the preserved funerary garments which were mainly of silk, the documentary evidence shows that the royal wardrobe would not have consisted entirely of luxurious silk fabrics.

Cloth i ng and texti le f u rnishings: R e p r e s e ntati ons of pow er a nd so cial d istinctio n Textile culture – that is, items of clothing as well as furnishings and decorative items – was used to represent power in both the religious and the secular realms, which were closely interlinked during the medieval period. It likewise made magnificence possible in religious worship and ceremonies, and helped single out people and social groups. Textiles were especially valued for the technical perfection of their craftsmanship as well as for their place of origin and, accordingly, how difficult they were to obtain and how rare they were. This meant that such fabrics were not only costly but had very specific characteristics that endowed them with what could be considered a special appearance. 39 Specifically: ‘and [it] showed payment from Pero Johan for receipt of a sable pelt and another

white one for the king’ (‘et mostro pago de Pero Johan que recibiera para una penna vera et otra blanca para el Rey, estos DCXX’); Gaibrois de Ballesteros, Sancho IV de Castilla I, p. 76; López Dapena, Cuentas y gastos, p. 497. ‘5 and a half varas of scarlet for a saya and two pairs of hose […] for two pairs of hose for the king, two and a half varas of scarlet […] for hoods for the king, one vara of scarlet […] for two tabards of scarlet and an over-tabard, 11 varas, and they were received by Ferrán Pérez’ (‘V varas et media d’Escarlata para saya et dos pares de calzas […] para dos pares de calças para el Rey, dos varas et media d’escarlata […] para Almuças al Rey, una vara d’Escarlata […] para dos tabardos d’Escarlata et un sobretabardo, XXI varas et recibioles Ferrán Pérez’); Gaibrois de Ballesteros, Sancho IV de Castilla I, p. 77; López Dapena, Cuentas y gastos, p. 498. ‘Scarlet for 50 maravedíes […] for the king, for an over-tabard […] 4 and a half varas […] to Pero Johan, tailor [alfayat], for hoods for the king. One and a half varas’ (‘Escarlata a L maravedís […] Al Rey, para un sobretabardo […] IV varas et media […] a Pero Johan, alfayat, para almuças al rey. I vara et media’); Gaibrois de Ballesteros, Sancho IV de Castilla I, p. 106; López Dapena, Cuentas y gastos, p. 548; Gutiérrez Baños, Las empresas artísticas, p. 91. On the term escarlata: Alfau de Solalinde, Manual de tejidos, pp. 95–99; Martínez Meléndez, Los nombres de los tejidos, pp. 76–85. 40 ‘To Roy Peres de la Camara […] for two pairs of hose for the king, date 29 September, blanqueta, 3 varas […] to Johan Martines de la Camara, by means of a document of the bishop, blanqueta for the king’ (‘A Roy Peres de la Camara […] para dos pares de calças para el rey, fecha XXIX de septiembre, blanqueta, III varas […] A Johan Martines de la Camara, por alvalá del obispo, blanqueta para el rey’); Gaibrois de Ballesteros, Sancho IV de Castilla I, p. 107; López Dapena, Cuentas y gastos, p. 549.

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The fabrics that were available in the Iberian Peninsula in this period were varied in origin. As these aspects are explored in other chapters of this book, we will not discuss them here but merely point readers to the related literature. With respect to Castile, Gutiérrez Baños and Teófilo Ruiz documented the circulation of textiles from the regions in the North of the Peninsula (mainly the ports in the Cantabrian Sea),41 and others from Muslim Spain. In this connection it is striking to note the use of textiles decorated with Arabic script, particularly in ecclesiastic circles and ceremonies but also in the royal sphere; the fact that inventories refer to these ‘inscriptions in Arabic’ (‘letreros en arauigo’) attests to the great awareness there was of them during the period in question. The use of these materials (pertaining to the ‘Other’, the infidel and enemy) in Christian rituals and royal circles has been interpreted as the expression of the aesthetic that was common in the Iberian Peninsula of the day, irrespective of creeds and religions, and as evidence of a taste for the ‘Moresque’ in items that were highly valued for their luxuriousness. This fashion continued to spread until the late Middle Ages and beginning of the Modern Period.42 An interesting type (which we will examine in detail later) came from the Far East: the so-called panni tartarici, luxurious textiles that are widely found in inventories dating from the late 1200s and early 1300s. Prominent among the examples of documentary references to textile purchases by the monarchy are several payments of thousands of maravedíes made in 1294 by Sancho IV and especially by his wife María de Molina to purchase woollen cloth, sendal, scarlet, pelts, and rings.43 41 A summary of the fabrics mentioned under the various items of Sancho IV’s accounts can

be found in Gaibrois de Ballesteros, Sancho IV de Castilla I, pp. 45–46. For data on imports via the Basque ports see López Dapena, Cuentas y gastos, pp. 65–115; more recently: Ruiz, ‘Textile consumption in Late Medieval Castile: the social, economic and cultural meaning of clothing’; Mª Paz Moral Zuazo and Emiliano Fernández de Pinedo Fernández, ‘From wool to linen and silk. The consumption of cloth by the Royal Houses of Aragon and Castile: from the 14th to early 16th centuries’, in Arte y producción textil en el Mediterráneo medieval, ed. by Laura Rodríguez Peinado and Francisco de Asís García (Madrid: Polifemo, 2019), pp. 181–206. 42 Ramón Menéndez Pidal, España y su historia (Madrid: Ediciones Minotauro, 1957), p. 276; Maria Judith Feliciano, ‘Muslim shrouds for Christian kings? A Reassessment of Andalusi Textiles in 13th-century Castilian Life and Ritual’, in Under the influence: questioning the comparative in medieval Castile, ed. by Cynthia Robinson and Leyla Rouhi (Leiden and Boston: Brill, 2005), pp. 101–31; Manuel Jódar Mena, ‘El gusto por lo morisco como símbolo de identidad del poder. El caso del Condestable Iranzo en el reino de Jaén’, Revista de Antropología Experimental, 12 (2012), 335–48; David Nogales Rincón, ‘A la usanza morisca: el modelo cultural islámico y su recepción en la corte real de Castilla’, Ars Longa, 27 (2018), 45–64. There is an example of a cope decorated with Arabic inscriptions in the chapel of the Constables in Burgos cathedral; Mónica Moreno García and Aranzazu Platero Otsoa, ‘Gloria al Sultán en la capilla de los Condestables de la catedral de Burgos’, Akobe: Restauraicón y conservación de bienes culturales, 8 (2007), 36–43. Also, some of the textiles found in the royal mausoleum of Las Huelgas (Burgos) are decorated with Arabic inscriptions, see Gómez Moreno, El panteón real de las Huelgas. 43 The queen paid Gil Nerdiel or Verdiel 5,704 maravedíes for two ‘paños de Doay’ and sendals, orphreys and one scarlet for the visits to Logroño in 1294; Gaibrois de Ballesteros, Sancho IV de Castilla I, p. XLI; López Dapena, Cuentas y gastos, p. 434. In April–August 1294, he was



C l othing, F ur nishings and Cer em o n i es a t the C a s ti l i a n C o urt 2 45

The most common outfit in the period studied consisted of underclothing, a saya (tunic), pellote (sideless overgown) and manto (cloak).44 In these widespread garments, however, the quality of the end results could vary enormously depending on the fabrics from which they were made, as pointed out earlier. Exactly the same types of garments were used as sleepwear. For example, Sancho IV had a kind of tunic as night robe (‘aljuba de noche’) and a ‘pellote that went over it’ (‘pelote que vista so ella’), both made of verdescur.45 It is important to note that men’s and women’s garments, known by various names whatever they were called during the period, were made from the same types of textiles, as evidenced by the similar woven decoration on the outfits in which the Leonor (d. 1244), Queen of Aragon, daughter of Alfonso VIII and Leonor Plantagenet, and Infante Felipe (d. 1274), younger brother of Alfonso X, who were buried in Las Huelgas in Burgos and Villalcázar de Sirga (Palencia) respectively.46 The two main institutions of the era, the royal court and the Church, used exactly the same types of textiles for the staging, decoration and pageantry of the various ceremonies held in their respective environments. Rich textiles and ornaments were regarded as a demonstration of power (both royal and ecclesiastical), but also as an expression to honour the sacred. A paradigmatic case is the type of textile used to craft part of the ecclesiastical vestments in which the archbishop Jiménez de Rada (d. 1247) was interred in Santa María de Huerta in Soria: specifically, the dalmatic and tunic are made of a similar cloth to the saya in which Beatriz of Swabia (d. 1235) was laid to rest in her tomb first in Las Huelgas then in Seville cathedral, which was examined in given 7,061 maravedíes for cloths and sendals the queen purchased from him; Gaibrois de Ballesteros, Sancho IV de Castilla I, p. 67; López Dapena, Cuentas y gastos, p. 482. Don Bartolomé Monresin was given 2,945 maravedíes because the queen owed him for woollen cloths and other items; Gaibrois de Ballesteros, Sancho IV de Castilla I, p. 42; López Dapena, Cuentas y gastos, p. 436. Rodrigo Eañes de Çamora was paid 4,000 maravedíes for sable pelts (peñas veras) by means of a letter from the King and Queen; Gaibrois de Ballesteros, Sancho IV de Castilla I, p. 53; López Dapena, Cuentas y gastos, p. 454. On the instructions of the King and Queen, Ferrando Matheos was paid 4,000 maravedíes for rings the King purchased from him; Gaibrois de Ballesteros, Sancho IV de Castilla I, p. LXVII; López Dapena, Cuentas y gastos, p. 482. 44 On medieval clothing, which became more complex regarding types throughout the 13th century see Bernis Madrazo, Indumentaria medieval; Fernández González, ‘Que los reyes vestiessen paños’. For a compilation of medieval garments housed in various institutions: Elizabeth Coatsworth and Gale R. Owen-Crocker, Clothing the past. Surviving garments from early medieval to early modern western Europe (Leiden: Brill, 2018). 45 Gaibrois de Ballesteros, Sancho IV de Castilla I, p. 106; López Dapena, Cuentas y gastos, p. 548; Gutiérrez Baños, Las empresas artísticas, p. 92. On the term aljuba see Dolores Serrano-Niza’s contribution to this volume, pp. 207–32 (pp. 226–28). 46 Amador de los Ríos y Villalta, ‘Restos del traje de infante don Felipe’; Gómez-Moreno, El Panteón Real de las Huelgas, pp. 23–24. This similarity has been pointed out since the discovery of the contents of the tombs at Las Huelgas in Burgos.

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1948.47 All these garments are fashioned from lampas48 in shades of cream and grey respectively, decorated with small monochrome scrolls. Sumptuous textiles identical in pattern and manufacturing technique were also used indiscriminately to make both clothing and items of furnishing and interior decoration.49 The collection of textiles from Las Huelgas in Burgos includes excellent examples of fabrics employed for both purposes in the same period. We find the same type of textile (liseré tabby with different colour weft threads, Fig. 10.3 a–d)50 used as a furnishing fabric in one of the pillows of Queen Leonor of Aragon (d. 1244), and to line the coffin of Fernando de la Cerda (d. 1275), son and heir of Alfonso X and Violante of Aragon. As a garment fabric it is found in two items, the saya from the tomb Gómez-Moreno attributed to María de Almenar (d. c. 1200) and a gown found in the tomb attributed to Alfonso (d. around 1250), an illegitimate son of Alfonso X. Documentary sources corroborate this textile evidence. Although the precise meaning of a few names of textiles found in written sources remains somewhat unclear and many have varied over time, it is interesting to note that the same terms can be traced in differing contexts. For example, a textile referred to as jamete, xamete or xamit was widely used in the 13th century. Two literary examples from the late 13th century illustrate how these terms are employed indiscriminately in connection with both clothing and furnishings. The Castigos de Sancho IV states that ‘behind the king and the whole house where he was were curtains of red xamete patterned all over with gold letters’.51 La Conquista de Ultramar mentions

47 Gómez-Moreno, ‘Preseas reales sevillanas’, p. 198; Mª Socorro Mantilla de los Rios, Vestiduras

48

49

50

51

pontificales del arzobispo Rodrigo Jiménez de Rada, s. XIII (Madrid: Ministerio de Cultura. Instituto de Conservación y Restauración de Bienes Culturales, 1995), pp. 88–123. Technically lampas is: ‘a term used exclusively for figured textiles in which a pattern, composed of weft floats bound by a binding warp, is added to a ground fabric formed by a main warp and a main weft. The ground may be tabby, twill, satin, damask, flushing-warp weave, etc. The weft threads forming the pattern may be main, pattern or brocading wefts; they float on the face as required by the pattern, and are bound by the ends of the binding warp in a binding ordinarily tabby or twill and which is supplementary to the ground weave’; CIETA, Vocabulary of technical terms. Fabrics. English, French, Italian, Spanish (Lyon: Centre International d’Etude del Textiles Anciens, 2006), p. 45. The vestments in which archbishop Jiménez de Rada was buried are embellished with textiles like those used for furnishings and decoration. For example, the border adorning his alb is similar to that of the pillow in the tomb Gómez-Moreno attributed to María de Almenar (d. c. 1200) in Las Huelgas in Burgos; Gómez-Moreno, El Panteón Real de las Huelgas, p. 29; Mantilla de los Rios, Vestiduras pontificales del arzobispo, pp. 134–58. Technically a liseré tabby is defined as a tabby where: ‘a weft float figure is formed by the main weft, or one of the main weft threads’: CIETA, Vocabulary of technical terms. Fabrics. English, French, Italian, Spanish, p. 47. ‘a las espaldas del rey e toda la casa en que el estaua era encortinada de pannos de xamete bermejos labrados todos con letras de oro’; Castigos del rey don Sancho IV, ed. by Hugo Oscar Bizarri (Madrid: Iberoamericana, 2001), p. 145.

a

c

b

d

Fig. 10.3  Liseré tabby with different-coloured weft threads, used: a as a furnishing fabric in one of the pillows (00650517) of Queen Leonor of Aragón (d. 1244), daughter of Alfonso VIII and Eleanor Plantagenet. © Patrimonio Nacional b to line (00651938, detail) the coffin of Fernando de la Cerda (d. 1275). © Patrimonio Nacional c as a dress fabric in the saya (00651972) from the tomb attributed to María de Almenar (d. c. 1200). © Patrimonio Nacional d as a dress fabric in a gown (00650506) found in the tomb attributed to Alfonso (d. c. 1250), an illegitimate son of Alfonso X. © Patrimonio Nacional

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this textile as the upholstery of a very ornate chair and also it had been used for a liturgical ornament for a bishop.52 Another example is ciclaton, a type of textile cited in connection with the clothing worn by El Cid according to the epic poem (mid-12th-century) about the vindication of Rodrigo Díaz de Vivar.53 It was also used in some of the pillows that furnished an astonishingly sumptuous living room of Mu’ammal al-Qastali, a lord of Valencia,54 and also in various liturgical ornaments.55 The fact that the same fabrics could be employed for all kinds of clothing as well as for furnishings or decoration does not mean to say that certain types were not preferred for particular items and sometimes constituted ‘models’ that remained prevalent for a long time. For example, white linen fabrics embroidered with coloured silks were used to make both shirts (such as that of Alfonso VIII, r. 1158–1214, interred in Las Huelgas, Burgos) and pillows, such as one that belonged to his wife Leonor (d. 1214, Las Huelgas, Burgos). The shirt and, above all, pillows of this kind were depicted some decades after in various scenes of the Cantigas.56 As goods closely related to luxury, textiles were a means of distinguishing the monarch, as can be seen in various writings of the period. In the Siete Partidas the singling out of the king by means of clothing was attributed to ancient times: ‘The ancient sages established the rule that kings should wear garments of silk, adorned with gold and jewels, in order that men might know them’.57 The idea that the sumptuousness of the king’s clothing should always be greater than that of the rest of the population is expressed in Secreto de los Secretos, a Spanish version of Secretum Secretorum: 52 Martínez Meléndez, Los nombres de los tejidos, p. 309. 53 ‘Sobr’ella un brial primo de ciclatón. Obrado es con oro, parecen por o son’; Cantar del Mio Cid.

54 55

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57

Estudio preliminar de Francisco Rico, ed. by Alberto Montaner (Barcelona: Galaxia Gutemberg, 2007), p. 185. Manuela Marín, ‘Signos visuales de la identidad andalusí’, in Tejer y vestir: de la Antigüedad al Islam, ed. by Manuela Marín (Madrid: CSIC, 2001), pp. 137–80 (p. 141). Martínez Meléndez, Los nombres de los tejidos, p. 292. The author notes that the term was used around 1230 for a dalmatic in Vida de santo Domingo de Silos by Gonzalo de Berceo and in 1244 for a maniple. Gómez-Moreno, El Panteón Real de las Huelgas, pp. 26–27; María Barrigón, ‘Textiles and farewells: revisiting the grave goods of King Alfonso VIII of Castile and Queen Eleanor Plantagenet’, Textile History, 46 (2015), 235–57 (p. 240 and 50). In the Cantigas, for example in number CXLVIII; RBME, T. I.1, fol. 204v. ‘los sabios antiguos establecieron que los reyes vestiesen paños de seda con oro et con piedras preciosas, porque los homes los pudiesen conocer’; Partida II, Título I, Ley V; RAH, Las Siete Partidas, editadas y cotejadas con varios códices antiguos por la Real Academia de la Historia. Tomo II Partida Segunda y Tercera, pp. 28–29. English translation cited from Burns, Las Siete Partidas Volume Two, trans. by Samuel Parsons Scott, p. 288. Reported in Fernández González, ‘Que los reyes vestiessen paños’, p. 368; Olga Pérez Monzón, ‘La imagen del poder y el poder de la imagen. Alfonso X de Castilla y el infante don Felipe’, in Nuevo Mundo, Nuevos Mundos (2009) < https://doi.org/10.4000/nuevomundo.56517> [accessed 15 August 2020].



C l othing, F ur nishings and Cer em o n i es a t the C a s ti l i a n C o urt 2 49 It is most fitting to royal majesty that the king be clothed honorably and always show himself in beautiful clothing that surpasses others in beauty. For so must the king dress in beautiful things and rare adornments, because he must surpass others in his special manner of dress, so that greater reverence is made to him.58

Another version, the treatise entitled Poridat de Poridades, likewise stresses that the king ‘must dress very well, and in fine clothes, so that he excels above all other people’.59 Going further than the individualisation of the king through his clothing, the Castigos de Sancho IV written in the late 13th century includes a delightful allegory of a monarch explaining the virtues and qualities signified by his ornaments and adornments. Aside from a reference to his crown, whose precious stones attest to the qualities a good king should have, what it says about clothing is particularly telling. The King: … was dressed in cloths covered in gold and silk. And it is through gold that the riches and nobility possessed by the king of the kingdom are understood. And through the silks and the adornments he must wear, for he could not display adornments fully or continuously if he did not have riches to show. This king’s clothes were orphreyed with seed pearls and with precious stones. This orphey displayed the bounteous rewards which the king should grant to those who deserve them by serving him well and performing good deeds. The linings of this king’s clothing were of white ermine fur, whereby is shown the cleanliness the king should have in his soul and not soil it with ill deeds or neglect […] On his right foot the king wore a very rich shoe embroidered with precious stones and seed pearls. And this shoe was called firmness. And on his left foot he wore another shoe embroidered in the same way, which was called calm.60 58 ‘mucho conuiene a la majestad rreal el mesmo rrey honradamente ser uestido e siempre con

fermosos aparejamiento aparesçer e sobrepujar a los otros en fermosura. Pues que assy es, deue el rrey ser uestido de fermosas cosas e extrañas guarniciones, por que deue a los otros en vna especial cosa de vestiduras sobrepujar, por que a el devida rreuerençia sea dada’; Hugo Oscar Bizarri, ed., Secreto de los secretos. Poridat de las poridades. Versiones castellanas del Pseudo-Aristóteles Secretum secretorum (Valencia: Universidad de Valencia, 2010), p. 71 and 112. 59 ‘se uista muy bien, e de buenos pannos, de guisa que sea estremado de todas las otras gentes’: Bizarri, Secreto de los secretos, p. 71 and 112. This excerpt and the previous one are also cited in Olga Pérez Monzón, ‘Iconografía y poder real en Castilla: las imágenes de Alfonso VIII’, Anuario del Departamento de Historia y Teoría del Arte, 14 (2002), 19–41 (p. 26). The Secreto de los Secretos, like the Castigos de Sancho IV, is a literary work containing advice and knowledge for rulers, and both are examples of mirrors for princes. See Hugo Oscar Bizarri, ‘Sermones y espejos de príncipes castellanos’, Anuario de Estudios Medievales, 42 (2012), 163–81. 60 ‘estaua vestido vunos pannos cubiertos de oro e de seda. E por esto se entienden por el oro las riquezas e las noblezas que ha el rey del regno. E por la seda e las aposturas que deue auer en si, ca las aposturas non las puede amostrar conplidamente ni continuadamente synon ouiere riquezas en que las muestre. Los sus pannos deste rey eran orofresados en aljófar e con piedras preçiosas, la qual orofresadura se demuestra los galardones de bien que deue dar el rey a los que lo meresçen seruiondole bien e faziendo buenas obras. La forradura deste rey

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The general regulation for distinguishing the king through textiles is recorded in a simple rule of the Cortes (assemblies) of 1258 stating that the king should dress as he pleased and with as many fabrics as he wished.61 From the 13th century onwards sumptuary laws were passed both to prevent luxury and to provide a mechanism for distinction and even segregation through textiles and clothing.62 Several garments and fabrics were thus reserved for the king, such as rain cloaks (capas aguaderas) made of scarlet,63 and certain items of clothing and colours became standard attire for both members of the king’s and queen’s households. Nobles and knights, however, were banned from having more than four garments made per year. These regulations were frequently re-enacted, which suggests that compliance was low. Also some of them included the clergy. For instance, the Cortes of Valladolid in 1258 banned clergy in royal service from wearing red and green.64 Directly in the ecclesiastical environment, Councils such as Lérida (1229) or Tarragona (1282) also acted to check on the clergy’s morals.65 This reflects that

61 62

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eran pennas blancas arminnas, por la qual se demuestra la limpieza que el rey deue auer en la su alma e non la ensuciar en malos fechos nin en malos cuidados […] En el su pie diestro el rey teníe un çapato muy rico labrado con oro e con piedras preçiosas e con aljófar. E este çapato era llamado firmedumbre. E en el pie siniestro teníe otro tal çapato asi labrado el qual era llamado asosegamiento’; Bizarri, Castigos del rey don Sancho IV, pp. 143–44. Discussed in José Manuel Nieto Soria, ‘Imágenes religiosas del rey y del poder real en la Castilla del siglo XIII’, En la España Medieval, 5 (1986), 709–30 (pp. 719–20). RAH, Cortes de los antiguos reinos de León y Castilla. Tomo primero, p. 55. José Damián González Arce, Apariencia y poder. La legislación suntuaria castellana en los siglos XIII–XV (Jaén: Universidad de Jaén, 1998). For a reflection on how some of the ordinances enacted against luxury, underlining the contradiction between the iconography of certain saints and the abundant show of wealth in their clothing, see Juan Vicente García Marsilla, ‘Los santos elegantes. La iconografía del joven caballero y las polémicas sobre el lujo en el arte gótico hispano’, in Imagen y cultura. La interpretación de las imágenes como historia cultural, ed. by Rafael García Mahíques and Vicent Francesc Zuriaga Senent (Valencia: Generalitat Valenciana, 2008), pp. 775–86. Although we do not examine in detail the distinctions the sumptuary laws established for Jews and Moors, readers can consult Olivia Remie Constable, To live like a moor. Christian perceptions of muslim identity in Medieval and Early Modern Spain (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2018). Escarlata had been reserved for the king’s capa aguadera or tabardo aguadero (rain cloak or tabard) from 1258, when Alfonso X reigned, until 1339; González Arce, Apariencia y poder, p. 124. The fact that Pope Boniface VIII received red scarlet (escarlata rube) and white scarlet (escarlata alba) in 1295 testifies to the quality of this fabric; Émile Molinier, ‘Inventaire du trésor du Saint-Siège sous Boniface VIII (1295) (suite et fin)’, Bibliothèque de l’école des chartes, 49 (1888), 226–37 (p. 229). They were forbidden to wear other items such as hose (calzas) that were not dark, stitched-on sleeves (mangas cosedizas) and shoes with laces or buckles; RAH, Cortes de los antiguos reinos de León y Castilla. Tomo primero, p. 55; González Arce, Apariencia y poder, pp. 131–32. Canons IX, XXIV and XXV of the Council of Lérida (1229) specify that the gown could not reveal the wearer’s sides or hose, and bracelets, gold or silver buckles, and silk belts were prohibited. Canon II of the council of Tarragona (1282) banned vestments of different colours and showy footwear; see Xavier Baró i Queralt and José Antonio Ontalba Rupérez,



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both the colour and the fabric itself expressed the status of the wearer and served to represent power.66

P r e c i ous texti les: b etw ee n Co u rt and Chu rch Medieval palaces, as epicentres of power and physical extensions of royal authority, were used for many purposes in itinerant courtly life. Their magnificent, richly decorated reception halls were settings for various ceremonies and festivities. A beautiful description of how palace interiors were adorned and embellished with textiles for different ceremonies can be found in the Cantar del Mío Cid (mid-12th-century), in this case for a wedding: ‘Now they began to adorn the palace with fine carpets on the floors and walls, and much purple, samite, and rare fabrics.’67 A few of the miniatures illustrating the Cantigas also show the richness of the luxurious interiors with splendid textiles for curtains, rugs and cushions. Importance was also attached to illuminating these rooms, as reflected in an entry in the accounts of Sancho IV recording a payment of a thousand maravedíes for ‘the large candles that burned before the king and queen all month’ (‘las candelas grandes que ardían ante los reyes todo el mes’).68 Furthermore, the King and Queen supplied clothing to the members of their court. In a document of 1208, Alfonso VIII stated, when the Monteros de Espinosa (royal guard) were summoned to serve him, that ‘I am obliged to provide them with sustenance and clothing in one colour while they are with me’ (‘soi obligado ‘Aproximación a la moral en la Tarraconense (s. XIII–XV)’, Hispania Sacra, 51 (1999), 655–67 (p. 663). 66 This aspect was recently analysed in relation to Pope Boniface VIII by Maureen C. Miller, in ‘Clothing as communication? Vestments and views of the papacy c. 1300’, Journal of Medieval History, 44 (2018), 280–93. In connection with Spain, there are studies on episcopal vestments as a reflection of power through funerary sculpture: Marta Cendón Fernández, ‘El poder episcopal a través de la escultura funeraria en la Castilla de los Trastámara’, Quintana, 5 (2006), 173–84; Marta Cendón Fernández, ‘La indumentaria episcopal como reflejo de poder en la escultura funeraria bajomedieval’, in Imágenes del poder en la Edad Media, ed. by Etelvina Fernández González (León: Universidad de León, 2011), pp. 101–20. 67 ‘penssaron de adobar essora el palaçio, por el suelo e suso tan bien encortinado, tanta pórpola e tanto xamed e tanto panno preçiado’; Cantar de Mío Cid, ed. by José Luis Girón Alconchel and María Virginia Pérez Escribano (Madrid: Castalia, 2015), p. 245. English translation cited from Poem of my Cid (selections) – Poema de mio Cid (selecciones), ed. by Stanley Appelbaum (New York: Dover Publications, 2005), p. 71. On palaces as residences and places of authority through documentary sources, see Therese Martin, ‘Chronicling the Iberian Palace: written sources and the meanings of medieval Christian rulers’ residences’, Journal of Medieval Iberian Studies, 2 (2010), 109–39. Although focusing chiefly on the 14th century and, especially, the 15th, an interesting source on ornament is Olga Pérez Monzón, ‘Ornado de tapicerías y aparadores de muchas vaxillas de oro e plata. Magnificencia y poder en la arquitectura palatina bajomedieval castellana’, Anales de Historia del Arte, 23 (2013), 259–85. 68 Gaibrois de Ballesteros, Sancho IV de Castilla I, p. 46.

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yo a proveerles de mantenimientos i vestidos de un color mientras que conmigo estuvieren’).69 Although Julio González judged the document to be dubious, and subsequent studies consider it to be forged,70 it is nevertheless true that the royal commitment to provide textiles in certain colours was a medieval custom. Similar documents are found in the accounts of Sancho IV: in 1293−94, Juan Rois de Burgos, amo (housekeeper) of the Infante don Pedro, was given 300 maravedíes for clothing,71 and in 1294 Doña Marina Suares was paid 4,000 maravedíes for wages and to provide household textiles for the Infante Don Pedro.72 A list of expenditures, Nómina de los gastos en vestidos y paños para la compaña del rey (18 septiembre de 1294) is particularly interesting.73 It specifies the lengths in varas74 and types of textiles given to servants of the cámara: messengers, squires, crossbowmen, falconers, scribes, clergy of the chapel, and others. The types of cloth granted to them were blao, viado, camelín, valançina, santomer, paño tinto and escarlata.75 Special mention, owing to his profession, should be made of the master alfayate Pedro, who received nine varas of viado and three and a half varas of paño tinto. Sometimes sources specify the garments for which the fabrics were intended: for example, viado for cloaks and pellotes, and paño tinto for sayas and hose for the ‘ten muleteers

69 Julio González, El reino de Castilla en la época de Alfonso VIII¸ III, 1191–1217 e índices (Madrid:

70

71 72 73 74 75

Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas, 1960), pp. 445–46. Reported in Isidro G. Bango Torviso, ‘La imagen pública de la realeza bajo el reinado de Alfonso X. Breves apostillas sobre regalia insignia y actuaciones protocolarias’, Alcanate: Revista de Estudios Alfonsíes, 7 (2010–2011), 13–42 (p. 38). This document actually refers to the granting of several solares of land to the Monteros de Espinosa; they claimed that this land had long belonged to them, citing this supposed document of 1208 which already granted them those rights. Even if it is a forged diploma, it is interesting on account of the tangential reference to clothing at the court as evidence of this custom in the medieval period, though perhaps not as early as 1208. Carlos Estepa Díez, ‘Apéndices’, in Poder real y sociedad: estudios sobre el reinado de Alfonso VIII (1158–1214), ed. by Carlos Estepa Díez, Ignacio Álvarez Borge and José María Santamarta Luengos (León: Universidad de León, 2011), pp. 270–345 (p. 307). López Dapena, Cuentas y gastos, p. 436. Gaibrois de Ballesteros, Sancho IV de Castilla I, p. 67; López Dapena, Cuentas y gastos, p. 481. Gaibrois de Ballesteros, Sancho IV de Castilla I, pp. 73–74; López Dapena, Cuentas y gastos, pp. 492–95. The Castilian vara measured approximately 0.83 m. Camelín was a textile that could come in various qualities and be composed of different fibres. Etymologically the word has been linked to camel hair, though other scholars have suggested it was a wool plush textile; Alfau de Solalinde, Manual de tejidos, p. 71; Martínez Meléndez, Los nombres de los tejidos, pp. 427–32. The characteristics of the fabric referred to as valançina are unclear, though it has been pointed out that it was made of wool; Alfau de Solalinde, Manual de tejidos, pp. 177–79. Santomer was a woollen cloth from Saint-Omer in north-west France; Alfau de Solalinde, Manual de tejidos, p. 84 and 164. Paño tinto referred to a dyed textile; Alfau de Solalinde, Manual de tejidos, p. 171.



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of Juan Matheo who go about the chamber’ (‘diez omes de bestias de Juan Matheo que andan en la camara’).76 Lastly, it is interesting to note that textiles were supplied by the monarch not only to the court but also to the Church. Certain institutions were granted privileges with respect to dress, such as the Abbey of Santa María la Real de las Huelgas de Burgos (which had close links to the Crown).77 In the ecclesiastical sphere, especially from the Late Middle Ages onwards, the various rules enacted by the chapters of many churches established that dignitaries, on being appointed, should gift the institution various ecclesiastical vestments or their equivalent in money, as occurred in the cathedrals of Leon (1327) and Santiago (1328).78 Apart from the textiles obtained through privileges and canonical regulations of this kind, medieval ecclesiastical inventories not only list the ecclesiastical vestments (among other things) that existed at a particular date but sometimes specify the person – often bishops or kings – who had supplied them. We should not forget the important role played by textiles in the medieval period, as offerings and gifts in the diplomatic sphere, which enhanced the prestige of the giver

76 Other references to textiles, though not connected with posts in the cámara, mention:

‘valançina for the cellar master to make a tabard, viado for cloaks and paño tinto for sayas and hose of the pages on foot, or viado for making a pellote, saya and hood for the falconer and Pedro Portugal’ (‘valançina al bodeguero para hacer un tabardo, viado para capas y paño tinto para sayas y calzas de los escuderos de pie, o viado para confeccionar pellote, saya y capirote para el halconero y Pedro Portugal’): Gaibrois de Ballesteros, Sancho IV de Castilla I, pp. 73–74; López Dapena, Cuentas y gastos, pp. 492–95. 77 ‘Through letters from the king and queen to the abbess of the convent of Santa María La Real in Burgos, which have privileges in clothing and fish.’ (‘Por cartas del rey et de la reyna, al abbadessa et al Convento de Santa María la Real de Burgos, que tienen por privilegios para vestir et para pescado.’); Gaibrois de Ballesteros, Sancho IV de Castilla I, p. 42; López Dapena, Cuentas y gastos, p. 435. ‘To María Guillem, nun of the convent in Burgos [Las Huelgas?], by means of a letter from the queen with instruction to provide clothing, and to each of the other nuns, dated 7th February of the 32nd era. She showed proof of having received 12 varas of camellín and 100 dineros in money.’ (‘A Maria Guillem, monia del monasterio de Burgos [¿Huelgas?], por carta de la reyna, en quel mandava dar de vestir, assi como a cada una de las otras monias, dada VII de febrero, era de XXXII. Mostro pago della que recibiera XII varas de camellin et C maravedís en dineros’; Gaibrois de Ballesteros, Sancho IV de Castilla I, p. 77; López Dapena, Cuentas y gastos, p. 498. The dinero was originally a silver coinage. However, as the 13th century went on, it was employed as money of account: see Rueda, Primeras acuñaciones de Castilla y León, pp. 44–48. 78 At León Cathedral anyone promoted to the rank of canon had to donate, within the space of a year, a processional cloak of panno aureo serico, xamito or baldoquino or 400 maravedíes. At Santiago Cathedral anyone who was promoted was to donate a silk cloak or 300 maravedíes; in addition, those who were elevated to high-ranking posts such as treasurer were specifically required to gift a second cloak or 200 maravedíes: Antolín P. Villanueva, Los ornamentos sagrados en España. Su evolución histórica y artística (Barcelona: Labor, 1935), pp. 135–36.

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and acknowledged his important quality of generosity.79 Donors could give a fabric, a secular garment to be transformed into an ecclesiastical vestment,80 or even an ecclesiastical garment already made – always for the purpose of enriching the sacristy and worship. Ornaments decorated with the donor’s coat of arms were particularly striking, as their name thus became indissolubly linked with the gift and enhanced the prestige of the church as well. Specific examples worthy of mention are: a cloak decorated with the castles and lions of Castile and Leon for the choir of Lugo Cathedral in 1289; and, in the 14th century, the various silk frontals embroidered with Juan I of Castile’s coat of arms that this king (d. 1390) gave to Oviedo Cathedral; and a cope, the hood of which displayed the coat of arms of the King of Aragon, that was given to Toledo Cathedral in the 14th century.81 The use of heraldic motifs to adorn textiles had begun in the 13th century, initially only partially covering the surface and eventually the entire surface (Fig. 10.4). The coat of arms was obviously an important distinguishing feature and played a significant role in textiles and was employed in ceremonial royal settings. During that period the garments most closely related to the king were those that bore his insignia. They therefore embodied an explicit gesture when they were given to the Church, but also when they were used at various court ceremonies.

79 According to the archbishop Jiménez de Rada, Alfonso VIII was described as generous owing

to his custom of presenting textiles and clothing as gifts; Rodrigo Jiménez de Rada, Historia de los hechos de España, with intro., trans., notes and indices by Juan Fernández Valverde (Madrid: Alianza Editorial, 1989), pp. 311–12. Recorded in Barrigón, ‘La cultura de las ricas telas en época de Alfonso VIII’, pp. 158–59. On textiles as gifts during the reigns of Juan II (d. 1454) and Enrique IV (d. 1474) see Sila Oreja Andrés, ‘El obsequio de tejidos como gesto de munificencia en el tardomedievo castellano: testimonios literarios’, Anales de Historia del Arte, 24, special issue (2014), 389–400. 80 Many cases may be cited. For example, according to an Inventory from Toledo Cathedral dated to the second half of the 13th century, the King of Portugal gave the cathedral a cloth woven with gold from which a cloak was made; the archbishop Don Gutierre gifted a purple cloth out of which a dalmatic and tunic were made; and the King of Navarre donated a cloth of gold from which five capes were fashioned; José Villaamil y Castro, Colección de artículos en su mayoría sobre el mobiliario litúrgico de las iglesias gallegas en la Edad Media (Madrid: Nueva Imprenta de San Francisco de Sales, 1907), pp. 69–70. The Queen Saint Isabel of Portugal gave the apostle Santiago (St James) a rich crown, as well as a gown and several pieces of cloth when she visited the cathedral at Santiago dedicated to him; Villanueva, Los ornamentos sagrados, p. 137. Donations and heraldic textiles are mentioned in María Barrigón, ‘Vestiduras litúrgicas en la España de la época medieval’, in Al hilo de la seda. Vestiduras y ornamentos sagrados en la diócesis de Jaén (siglos XVI–XVIII), ed. by Ismael Amaro Martos (Jaén: Fundación Caja rural de Jaén, 2019), pp. 39–46 (p. 42). 81 Inventory of Lugo Cathedral in Villaamil y Castro, Colección de artículos, p. 172; Inventory of Oviedo Cathedral of c. 1385 in Villaamil y Castro, Colección de artículos, p. 45; Inventory of Toledo Cathedral in Pérez de Guzmán, ‘Un inventario’, p. 387.

Fig. 10.4  Pellote of Fernando de la Cerda (00650538). © Patrimonio Nacional.

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Texti les and ce re mo nie s: enth ronem ents and ro yal f u ne ral s The importance of the king’s clothing is constantly pointed out in documentary sources of the period, although unfortunately detailed descriptions are not usually provided. For example, Fray Juan Gil de Zamora (d. c.1318) wrote: ‘Quales autem reges esse debeant in habitu et in gestu, scribit Aristoteles Alexandro, dicens: induatur rex honestis et optimis indumentis, ut illis separetur ab aliis’ (‘How kings should be in customs and in manners, wrote Aristotle to Alexander, saying: an honourable king is dressed in very good garments so he can be distinguished from others’).82 Great importance was therefore attached to costume in various court ceremonies. Two royal ceremonies were of particular political significance: the death of a king and the enthronement of his successor. A plethora of aspects related to royal magnificence and the image of the monarchy was exhibited at these ceremonies. The Castilian notion of royalty has been discussed by scholars,83 and the death of the king has been studied from a variety of approaches.84 The perspective 82 De preconiis Hispanie [por] Fray Juan Gil de Zamora, ed. by Manuel de Castro y Castro (Madrid:

Universidad de Madrid. Facultad de Filosofía y Letras, 1955), p. 191. Recorded in Gutiérrez Baños, Las empresas artísticas, p. 90. 83 The debate remains open regarding the conception of the Castilian monarchy as a sacralised royalty compared to other European kingdoms. It displayed certain peculiarities relating to various ceremonies, such as specific coronations, the dispersal of tombs and failure to consider the king as a thaumaturge. On the different stances in this debate, see Nieto Soria, ‘Imágenes religiosas del rey y del poder real en la Castilla del siglo XIII’; José Manuel Nieto Soria, Fundamentos ideológicos del poder real en Castilla (siglos XIII–XVI) (Madrid: Eudema, 1988); José Manuel Nieto Soria, ‘Tiempos y lugares de la realeza sagrada en la Castilla de los siglos XII al XV’, Annexes des Cahiers de linguistique et de civilisation hispaniques médiévales, 15 (2003), 263–84; José Manuel Nieto Soria, ‘El poder real como representación en la monarquía castellano-leonesa del siglo XIII’, Res publica, 17 (2007), 81–104; Adeline Rucquoi, ‘De los reyes que no son taumaturgos: los fundamentos de la realeza en España’, Relaciones. Estudios de Historia y Sociedad, 13 (1992), 55–100; Teófilo F. Ruiz, ‘Une royauté sans sacre: la monarchie castillane du bas Moyen Âge’, Annales. Économies, Sociétés, Civilisations, 39 (1984), 429–53; Peter Linehan, ‘Frontier kingship: Castile 1250–1350’, in La royauté sacrée dans le monde chrétien, ed. by Alain Boureau and Claudio Sergio Ingerflom (Paris: École de Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales, 1992), pp. 71–79. A recent monograph analysing these questions is José Mª Monsalvo Antón, La construcción del poder real en la monarquía castellana siglos XI–XV (Madrid: Marcial Pons, 2019). 84 As well as the works mentioned in the previous note, on the historiography of rituals see Gonzalo Carrasco García, ‘Ritual político, antropología e historiografía bajomedieval hispánica’, Espacio, tiempo y forma, Serie III, Hª Medieval, 30 (2017), 121–92. On the death of the king see Emilio Mitre Fernández, ‘La muerte del rey: la historiografía hispánica (1200–1348) y la muerte de las elites’, En la España Medieval, 11 (1988), 168–83; Emilio Mitre Fernández, ‘Muerte y memoria del rey en la Castilla Bajomedieval’, in La idea y el sentimiento de la muerte en la historia y en el arte de la Edad Media II, ed. by Georges Duby (Santiago de Compostela: Universidad de Santiago de Compostela Imprenta Universitaria, 1992), pp. 17–26; Ariel



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most relevant to this chapter involves analysing the role textiles played at these ceremonies.85 The choice of specific garments as shrouds at royal funerals was intentional, though the exact reasons for each choice remain somewhat unclear. A typical royal burial in the 13th century consisted of a pinewood coffin, lined with textiles, in which the body of the deceased was laid over a number of pillows, dressed according to his or her status. Other elements such as crowns, swords, and crosses were also included. The deceased were buried with objects pertaining to their rank, and kings and queens were therefore interred with luxurious grave-goods, as dictated by the Siete Partidas:

Guiance, Los discursos sobre la muerte en la Castilla medieval, siglos VII–XV (Valladolid: Junta de Castilla y León. Consejería de Educación y Cultura, 1998); Denis Menjot, ‘Un chrétien qui meurt toujours. Les funérailles royales en Castille à la fin du Moyen Âge’, in La idea y el sentimiento de la muerte en la historia y en el arte de la Edad Media, ed. by Manuel Núñez and Ermelindo Portela (Santiago de Compostela: Universidad de Santiago de Compostela Imprenta Universitaria, 1988), pp. 127–38; Xavier Dectot, ‘El rey muerto y el peregrino, estudio sobre las tentativas de recuperación de los flujos de peregrinación en beneficio de la memoria dinástica de parte de los reyes ibéricos (siglos XI–XIII)’, in Actas del V Congreso de Arqueología Medieval Española (Valladolid: Junta de Castilla y León, 1999), pp. 431–39; Margarita Cabrera Sánchez, ‘Funerales regios en la Castilla bajomedieval’, Acta historica et archaeologica mediaevalia, 22 (2001), 537–64; Manuel González Jiménez, ‘La muerte de los reyes de Castilla y León en el s. XIII’, Boletín de la Real Academia de Buenas Letras, 34 (2006), 143–59; Olga Pérez Monzón, ‘Quando rey perdemos nunqua bien nos fallamos … La muerte del rey en la Castilla del s. XIII’, Archivo español de Arte, 80, no. 320 (2007), 379–94. 85 Etelvina Fernández González, ‘Una tela hispano-musulmana en el sepulcro de doña Mencía de Lara del monasterio cisterciense de san Andrés del Arroyo’, in Actas de las II Jornadas de cultura árabe e islámica (Madrid: Instituto Hispano-Árabe de cultura, 1985), pp. 197–220; Etelvina Fernández González, ‘Las galas del ajuar funerario’, in Monjes y monasterios: el Císter en el medievo de Castilla y León [exhibition catalogue], ed. by Isidro G. Bango Torviso (Valladolid: Junta de Castilla y León, 1998), pp. 335–57; Fernández González, ‘Que los reyes vestiessen paños’; Francesca Español Bertran, ‘Los indumentos del cuerpo a la espera del Juicio Final’, in Vestiduras Ricas: el monasterio de las Huelgas y su época (1170–1340), ed. by Joaquín Yarza Luaces (Madrid: Patrimonio Nacional, 2005), pp. 73– 88. Specific textiles related to these two ceremonies, coronations and funerals were recently examined in María Barrigón, ‘Algunas consideraciones sobre textiles, coronaciones y funerales en la Corona de Castilla en el siglo XIII’, in Casa y Corte. Ámbitos de poder en los reinos hispánicos durante la Baja Edad Media (1230–1516), ed. by Francisco de Paula Cañas Gálvez and José Manuel Nieto Soria (Madrid: La Ergástula Ediciones, 2019), pp. 45–71. Other studies focus on the clothing and textiles used for mourning: Olga Pérez Monzón, ‘Escenografías funerarias en la Baja Edad Media’, Codex Aquilarensis, 27 (2011), 213–44 (pp. 235–36); Margarita Cabrera Sánchez, ‘El rey ha muerto: ritos, funerales y entierro de la realeza hispánica medieval’, in De la tierra al cielo. Ubi sunt qui ante nos in hoc mundo fuere? Actas de la XXIV Semana de estudios medievales de Nájera, ed. by Esther López Ojeda (Logroño: Instituto de Estudios Riojanos, 2014), pp. 239–60 (pp. 254–55); David Nogales Rincón, ‘El color negro: luto y magnificencia en la Corona de Castilla (siglos XIII–XV)’, Medievalismo: Revista de la Sociedad Española de Estudios Medievales, 26 (2016), 221–45.

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Fig. 10.5  Alfonso X in Libro de los Juegos, MS. T. I.6, fol. 65r, RBME. © Patrimonio Nacional.

Rich garments, or precious ornaments like those of gold or silver should not be buried with the dead, except in the case of certain persons; as, for instance, a king, a queen, or one of their children.86

Their funerary clothing, as insignia and symbols, would of course have matched their royal condition and status, reflecting the clothing they had worn at any solemn occasion or ceremony in which they took part: enthronements, births, christenings, weddings, and military triumphs.87 It has been suggested that the outfits chosen to accompany Castilian monarchs on their ‘journey to the afterlife’ were the same ones they wore for their coronation.88 Indeed, there is detailed information on this practice in the Crown of Aragon, especially a few royal wills

86 ‘Ricas vestiduras nin otros ornamientos preciados asi como oro ó plata non deben meter á los

muertos sinon á personas ciertas, asi como á rey ó á reyna, ó á alguno de sus fiios’, Partida I, Título XIII, Ley XIII; RAH, Las Siete Partidas, editadas y cotejadas con varios códices antiguos por la Real Academia de la Historia. Tomo I Partida Primera (Madrid: Imprenta Real, 1807), p. 389. The quotation is recorded, among others, by Español Bertran, ‘Los indumentos del cuerpo’, p. 75; Pérez Monzón, ‘Quando rey perdemos nunqua bien nos fallamos’, p. 385. 87 Fernández González, ‘Que los reyes vestiessen paños’, p. 370. 88 Español Bertran, ‘Los indumentos del cuerpo’, p. 75; Fernández González, ‘Que los reyes vestiessen paños’, p. 371.



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with specific instructions.89 However, a study on whether this may have been the case in 13th-century Castile found no correlation between known documentary sources and monarchs’ surviving grave-goods to indicate the systematic use of the same outfits for each monarch’s enthronement and funeral ceremonies.90 As has become clear throughout this chapter, material and documentary evidence shows that royal wardrobes, though not consisting exclusively of silk, were well stocked with garments for courtly ceremonies. A distinction can be drawn between two types of textiles used in ceremonies of the period: heraldic (closely connected with the king) and luxurious in some way or another (technique, colours, decoration) and which displayed certain features or characteristics and which therefore, since early times, helped distinguish the monarch. Heraldic textiles are individualised expressions of the royal presence and were depicted in 13th-century images, for example, Alfonso X (d. 1284) as portrayed in the stained-glass windows of Leon Cathedral, in the Libro de los Juegos (Fig. 10.5) and in the Cantigas.91 These images are an accurate reflection of surviving textiles and clothing of this kind, chiefly from funerary contexts.92 Notable examples are the green fabric with red shields and inset castles found in the tomb of Alfonso VIII (d. 1214),93 a fragment we suggest was part of the coffin linings or a pillow.94 Somewhat later examples are the fragments of the cloak of Fernando III (d. 1252) from his tomb in Seville Cathedral.95 Dating from the last third of the 13th century is the suit of three matching garments – saya, pellote and cloak – in which the 89 For example the case of Pedro el Ceremonioso (Peter the Ceremonious) of Aragon (d. 1387) in

Español Bertran, ‘Los indumentos del cuerpo’, p. 77.

90 Barrigón, ‘Algunas consideraciones sobre textiles, coronaciones y funerales’. 91 Fol. 65r (RBME, MS T. I.6). On the Cantigas and royal image, see Alfonso X el Sabio (1221–1284). Las

92

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Cantigas, ed. by Fernández Fernández and Ruiz Souza; Ana Domínguez Rodríguez, ‘Retratos de Alfonso X el Sabio en la Primera Partida (British Library, Add. ms.20.787). Iconografía y cronología’, Alcanate, 6 (2008–2009), 239–51; Fátima Pavón Casar, La imagen de la realeza castellana bajomedieval en los documentos y manuscritos (Madrid: Universidad Complutense de Madrid, 2008). For a compilation of iconography with heraldic garments, see Francisco de Asís García García, ‘Vestiduras emblemáticas. Heráldica y divisas en la indumentaria bajomedieval’, Diseño de moda: teoría e historia de la indumentaria, 1 (2015), 121–29. Focusing on 14th- and 15th-century France, a recent study analysed the scant documentary references to textiles of this kind in contrast to their extensive presence in iconography, suggesting that perhaps they were not as widespread as initially thought: Laurent Hablot, ‘Revêtir l’armoire. Les vêtements héraldiques au Moyen Âge, mythes et réalités’, Espacio, tiempo y forma, Serie VII, Historia del Arte, 6 (2018), 55–87. Gómez-Moreno, El Panteón Real de las Huelgas, p. 27. Barrigón, ‘Textiles and farewells’, pp. 242–44. On heraldry see Faustino Menéndez Pidal de Navascués, Heráldica de la casa real de León y de Castilla: siglos XII–XVI (Madrid: Hidalguía, 2011). For the cloak of Fernando III see GómezMoreno, ‘Preseas reales sevillanas’; María Jesús Sanz, ‘Ajuares funerarios de Fernando III, Beatriz de Suabia y Alfonso X’, in Sevilla 1248: congreso internacional conmemorativo del 750 aniversario de la conquista de la ciudad de Sevilla por Fernando III, rey de Castilla y León, ed. by Manuel González Jiménez (Madrid: Centro de Estudios Ramón Areces, 2000), pp. 419–50.

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Infante Fernando de la Cerda (d. 1275) was buried at Las Huelgas in Burgos (Fig. 10.4) and the chasuble of the Infante Sancho (d. c. 1275) in Toledo Cathedral.96 Alfonso X was also shrouded in a heraldic suit.97 And in a non-funerary context, 1332 Alfonso XI chose to wear this type of clothing at his coronation.98 We saw earlier that there are also references to these heraldic textiles being gifted to churches. These textiles were manufactured through a variety of techniques; however they do display a similar type of decoration: the repetition of royal heraldic motifs, which, in later examples, cover the entire surface. As Olga Pérez Monzón stated, heraldic signs underlined the monarch’s symbolic power, identified the king with the kingdom, and stood for royal autorictas.99 It is telling that the Siete Partidas stated: … the likeness of the king, as, for instance, his seal where his form is represented, and also the insignia which he bears upon his arms, and his money, and his letters on which his name is traced, should all be greatly honoured, because they bring him to mind wherever he does not happen to be.100

Aside from the textiles adorned with such characteristic decoration, it is interesting to note how the contents of tombs of the period allow us to trace the 96 Fernando de la Cerda’s clothing in Gómez-Moreno, El Panteón Real de las Huelgas, p. 22 and 60;

Amalia Descalzo Lorenzo, ‘El vestido entre 1170 y 1340 en el Panteón Real de las Huelgas’, in Yarza Loaces, Vestiduras Ricas, pp. 107–18 (pp. 110–11); Concha Herrero Carretero, ‘Manto’, ‘Pellote’, ‘Aljuba o saya encordada’, in Yarza Loaces, Vestiduras Ricas, pp. 157–59. Of the most recent publications on them see Kristin Böse, ‘Beyond foreign: textiles from the castilian royal tombs in Santa María de las Huelgas in Burgos’, in Oriental silks in medieval Europe, ed. by Julianne von Fircks and Regula Schorta (Bern: Abegg-Stiftung, 2016), pp. 213–30 (pp. 218–22); Coatsworth and Owen-Crocker, Clothing the past, pp. 54–56, 98–99, 209. For the chasuble of the Infante Sancho (archbishop of Toledo) see Los textiles de la catedral de Toledo. Tapices. Reposteros. Estandartes. Paños, ed. by Susana Cortes and Juan Pedro Sánchez Gamero (Toledo: Antonio Pareja Editor, 2015), p. 15; Juan Pedro Sánchez Gamero, Carlos Turillo and Mª del Prado López Martín, Guía Catálogo. Tapices. Textiles. Orfebrería de la Catedral Primada y Colegio de infantes (Toledo: Instituto Superior de estudios teológicos san Ildefonso, 2014), pp. 20 and 59. 97 Gómez-Moreno, ‘Preseas reales sevillanas’, pp. 199–201. 98 ‘Et el dia que se ovo de coronar vestió sus paños reales labrados de oro et de plata á señales de castiellos et de leones’; Cayetano Rosell, Crónicas de los reyes de Castilla desde don Alfonso el Sabio hasta los Católicos don Fernando y doña Isabel (Madrid: M. Rivadeneyra Editor, 1875), p. 235. 99 Olga Pérez Monzón, ‘Heráldica versus imagen’, in Alfonso X el Sabio [exhibition catalogue], ed. by Isidro G. Bango Torviso (Murcia: Comunidad Autónoma Región de Murcia, Caja de Ahorros del Mediterráneo, 2009), pp. 94–101 (pp. 94–96). 100 ‘la imagen del rey, como su seello en que está su figura, et la señal que trae otrosi en sus armas et en su moneda, et en su carta en que se mienta su nombre, que todas estas cosas deben seer mucho honradas, porque son en su remembranza do él non esta’, Partida II, titulo XIII, ley XVIII; RAH, Las Siete Partidas. Tomo II, p. 117. English translation by Samuel Parsons Scott in Burns, Las Siete Partidas Volume Two, p. 354.



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existence of various features that were novel at that time. These features denote a concern for seeking distinctive and luxurious items as a means of singling out the monarch, thereby drawing attention to his status through elements that gradually became fashionable for the general public as well. In his work Planeta written at the start of the 13th century, Alfonso VIII’s chancellor, Diego García de Campos, launched into an invective against variety and senselessness in dress. He held it to signify a decline in virtue, citing adornments of gold feathers, tight-fitting clothing and the use of lacing.101 He particularly objected to lacing on garments, which, although criticised in the early 13th century, is later found on clothing throughout that century, as illustrated by examples from grave-goods from Las Huelgas such as those of the tomb attributed by Gómez-Moreno to María de Almenar (d. c. 1200), those of Queen Leonor of Aragon (d. 1244) Fig. 10.6, the Infante Fernando de la Cerda (d. 1275) and from Caleruega, in the case of the Infanta Leonor (d. 1275).102 Garments found in early tombs also had buttons, of which an early example is the tunic of Queen Beatriz of Swabia (d. 1235), which was fastened with a filigree and turquoise one.103 Many of these garments were made chiefly made of silk, the richest of all textile fibres. Dyes were also very important in the period, such as indigo for the suit of Alfonso VIII (d. 1214) and kermes for that of Enrique I (d. 1217).104 As for textile techniques, two interesting examples are worthy of mention. The first is the gown in which the Infanta Leonor was buried in 1275 in Caleruega (Burgos). Her saya encordada (tunic with side lacing) is warp faced five-end satin weave with a silk warp and cotton weft, and features tapestry decoration with metal-wrapped threads floated over the warp threads on the loom.105 Not only is 101 ‘Quando vestibus non est modus et diversitati vestium non est finis. Veste ex vestibus

procreantur tanquam vestium seminata varietas cum fructu centessimo renascatur. Unde vestis polyssena tot mutat facies in cyssura quot faties ipsa prothea: vestes induit in tonsura. Quidam quidem aurifrigiis plumantium per loca varia vestes decorticant et incrustant tanquam centum argi occulos in pavonis cauda depingerent fabulose. Quidam autem stricturis en angustiis intendunt potius quam picturis et syncopantes latera: quod furantur tunicis, supplent cordis …’; Diego García de Campos, Planeta, ed. by P. Manuel Alonso (Madrid: CSIC, 1943), p. 194. Recorded by Julio González, El reino de Castilla en la época de Alfonso VIII, I, Estudio (Madrid: Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas, 1960), pp. 257–58. Also in Barrigón, ‘La cultura de las ricas telas’, p. 158. This publication discusses other elements indicating luxury in textiles in the early 13th century, as does Barrigón, ‘Algunas consideraciones sobre textiles, coronaciones y funerales’, pp. 56–57. 102 Gómez-Moreno, El Panteón Real de las Huelgas, pp. 22, 24, 29; Barrigón, ‘El ajuar de la infanta Leonor de Castilla (†1275)’, pp. 106–08. 103 Gómez-Moreno, ‘Preseas reales sevillanas’, p. 198. 104 María Barrigón, ‘An exceptional outfit for an exceptional King: the blue funerary garments of Alfonso VIII of Castile at Las Huelgas’, Viator: Medieval and Renaissance Studies, 46 (2015), 155– 72; María Barrigón, ‘Alfonso VIII y el color azul: nuevas investigaciones sobre un rey medieval a la vanguardia de la moda’, Reales Sitios, 202 (2015), 16–33; Concha Herrero Carretero, ‘Pellote de Enrique I’, in Yarza Loaces, Vestiduras Ricas, p. 156. 105 On techniques see Chapter 2 in this volume.

Fig. 10.6 (right)  Laced saya of Queen Leonor (Eleanor) of Aragon (00650515). © Patrimonio Nacional. Fig. 10.7 (below)  Coffin of Alfonso de la Cerda (00650545). © Patrimonio Nacional.



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this gown notable for its particular tapestry technique, linked to Muslim Spain, but the early terminus ante quem established by the date of her death indicates the value a satin garment must have had at the time.106 The second example is the famous tartarí (panni tartarici), garments which were highly valued between the late 1200s and early 1300s. This type of fabric, then in vogue, was chosen for the enthronement of Fernando IV (d. 1312),107 but it was also used to line several coffins in Las Huelgas in Burgos (Fig. 10.7) and was powerfully present in various liturgical ornaments in the cathedral at Toledo.108 Both the documentary and material evidence shows that these exotic fabrics were used in the most solemn ceremonies and rituals.

Conclusio ns Textiles as objects which convey luxury and, accordingly, the magnificence of power, are an outstanding feature both in the royal court and in the ecclesiastical sphere in Castile during the period studied here (1214–1332). Material and documentary records show that both realms of power employed identical types of textiles, which were used indiscriminately in furnishings and clothing, both men’s and women’s, and were kept with all great care and attention. It is likewise interesting to note that royal wardrobes of the period progressively incorporated the novelties of the day in a desire for distinction, including dyestuff, perfection of craftmanship, decorative patterns and adornments. The royal family, and especially the King, could be easily distinguished by their outfits, employed in the various courtly ceremonies. Last, but not least, textiles were specially linked to the ideas of royal power and generosity as they were items that could be granted as gifts. 106 Barrigón, ‘El ajuar de la infanta Leonor de Castilla (†1275)’, pp. 104–05.

107 ‘ … and he was dressed in some noble cloths of panni tartarici, and they placed him before

the high altar in the main church of Toledo, and they received him as king and lord’ (‘ … é vistiéronle unos paños nobles de tartarí, é pusiéronle ante el altar mayor en la iglesia mayor de Toledo, é rescibiéronle por rey é por señor’); Rosell, Crónicas de los reyes de Castilla, p. 93. Recorded in Barrigón, ‘Algunas consideraciones sobre textiles’, p. 54. 108 On panni tartarici see Anne E. Wardwell, Panni Tartarici: eastern Islamic silks woven with gold and silver, 13th and 14th centuries, Islamic Art. An annual dedicated to the culture of the Muslim world, III (Genoa and New York: The Bruschettini foundation for Islamic and Asian art and The Islamic Art Foundation, 1989); Juliane von Fircks and Regula Schorta, Oriental silks in medieval Europe (Bern: Abegg-Stiftung, 2016). Following their discovery, those preserved at Las Huelgas, in Burgos, belonging to the Infante Pedro (†1319), Blanca of Portugal (†1321) and Alfonso de la Cerda (†1333), were described in Gómez-Moreno, El Panteón Real de las Huelgas, pp. 33–35, 64–65 and plates XXXV, XLVI, XCI–XCVI; subsequently in Concha Herrero Carretero, ‘Marques d’importation au XIVe siècle sur les tissus orientaux de las Huelgas’, Bulletin du CIETA, 81 (2004), 41–47. For ornaments made from panni tartarici in Toledo Cathedral see Pérez de Guzmán, ‘Un inventario’, pp. 383, 386, 391–98, 404–07, 418.

chapter 11

Fabrics and Attire at the Court of Navarre in the Second Half of the Fourteenth Century 1 Merche Osés Urricelqui

I ntroduct io n

T

he geographically small kingdom of Navarre was situated in northern Spain, controlling the route from Iberia through the Pyrenees, and bordered by both Aragon and Castile. In the 14th century the kingdom of Navarre reached its highest splendour, especially during the reign of Carlos III (1387–1425). This monarch and his father, King Carlos II (r. 1349–1387), built up a court rich in luxury and magnificence, through the acquisition of large quantities of sumptuous objects, to set the scene for manifesting regal power. In the 14th and 15th centuries the strengthening of monarchical power went hand-in-hand with the appearance of new forms of political propaganda exalting the superiority of the sovereign. As J. V. García Marsilla observed, ‘the king not only needed to be powerful but to seem powerful, too’.2 This led to great care being taken over the king’s image, which had to be striking at all times, and particularly at public events, such as tournaments, 1

This work is part of the research project HAR2016-74846P MIGRAVIT: ‘La muerte del Príncipe en Francia y en los reinos hispánicos (s. XI–XV). Modelos de comparación’, de la Agencia Nacional de Investigación and ‘Espacios femeninos cortesanos: Ámbitos curiales, relaciones territoriales y prácticas políticas’, PGC2018-099205-A-C22, granted by the MICINN and co-financed by the Agencia Estatal de Investigación and the Fondo Europeo de Desarrollo Regional (FEDER). 2 Juan Vicente García Marsilla, ‘Vestir el poder. Indumentaria e imagen en las cortes de Alfonso El Magnánimo y María de Castilla’, Res Publica, 18 (2007), 353–73 (p. 353).

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courtly banquets, royal accessions or coronations, as well as royal births, marriages and funerals. The monarchs of Navarre took great pains to enhance the visual aspects of their power, spending huge sums of money on their wardrobes and employing the most renowned tailors to design and make their costumes. Documentary sources record great quantities of wool, silk, linen and cotton fabrics, destined for household textiles and clothing for the members of the royal family and the court. These garments included those for daily use as well as outfits for use at royal ceremonies where the king’s political propaganda was staged. Both Carlos II and Carlos III, princes of French blood but sovereigns of an Iberian kingdom,3 enabled Navarre to take part in international meetings, receptions, feasts and celebrations, in the fashions of the leading courts at the time to which they were related: the Valois, Orleans, Anjou, Berry, Bourgogne, Bourbon, Aragon and Trastámara, among others. A notion common to all contemporary monarchies was the conviction that luxury and magnificence were essential to evincing the grandeur of the royal family, and the ceremonies involving the monarch were ideal occasions for their lavish display. The architectural settings for these ceremonial rituals, such as cathedrals, palaces, churches and major thoroughfares, provided a permanent stage perfectly suited to showcasing with full pomp and circumstance the high rank and dignity of each of the members of the royal family. The kings’ banquets, their attire, the quality of the gifts bestowed on their guests, were all clear messages sent out to their allies and enemies regarding the monarchs’ power and position in society. From 1234 the royal family had only lived sporadically in Navarre, remaining mostly in France.4 The decision by Carlos II of Evreux, in 1361, to settle in his kingdom, brought a significant change in the profile of the royal family, with an ideology of royal magnificence that was exemplified by the textiles and dress of the court.5 The following chapter offers an analysis of the fabrics purchased by the court of Navarre in the second half of the 14th century, during the reigns of Carlos II and Carlos III. The aim of this survey is to ascertain the quality, colours and uses of these fabrics in clothing and household textiles, to identify their recipients, 3

Both kings were born in France and spent their childhood there until they inherited the throne of Navarre. They were members of the Evreux dynasty, related to the kings of France, and Carlos II even claimed his right to the French throne. 4 Concerning the ‘absence’ of the crown until, at least, 1361 and what this entailed for the royal power, see Eloísa Ramírez Vaquero, ‘Reinar en Navarra en la Baja Edad Media’, in Ceremonial de la coronación, unción y exequias de los reyes de Inglaterra, ed. by Eloísa Ramírez Vaquero, 2 vols (Pamplona: Gobierno de Navarra, 2008), II, pp. 279–303. 5 Iñigo Mugueta Moreno and Merche Osés Urricelqui, ‘Gastos suntuarios de Juana II y Felipe III de Evreux (1328–1330)’, in Grupos sociales en la historia de Navarra. Sus relaciones y sus derechos. V Congreso de Historia de Navarra, ed. by Carmen Erro Gasca and Iñigo Mugueta Moreno (Pamplona: Sociedad de Estudios Históricos de Navarra, 2002), pp. 107–118.



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and to determine the occasions on which they were employed, in order to establish a ‘textile hierarchy’. This will illustrate how the kings and queens of Navarre designed their own scenography for the visual display of their royal power, hitherto distant and to some extent foreign.

Docum entary so u rce s In addressing this analysis of courtly attire in medieval Navarre, the documentary sources for data relating to accounts at the Archivo Real y General de Navarra (Royal and General Archives of Navarre) are exceptional.6 These are the treasurer’s accounting registers, in which entries were made, systematically and on an annual basis, for the kingdom’s revenue and expenditure. The section for expenditures features a number of chapters for royal household goods such as luxury items, items for daily use, such as jewellery, cloth and clothing, furs and skins, tableware and dressmaking, under headings such as joyeles, paynnos, peylleteria, merceria, telas and faycones de ropas. Always in identical order, these disbursements refer to a succession of payments including products purchased, tailoring of new or altered clothing, jewels or tableware (Fig. 11.1).7 In many cases, the accounting documents from the 14th century onwards enable a step-by-step reconstruction of the ceremonial performances conducted by the Navarrese monarchs and their courts. We should, however, remember in this regard that the data reflected in the accounting registers was not drafted as a narrative or composition to mark the history of events, however great their importance, but rather as book-keeping entries in the royal ledgers in which disbursements from the Treasury were inscribed for the sole purpose of keeping accounts. It is, therefore, not always possible for researchers to glean as much information as may be desired and some details inevitably remain unknown, only to be recovered through comparison with other contemporaneous sources. To conduct a study on this subject it is necessary to put together the documentary sources with artworks and archaeological remains, in order to identify many of the documented items, in greater or lesser detail, in the written sources. Paintings, sculptures, miniatures and seals give insights into the goods and costumes worn by the men and women of the period (Figs 11.2–11.4).

6 7

Henceforth AGN. Sección Comptos. Registro del Tesorero, henceforth Reg. Summaries about expenses for small jewels, wool fabrics, furs, haberdashery, sendals, linens and towelling were first written in 1352 (Reg. 68) and would continue until 1375. From that date onwards, there was a new summary, fayçones de ropas (dressmaking), that would be written annually, including during the 15th century.

Fig. 11.1  Treasurer’s accounting registers (AGN, Reg. 207, fol. 112v). Year 1389 © Royal and General Archives of Navarre.



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Fab ri cs Fabric inevitably played a prominent role in daily life. It was used for clothing, household textiles, furnishings, trappings for horses, and for the protection, decoration, packaging and carrying of all kinds of objects and goods.8 Cloth-making became highly developed in medieval Europe where clothing, just as it is today, was a basic necessity for the population; but was also an indicator of a person’s social standing, to a greater degree than today. The purchase of fabrics constituted a major portion of the crown’s overall expenditure. These were needed, among other uses, to make the royal family’s costumes and clothing for the members of the court. These garments were both for everyday use and for attending events within and outside the court of Navarre. The fabrics purchased were of many different qualities according to the circumstances and the recipients in each case. The fabric’s place of origin, colour and price were the principal indicators of its quality, in many cases confirmed by its recipient and intended use. These fabrics were distributed to the members of the royal family, to representatives of royal or princely households received at audience, to sundry members of the local or foreign nobility and, in greater measure, to the members of the court. The distribution was not decided perfunctorily, but according to what we may call a ‘textile hierarchy’ relating to the quality of the fabric. A large number of servants to the royal household were members of the most illustrious noble families in the kingdom, or others such as the monarch’s illegitimate family. The elites thus commenced their initiation in the service of the king. They learned the skills required in each capacity (such as page, squire or usher), in a form of cursus honorum (career path), and with time would rise to posts of greater responsibility. All these people would receive gifts from the monarchs (in the form of fabrics, gold and silver work) in acknowledgement of services rendered and, in some measure, in the expectation of future loyalty. The noble elite comprising the king’s entourage was thus nurtured and supported while a mutual bond of trust was formed. This provided the monarchy with a loyal personal following and enhanced personal commitments that, years later, in the 15th century, would contribute to the banderización9 of the kingdom.

8

For further information see María del Carmen Martínez Meléndez, Los nombres de tejidos en castellano medieval (Granada: Universidad de Granada, 1989); Jesusa Alfau de Solalinde, Nomenclatura de los tejidos españoles del siglo XIII, Anejos del Boletín de la Real Academia Española, Anejo 19 (Madrid: Real Academia española, 1969); Dominique Cardon, La draperie au Moyen Âge. Essor d’une grande industrie européenne (Paris: CNRS, 1999); The Cambridge history of western textiles, ed. by David Jenkins, 2 vols (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003). 9 A process that occurred in the kingdom of Navarre in the middle of the 15th century when the kingdom was divided into two factions, one in favour of King Juan II (agramonteses) and the other in favour of his son Carlos, Prince of Viana (beaumonteses).

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Wool fabric10 Among the fabrics purchased by the Navarrese court in the second half of the 14th century, wool was more abundant by far than silk, linen and cotton. The terminology used for the wool textiles mentioned in the sources varies greatly and is rather imprecise in some cases. A large percentage of entries refer to the place of origin (Ypres, Bristol) – although this is not always the case – and to the colour of the material. These two may be given together or separately, and, to a lesser extent, the dyestuff and dyeing technique applied (carmine), decoration (striped) and other features (fine, heavy, de la gran suerte, sheared, plain). Knowing the provenance of the wool cloths provides the key to the quality of the Navarrese monarchy’s purchases, given that some of the production centres had a long-standing manufacturing tradition. In the book-keeping sources from which these data have been collected, provenance is mentioned as justification for the disbursement, as it refers to a recognised standard of quality and warrants the price. In all, the court of Navarre is documented to have purchased wool fabrics from 36 different locations, underscoring the prevalence and importance of certain geographical areas, such as England, Normandy, Brabant, Languedoc, Flanders, the Crown of Aragon and Italy. English wool fabrics were the most sought after. More than 15,600 ells11 of material were bought. In the second half of the 14th century English woollens were excellent, their quality having improved over the previous centuries. They were also less expensive than others owing to the raw materials being locally available rather than having to be imported. This generated lower production costs and, as a consequence, English woollen fabrics gradually became international market leaders.12 10 In the original documentation all these fabrics appear under the common name ‘paño’

meaning cloth, without specifying their quality. This was related to their price and the origin of the textile, but sometimes the same place of origin could include textiles named in the same way but with different qualities. Therefore, it is very difficult to distinguish between woollens and worsteds, which is why in most cases they will be identified simply as wool cloth. 11 The measurements used for textiles in the kingdom of Navarre at this time were varied. In the case of wool fabrics, the most commonly used measure is the ell, although, to a lesser extent, the purchase in pieces, alnas, canas, vergas, cloths and units is also mentioned. An ell has different equivalences that range between 48 and 63 centimetres. For silks the piece predominates and canas (1 cana = 155 cm), palms, alnas, units, pairs and, to a lesser extent, ells are also used. In fabrics made of vegetable fibres the most used is the ell, and to a lesser extent pieces, units and yards (1 yard = 84 cm). For Navarre metrology see Javier Zabalo Zabalegui, La administración del reino de Navarra en el siglo XIV (Pamplona: Universidad de Navarra, 1973), p. 231. 12 Sophie Desrosiers, ‘Les tissus’, in Art et société en France au XV siècle, dir. by Christiane Prigent (Paris: Maisonneuve & Larose, 1999), pp. 454–55; Máximo Diago Hernando, La industria y el comercio de productos textiles en Europa, siglos XI al XV (Madrid: Arco Libros, 1998), pp. 21–28; Jacques Heers, ‘La mode et les marchés des draps de laine: Gênes et la montagne à la fin du Moyen Âge’, Annales ESC, 26 (1971), 1093–1117; Paulino Iradiel Murugarren, Evolución de la



Fabr ics and At t ir e at t he C o urt o f N a va rre 2 7 1

The highest number of entries for English wool cloth in the accounts refers to items purchased from Bristol, with close to 9,000 ells, followed by London with nearly 4,000 ells. At some distance, we find those referred to generically as ‘English’ and wool cloth produced in Chester (Table 11.1).13 Table 11.1  English wool cloths bought by the Navarre Court during the second half of the 14th century, according to the treasurer’s accounting registers. Provenance

Quantity

Price per ell

Bristol

8897.66 ells

22–55 sueldos

15.5 bolts 18.5 cloths London

3752.66 ells

30–66.7 sueldos

2.5 bolts 1 cloth 12.25 vergas England

1928 ells

6–52 sueldos

2 bolts 6 cloths Chester

1057.25 ells

22–54 sueldos

7 bolts 6 units

Wool cloths from Bristol were destined primarily for the royal household staff, and secondly for the royal family. These materials came in a wide range of colours. They were used mainly for making clothing (hose, shirts, doublets,

industria textil castellana de los siglos XIII al XVI. Factores de desarrollo, organización y costes de la producción manufacturera en Cuenca (Salamanca: Universidad de Salamanca, 1974), pp. 99, 120–21. 13 For all the Tables: different measurements are indicated in the sources but it is impossible to convert them to the same unit because equivalences are not mentioned. The coins used in the kingdom of Navarre have the following equivalences: 1 pounds=20 sueldos; 1 sueldo=12 dineros.

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houppelandes,14 surcoats, mantles, tabards and capirotes15), outer garments for the most part, and caparisons for covering horses’ saddles. Such items would be worn at the festivities of All Saints and Christmas, and by the members of the royal household at the wedding of the Crown Prince, the future Carlos III, in 1375 (Fig. 11.2).16 By contrast, wool cloth produced in London was used mainly for the royal family’s houppelandes, cloaks, riding cloaks, shirts, doublets and hose, to be worn at the above mentioned festivities and the Estrenas,17 at meetings of the Navarrese monarchs with those of other courts,18 at the baptism of the first-born prince,19 as a sign of mourning20 or to participate in hunting parties.21 The most popular colours were vermilion and black. London woollen material was of evidently better quality than Bristol, from its price and its use in fashioning mantles for the royal princesses to wear on feast days, while another set made of Bristol wool cloth was for daily use.22 It was English wool fabric that was chosen for Princess Johana’s entourage travelling to Brittany for her wedding with the Duke of Brittany in 1386.23 14 The hopalanda was the most worn garment in the court of Navarre after 1361. The first

15

16 17 18

19 20 21 22 23

reference to its use is in the year 1362 (Carmen Bernis Madrazo, Indumentaria medieval española (Madrid: Instituto Diego Velázquez, 1956), pp. 30–31). It is an external garment, unisex, fullbodied with flared sleeves, of Frankish-Burgundian origin, with many variants. For further details see Merche Osés Urricelqui,‘¿Una prenda para cada ocasión? Vestir a la corte navarra durante el reinado de Carlos III el noble (1387–1425)’, in Casa y Corte. Ámbitos de poder en los reinos hispánicos durante la Baja Edad Media (1250–1500), ed. by Francisco de Paula Cañas Gálvez and José Manuel Nieto Soria (Madrid: La Ergástula, 2019), pp. 123–46. A headdress in the form of a hood that underwent major transformations throughout the 14th and 15th centuries. It covered the head, neck and shoulders, and the tip of the hood extended exaggeratedly downward and could be rolled over the head as a crest. Reg. 152, fol. 44v. The day of Estrenas is New Year’s Day, in which many gifts were given to the people who were part of the Court and the Royal Family. ‘A Petit Gillot, por 24 cobdos de paynno uerde de Londres, por 24 escudos de Francia que la reyna compro d’eill pora su vestir quando postremerament los rey et reynna fueron en vistas en Borja con la reynna Violant’ (Reg. 263, fol. 157r). The transcription of the original documentation always makes reference to what is discussed in the main text here, therefore no translation is deemed necessary. ‘Por 52 cobdos de morado de Londres por vestir las inffantas a los bapteos del dicho sennor inffant’ (Reg. 236, fol. 81r). ‘A Johan de Calua por 40 cobdos et 1 terz de negro de Londres por las dichas roppas de duello’ (Reg. 233, fol. 85v). ‘A Miguel Laceilla et Martin Bertan por 20 cobdos de negro de Londres por doblar dos hopelandas por el rey a yr a caça, por fazer mangas et capirotes’ (Reg. 225, fol. 31r). Reg. 179, fol. 79v. ‘A Andreo d’Aldaz, mercadero de Pomplona, por 3 paynos ingleses comprados d’eill et deliurados a las gentes que deuen yr en Bretaynna con la inffanta dona Johana, vallen IIIC libras’ (Reg. 189, fol. 97v).

Fig. 11.2 Woman wearing houppelande. Retable of Santa Catalina. Tudela Cathedral (Navarra) Early 15th century. © Navarre Government Historical Services.

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Next in importance after English wool cloth came the wool fabrics made in Normandy, one of France’s leading cloth production centres. These amounted to over 4,000 ells in total. This region had developed rapidly from the 13th century, and its products, which, broadly speaking, followed Flemish cloth-making methods, gained an excellent reputation for quality (Table 11.2).24 Table 11.2  Normandy wool cloths bought by the Navarre Court during the second half of the 14th century, according to treasurer’s accounting registers. Provenance

Quantity

Price per ell

Montivilliers

3428.33 ells

24-78 sueldos

2 bolts 2.5 cloths Rouen

425.33 ells

44-65 sueldos

Saint-Lô

176 ells

17-25 sueldos

Evreux

52.75 ells

28 sueldos

Caen

12 bolts

Not mentioned

Bernay

6 ells

29 sueldos

Prominent among the Navarrese court’s purchases from Normandy is wool cloth from Montivilliers, with a total of nearly 3,500 ells. The price paid varied from 24 to 78 sueldos per ell, which suggests cloth of high quality.25 Among the colours mentioned there is a predominance of grey, green, blue, red and dark. Colour, in addition to provenance, is one of the determining factors of quality.26 The use of one dyestuff over another affected the end price of the material. 24 Michel Mollat, ‘La draperie Normande’, in Produzione, comercio e consumo dei panni di lana

(nei secoli XII–XVIII), Atti della seconda settimana di studio, Prato, 10–16 aprile 1970, Istituto internazionale di storia economica ‘F. Datini’, ed. by Marco Spallanzani (Florence: Leo S. Olschki, 1976), pp. 403–21 (pp. 408–09); Françoise Piponnier, Costume et vie sociale, la cour d’Anjou XIVe–XVe siècle (Paris: La Haye, Mouton, 1970), p. 109; Nadege Gauffre, ‘La parure à la cour des comtes et des ducs de Savoie (1300–1439), approvisionnement, confection et distribution’ (unpublished Mémoire de D.E.A. d’histoire médiévale, Université Lumière Lyon 2, 1999), pp. 90–91. 25 For comparison the wages of the employees in the royal works are the following: master masons, 8 sueldos per day between 1389 and 1420; royal teachers, 10 sueldos; waiters 4 sueldos; Javier Martínez de Aguirre, Arte y Monarquía en Navarra 1328–1425 (Pamplona: Gobierno de Navarra, 1987), pp. 85–93. In 1356 an annual salary of a farmer is recorded as 30 sueldos. 26 Iradiel Murugarren, Evolución de la industria textil castellana, p. 122. Concerning the dyes see María Martínez Martínez, La industria del vestido en Murcia (ss. XIII–XV) (Murcia: Academia Alfonso X el Sabio, 1988), pp. 66–88; Alicia Sánchez Ortiz, ‘Juegos cromáticos de apariencia y poder en las cortes europeas medievales’, Goya, 293 (2003), 91–102 (pp. 95–100); Juan Vicente García Marsilla, ‘Producción y comercio de las plantas tintóreas en el País



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This is evident in the case of a bolt of Montivilliers wool cloth purchased in 1398, accompanied by an explicit description of the dyestuff used to render the material’s carmine red colour (dyed with kermes vermilio): payno bermeio de Mostreuiller tinto en grana.27 The price paid for these 22 ells was 72.85 pounds. Grain (kermes vermilio) was the most expensive dyestuff at the time, and greatly increased the price of the cloth, regardless of the quality of the wool used in its manufacture.28 Most Montivilliers cloth purchased was used to make the garments (cottes, houppelandes, mantles and capirotes) worn by the royal family at festivals (All Saints, Lent, Christmas) and events such as the birth of a princess,29 the arrival of messengers from Cyprus,30 celebrations for the knighting of a nobleman31 or the wedding of the future Carlos III and that of Princess Johana with the Duke of Brittany.32 Hunting was also an activity that merited wearing high-quality clothing, often a short or calf-length houppelande of fine wool cloth, such as that of Montivilliers.33 It must be borne in mind that when monarchs indulged in one of their favourite sports, such as hunting, they would often do so in the company of other noblemen, when they no doubt took advantage of the occasion to discuss a range of issues relating to the rule of their kingdom. It was therefore deemed essential to uphold the image of wealth and power surrounding the king by wearing the appropriate attire.

27 28

29

30

31 32

33

Valenciano bajomedieval’, in Pastel, Indigo et autres Teintures naturelles: Passé, Présent, Futur, ed. by Dominique Cardon, et al. (Toulouse: Arnstadt, 1995), pp. 87–94; Michel Pastoureau, Bleu. Histoire d’une couleur (Paris: Seuil, 2002); Michel Pastoureau, Noir. Histoire d’une couleur (Paris: Seuil, 2008); Michel Pastoureau, Vert. Histoire d’une couleur (Paris: Seuil, 2013); Michel Pastoureau, Rouge. Histoire d’une couleur (Paris: Seuil, 2016). English translations of these volumes by Pastoureau have been published by Princeton University Press. Reg. 243, fol. 94r–v. Judith Hofenk-de Graaff, The colourful past. Origins, chemistry and identification of natural dyestuffs (London: Archetype books, 2004); Dominique Cardon, Le monde des teintures naturelles (Paris: Belin, 2014). ‘A Miguel Laceilla por paynnos deliurados a la seynnora reynna por vestir a eillas et a las inffantas a su leuantamiento de la parizon de la inffanta dona Ysabel, es asaber, una pieca de granca meya grana de Mostiuiller’ (Reg. 233, fol. 83v). ‘Por fazer a la reyna et inffantas a la venida de los menssageros de Chipre 10 hoppallandas. Fueron tomados primo 3 paynnos blanc gris de Mostreuiller et otros tres paynnos de bert obscur de Mostriuiller’ (Reg. 236, fol. 81v). ‘a Miguel Laceilla et sus compayneros por 13 cobdos et meyo de roge de Mostiuiller media grana, dados al seynor de Lassagua por su manto a su cauailleria’ (Reg. 233, fol. 83v). ‘A Miguel Laguiller por muchos paynnos comprados d’eill para las bodas de mossen Charles […] por IX cobdos de gris de Moustieruiller, por cobdo XXXV sueldos (Reg. 152, fol. 45r); a Martin d’Echarro, mercader de Pomplona, por dos medios paynnos de gris de Mostiuiller que la inffanta dona Johana dio a la contesa de Fox, por liurea de su boda, C florines’ (Reg. 189, fols 97v–98r). ‘A Miguel Laceilla et Martin Bertran […] por 8 cobdos et meyo d’otro gris obscur de Mostiuiller puesto en una hopelanda pora el rey a yr a caça de los falconner et fue doblada del negro de suso’ (Reg. 225, fol. 31r).

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Other wool cloths made in Normandy were also utilized, albeit on a smaller scale (see Table 11.2). Wool fabrics from the region of Brabant totalled almost 3,000 ells (see Table 11.3). In the last few centuries of the Middle Ages, cloth-making in this area attained the highest esteem and an elevated standard of quality. These items appeared on the market toward the end of the 13th century. Throughout the 14th century they were in great demand at the courts of the day, partly overshadowing the products of Flemish woollen cloth-makers.34 Table 11.3  Brabant woollen cloths bought by the Navarre Court during the second half of the 14th century, according to treasurer’s accounting registers. Provenance

Quantity

Price per ell

Mechelen

2098.66 ells

16-56.3 sueldos

1 bolt 2 cloths Brussels

827.25 ells

12-58.5 sueldos

5 bolts 6 cloths 48.75 alnas 4 rods Leuven

343.75 ells

28-69.8 sueldos

1 cloth Lier

16 ells

52 sueldos

5.5 alnas

The most popular Brabantine wool fabric was produced in Mechelen, and the court of Navarre ordered a large supply – over 2,000 ells – as did other royal households.35 These wool cloths were mainly red, vermilion and dark blue, although other colours such as blue, white, purple and pink are mentioned. They 34 Robert-Henri Bautier, ‘La place de la draperie brabançonne et plus particulièrement

bruxelloise dans l’industrie textile du Moyen Âge’, in Robert-Henri Bautier, Sur l’histoire économique de la France médiévale: la route, le fleuve, la foire (Aldershot: Variorum, 1991), pp. 31–63. 35 Gauffre, ‘La parure à la cour’, p. 91; María Martínez Martínez, ‘Los gastos suntuarios de la monarquía castellana: aproximación a los aspectos técnicos y económicos a través del ejemplo de Juan I’, in La manufactura urbana i els menestrals (s. XIII–XVI): IX Jornades d’Estudis Històrics Locals, ed. by Maria Barceló Crespí (Palma de Mallorca: Institut d’Estudis Baleàrics; Eivissa: Conselleria de Cultura, Educació i Esports, Govern Balear, 1991), pp. 115–40 (p. 121); Bautier, ‘La place de la draperie brabançonne’, pp. 39–43 and p. 51.



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were destined chiefly for members of the royal family and, to a lesser extent, for high officials of the royal court, clergy, members of the nobility, knights and other members of the household. These materials were also used to make a range of ceremonial garments, worn for instance at the wedding of the future Carlos III and on the feast of All Saints, Christmas or the Estrenas.36 A piece of this wool cloth was presented to maestro Guillem on his visit to Navarre in 1381 accompanying Cardinal Luna, to discuss the matter of the Western Schism.37 Brussels was another key textile manufacturing enclave in the Brabantine region. The quality of the woollens – especially the material known as ‘scarlet’38 – produced there in the 14th century was outstanding, and earned the city its incomparable renown. Brussels wool cloth was a high-quality fabric but not comparable to the sumptuous scarlet.39 Over 800 ells were purchased, at prices ranging from 12 to 58 sueldos, in grey, pers (dark blue), green, blue and vermilion, primarily for the special costumes and other clothing worn by kings and royal family members. An example is the outfit worn by King Carlos III at the funeral of the Count of Montpensier, son of the Duke of Berry, which included hose, long cape and voluminous headwear all in black.40 Likewise, this was the supplier chosen for the wardrobe of King Carlos II’s sister, the Countess of Foix, when, in 1365, she accompanied her sister-in-law, Queen Joanna, wife of Carlos II and sister of the king of France, to the French court as mediator between the sovereigns over possessions on French soil.41 Painstaking care was invested in the Countess’s appearance, ensuring an arresting image at all times. This wool cloth was also used to

36 Reg. 152, fol. 45v; Reg. 189, fol. 100r; ‘A Miguel Laceilla, mercadero de Pomplona, et a sus

37 38

39

40 41

compayneros, por paynnos en lur tienda comprado pora vestir a Lançelot et a sus capeillan, donzeilles et seruidores pora en esta fiesta de Nauidat, es assaber, por 5 cobdos et meyo de morat de Melines pora el dicho Lancelot’ (Reg. 210, fol. 118r). Reg. 169, fol. 63r. Scarlet: excellent quality woollen cloth, always dyed with kermes. See John H. A. Munro, ‘The Medieval Scarlet and the Economics of Sartorial Splendour’, in John H. Munro, Textiles, towns and trade: essays in the economic history of late-medieval England and the Low Countries (Aldershot: Variorum, 1994), pp. 13–70, a classic essay first published in 1983; and, the author’s final word on the subject: John Munro, ‘Scarlet’, in Encyclopedia of Medieval Dress and Textiles of the British Isles, c. 450–1450, ed. by Gale Owen-Crocker, Elizabeth Coatsworth and Maria Hayward (Leiden: Brill, 2012), pp. 477–81. Michèle Beaulieu and Jeanne Baylé, Le costume en Bourgogne. De Philippe le Hardi à la mort de Charles le Téméraire (1364–1477) (Paris: Presses Universitaires de France, 1956), p. 24. Among cloths from Brussels, sources highlight paño de Bruselas which was a fabric of good quality that could be blue, white or purple, etc. Escarlata de Bruselas (scarlet), however, was a luxury fabric, made with the finest wools and always dyed with kermes. Reg. 240, fol. 25r. ‘Item por XL coudos de paynno de Bruçellas por fazer ropas a la contessa de Foix para yr en Françia en la compaynnia de la seynnora reyna, IIIIxx florines’ (Reg. 113, fol. 83v).

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make cote-hardies for the king’s squires,42 the infante don Luis’s servants and the counsellor to King Carlos II, among others.43 The Languedoc, in the south of France, was the second most important cloth-making region of the country after Normandy. During the 13th century, the Languedoc had become a well-established manufacturing centre that maintained its productivity into the late medieval centuries. This region specialised in medium- and, especially, lower-quality wool fabrics that were already known in the 13th century in markets across the Iberian Peninsula. The court of Navarre purchased nearly 2,000 ells in total (see Table 11.4). Table 11.4  Languedoc wool cloths bought by the Navarre Court during the second half of the 14th century, according to treasurer’s accounting registers. Provenance

Quantity

Price per ell

Fanjeaux

804.5 ells

18–36 sueldos

47.5 bolts 4 units Pamiers

377.5 ells

12–17 sueldos

3 bolts Perpignan

258 ells

22–24 sueldos

Toulouse

139.16 ells

8 sueldos

3 bolts 2 cloths Limoux

89 ells

15–22 sueldos

4.5 bolts Monpellier

20 bolts

5 sueldos

Montolieu

67 ells

7.5 sueldos–16 sueldos

2.5 bolts 4 cloths Marciac

64 ells

8 sueldos

Saint-Girons

60 ells

Not mentioned

Carcassonne

22 ells

18 sueldos

42 ‘Item al dicto Gautier Arnalt Poullain, por ciertos paynnos comprados deyl […] XXX cobdos

de vert de Broissellez, el cobde XXX sueldos, por fazer cotas hardias a los escuderos del dicto seynor rey qui montan IIIIXX VIII libras’ (Reg. 76.2, fol. 106r). 43 Reg. 84, fol. 129v.



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Of these, Fanjeaux wool cloth was the most called for, with almost 800 ells bought. The price paid for this medium-quality commodity, in green, vermilion and violet hues, ranged between 18 and 36 sueldos per ell. This material was used to make the every-day clothing worn by the members and servants of the royal household, and bedcovers for the king’s bedchamber.44 Other wool fabrics were also purchased from this region, as mentioned in Table 11.4. Up to 2,000 ells of wool cloth were bought from Flanders, where the cloth-making industry that had been developing since the 11th century peaked in the 13th century. Flemish workshops specialised in the production of rich broadcloths which required the best quality wool imported from England. In the late medieval centuries, however, cloth-makers in this region turned to making lighter, more inexpensive materials (Table 11.5).45 Table 11.5  Flanders wool cloths bought by the Navarre Court during the second half of the 14th century, according to treasurer’s accounting registers. Provenance

Quantity

Price per ell

Ypres

1472.25 ells

7–65 sueldos

2 bolts 3 cloths Ghent

245 ells

12–20 sueldos

3 bolts 3 units Wervicq

96 ells

17–32 sueldos

The Hague

41.5 ells

19 sueldos

Courtrai

22 ells

10 sueldos

The Navarrese court obtained 1,500 ells of wool cloth from Ypres in Flanders. The price per ell varied between 7 and 65 sueldos. The least expensive piece was a bolt of striped worsted for falconers’ outfits.46 These were mostly green, white, purple, 44 Reg. 86, fol. 125v; ‘a Pascoal Cruzat el mayor, por paynos taiados en su tienda […] por un

paynno de Fangeaus pora cubiertas de lechos pora la goardarroba del rey […] XLIIII sueldos’ (Reg. 179, fol. 79v). 45 Diago Hernando, La industria y el comercio, pp. 11–19, 28–33; Georges Espinas, La draperie dans la Flandre française au Moyen Age, 2 vols (Paris: Auguste Picard, ed., 1923); Simone AbrahamThisse, ‘Le commerce des draps de Flandre en Europe du Nord: Faut-il encore parler du déclin de la draperie flammande au bas Moyen Âge?’, in La draperie ancienne des Pays-Bas: débouchés et stratégies de survie (14e–16e siècles), Actes du colloque tenu à Gand le 28 avril 1992, ed. by Marc Boone and Walter Prevenier (Leuven: Garant, 1993), pp. 167–205. 46 ‘Por V coudos de paynno barrado d’Ipre pora’l falçonero, a VII sueldos el coudo, XXXV sueldos’ (Reg. 84, fol. 129v).

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dark and red. The wool fabrics from Ypres were purchased both for clothing the members of the royal family and the royal household. Garments were made for everyone, some of which were presented at the feast of las Estrenas and on 1 May, when it was the custom for young people to dress in green.47 Long mantles were also tailored for nobles to wear at their knighting ceremony.48 In 1358 the Sargentos de Armas (the king’s armed guard) were issued with appropriate dress to appear before the King of Castile.49 In addition to the wool fabrics from Ypres, others were also procured in smaller quantities from Ghent, Wervicq, The Hague and Courtrai (see Table 11.5). Fewer by some distance are the references to wool cloths produced in the Crown of Aragon, which total close to a thousand ells. In the early decades of the 14th century a number of cloth-making centres became established in the territories under the Crown of Aragon, not only in the large cities but in much smaller demographic settlements such as Puigcerdà, Ripoll and San Juan de las Abadesas. This industry gave rise to an unexpected economic upturn in these remote mountain communities. The wool fabrics produced were deemed of medium to poor quality (Table 11.6).50 A considerable amount – over 400 ells – of Aragonese wool cloth was used in Navarre, known generically as ‘wool cloth of Aragon’. These fabrics were primarily white, although green and red were also available. This inexpensive worsted cloth, as shown by the prices paid, was destined for houppelandes and their

47 ‘A Symeno d’Echarri, mercadero, por 13 cobdos de paynno verde d’Ipre que dio el rey al alferiz por fazer una hoppa pora’l primer dia de mayo’ (Reg. 233, fol. 128v). Green was the

colour of change and renewal, associated with the idea of nature, the arrival of spring and youth. See Michel Pastoureau, ‘Du bleu au noir. Éthiques et pratiques de la couleur à la fin du Moyen Âge’, Médiévales, 14 (1988), 9–21 (p. 18); Sánchez Ortiz, ‘Juegos cromáticos’, p. 99; Christian de Mérindol, ‘Couleur, étoffe et politique à la fin du Moyen Âge. Les couleurs du roi et les couleurs d’une cour ducale’, in Recherches sur l’economie de la France médiévale. Les voies fluviales. La draperie, Actes du 112e Congrès national des sociétés savantes (Lyon: Editions du C.T.H.S., 1987), pp. 221–49 (pp. 230–31). 48 ‘A Nicholas d’Azedo, mercadero de Pomplona, […] por una pieça de roge de Ypre de la grant suert, content 40 cobdos et mas 9 cobdos et meyo en un escay deliurados al vizconte de Bayguerr, Martin d’Ayuarr, Garcon d’Uroz, Pere Arnaut de Garro et Johan de Domezayn, por fazer 5 mantos luengos para el dia de su cauailleria’ (Reg. 210, fol. 110v). 49 Reg. 86, fol. 125v. 50 Diago Hernando, La industria y el comercio, pp. 38–40; José Ángel Sesma Muñoz, Transformación social y revolución comercial en Aragón durante la Baja Edad Media (Madrid: Fundación Juan March, 1982), p. 27.



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Table 11.6  Worsted cloths from the Crown of Aragon bought by the Navarre Court during the second half of the 14th century, according to treasurer’s accounting registers. Provenance

Quantity

Price per ell

Aragon

452.5 ells

11-31 sueldos

17 cloths Zaragoza

346.25 ells

14-20 sueldos

2 bolts Ripoll

155.5 ells

14-18 sueldos

Puigcerdá

41 ells

20 sueldos

linings for valets,51 pages,52 lion keepers,53 and falconers,54 serving the royal household. The same held for all other items of worsted from the Crown of Aragon (see Table 11.6). Lastly, 160 ells of woollen cloth from Florence were purchased. This type of textile was a luxury fabric made in different colours – pers, green, blue, pink and purple – used for houppelandes and jupons for the members of the royal family.55 Certain wool fabrics are registered without mention of their provenance. These include over 4,600 ells of cloths. In some of them the colour or other distinguishing feature is mentioned (such as red wool fabric de la gran suert); others are named after their manufacturing technique, their colour, or the items of clothing made with them, among other things. Such textiles are referred to as blanqueta, estameña, frisa, hustela, palmeta, sarga and saial (see Table 11.7).56 To judge by their prices, these wool fabrics were of modest quality. 51 ‘Item 7 cobdos de paynno blanco d’Aragon dado a Jaquet, vallet del infant, por se vestir’ (Reg. 179, fol. 80r). 52 ‘Item vn paynno blanco d’Aragon por doblar las hopalandas de los pages del rey, XXVIII florines’ (Reg. 189, fol. 100r). 53 ‘Item XX cobdos de otro blanco d’Aragon et XX cobdos de gris por vistir los dos moços de la liona et Gomiz, valet de la dicta lionna, XXVIII florines’ (Reg. 189, fol. 100r).

54 ‘A Robient, falconero del rey, de dono de gracia especial 20 dia de febrero, 6 cobdos de paynno

de Bristo a fazer una hopelanda por el et 6 cobdos et meyo de blanco d’Aragon a doblar la dicha hopa, tomados en la tienda de Petit Gillot d’Olit’ (Reg. 225, fol. 176v). 55 ‘Item por X cobdos de vert de Florença pora fazer vna hopalarenga al rey, XXV florines’ (Reg. 189, fol. 99v). 56 Blanqueta: white wool cloth; Estameña: simple and low-quality worsted fabric; Frisa: lowquality worsted fabric; Hustela: worsted fabric; Sarga: cheap, coarse worsted fabric of common use; Sayal: coarse worsted fabric of poor quality (Martínez Meléndez, Los nombres de tejidos); Palmeta or Palmilla: worsted cloth produced in the region of Cuenca and imitated in other places, it has different qualities and colours and can be considered an ordinary worsted fabric (José Ángel Sesma Muñoz and Ángeles Líbano Zumalacarregui, Léxico del comercio medieval en Aragón (siglo XV) (Zaragoza: Institución Fernando el Católico, 1982).

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Table 11.7  Wool cloths identified by colour or type bought by the Navarre Court during the second half of the 14th century, according to treasurer’s accounting registers. Name

Quantity

Price per ell

Unidentified cloths

4601 ells

6–52 sueldos

11.5 bolts 19.5 cloths 43 alnas 2.5 yards Bruneta

1483.66 ells

20–54 sueldos

4 bolts Scarlet

740.83 ells

40–143 sueldos

1 bolt 1 rod 9 yards Palmeta

175 ells

12–13 sueldos

6 bolts Estameña

31 ells

6.5 sueldos

Frisa

26.5 ells

Not mentioned

2 units 5 alnas Sarga

18 ells

9 sueldos

Blanqueta

14 ells

16–22 sueldos

Saial

10 ells

2.7 sueldos– 5 sueldos

1 cloth Hustela

2 ells

Not mentioned

Half a bolt 4 units

The fabric known as bruneta was a black or very dark woollen textile used for clothing royal family members and courtiers in mourning. For attendance at funerals in the 14th and 15th centuries in Navarre, at least from 1361,57 bruneta

57 ‘Item a Peyre de Badostain, por una pieça de bruneta entegra, de la quoal el dicto seynor fue

vestido por la muert de la reyna de Françia, LX escudillos, cada un por XVI sueldos, […] valen XLVIII pound’ (Reg. 99, fol. 140r).



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Fig. 11.3 Dress for mourning at the king’s funeral. Ceremonial Book. AGN, Códices y cartularios, B2, fol. 22v. © Royal and General Archives of Navarre.

was worn by everyone from royal family members to the last courtier (Fig. 11.3).58 The Navarrese court purchased almost 1,500 ells of this material. Its place of origin is sometimes mentioned, which may be England, Bristol, Chester, Lovaine, Mechelen, Douai or Ghent. The price for this item varied between 20 and 54 sueldos per ell. Clothing was made for funeral attendees using different qualities of fabric according to the category of the wearer, but in a single colour for all: black. Tailors produced houppelandes, hose, capes and capirotes, among other garments. Even 58 Merche Osés Urricelqui, ‘Ceremonias funerarias de la realeza navarra en la Baja Edad Media’,

in Estudios sobre la realeza navarra en el siglo XV, ed. by Eloísa Ramírez Vaquero (Pamplona: Universidad Pública de Navarra, 2005), pp. 103–28; David Nogales Rincón, ‘El color negro: luto y magnificencia en la Corona de Castilla (siglos XIII–XV)’, Medievalismo: Revista de la Sociedad Española de Estudios Medievales, 26 (2016), 221–45.

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the death of other neighbouring kings and queens – who were often related in some degree to those of Navarre – obliged the Navarrese court to dress in mourning for a period of time. Such was the case in 1398 upon the death of Queen Blanca of France (Blanche of Navarre), an aunt of Carlos III with whom he had spent a large part of his infancy in that neighbouring country, and whom he had visited more than once on his subsequent travels to the Valois court. On this occasion, a black houppelande and cape were tailored for Queen Leonor, both with a fur lining.59 The passing in 1390 of the King of Castile, Leonor’s brother, once more cast the court into mourning.60 Scarlet was a cloth of exceptional quality and was very popular in the Middle Ages. The court of Navarre purchased over 700 ells in several colours such as vermilion, purple, pink and ‘sanguine’. Because it was expensive, it was normally restricted to royal family use and to that of ecclesiastical dignitaries, although there is one instance recorded of a quantity of this material being given to a merchant of Barcelona who belonged to the king’s inner circle.61 Wearing scarlet was reserved for specific ceremonies, most notably coronations, the first-born’s christening and receptions at the court. The coronation of King Carlos III took place in 1390 at the cathedral of Pamplona. On that day, the king was in his best finery, arriving at the cathedral in regal attire, houppelande and cape of pink Brussels scarlet. He was crowned in the same costume.62 The outfit cost 363 pounds. The birth of the longed-for heir to the kingdom of Navarre, in June 1397, also named Carlos,63 brought great joy to the court. At his christening in the cathedral of Pamplona, his mother wore a rich, fur-lined houppelande in purple scarlet, with a cape to match. Her sisters attended wearing the same colour and the baby was dressed in scarlet in vermilion, a colour believed to be associated with protection,

59 Reg. 243, fol. 95v. 60 ‘A Pascoal Cruzat el mayor, por 29 cobdos de bruneta de que fueron vestidas las dos fijas del

rey, de cotas, hopas, mantos, capirotes et calças pora el duelo del rey de Castilla, su thio’ (Reg. 210, fol. 113v). 61 ‘Item por XX cobdos d’escarlata por dar al obispo de Lascar, por cobdo IIII pound, 10 sueldos, valen 90 pound; a Miguel Laguiller, por vna escarlata de Brocellas conteniente XLVIII cobdos, la quoal el rey dio a Federy Boni, mercadero de Barçalona, como perece […] por cobdo III pound, 10 sueldos, valen IIc XVI pound’ (Reg. 152, fols 45v, 46v–47r). 62 ‘Qui traysso de Barçallona a Pomplona para el coronamiento del rey es assaber, otra escarlata rosada de Broçellas de que para el rey fue fecha al su coronamiento una ropa real et una hopalanda’ (Reg. 207, fol. 118v). Concerning the ceremonials see Merche Osés Urricelqui, ‘El ritual de la realeza navarra en los siglos XIV y XV: coronaciones y funerales’, in Ceremonial de la coronación, unción y exequias de los reyes de Inglaterra, ed. by Eloísa Ramírez Vaquero, 2 vols (Pamplona: Gobierno de Navarra, 2008), II, pp. 305–21. 63 He did not live to adulthood, dying in 1402.



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while at the same time heightening the prestige of royal blood by blending it with the colour of the most precious dye.64 In 1400, a meeting took place between the Navarrese monarchs and Queen Violant of Aragon, very close to the border, in the Aragonese town of Borja. A number of reasons may have led to the rendezvous, such as the issue of the Western Schism or the negotiations for a marriage involving the two crowns. The Navarrese monarchs, wishing to make a favourable impression on the Queen, took special care in their choice of attire for the occasion. They dressed in lavish vermilion-coloured scarlet lined with fur.65 During the reigns of Carlos II and III a succession of receptions were given for members of European and peninsular royalty and their ambassadors and messengers. At these, all the techniques of courtly theatrics were deployed, pomp and circumstance maximised. The aim of the court was to showcase its grandeur, and these receptions were intended as visual exhibitions carefully calculated to ensure the intended image remained impressed on the guests’ memory.66 The sovereign appeared in his full regalia, in red and carrying the royal insignia, opulently displaying his kingly condition, establishing his magnificence through his appearance. We may assume that he would have appeared ‘en Majestad’, as depicted on seals and miniatures (Fig. 11.4). Painstaking care was taken over every detail and in particular over the items of clothing worn, not only by the monarchs and their close relatives but also by the members of the court. These were ideal opportunities to be seen and for the hosts to showcase their refined taste and splendour.

64 Reg. 236, fol. 81r. Sophie Jolivet, ‘Pour soi vêtir honnêtement à la cour de monseigneur le

duc de Bourgogne. Costume et dispositif vestimentaire à la cour de Philippe le Bon de 1430 à 1455’ (unpublished doctoral thesis, University of Bourgogne, Dijon, 2003), pp. 647 (n. 73) and 649; Danièle Alexandre-Bidon and Pierre Riché, L’enfance au Moyen Âge (Paris: Le Seuil, Bibliothèque Nationale de France, 1994), p. 184; Michel Pastoureau, ‘Ceci est mon sang. Le christianisme médiéval et la couleur rouge’, in Le pressoir mystique, Actes du colloque de recloses, 27 mai 1989, ed. by Danièle Alexandre-Bidon (Paris: Les éditions du cerf, 1990), pp. 43–56; Alicia Sánchez Ortiz, ‘El color símbolo de poder y orden social. Apuntes para una historia de las apariencias en Europa’, Espacio, Tiempo y Forma, Serie IV, Hª Moderna, 12 (1999), 321–54 (p. 326, n. 9). 65 ‘Por vestir a los seynnores rey et reynna et a otras gentes del hostal del rey, pora las vistas que ouieron en el mes de março postremerament passado en Borja con la reynna Viollant d’Aragon, es asaber, por 25 cobdos et medio d’escarlata bermeilla de Mostreuiller pora los dichos rey et reynna; por 7 codos de escarlata a meya grana pora los dichos rey et reynna’ (Reg. 256, fol. 123v). 66 José Manuel Nieto Soria, Ceremonias de la realeza. Propaganda y legitimación en la Castilla Trastámara (Madrid: Nerea, 1993), p. 134; Juan Vicente García Marsilla, ‘Le immagini del potere e il potere delle immagini. I mezzi iconici al servicio della monarchia aragonese nel basso medioevo’, Rivista Storica Italiana, 112. 2 (2000), 569–602; Francesca Español Bertran, Els escenaris del rey. Art i monarquia a la Corona d’Aragó (Manresa: Angle Editorial, 2001).

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Fig. 11.4  Wax seal of King Carlos III. ACP, III Epi 37. Año 1392. © Cathedral Archive of Pamplona.

Silk Monarchs also favoured silk fabrics. These materials, characterised by their soft feel and iridescent, textured appearance, including velvet, satin and brocade, were the most highly prized. As can be seen in the Navarrese accounts during the period studied, an extensive variety of silks were purchased, albeit in smaller quantities than wool fabrics. The consumption of silk evidently increased considerably in the final years of the 14th century, under the reign of Carlos III. In contrast to wool cloths, for which provenance was the principal criterion in differentiation and classification and, along with other aspects, in determining their quality, the origin of silk fabrics is rarely given, mention being made only of Lucca, Florence and ‘Indio’. Sixteen terms are used to describe silk fabrics. Those most favoured by the royal household of Navarre were sendal, satin, velvet, taffeta and camelot, with others as shown in the table below in smaller quantities (see Table 11.8).



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Table 11.8 Silk fabrics bought by the Navarre Court during the second half of the 14th century, according to treasurer’s accounting registers. Name

Quantity

Price per bolt

Atabis

8 bolts

71.5–90 pounds

11 yards 1 unit Baldachin

14 bolts

48–66 pounds

4 pairs 13 units 2 cloths Brocade

48.33 bolts

38.33–108 pounds

19 pairs 13 units Camelín

6 ells

Not mentioned

Camelot

100.5 bolts

10.31–91 pounds

6 units 45.5 rods, 3 hands 1.5 alnas 32 ells Camocas

3 bolts

Not mentioned

Cloth of gold

42 bolts

7.5–364 pounds

1 pair 43 units 24 cloths Cloth of silk

35 bolts

15–126 pounds

22 units 9 yards 8 alnas 33.5 ells 48.5 cloths Damask

59 bolts 17 units 12 yards, 4 hands 6.75 alnas 37 cloths

48–76.80 pounds

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Name

Quantity

Price per bolt

Paños moriscos

5 units

26 pounds

92.5 bolts

6.6–100 pounds

Satin

37 units 96 yards, 12 hands 21.66 ells 6 cloths Sendal

121.5 bolts 2 units

3.3 sueldos–21 pounds

17 yards 480 ells Taffeta

138.5 bolts

8.5–22.67 pounds

15 units 215.25 ells 30.5 ounces 2 escay Tecido de seda

27 units

Not mentioned

7.5 ounces Tercenel

25 bolts

13.33–14.3 pounds

5 units Velvet

73 bolts

24–875 pounds

116 yards, 24 hands 7 pair 36 units 33.37 alnas 120 ells

As in the case of wool cloths, it is almost impossible to establish a single figure for the quantity of silk fabric purchased by the court of Navarre. Units of measure, in both cases, are complex and diverse, and the quantification or measurement conversion problems often remain unsolved. The quantities purchased cannot be reduced to a common unit that would enable the overall amount to be calculated.



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The excellent quality of the velvet67 is reflected in its price, for instance patterned velvet, among which was a piece measuring 8 canes, black in colour, decorated with historical motifs, purchased in 1396 for Queen Leonor at a price of 266.67 pounds.68 Another piece of red velvet featuring a pattern of gold crowns was used to make two houppelandes for King Carlos III for use at his rendezvous with the King of Aragon in 1391.69 This cost 875 pounds, the most costly item of fabric purchased by the Navarrese court. Considering that the salary of a royal tutor was 10 sueldos per day, or that of footman 4 sueldos, these were fabulously expensive materials. It is therefore clear that wearing these fabrics, and not others, was intentional and grounded on a solid rationale. Owing to its great value, the use of velvet was largely restricted to the royal family, and in particular, to the king, although certain high officials (chamberlain,70 alférez,71 marshal) and some other noblemen were included. Velvet was not only reserved for certain individuals, but also used for certain prominent events. At his coronation, Carlos III, at the moment of becoming consecrated as king, changed his clothes of regal scarlet, described above, for a velvet houppelande in white, the symbol of purity, lined with squirrel fur and with a matching mantle.72 The records show that velvet was also used for houppelandes, doublets and coats

67 Dense, pile-woven, silk fabric made in different colours and of great quality. Martínez

68 69 70 71

72

Meléndez, Los nombres de tejidos, pp. 363–70; Roberta Orsi Landini, I Velluti: Nella collezione della galleria del costume di Firenze / The velvets: In the collection of the costume gallery in Florence (Florence: Mauro Pagliai Editore, 2017). Reg. 233, fol. 89v. Reg. 207, fol. 136r–v. ‘A Mono de Casino por una pieca de beluet roge de Florencia […] dada al dicho Bertran de Lacarra, chambelan’ (Reg. 207, fol. 131v). ‘A Seuestre Trente, marchant de Lucques, bourgois de Paris, pour autres parties de draps de soye que le roy a eus de lui pour soy vestir, primero le 30 jour de may 1398, pour 2 pieces de velluyau noir au poil et bas poil que le roy donna al afferiz’ (Reg. 240, fol. 26r); ‘a Mono de Casini, huxier d’armas del rey, por cosas compradas d’eill las quoalles dio el rey en Estrenas el dia de cabo d’ayno primo, una pieca de beluet peludo vermeillo carmezi, content 11 canas et 2 palmas, el quoal dio el rey al alfferiz’ (Reg. 250, fol. 153v). The chamberlain was in charge of the king’s chamber. It was an honorary title given to the most illustrious lords of the kingdom, as a reward for their services. The alférez and the marshal were high officials in the army. For more information about structure of the Navarrese court see María Narbona Cárceles, La corte de Carlos III el Noble, rey de Navarra: espacio doméstico y escenario del poder, 1376–1415 (Pamplona: Eunsa, 2006); Zabalo Zabalegui, La administración del reino. ‘A Gaubert de la Gautru qui traysso de Barçallona a Pomplona para el coronamiento del rey es assaber, 5 piecas de beluet blanco de que se fezo la ropa del coronamiento del rey’ (Reg. 207, fol. 133r).

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for Easter,73 the Estrenas and for travelling.74 This same material was used to make cushions for the boudoir and chapel of a princess.75 Satin,76 a sumptuous silk fabric, was used to make clothing including jupons and houppelandes for the members of the royal family and household. Such is the case of a squire who was to accompany the alférez to England in 1393, richly dressed with a jupon of black satin.77 The red caparison, embroidered with the royal arms, covering the horse bearing Carlos III to the cathedral for his coronation,78 was also made from satin. This highly esteemed material was often presented as a royal gift or at the feast of las Estrenas.79 The most popular colours were vermilion and black. Sendal80 was a material suitable for clothing, linings and curtains for the king’s chapel.81 Mainly in vermilion, it was worn by the royal family82 and some high royal household officials.83 Its price was moderate in comparison with velvet, brocade and cloth of gold. The same applies to taffeta,84 which was purchased in 73 ‘Por una pareilla de beluet verde toda de seda, de la quoal ha seydo fecha una hopalanda para el rey et otra para mossen Pes de Laxssaga para Pascoa passada’ (Reg. 207, fol. 134r).

74 ‘Por 28 cobdos et medio de beluet negro en seda al cobdo de payno, de que el rey fezo fazer 2 jaquetas pora su viage’ (Reg. 243, fol. 96r). 75 ‘A Bernart, mercadero de Bearn, por dos beluetes pora la inffanta dona Johanna, de que

76 77 78

79

80

81

82 83 84

fueron fechos los cuixines de la dicta inffanta pora comer en sala et pora en su capieilla’ (Reg. 189, fol. 103r). Rich silk fabric that comes in several varieties. For the term satin and its semantic problems, see Martínez Meléndez, Los nombres de tejidos, pp. 241–46, s.v. aceituní. Reg. 219, fol. 65r. ‘A Sancho de Moncayo qui traysso de Çaragoça a Pomplona pora el coronamiento del rey, es assaber, 6 piecas de satenes simples, bermeillos, para la cubierta del cauaillo del rey et otras cosas al su coronamiento; a Conch, brodador, […] por su trauayllo de brodar 9 losenjas a las armas del rey, puestas sobre la cobierta de satin del cauaillo del rey que caualgo al su coronamiento, 45 florines’ (Reg. 207, fols 133r, 133v). ‘A Mono de Casin, huisier d’armas del rey […] por otras partidas que dio el rey a Estrenas del primero dia del aynno, primo por un satin de domas morado, contenient 6 canas et media, pora’l rey a fazer jupones’ (Reg. 233, fol. 90v). There is no unanimity about sendal; some consider it a silk fabric and others linen; Martínez Meléndez, Los nombres de tejidos, pp. 386–98; Sophie Desrosiers, ‘Sendal-cendal-zendado, a category of silk cloth in the development of the silk industry in Italy (twelfth–fifteenth centuries)’, in Crusading and Trading between West and East. Studies in Honour of David Jacoby, ed. by Sophia Menache, et al. (London: Taylor and Francis, 2019), pp. 340–50. ‘Traixo de Çaragoça et las rendio 10 dia d’octobre 1388, es assaber, por 2 pieças de cendal tercelin bermeio puestos en acabar las cortinas de la capieilla del rey, por oyr su missa’ (Reg. 197, fol. 176v). ‘A Simeno de Miraglo, recebidor de Tudella, por 6 piecas de cendal tercelin pora dos hoppas del rey et de la reyna et por expensas a yr a Caragoça’ (Reg. 233, fol. 89r). ‘A Mono de Casino, lombart, por tres pieças de cendal tomado d’eil, 10 dia de junio, et dados a mossen Bertran de Lacarra (chamberlain)’ (Reg. 210, fol. 127v). Thin and very dense silk fabric used especially for linings; Martínez Meléndez, Los nombres de tejidos, pp. 352–56.



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large quantities by the Navarrese court for lining clothes85 and making drapes86 and bed clothes for the royal household. Cloth of gold was an extraordinarily precious fabric used by the royal family, noblemen and, exceptionally, knights. Particularly noteworthy are the houppelandes in cloth of gold worn by Beltrán de Laxaga and Pedro Jurdán de Urrias on the day of their knighting, both presented as gifts by the king.87 The monarchs took pride in offering gifts of this fabric to religious centres. An example of this are the two pieces presented in 1381 by Prince Carlos to the Cathedral of Pamplona on his return from France.88 These were given on 1 January, the feast of the Estrenas.89 Cloth of silk was used for the sumptuous houppelandes worn by the members of the royal family and nobility. Most outstanding were the pearl-embroidered houppelandes, part cloth of silk and part black satin, worn by the princesses.90

Vegetable fibres During the Middle Ages, fabrics made of vegetable fibres never attained the social prestige commanded by wool and silk cloths. They were less expensive and lighter, used for making other items of clothing, usually under-clothing and household textiles, for lining outer garments, and for wrapping and carrying goods. The Navarrese book-keeping records show that vegetable-fibre cloth purchases were less significant than those of wool for courtly clothing, both in number of purchases and in value. They were used for clothing with limited visibility, concealed by other garments. These light and inexpensive vegetable-fibre materials were, however, purchased in abundance for household textiles (such as sheets, towels, covers, mattresses, tapestries and tablecloths).91 This is evident in the acquisi85 ‘A Johanco Palmer, mercadero de Pomplona, por 8 piecas de taffetas verde puestas en doblar

86 87

88 89 90 91

2 hoppas verdes por el rey al primero dia de mayo, et 4 hoppas et 4 capirotes por las fijas et hermanas del rey’ (Reg. 225, fol. 194r). ‘Traixo pora la fiesta de Nauidat 1389, por 3 piecas de tafetaf barrado d’oro por las cortinas de la cambra, que pesan al peso de Montpesler 13 pound et meya’ (Reg. 197, fol. 176v). ‘Por la faicon de una hoppa de paynno d’oro con estoffas de seda et fillo por mossen Bertran de Lassaga, aqui puesta por comandamiento del rey pora su cauailleria (Reg. 233, fol. 95r); a Lorenzo Alaman, por la faicon de una hopelanda de paynno d’oro doble de taffetaf pora mossen Pero Jurdan d’Urryas, que el rey lo fezo cauaillero el lunes antes de la Trinidat’ (Reg. 225, fol. 41r). ‘A eill por dos paynnos d’oro que el seynnor infant dio a Sancta Maria de Pomplona el dia de la su venida de Francia, IIIIxx XVI libras’ (Reg. 169, fol. 65r). ‘A Simeno de Miraglo, recebidor de Tudela, por 3 paynnos d’oro dosmasquines comprados en Caragoça, dado a la reynna a Estrenas’ (Reg. 229, fol. 45r). ‘A Johan de Chapaynna, costurero de las seynnoras infantas, por las faicones de 3 hoppas mey partidas de paynno de seda con satin negro brodado de perlas’ (Reg. 225, fol. 41r). ‘Tela de Flandes de 5 de ancho por 7 codos y medio de largo para hacer 1 par de linzuelos para la cama del rey, entran 75 codos’ (Reg. 256, fol. 129r).

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M er che Osés U rri c el q ui

tion of over 10,500 ells of vegetable-fibre cloth purchased in the second half of the 14th century. Two raw materials (linen and cotton) were required for the manufacture of vegetable fibre fabrics. Linen was used for the majority of this type of material (lienzo, Bretaña, Holanda, bocarán). Cotton was used primarily to manufacture fustian (see Table 11.9). During the medieval period, many of these vegetable fibre textiles were known generically as ‘cloth’ (tela). In the late medieval Navarrese documentary sources this term refers exclusively to fabrics made from vegetable fibres.92 The naming of these textiles in the documentary sources is brief and simple. The majority of entries appear under the generic term, which encompasses a wide range of qualities. Occasionally, the provenance is given, in which cloth from Navarre, Reims and Castile are the most commonly named. These were used mainly for making under-garments, shirts93 and coifs, in addition to household textiles.94 The practical aspect of these vegetable fibre textiles must be borne in mind: they were durable, easy to launder, and the finer varieties were pleasant next to the skin and lighter than wool or silk fabric; but they were ordinary. They were supplied mainly in white, although there are references to other colours. Another vegetable fibre textile consumed in abundance – more than 300 ells – at the court of Navarre was bocací,95 predominantly white,96 but also supplied in other colours. This was used to line clothing and for household textiles, as in the case of fustian.97

92 ‘A Maria Martin, costurera, por 58 coubdos de tela de Bretaynna puestos en 2 pares de

93 94 95

96 97

grandes lincuellos pora la torr del rey; item 30 cobdos d’otra tela de Nauarra pora forrar los dichos lincuelos’ (Reg. 229, fol. 45v); ‘por 38 cobdos de tela fina para fazer camisas al rey’ (Reg. 207, fol. 137r); ‘item a Maria Martin por 16 cobdos de tela de la terra puestos en 12 bragas pora’l rey’ (Reg. 229, fol. 46r). ‘A Miguel d’Aldaz de Pomplona […] por XXVI cobdos d’otra tela mas fina por las camisas del rey, a IIII sueldos, VI dineros el cobdo valen CXVII sueldos’ (Reg. 174, fol. 67r). ‘Por 4 pieças de tela tinta puesta en fazer una cambra de camelotes a meyo çiello pora el rey’ (Reg. 201, fol. 83v). Fabric that has experienced great evolution over the centuries. In its origin it was a very fine linen fabric and in the 14th century the name was given to a very common cotton fabric; Martínez Meléndez, Los nombres de tejidos, pp. 421–26. ‘A Miguel d’Esparça por vna pieça de bocaçin blanco de Chippre conteni X cobdos por fazer vn ciello et un dosier a la chappella del rey, valen LXVIII sueldos’ (Reg. 152, fol. 49r). ‘3 pieças de bocaçin blanco de Carmona et dos pieças de fustan blanco por doblar 10 hopalandas de verde para los 4 donzeles et Jullian (Reg. 201, fol. 83v); por dos pieças de fustain raso de que son fechos 2 linçuelos pora el rey’ (Reg. 201, fol. 84r).



Fabr ics and At t ir e at t he C o urt o f N a va rre 2 9 3

Table 11.9  Fabrics made of vegetable fibres bought by the Navarre Court during the second half of the 14th century, according to treasurer’s accounting registers. Name

Quantity

Price per ell

Price per bolt

Burlap

2 units

Not mentioned

Not mentioned

Bocarán

332.5 ells

6.8 sueldos

8.4–13 pound

2.3–17 sueldos

Not mentioned

91.75 bolts 21 units Cloth (provenance unknown)

8198.75 ells 22.75 bolts 6 yards

Cloth of Besançon

100.5 ells

11 sueldos

Not mentioned

Cloth of Brittany

58 ells

3.3 sueldos

Not mentioned

Cloth of Castile

257.5 ells

Not mentioned

Not mentioned

Cloth of Flanders

190 ells

10–12 sueldos

Not mentioned

Cloth of Holland

10 ells

8 sueldos

Not mentioned

Cloth of England

24 ells

5 sueldos

Not mentioned

Cloth of Maçen

12 bolts

Not mentioned

3.9 pounds

Cloth of Montpellier

28 ells

5 sueldos

Not mentioned

Cloth of Navarre

1279.5 ells

2.5–8 sueldos

Not mentioned

Cloth of Reims

282.25 ells

10–16 sueldos

Not mentioned

Fustian

281 ells

11 sueldos

6–7.2 pound

11 sueldos

Not mentioned

2 sueldos

Not mentioned

61 bolts 24 units Lienzo

139 ells 289.5 yards

Terliz

79 ells

Conclusio ns Despite the large amount of data offered by documentary sources, unfortunately not one of these textile pieces has survived. During the second half of the 14th century the court of Navarre purchased large quantities of wool fabrics, silks and cloth of vegetable fibres, among which the greatest demand was for those made of wool. The materials were highly diverse regarding their provenance and colour, aspects that were reflected in the end price of the products. These materials were used for personal clothing and furnishings

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M er che Osés U rri c el q ui

for the royal chambers. In greatest demand were materials dyed in dark colours (hues of red, blue, green and black), brilliant, dazzling shades, which were particularly expensive owing to the exotic dyestuffs used. Additionally, these intense colours were in perfect contrast to the sheen of gilt brocade or the glitter of jewels worn over clothing. The combination of all these items conveyed a sense of economic power as well as being in fashion. The distribution made by the Navarrese monarchs of the fabrics purchased demonstrates a textile hierarchy. The fabrics of the highest quality were reserved for the members of the royal family, to the most illustrious noblemen in the kingdom, many of whom belonged to the royal household where they commenced their training, to high-ranking members of the clergy, to the staff of the royal household and to senior administration officials (mariscal, canciller, alférez) who also formed part of the royal household. The monarch presented all of these individuals with gifts, a system of patronage acknowledging service and loyalty. The noble elite comprising the king’s entourage was thus supported. In addition, however, textiles were given to the envoys of neighbouring courts, thus maintaining positive and peaceful relations between courts. None of these purchases were made in a haphazard way, but were rather carried out according to a rationale which held that appearance denoted status. In particular, the image of the monarch must always be resplendent, especially so at public events. For those occasions the highest quality fabrics were reserved. Magnificence, lavishness, and ceremony formed a fundamental part of the politics of prestige. An image was built up of the monarch through gesture, ceremony, and a host of visual references, all serving the propagandistic purpose of presenting to the world a model of political and regal power – in which the monarch’s dress played a crucial role.

chapter 12

Textile Production and Jewish Clothing in the Iberian Peninsula: Characteristics, Customs and Differences between Catalan and Other Jewish Communities Esperança Valls Pujol

I ntroductio n

C

lothing has always been a mark of identity for Jews, but the uniqueness of medieval peninsular Jewish dress was limited by Gentile laws and decrees against the Jewish community. In general, Jewish daily attire in the Middle Ages did not differ significantly from that of their contemporaries. The idiosyncrasies of each peninsular Jewish community were dictated by the discriminatory sumptuary laws, edicts and laws of Gentiles that restricted the use of certain clothes, as well as the precepts derived from Jewish legislation (Halakha) and community agreements, local customs and traditions. The sources for the study of Jewish medieval garments are diverse but often scarce. The stipulations and decrees of Christians and Muslims, as well as the ordinances of Jewish communities, are an important source. Notarial records are the most detailed source, especially from the 14th and 15th centuries. Loan registries usually refer to items of clothing and a certain number of garments used as a guarantee; however, this documentation is sketchy and not very descriptive. Entries frequently refer only to the most valuable objects, not to items for daily use. The wills that many Jews deposited with Christian notaries included inventories that provide us with an accurate image of the deceased’s textile possessions.

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Esp er ança Val l s Pujo l

In addition to non-Jewish documentation there are Hebrew manuscripts of the time, such as commercial accounts, asset inventories, or debt records. These are not very abundant, but also offer evidence on this subject.1 Iconography is an invaluable source for this study, but offers a biased view. Christian pictorial images represent Jews with humiliating and discriminatory details.2 The representations that appear in illuminated Hebrew codices are more interesting, although they often show the most luxurious elements among the Jews, depicting them as separate from society, not wealthy, and often idealized. Archaeological finds are scarce apart from jewellery such as earrings, necklaces, amulets, rings, or belts and some remains of very damaged fabric, such as from the Jewish Necropolis of Tàrrega in Catalonia.3 Finally, the responsa literature (‫ותשובות‬ ‫‘ שאלות‬questions and answers’) – that is, the body of legal opinions of the rabbinical authorities, given in response to questions addressed to them – offers us scattered information related to clothing as it is linked to religious convention. There is a particular danger of engaging in anachronisms from more recent periods and from current communities in the case of Iberian Jews. There are many interferences that can distort the Jewish local customs: practices learned in previous contexts, the mixing of individuals from different backgrounds or local Gentile proscriptions. Dress is a distinctive sign of Jewish identity, but is not universal: each community creates an identity as a result of the cultural and historical interactions in the area.4

1

See, for example, Jordi Casanovas Miró, et al., Libro de cuentas de un prestamista judío gerundense del siglo XIV (Barcelona: Universitat de Barcelona, 1990); Javier Castaño, ‘Nuevos documentos hebraico-aljamiados de Aragón (1): fragmentos e un registro contable de pagos de la aljama de Tarazona’, Sefarad, 64.2 (2004), 315–40; or the collection of Hebrew manuscripts of accounts described in Esperança Valls Pujol, ‘Els fragments hebreus amb aljamies catalanes de l’Arxiu Històric de Girona: estudi textual, edició paleogràfica i anàlisi lingüística’ (doctoral thesis, University of Girona) [accessed 7 October 2021]. 2 For Christian medieval iconographic representations of Jews see Paulino Rodríguez Barral, La imagen del judío en la España Medieval: el conflicto entre cristianismo y judaísmo en las artes visuales góticas (Barcelona: Universitat de Barcelona, 2009); Joan Molina Figueras, ‘Las imágenes del judío en la España medieval’, in Memoria de Sefarad, ed. by Joseph Pérez and Isidro G. Bango Torviso (Madrid: SEACEX-Sociedad Estatal para la Acción Cultural Exterior, 2002), pp. 372–79; María del Carmen Lacarra Ducay, ‘Representaciones pictóricas de los judíos en Aragón, siglos XIII al XV’, Boletín del Museo e Instituto Camón Aznar, 99 (2007), 235–58; Teresa Alsina, ‘La imatge visual i la concepció dels jueus a la Catalunya Medieval’, L’Avenç, 81 (1985), 54– 56; Rosa Alcoy i Pedros, ‘Canvis i oscil·lacions en la imatge pictòrica dels jueus a la Catalunya del segle XIV’, Actes: 1r. Col·loqui d’Història dels jueus a la Corona d’Aragó (Lleida: Institut d’Estudis Ilerdencs, 1991), pp. 371– 92. 3 The most important archaeological finds to which we refer in this work come from Barcelona (Museu d’Història de la Ciutat de Barcelona), Tàrrega (Museu Comarcal d’Urgell), Lleida (Museu de Lleida), Girona and Castelló d’Empúries (Museu d’Història dels Jueus), Puigcerdà (Museu Cerdà), Toledo (Museo Sefardí) and Teruel (Museo de Teruel). 4 Esther Juhasz, ‘Costume’, in Encyclopedia of Jewish Folklore and Traditions, ed. by Raphael Patai and Haya Bar-Itzhak (London, New York: Routledge, 2015), pp. 113–16.



T ex t ile P r odu ct ion and Jewi s h C l o thi n g 2 9 7

J ew i sh Rul e s Biblical commandments regulate aspects of clothing. These regulations address the prohibition of wearing šaˁatnez (‫)ַשַׁעְטנֵז‬, clothes that contain both sheep’s wool and flax-linen.5 Men must wear ṣitṣit (‫)ציצית‬, fringes or tassels on the four corners of the garments that cover them.6 With time and the change of styles, ritual robes were encompassed by this precept. The prayer shawl, the tallit (‫)ַט ִלּית‬ is a rectangular piece of wool with fringes (ṣitṣit) for men to wear over clothes, traditionally during morning prayer, as well as on the night of Yom Kippur. Some Jews wear a special small tallit with fringes, called a tallit katan (also known as ṣitṣit), under their clothes. The biblical text prohibits men from wearing women’s clothes and vice versa.7 For married women, covering the head was a basic precept (Mishnah Ketubot 7.6).8 There are also norms and ordinances from medieval communities such as the taqanot (‘Regulations’) of Valladolid in 1432 or other regulations from the responsa literature, such as those of Rabbi Shlomo ben Adret, who dealt with such religious rules, especially those focused on modesty, but also tried to apply local Christian regulations.9 It is thus difficult to determine whether these prescriptions derive directly from exegetical interpretation or whether they have taken on Gentile customs and dispositions. Over time, the Jews adopted clothing styles from the Gentiles, but adapted such garments to preserve their culture and religion.

5

‘You shall not wear a material mixed of wool and linen together’ (Deuteronomy 22. 11). ‘The Lord spoke to Moses: Speak to the Israelites and tell them to make tassels for themselves on the corners of their garments throughout their generations and put a blue thread on the tassel of the corners. You must have this tassel so that you may look at it and remember all the commandments of the Lord and obey them and so that you do not follow after your own heart and your own eyes that lead you to unfaithfulness. Thus you will remember and obey all my commandments and be holy to your God. I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt to be your God. I am the Lord your God’ (Numbers 15. 37–41); ‘You shall make yourselves tassels for the four corners of the clothing you wear’ (Deuteronomy 22. 12). 7 ‘A woman must not wear men’s clothing, nor should a man dress up in women’s clothing, for anyone who does this is offensive to the Lord your God’ (Deuteronomy 22. 5). 8 Composed in Israel (c. 225 CE). Ketubot (Prenuptial agreements) belongs to the third order, Nashim (Women) and discusses the Ketubah (Judaism’s prenuptial agreement), as well as topics such as virginity, Jus primae noctis and the obligations of a couple towards each other. It has thirteen chapters. See [accessed 25 August 2021]. 9 Taqana (pl. taqanot) is a regulation promulgated by rabbinical and community authority. 6

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Esp er ança Val l s Pujo l

Ch ri sti an and M u sl im Ru l e s Dress Rules in al-Andalus In Muslim kingdoms, there are several edicts regulating the clothing of Jews, starting from the 8th century at the time of Caliph Omar II. He ruled that non-Muslims should be distinguished by their dress to show their legal status as infidels. While Muslims, Jews and Christians were all considered ‘people of the book’ and received special treatment as ‘protected’ (dhimmis) persons, Jews were nonetheless subject to special taxes, clothing regulations, wearing hats, to have saddle horses and different naming practices from those of Muslims. There was some tolerance, guaranteeing the personal safety and professional lives of these groups, but Jews did not have authority above the ‘believers’.10 In al-Andalus during the most intolerant periods, however, Jews were forced to wear distinctive signs, such as a hat, belt, or a certain dress.11 In an illumination in the Libro de axedrez, dados e tablas (Book of chess, dice and tables) of Alfonso X, there is a representation of a Jew wearing a yellow conical-shaped hat with a wide brim, playing chess with a Muslim.12 Throughout the 13th century in Granada, Jews were forced to wear a yellow hat like the Jews of Egypt instead of a turban.13 Jews were also forced to renounce clothing made of silk cloth after the revolts of the late 15th century.14 Jews had to wear dark colours, like black or blue (in some territories there were specific colours for Jews and other colours for Christians). Green was reserved for Muslims and in various edicts, in addition to forbidding luxurious clothing, there were also restrictions about cut and length.15

Dress Rules in Christian Kingdoms In ancient times (and still in the medieval period in some regions of northern France and Germany), Jews voluntarily distinguished themselves from the rest of the population in their clothing, head covering, or haircut; in the 13th century, however, these differences no longer existed, and Jews were often confused with Christians, which worried the Church.16 Contact between the social groups 10 Joseph Pérez, Los judíos en España (Madrid: Marcial Pons, 2005), p. 31. 11 María José Cano Pérez and Beatriz Molina Rueda, ‘Judaísmo, Cristianismo e Islam en Sefarad

12 13 14 15 16

¿Un ejemplo de dialogo intercultural?’, Miscelánea de Estudios Árabes y Hebraicos. Sección de Hebreo, 49 (2000), 207–32. Real Biblioteca del Monasterio de El Escorial, MS T. I.6, fol. 63 [accessed 25 August 2021]. Pérez, Los judíos, p. 37. Ibid. Juhasz, ‎‘Costume’‎, p. 114. Eduard Feliu i Mabres, ‘Quatre notes esparses sobre el judaisme medieval’, Tamid, 2 (1998– 1999), 81–122.



T ex t ile P r odu ct ion and Jewi s h C l o thi n g 2 9 9

was considered dangerous, and in the Third and Fourth Lateran Councils (1180 and 1215), several measures were taken to separate and differentiate Jews and Muslims from Christians. Among other regulations, the Lateran Council of 1215 stipulated that every Jew, man or woman, dress differently from Christians to prevent the latter from mistakenly engaging in sexual relations with Saracen or Jewish women, or any Jewish man from having relationships with Christian women.17 In later documents, a distinctive sign on the dress was required. In 1234, Gregory IX demanded the fulfilment of the Lateran provisions by all of the kings of the Peninsula.18 Jews had to wear a round coat and a circular, coloured badge (red-yellow, red or yellow) on top of the cloth, and Muslims had to cut their hair in a certain way and wear a specific dress.19 Jews did not readily accept these decrees, especially the use of the round badge. This rule initially was irregularly applied, but began to be implemented increasingly rigorously during the two subsequent centuries. From the pogroms of 1391 and throughout the 15th century until the expulsion, such requirements were intensified and enforced. Under the reign of Jaume I (1208–1276) Jews did not have to wear a specific mantle. The first such resolution was ratified in 1268 and affected the Barcelona community before being extended to Girona, Perpignan, and Montpellier.20 Jews were exempted from wearing a badge, and round cloaks were prescribed for walking inside villages. Outside villages, Jews had to wear a raincoat with sleeves, or any other water-repellent garment. This measure did not affect the Jews of the court. At the beginning of the 14th century, however, Jews were forced to wear a round badge (rodella) on their garment at chest height or on the right shoulder and to wear the cape and hood publicly.21 Women had to wear a different type of round fabric badge called the capsana (Fig. 12.1).22 In 1283, Pere III ruled that Valencian Jews should follow the same regulations as the Jews of Barcelona. Those 17 Feliu i Mabres, ‘Quatre notes’, pp. 118–19. See canon 68 of the aforementioned Lateran

18 19

20 21 22

Council of 1215 [accessed 25 August 2021]. The Latin text of the 4th Lateran Council may be found in Decrees of the Ecumenical Councils, Volume One Nicaea I to Lateran V, ed. by Norman P. Tanner S.J. (London: Sheed & Ward, 1990), p. 266. See also pp. 190, 199-200, and p. 351 in the present book. Pere Vidal, ‘Els jueus dels antics comtats de Rosselló i Cerdanya’, Calls, 2 (1987), 92 (n. 106). Nirenberg has demonstrated, based on documentation from the Royal Archive of Barcelona, that all of these distinctive marks were intended to avoid interreligious sexual contacts and were not established with the sole purpose of humiliating these minorities as suggested by Cutler; David Nirenberg, Comunidades de violencia (Barcelona: Península, 2001), p. 192. This book was originally published in English: David Nirenberg, Communities of Violence: Persecution of Minorities in the Middle Ages (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1996). Arxiu Reial de Barcelona, Canc., reg. 37, fol. 45v (Regné núm, 372). Arxiu Històric de la Ciutat de Barcelona (AHCB), Llibre del Consell, 3, fol. 41 (year 1312). AHCB, Registre d’Ordinacions, 5, fol. 18r (year 1397). Teresa Vinyoles Vidal, ‘La mujer bajomedieval a través de las ordenanzas municipales de Barcelona’ in Las mujeres medievales y su ámbito jurídico: actas de las II Jornadas de Investigación Interdisciplinaria, 2nd edn (Madrid: Universidad Autónoma de Madrid, 1990), p. 150.

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Esp er ança Val l s Pujo l

Fig. 12.1  Woman with capsana in the capital of the south-eastern gallery of the fourteenthcentury monastery of Ripoll (Catalonia). Photographed for Naḥum Ben-Yehuda by Miquel Bosch, Conjunt monàstic de Santa Maria de Ripoll, reproduced with permission.

over ten years of age had to be covered with the ‘Jewish cloak’ or glimà which could not be red, green, or purple.23 It was later established that they should wear a coat, or gramalla, extending to the heels and the yellow or red badge.24 23 Shlomo ben Adret, Še³elot u-tešuvot ha-RaŠBA, ed. by Aharon Zeleznick, 3 vols (Jerusalem:

Makon Or Yerušalayim, 1997–1998), III, no. 218.

24 ‘Los dits juheus, ço es los mascles e cascu d ells, haien a portar capa juhiga o gramalla llarga

fins als talons ab roda groga o vermella be ampla, la qual haien a portar en los pits en cascuna vestidura que porten sobirana’, Ordre de Joan I València, 1393 (‘capa juhiga’, Faraudo de SaintGermain, Vocabulari de la llengua catalana medieval [accessed 25 August 2020].



T ex t ile P r odu ct ion and Jewi s h C l o thi n g 30 1

The book of Customs of Tortosa explained more explicitly that the coat must cover the other garments and that it must be round, closed, and have a hood (caperó).25 However, the round cloaks, which seem to distinguish Jews in the territories of Jaume I, were banned in the provincial council of Valladolid in 1228 and by Pope Innocent IV in a letter of 1248 to the bishop of Magalona because people confused the Jews with clerics, who wore similar clothes. In Pamplona, the Fueros de Navarra (General Charter of Navarre, 1238) specified that both Jews and Saracens should differ from the Christians in their clothing and had to wear a ‘closed cloak’ or almasía (Catalan, almeixia), a kind of linen or wool tunic with wide sleeves also found in the Valencian documentation. The use of this garment was consolidated at the beginning of the 14th century in all Catalan territories as an alternative to the round badge. The Acords de Barcelona (Agreements of Barcelona) of the year 1302 prescribed that all Jews should wear this badge, day and night, though poor Jews could replace it with a yellow pointed hood.26 In the counties under Majorcan domination, Jews were also obliged to wear a cloak and, later, the round badge. The cloak was shaped like a long and wide mantle. In 1396 in Valencia – specifically in Morvedre (Sagunto) – in addition to the yellow round badge on the chest, the gramalla (long hooded cloak) or another dress covering the entire body to the feet was imposed.27 In Castilian lands, with the laws (pragmática) of Catarina de Lancaster (1412), men were obliged to wear tabards with wings – that is, a warm coat with wide sleeves that covered from the neck down to the waist – and to cover the head with pointed hoods with long chias –that is to say, a long veil. Women were obliged to wear long cloaks without silk fabrics or furs as lining or ornamentation, and their heads had to be covered with folded kerchiefs.28 The circular mark took various forms and sizes according to the various decrees to which it had to adapt and to the particular areas where it was worn. From the bull issued by Pope Honorius III in 1219, the round yellow badge was imposed

25 ‘Los jueus, la sobirana vestidura deuen portar tal que cobre totes les altres vestidures, deu

esser feyta axi com caparedona tota e closa ab caperó’; Libre de les Costums de Tortosa, I, ix, 3 in Libre de les Costums Generals Scrites de la Insigne Ciutat de Tortosa: ab alguns privilegis: confirmacions e sentencies fahents pera la administració de justicia, novament imprimides be e feelment ab sos originals archivats comprovades. Tortosa, 1809. Edition reproduction in Bienvenido Oliver, Historia del Derecho en Cataluña, Mallorca y Valencia, 4 vols (Madrid: Ginesta, 1876–1881), IV (1881). The original text is from the last years of the 13th century. 26 Miguel Ángel Motis Dolader, ‘Indumentaria de las comunidades judías y conversas en la edad media hispánica. Estratificación social, segregación e ignominia’, in Actas del I Congreso Internacional de Emblemática General = Proccedings of First International Conference on General Emblematics, ed. by Guillermo Redondo Veintemillas, Alberto Montaner Frutos and María Cruz García (Zaragoza: Institución Fernando el Católico, 2004), pp. 561–94. 27 Alfred Rubens, A History of Jewish Costume (London: Peter Owen, 1981), p. 89. 28 Enrique Cantera Montenegro, ‘La legislación general acerca de los judíos en el reinado de Juan II de Castilla’, Espacio Tiempo y Forma. Serie III, Historia Medieval, 25 (2012), 119–46 (126).

3 02

Esp er ança Val l s Pujo l

in Castile.29 In 1234, Pope Gregory IX asked the king of Navarre, Teobald I, to ensure that the Jews of both sexes sew a yellow round badge of felt or cloth that was at least four fingers long at chest level on both the front and back of the torso.30 In the Majorcan dominion, the badge was not prescribed until 1314, and it was only compulsory for those who did not wear a cloak. The badge had to be very colourful, made of cloth or silk, and stitched on top of the garment at the most visible point at the middle of chest. Such badges were apparently very small, as appears in the figure represented in the first book of the Ordinacions de Perpinyá (Ordinations of Perpignan 1276–1344).31 In this city, in addition to the coat, Jews had to wear a round brightly-coloured badge in the middle of the chest, different from the rest of Fig. 12.2  Jewish figure dressed in hooded cloak, with a round, white badge. Cathedral the clothes they wore and made of of Tarragona, detail of 15th-century mural cotton or silk.32 In Vic, the circular illustrating the story of the Invention of mark, red or red with yellow, had to the True Cross by St Helena. Photo: Sr. be the same size as a silver Barcelona Santi Grimau Ferré; © la Delegación de croat.33 In the cathedral of Tarragona, Patrimonio Cultural del Arzobispado de 15th-century murals in the chapel of Tarragona, reproduced with permission. Santa Helena (formerly dedicated to Santa Lucia), illustrating the story of the Invention of the True Cross by St Helena, depict Jews dressed with hooded cloaks, and wearing round, white badges (Fig. 12.2). It seems that this white mark 29 Rubens, A History, p. 84. 30 The badge was prescribed in several provincial Councils: Oxford (1222), Narbona (1227),

Rouen (1231), Arles (1234), Chichester (1245), Beziers (1246), Valencia (1248) and Albi (1254). Feliu i Mabres, ‘Quatre notes’, pp. 118–22. 31 Vidal, ‘Els jueus’, p. 46. 32 Rubens, A History, p. 84. 33 ‘A tot juheu estrany o privat qui aia xii anys ho més port roda de drap vermel ho groch per mig en la vestadura subirana devant en lo pits e que la roda sia ample de 1 croat d’argent e que no la gos amagar sots ban de xx sous’; Irene Llop i Jordana, ‘La fi de la comunitat jueva de Vic. Béns i conversió dels últims jueus (1391)’, Tamid, 9 (1997), 85–106 (93 and n. 40). The croat was a silver coin of Catalonia introduced by Pere II in 1285 and minted at Barcelona (25 mm).



T ex t ile P r odu ct ion and Jewi s h C l o thi n g 30 3

was imposed on the Jewish communities of Tarragona.34 According to a disposition of 1323, besides the obligation to wear the special cloak, Aragonese Jews had to wear a cloth badge, with no specific colour, but different from the clothes they wore, although the yellow and red badges were most common.35 In 1415, following the Etsi doctoris gentium – the papal bull issued by anti-Pope Benedict XIII, the leading exponent of medieval Jewish repression – and ratified on 23 July by King Ferran I, it was decreed in some Catalan cities that all Jews wear a round red and yellow badge and the women in particular had to wear a sign on their heads, the capsana.36 It was decreed in Barcelona that the size of the circular sign should be a hand span wide.37 The Valencian community evidently paid a lot of money to get this lessened because the distinctive sign was reduced by half and it was not considered obligatory to wear it on the outer garment.38 The Cortes of Toro of 1371 forced Castilian Jews to wear a badge on their clothes. Several decrees were issued according to which the badge was sometimes red in colour and at other times yellow.39 In the Ordenamiento de Valladolid and the Laws of Ayllón of 1412, the red badge was imposed, sewn on the front at the right shoulder, and it was also compulsory to wear long clothes that covered the body from head to foot.40 During the assembly of Medina del Campo (1465), in the heat of civil war in Castile, there were measures that were not initially implemented. However they served as a basis for future ones: because obligations had been relaxed for Jews who lived in Jewish 34 In Alcover (Alt Camp, Tarragona), following the bull of 1263 of Pope Urban IV addressed to

35 36

37

38 39 40

Archbishop Benet de Rocabertí which imposed the obligation to carry a distinctive signal, the municipality, in a note of 1378, decreed that: ‘ningun jueu pose anar per la Vila si no porta cosida a la roba una rodona de drap blanc.’ And another municipal agreement, without dating, older than the previous one, ordered that: ‘nul jueu vaja per la Vila vestit ab vestits de color morat, blau del cel, verd o vermell.’ According to Diego Bertrán, this prohibition is related to the relevance of colours to the liturgy and Christian symbolism. Diego Bertrán, ‘Noticia histórica sobre los judios en Alcover’, Butlletí del Centre d’Estudis Alcoverencs, 9 (1980), 12–15. Motis Dolader, ‘Indumentaria’, n. 26. Josep Maria Llobet i Portella, ‘Documents relacionats amb unes disposicions municipals sobre els jueus de Cervera (1479–1482)’, Tamid, 12 (1997), 167–80 (169); Rubens, A History, p. 83. It can be seen how women should wear this badge in the capital of the south-eastern gallery of the 14th-century monastery of Ripoll (Fig. 12.1) or in the capitals of the cloister of the Cathedral of Barcelona. ‘Los senyals acostumats et portats per jueus, ço és, rodella vermella de l’ample del palmell de la mà posada en los pits en tal forma que per tot hom sia vista’: Flocel Sabaté Curull, ‘L’ordenament municipal de la relació amb els jueus a la Catalunya baixmedieval’, in Cristianos y judios en contacto en la Edad Media: Polemica, conversion, dinero y convivencia, ed. by Claude Denjean and Flocel Sabaté Curull (Lleida: Milenio, 2009), pp. 733–804 (p. 774 and n. 316). Shlomo ben Adret, responsum num. V:183; Eduard Feliu i Mabres, ‘Salomó Ben Adret, mestre de la llei jueva’, Tamid, 4 (2002–2003), 35–109 (95). Joan Bada, ‘L’expulsió dels jueus, 1492’, Butlletí de la Societat Catalana d’Estudis Històrics, 20 (2009), 51–68 (58). Cantera Montenegro, ‘La legislación’, p. 126; Rubens, A History, p. 89.

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quarters, they were obliged to wear a red badge, and the use of precious fabrics was banned.41 Ten years later, the Cortes of Madrigal of 1476 ratified the obligation to wear a visible badge and the prohibition against wearing luxurious clothing of silk, garnet red colour, gold and silver.42 Some provisions went further and regulated the wardrobe of Jews in detail. These were incorporated into Christian sumptuary laws – ordinances designed to limit clothing as luxury – which during the course of the 14th century were dictated to some villages and European cities.43 The Castilian courts of the 13th century did not allow Jews to wear white furs, any kind of silk, red hose or other dyed clothes, except dark or black dyed wool.44 Colours were also prohibited, as in Alcover, Tarragona, where, according to a municipal agreement, Jews were not allowed to dress in purple, blue, green, or red.45 At the end of the 13th century, the community of Xàtiva’s regulations (taqanot) prohibited the wearing of coloured garments and certain ornaments.46 Tarazona banned the wearing of light-coloured clothes, and in other Aragonese communities, clothes were not allowed to be scarlet or white.47 In Majorca, at the beginning of the 15th century, the Constitution of King Ferran obliged all Jews to wear the gramalla or wide-sleeved tabard (a piece of clothing consisting of a back and a front part without sleeves and a hole for the head, sometimes worn to protect the clothes underneath when working) marked with the round badge, and to cover their heads with caperó ab cugulla, a pointed hood in the form of a funnel or cone.48 41 Bada, ‘L’expulsió’, p. 62.

42 Pérez, Los judíos, p. 117. 43 Montse Aymerich Bassols, ‘L’art de la indumentària a la Catalunya del segle XIV’ (unpublished

44 45

46 47 48

doctoral thesis, University of Barcelona, 2011), p. 91 [accessed 6 October 2021]. Aymerich Bassols examines the sumptuary laws from Barcelona, Cervera, Berga and Majorca. Rafael Conde y Delgado de Molina, ‘Vestit i societat: les ordinacions sumptuàries de Cervera (1344)’, Miscel·lània Cerverina, 2 (1984), 25–42 (29 and n. 13). Bertrán, ‘Noticia’, p. 13. Bertrán clarifies that the references related to municipal regulations come from documents kept in the ‘Lligall de documents solts’ from the Municipal Archive of Alcover. The rest come from the notarial manuals of the year mentioned, which are kept in the archive of the Archdiocese of Tarragona. Yom Tov Assis, ‘Diplomàtics jueus de la Corona Catalanoaragonesa en terres musulmanes (1213–1327)’, Tamid, 1 (1997), 7–26. Motis Dolader, ‘Indumentaria’, p. 573. ‘E mes que los dits juheus no gosen portar mantos, ans haien a portar demunt les vestidures que vestiran gramallas o tabardes ab aletas, portan en les dites gramalles de la part de fora los senyals que acustumen portar […]. Item, que per tal que ls juheus en lo dit regne mils sien coneguts, ordonam e manam que d açi avant haien a portar e porten lo capero ab la cugulla de un palm, feta a manera de embut o de corn, cosida entorn fins a la punta o en altra manera, perque aparegue distincio entre ells e los christians’, Rei Ferran I, Constitucions contra Jueus Mallorca, 1413; cited in Faraudo de Saint-Germain, Vocabulari de la llengua catalana medieval, s.v. ‘tavard’ and ‘cugulla’ [accessed 25 August 2021].



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Kings granted the privilege of dressing in ordinary clothes and not wearing any distinctive sign to numerous Jews, especially among the royal officials and other high-ranking figures. Collective exceptions were also common.49 In 1311, King Jaume II allowed Jews from Tarragona, Barcelona, and Vilafranca to wear the coat and gramalla.50 In several towns, such as Montblanc, under the reign of Martin I (1356–1410), Jews were exempt from wearing the round badge on the first day after arriving from a trip.51 The Jewish cloak featuring the distinctive round sign was also imposed on Catalan-Aragonese Jews in the 13th century according to the use of the Jews of Barcelona and Valencia.52 At the end of the 15th century, the Jews of Catalan lands were required without exception to wear the gramalla and caperó in addition to the round badge in some villages.53

M edi eval J ew i sh Cl o thing Jewish Clothing in al-Andalus The clothing of Jews in the peninsular territories of Muslim rule did not differ from their non-Jewish contemporaries and there are only a few sources available on this matter. The usual apparel in al-Andalus was silk or linen garments, as well as the aljuba (almeixia in Catalan), a long tunic with wide sleeves from which the coat was derived (a buttoned, knee-length tunic with sleeves, fitted to the body at the waist) in the Iberian Christian kingdoms, used by both men and women.54 These pieces could be very colourful, although, as we have mentioned, certain colours were restricted for Jews and Christians starting from the 12th century. Women also wore long and transparent gauze robes and often did not cover their heads as was common among men, according to Rabbi Avraham ibn Ezra

49 Feliu i Mabres, ‘Quatre notes’, pp. 118–22. 50 Jaume Felip Sánchez, ‘El call jueu de Montblanc (ss. XIII–XV)’, Podall, 5 (2016), 497–504 (499). 51 Felip Sánchez, ‘El call’, p. 503. 52 Tov Assis, ‘Diplomàtics’, pp. 12–13.

53 ʻEn dies pasats e antiguament los jueus [de Cervera] no acostumar de anar vestits de la

manera quall los que huy són van vestits, ço és, sens gramalla e caperó, etc., per los respectes e rahons desús dites he per proveyr ha inconvenients qualls per la dita rahó se pogueren sots seguir et alias’; Llobet i Portella, ‘Documents’, doc. 5 (26/5/1480, ACSG, Manuscrits, Jueus, paper solt). On 5 October 1479, the Municipal Council of Cervera stipulated that Jews had to wear visible round badges and pointed hoods. Alfons IV had previously ruled that if a Jew wore a round badge, he was not obliged to wear a cloak or pointed hood. 54 ‘Los sarraïns deuen portar los cabells tolts en redon … e la sobirana vestedura lur deu esser aljuba o almexia, si doncs no anauen laurar o obrar’; Libre de les Costums Generals Scrites de la Insigne Ciutat de Tortosa ii, rúbrica ix, 4; Oliver, Historia del Derecho en Cataluña, Mallorca y Valencia, vol. IV.

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(c. 1089–1167).55 With the arrival of the Almoravids (11th century), restrictions began to be imposed on Jewish clothing that, as we have shown, focused on wearing distinctive signs such as hats, belts, or special clothes, as well as the size and colour of the dresses. The turban, common among men until the 13th century, was gradually replaced by red or green hats, and yellow hats for Jews.56

Jewish Clothing in Christian Kingdoms The daily clothes of medieval peninsular Jews in Christian kingdoms were those of their Gentile contemporaries, except for the distinctive and obligatory elements and accessories related to religious prescription, such as the tallit. Documentation referring to Jews, especially inventories, mentions the usual attire at the time. There are occasional references to Jewish coats, raincoats, and garments marked with round badges. It is possible to get a sense of the daily dressing habits, albeit in a biased sense because the references largely come from wealthy Jews. Without material resources, it is more difficult to determine in greater detail the common clothing of Jews, for which there are hardly any mentions or property inventories. The following descriptions are, therefore, focused on a select, well-off portion of these Jewish peninsular communities. A general outline of the everyday Jewish clothes is presented, but it does not expand into a description of the customary pieces of the time. The focus remains especially on trying to detail singular elements that have been largely specified in the previous sections.57

Underclothes Underwear varied slightly between the different periods of the Middle Ages. Most men dressed in thigh-length pantaloons, as well as a fabric chemise that usually reached to the knees but could vary in length; for women, the chemise reached the feet. The legs were covered with hose, which were black or coloured stockings made of wool, linen, or silk; these were worn visibly by men, but women hid them under ankle-length robes. The hose were attached to the waist with a belt or at

55 Norman Roth, ‘Some Customs of Jews in Medieval Spain’, in From Catalonia to the Caribbean: The

Sephardic Orbit from Medieval to Modern Times. Essays in Honor of Jane S. Gerber, ed. by Federica Francesconi, Stanley Mirvis and Brian M. Smollett (Leiden: Brill, 2018), pp. 27–42 (p. 41). 56 Roth, ‘Some Customs’, p. 41. 57 Each of the garments common to the population of that time will not be described, as there is already a substantial bibliography on the subject. Both José Ramón Hinojosa Montalvo and Miguel Ángel Motis Dolader, in their respective works on Jewish clothing in Valencia and Aragon, devote much space to describing in detail the clothes that Jews wore that were also common to Christians, owing to a lack of substantial differences except for the obligatory and specific signs; José Ramón Hinojosa Montalvo, ‘Indumentaria y signos de identidad entre los judíos valencianos’, Hispania Judaica Bulletin, 9 (2013), 69–96.



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the thigh with an optional garter.58 The women also used a ‘cloth breast band’, a piece of clothing that covered the breasts, besides the hose, briefs, or panyos.59

Robes and outer clothing The average medieval costume represented in Romanesque art was flat, long, and differed little between men and women. The Gothic style introduced more creative dress, with more ornamentation, and that marked the differences between sexes. Dresses were worn over underwear and from the 14th century onwards there was a tendency to overlap two garments. The gonella or saya (kirtle) was the most common item. Gonella was the name given in Catalonia, Aragon, and Valencia to the same garment that in the Crown of Castile was called the saya. This was a robe. It was usually fitted at the waist, and for men was of varying length. The women’s version reached to the feet, with sleeves that were narrow at the upper arm, widened further down, and finally buttoned at the wrist.60 Concerning the gonella, Shlomo Ben Adret observes the obligatory nature of the sewn fringes (tsitsit) like the prayer shawl (the tallit): You asked me if where people wear the garment called gonella, cut on the front and on the back so that it seems to have four corners, needs to have a fringe.61 I say only the four cornered garment, which is open and has four angles, can be called tallit, but garments sewn and joined at the top, such as the gonella or the cote are not considered four-angled dresses. Furthermore, in ancient times they used to have these four-angled dresses in our villages, but we never saw anyone who, for the reasons above, complied so scrupulously.62

Another opinion states it was the custom in Barcelona to line the tallit with silk, though it was not a deep-rooted practice.63 This garment was made of linen and required about three metres of fabric.64 58 [accessed 25 August 2021];

Hinojosa Montalvo, ‘Indumentaria’, p. 71.

59 Aymerich Bassols, ‘L’art’, p. 18. 60 Judit Verdaguer, ‘La moda cortesana medieval al MEV’ [accessed 25 August 2021].

61 See note 7. 62 Responsa I: 434 and VII: 206; Eduard Feliu i Mabres ‘Mots catalans en textos hebreus medievals:

Els dictàmens de Salomó ben Adret’, Calls, 3 (1987), 53–73 (pp. 63–64).

63 ‘I have heard that rabbi Al-Barceloní [probably Yehudah ben Barzilay], of blessed memory,

was of opinion that those who put sendat (silk cloth) under the tsitsit are wrong, because it is not allowed’ [VII: 300]. The tsitsit are the fringes of the tallit, and here refer to the entire tallit; Feliu i Mabres ‘Mots catalans’, p. 70. 64 In 1410, in the will of Astruga, wife of Yosseph de Beses, there was mentioned an amount of money to make a tallit of three and a half alnes of linen fabric; Gabriel Secall i Güell, ‘Generalitats i notícies històriques sobre les noces dels jueus tarragonins en els s.XIII–XV’,

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On top of the gonella, it was common for Jewish men and women to wear a cote, which was a tight, sleeveless garment that reached to the feet and that, especially among the most well-off families, was the most highly ornamented piece of apparel. According to the iconography of the Catalan haggadot, Jewish women ‎wore a cote that was open at the sides and fitted to the body by a belt. Men also wore these outer garments, even in the house, but usually without a belt.65 The illumination of the Brother Haggada and especially the Rylands Haggada, shows both men and women wearing cotes splendidly decorated with buttons, braids, chains, and trim, silver-plated and gilt on the edges.66 In the 14th century, the so-called ‘cotehardie’, a unisex garment tailored to fit the torso and arms, usually with a row of buttons down the front as well as down each fitted sleeve from the elbow to the wrist, was widely popular and particularly so among the Jews. Wealthy men usually wore a broader and longer cote, down to their ankles, with long sleeves and buttons and paired it with a hooded mantle on top.67 In the Golden Haggada women playing instruments wear gonelles encordades (cotes with side-laced bodices), and in some illuminations women wear a surcote open at the side to show off the tunic underneath (Fig. 12.3). This type of surcoat or pellote (pelisse) was a garment in widespread use during the 13th and 14th centuries. It was a kind of a tunic, longer at the back than in front, lined or adorned with furs, without sleeves and with a very loose skirt, which allowed modifications to its structure. It could also be covered by a mantle or another warm outer garment.68 In the miniatures of Las Cantigas de Santa Maria and in Hispano-Moresque Haggada it appears that the male Jews of Castile wore a three-quarter-length tunic that did not reach the feet, as well as a pointed hat (Fig. 12.4). This hat, unlike in other parts of Europe, was unlined. In this region, other distinctive signs such as the cloak with hood and the round badge, were required.69 In Castile, until the imposition of clothing regulations, it was customary for rich Jewish women to wear silk, taffeta, camelote, cloth of gold, gilt, or lightweight cloth. They wore gowns with trains, aljubas (short tunics, fitted at the arms and waist with buttons), with full or half sleeves embroidered in gold and silk (Fig. 12.3), cloaks with high necklines, red cloth (paño bermejo) or wide silk or linen mantles to the feet, sometimes

65 66

67 68 69

Quaderns d’història Tarraconense, 3 (1982), 29–44 (33). One alna was a length measurement that was equivalent to two cubits or four spans, about 80 cm. Roth, ‘Some Customs’, p. 42. Brother Haggada, c. 1330; London, British Library MS Oriental 1404 ; Rylands Haggada, c. 1330–1349; Manchester, The John Rylands University Library, Heb. MS6 [both accessed 27 January 2022]. Hinojosa Montalvo, ‘Indumentaria’, p. 71. Aymerich Bassols, ‘L’art’, p. 271. Rubens, A History, p. 94.

Fig. 12.3  Above, women in laced gowns, captioned ‘Then Miriam, the prophet Aaron’s sister, took a timbrel in her hand, and all the women followed her, with timbrels and dancing’ (Exodus 15. 20 NIV); below, woman in patterned sleeves, captioned ‘Searching for leavened bread by candle light’. British Library MS Additional 27210 (Golden Haggada) fol. 15r detail. © The British Library Board, reproduced with permission.

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Fig. 12.4  Men in long tunics and figure in tall hat. British Library MS Or 2737 (HispanoMoresque Haggada) fol. 87r, captioned ‘Making cooking utensils kosher by immersion in boiling water’. © The British Library Board, reproduced with permission.



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embroidered with stripes called alcandoras, and linen or silk robes and cotes. The men wore garments edged and lined with gold cloth or silk, and necklaces.70 The inventories of peninsular Jews mention a great variety of clothing, coats, blankets, and cloaks made with a variety of woven materials and fabrics.71 It should be noted, however, that such inventories tended towards a more sumptuous taste among communities in greater contact with Muslim culture.72

Outdoor garments Regarding outdoor apparel, people wore large mantles, often with hoods, as well as long cloaks that were held on the shoulder or the front of the chest with a clasp, or with the garnatxa or garnacha, a kind of oversized outdoor garment. Towards the 14th century, the use of the gramalla was consolidated in Catalan territories; this was a tunic that derived from the garnatxa and was a tailored item, usually of wool, lined with velvet or fur, that featured a head opening, with wide sleeves (aletes, ‘wings’), often with a hood, and a little shorter than a robe.73 From the Barcelona Haggada it appears that the round neck sometimes featured characteristic ornamentation in the form of a pair of tabs or vertical stripes of a colour different from the rest of the dress.74 Cloaks, tabards, garnatxes and gramalles – the mantles and pointed hoods (Catalan caperons or Castilian capirotes) – made of fur or wool were the most distinctive apparel of medieval Jewish communities and the only ones that marked the forced difference. As already mentioned, in the lands dominated by the Catalan monarchy, Jews were forced to wear specific types of cloak, and all Jews, except courtiers, were covered with the ‘round cloak’ within villages, and outside the villages with a rain cloak or rainwear made of thick, waterproof fabric. It was common among Christian notaries to draw, on the cover of books of loans specific to Jews, the cartoon figure of a Jew, identifiable by a round cloak. In the year 1283, the Jews of Valencia were also required to wear this type of cloak, except in towns where Jews did not form a community and for the poorest Jews. 70 The Valladolid taqanot of 1432 forbade these luxurious garments, especially among married

women and brides during the first year of marriage; Motis Dolader, ‘Indumentaria’, p. 564.

71 See an example of the variety of fabrics and clothes with which Jews treated and traded in

the work of Meritxell Blasco Orellana, Manuscrito hebraicoaljamiado de la Biblioteca Nacional de Cataluña: ‘Codex Soberanas’ (Ms. No 3090, Siglo XIV), Catalonia Hebraica, I (Barcelona: PPU, 2003). 72 Hinojosa Montalvo, ‘Indumentaria’, pp. 94–95. 73 Aymerich Bassols, ‘L’art’, p. 218. The gramalla was a long tunic that could include a pointed hood. It was shorter than a robe and partially open in the front, with armholes and short and bulky sleeves called wings (ales). It was made of wool, although several variants were used including, exceptionally, velvet and marromote. See section 9.5.3.3 of Aymerich Bassols’s work. 74 Barcelona Haggada, c. 1340; London, British Library, MS Additional 14761, fols 28r, 31v, 35r, 35v [accessed 27 January 2022].

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‎The cloak had to be smooth and could not be red, green, or purple. In Pamplona, it was called a capa cerrada or almasía, or closed capuz with its hood.75 The obligation to wear coats and the restriction of colours fluctuated over time and were only intermittently enforced. The iconography and inventories show very colourful cloaks. There are good examples in the Barcelona Haggada and the illustrations of the Ferrer Bassa workshop in the illuminated manuscripts of the Guide to the Perplexed (Moreh Nevukhim) preserved in the Kongelige Bibliotek of Copenhagen.76 Black tunics (gramalles) were used as a sign of mourning, and in Christian artistic representations, the image of the Jew was always associated with this or a similar dark garment, often marked with a round badge and covered head.77 In these images, a Jewish woman tended to wear a long, smooth, single-colour tunic and a headdress that left only her face uncovered, with a capsana (Fig. 12.2) or hood. By contrast, Catalan notarial medieval inventories describe a variety of cloaks and mantles with coloured edges and a variety of fabrics.78 75 Motis Dolader, ‘Indumentaria’, p. 568. 76 A good overview of these splendid works can be found in the exhibition catalogue: Ana María

Bejarano, Joan Roca i Albert, Josep-Lluís Carod-Rovira and Manuel Forcano, Hagadàs Barcelona. L’esplendor jueva del gòtic català (Barcelona: Ajuntament de Barcelona, Museu d’Història de Barcelona, 2015). 77 See among other works on this subject Alsina, ‘La imatge’, pp. 54–56; Alcoy Pedros, ‘Canvis’, pp. 371–92; Rodríguez Barral, La imagen del judío en la España Medieval; César Favà, ‘La imatge dels jueus a la corona catalanoaragonesa en el context del culte a l’eucaristia. Els retaules gòtics del cos de Crist’, unpublished paper presented at III Congrés per a l’Estudi dels Jueus en Territoris de Llengua Catalana. Barcelona-Perpinyà (2007) (publication Barcelona: Institut d’Estudis Món Juïc, forthcoming). 78 Catalonia has a huge amount of medieval notarial material. There are many studies that use this type of archival material, such as inventories and wills, as do many of the works indicated in the footnotes. For our part, we have consulted the Hebrew documentation of the archives of the city of Girona and the following Latin wills and inventories of the same archives: AHG, Gi 5-322, fol. 148v (Notari Bartomeu Tord, 1361–1362: Testament de Bonastruc de Blanes, jueu d’Hostalric, habitant a Girona, 19 de juny de 1362/AHG170-374-T2-2313); Gi 4-61, fol. 62 (Notari Berenguer Ferrer: Testament de Bonjuà Iskhaq, jueu, ciutadà de Girona, 15 de setembre de 1420/AHG170-374-T2-2315); Gi 4-204, fol. 204 (Notari Berenguer Ferrer Sasala, Testaments, 1425–1460: Testament de Iossef Leo de Ferto, jueu de Girona, abans a Perpinyà, 20 d’abril de 1462/AHG170-374-T2-5582); Gi 5-321, fol. 17 (Notari Bartomeu Tord, Testaments 1362–1369: Testament de Regina, muller de Josep de Blanes, jueu de Girona, 27 d’octubre de 1362/AHG170-374-T2-8453); Gi 1-561, fol. 89v (Notari Nicolau Roca, fill, testaments 1483–1511: Testament de Pere de Masella, sastre jueu, àlies Salomó de Plinyes, oriünd del lloc d’Ejea de los Caballeros, regne d’Aragó, habitant de Girona, 25 de març de 1498/AHG170-374-T2-7574 and 8487); Gi 1-477, fol. 4 (Notari Nicolau Roca, pare, 1469: Testament de Seculina, vídua de Salomó Salon, jueu de Perpinyà. Després muller d’Isaac de Piera, 13 d’abril de 1470/AHG170374-T2-8592 and 8593); Gi 4-61, fol. 52 (Notari Berenguer Ferrer: Testament d’Estruch Benet, jueu de Girona, 27 de juny de 1415/ AHG170-374-T2-8902), Gi 4 (Notari Berenguer Ferrer, fol. 195: Testament de Mairona, muller de Vives Mosse, jueu de Perpinyà, habitant a Girona, 20 d’octubre de 1443/ AHG170-374-T2-5883 and 5884); Gi-02, 272, foli 46v (Notari Martí Sastre, Testaments 1461–1476: Testament de Salomó de Tolosa, jueu, 25 de setembre de 1465/ AHG170-374-T2-8486) and Gi 2-255, fol. 46v; Gi 2-450, fol. 381; Gi 4-441, fol. 102 (Notari Vidal



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Headdresses and footwear Men often covered their heads with a pointed hood (the aforementioned capirote or caperó), which was a high, loose covering finished at the tip that sometimes turned toward the front or extended downward, the body of the hood forming a small cape that covered the shoulders and the back; or they covered their heads with the hoods of their mantles. They could also wear a coif tied under the chin, beneath hats of varying heights that often included hoods and conical caps that were sometimes covered with turbans. Jews of Barcelona who could not afford the required cloak had to wear a yellow pointed hood.79 The younger men did not wear a hood and covered their heads with a simpler white hat, as shown in the illumination of Barcelona haggadot or in the Castilian Hispano-Moresque Haggada.80 As already mentioned, in 13th-century Castile, in the Cantigas de Santa Maria, Jews are represented with a conical pointed hat.81 Medieval women wore veils, headdresses, or hoods. Married women had to keep their heads covered and, under their headdresses, their hair was put up in coifs. Women also wore a veil around the face and tied under the chin or with braided coifs (còfies trenades or cofias de tranzado), lined headdresses adorned with ribbons enveloping the plait.82 In many of the scenes of the Golden Haggada, young men and women do not cover their heads. Representations in other haggadot, such as the Rylands Haggada, show women veiled or with shawls, diadems, simple coifs, or more sophisticated headdresses.83 The Jewish women of the Catalan domains wore capsana (Fig. 12.2), a coif with a yellow or red round badge, although in Castile this was only red.84 Jewish women of the lower classes could wear a turban (tovallola), usually of white linen. There is very little mention of footwear in the notarial documentation. Art provides some evidence, however, that the most common footwear included shoes, boots, slippers, or clogs. Based on the art, the shoes followed the shape of the foot and ended with a point. In Catalonia, Shlomo ben Adret in his responsa mentions clogs that Jews wore during the week: ‘You also asked me: The wooden footwear

79 80 81 82 83

84

Miquel, testaments, 1588–1596) and Gi 1-561, fol. 89v. Also, the inventory of goods and books (127 titles) of Natan Moixé Desportal of the year 1410 (AHG, SFG, Notarials, Inventaris. Lligall que va del 9 de juliol de 1410 al 31 d’octubre de 1410, de 38 folis; SFe288, fol. 1r /9.VII.1410 and SFe49, fol. 41–43 /26.VIII.1410). Francisco de Bofarull y Sans, ‘Ordinaciones de los concelleres de Barcelona sobre los judíos en el siglo XIV’, Boletín de las Buenas Letras de Barcelona, 6.43 (1911), 97–102. Roth, ‘Some Customs’, p. 42. Las Cantigas de Santa María, n. 25, fol. 38. See Rubens, A History, p. 90. Carmen Bernís-Madrazo, ‘Clothing’ in Medieval Iberia: An Encyclopaedia, ed. by E. Michael Gerli (New York and London: Routledge, 2003) pp. 237–38. Batsheva Goldman-Ida, ‘The Sephardic Woman’s Head-Dress in Spain and in the Ottoman Empire − Main Catalog’, in From Iberia to Diaspora: Studies in Sephardic History and Culture, ed. by Yedida Kalfon Stillman and Norman A. Stillman (Leiden: Brill, 1999), pp. 525–30. See note 25.

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called galotges (or galotxes), which has no nails, but a piece of plain iron instead of nails, that was put there so that the ground contact does not wear it away. Can it be worn on Saturday?’ Ben Adret also refers to the custom of wearing tapins (also called patins in Catalan or chapines in Castilian) that were worn by men as well as women.85 Tapins were a kind of tall sandal with a cork sole and very thick but flexible leather strap that tied to the ankle through two leather flanges that were worn under the shoes. They raised the foot above muddy ground, but did not make it easy to walk.86 In Adret’s opinion tapins were covered with leather and attached to the foot with the laces.87 Especially interesting is Ben Adret’s description of the shoes that must be used in the ceremony of halitsa. This is a rare ceremony, with unique features, which takes place in a rabbinical court and involves the brother of a deceased husband officially refusing to marry his sister-in-law, as required by Levirate law (Deuteronomy 25. 5–10). This was a kind of high shoe up to the ankle or close to the knee, made of a single piece of leather; it had no sole and was stitched on one side with a strap that bound it to the leg.88

Jewels and other accessories In the inventories of Jewish trousseaux and loan registers, dress accessories and jewels are mentioned. Archaeological excavations have also yielded jewels and amulets, such as rings with or without inscriptions, of silver, gold or bronze; silver belts; bronze or silver earrings; and necklaces, some of which were ornamental pendants and others with apotropaic function.89 The earrings found in Barcelona and Girona are silver rings with spherical ornaments (14th-century). Thin gold rings were also found, as well as an ornament with an emerald and bronze and gold stamps.90 In Tàrrega (Lleida), there was a significant find of parts of a child’s beaded necklace with amulets in the shape of a hand of Fatima (hamsa), a cylinder and a plate, with decorations made of glass paste, jet, horn, coral, silver, and rock crystal. Other necklaces for children and adults of both sexes have also been found, mostly of jet, and in one case glass,

85 Feliu i Mabres, ‘Mots catalans’, 63. 86 Aymerich Bassols, ‘L’art’, p. 505.

87 Responsa I: 607 and VII: 219. Feliu i Mabres ‘Mots catalans’, p. 66. 88 ‘And this shoe doesn’t have that bottom part of the foot that touches the ground that they

call sole’, Responsum VII: 398; Feliu i Mabres ‘Mots catalans’, p. 72.

89 Most of the jewels come from the archaeological excavations of a Jewish necropolis. 90 See Victòria Mora, ‘La Catalunya jueva: les àrees de Barcelona i Tarragona’, in La Catalunya

Jueva, ed. by Yom Tov Assis and Mariona Company (Barcelona: Àmbit; Museu d’Història de Catalunya, 2002), pp. 36–55 and Jordi Casanovas Miró, ‘Testimonis materials de la presència dels jueus a Catalunya en l’època medieval’, in La Catalunya Jueva, ed. by Assis and Company, pp. 142–59.



T ex t ile P r odu ct ion and Jewi s h C l o thi n g 31 5

as well as ceramic and black glass bracelets.91 In the excavations of the Jewish quarter of Puigcerdà (Girona) a boar’s tusk used as a pendant or amulet, a golden brass buckle with a rampant lion, a circular buckle, and a heraldic ornament were found.92 In the excavations of Deza, in Soria, several jet beads from the 12th and 13th centuries are also documented.93 The use of amulets was widespread in the Middle Ages; even Jews tolerated it to protect themselves from illnesses, especially for children.94 At the necropolis of Toledo a very well worked circular silver earring was found.95 During the excavations of the necropolis of Teruel parts of much more elaborate, ornamental necklaces with pendants worked out of silver in the form of leaves, as well as braided chains of silver, and bronze pins to hold clothing and hair ornaments were found. Copper and silver rings with inscriptions, a thin gold ring with a blue glassy stone, and a dark glass bracelet covered with golden glass were also found.96 The sumptuary laws in the taqanot of Valladolid also reveal the widespread habit among wealthy Jewesses of wearing gold and silver jewellery or pearl necklaces on the neck or on forehead, as well as gold and pearl brooches, enamel and silver ribbons of up to four ounces, which were otherwise restricted to unmarried women and brides in their first engagement year.97 In the elaborate illuminations of the Passover haggadot, women wore colourful clothes, sometimes beautifully enriched with trim and embroidered gold and silver thread, buttons, and braided chains, as in the Rylands Haggada or Brother Haggada. 91 Anna Colet et al., ‘Els amulets de la necròpolis medieval hebrea de les Roquetes de Tàrrega

92

93 94 95

96

97

(L’Urgell)’, in Actes del IV Congrés d’Arqueologia Medieval i Moderna a Catalunya. Tarragona, del 10 al 13 de juny de 2010, ed. by Isabel Fernández del Moral Delgado, Joan Menchón i Bes and Josep M. Vila Carabasa (Tarragona: ACRAM; Ajuntament de Tarragona, 2011), pp. 1021–24. See the pictures of some of this amuletic jewellery in [accessed 25 August 2021]. Oriol Mercadal and Carme Subiranas i Fàbregas, La comunitat jueva de Puigcerdà (1250–1493). Documentació i arqueologia de la Vila Nova i del Call (Barcelona: Institut d’Estudis Món Juïc, 2018), pp. 45, 59. Jordi Casanovas Miró and Odile Jorge y Ripoll López, ‘Catálogo de materiales aparecidos en la necrópolis judaica de Deza (Soria)’, Celtiberia, 65 (1983) 135–48. Colet, ‘Els amulets’, p. 1023. Arturo Ruíz Taboada, ‘El cementerio judío en el contexto funerario del Toledo bajomedieval’, in La judería de Toledo, un tiempo y un espacio por rehabilitar: actas del XXI Curso de Cultura Hispanojudia y Sefardí organizado por la Universidad de Castilla-La Mancha, ed. by Jean Passini and Ricardo Izquierdo Benito (Toledo: Ediciones de Castilla-La Mancha, 2014) pp. 209–46. See more information about the excavation and the piece in [accessed 21 September 2019]. Jaime Vicente Redón and Carmen Escriche Jaime, ‘Ajuares de la necrópolis judía de Teruel’, in Memoria de Sefarad, ed. by Isidro Bango (Madrid: SEACEX-Sociedad Estatal para la Acción Cultural Exterior, 2002), pp. 121–29. See also the images in ; and in the search engine CERES (Colecciones en Red ) [both accessed 25 August 2021]. Motis Dolader, ‘Indumentaria’, p. 564.

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The figures do not appear to be wearing jewels, however. In the Prato Haggada, one can sometimes distinguish belts with buckles for some of the clothes.98

Festive and ceremonial clothing References to the attire worn by Jews on their major holidays or during the most important events of their lives are scarce. The rule that men and women should dress in fine clothes on Saturdays and at feasts should therefore be recalled. The scenes of Pesach seder (Passover ritual feast) presented in the Catalan haggadot or in Hispano-Moresque Haggada show such splendour. The garments are coloured, drape beautifully and, in some illustrations, such as the Rylands Haggada, are adorned with embroidery, buttons, chains, ropes, and trim of gold and silver. Women are shown with loose hair or with headdresses more luxurious than in the representations of non-festive days, when they are usually covered by cloaks or tunics with hoods or with simple veils and white coifs. The habitual dress of the Jews during Christian funeral ceremonies in Catalonia is described in great detail in the Libre verd del racional de Cervera, preserved in the Historic Regional Archive of La Segarra. In Cervera, after the death of King Alfonso IV in the summer of 1458, the city’s Jews participated in a ceremonious procession. Twenty children were dressed in pointed hoods (caperons), six rabbis dressed in splendid linen clothes, thirty adult Jews were dressed in coats, and the rest of the community wore gramalles with caperons.99 Years later, in February 1479, in the ceremony of the same city after the death of King Joan II (on 19 January), half of the Jews wore coats, the other half had black gramalles, and all of them wore caperons.100 These black gramalles with caperons worn at the funeral ceremonies can also be seen in one of the representations of the Golden Haggada, fol. 14v. The black cloak with a pointed hood was a sign of mourning at the time. During the first year of mourning, the nearest relatives of the deceased usually wore black, which was

98 Prato ‎Haggada, c. 1325–1350. The Jewish Theological Seminary Library, New York, MS 9468. 99 ‘E tot primer isqueren del cayl pus amont entorn XX infants juheus ab los caperons vestits,

portants cascú I brandó negre cremant. E aprés isqueren IIIIe juheus, los pus honrats de la aljama, que portaven I moniment cubert de drap de seda e hor al coyll, ab IIIIe brandons grosos. E aprés isqueren VI juheus rabins que cantaven aprés lo moniment molt bé, vestits de drap de li molt bell. E aprés vengueren tots los juheus, vestits de saques entorn XXX, poch més o menys, e aprés los altres ab lurs gramaylles e caperons vestits, fins en la dita plaça, hon posaren lo dit moniment, e entorn aquell moltes dones juygues que fahien hoynes o plants ab diverses cants o dolors’ (Llibre verd del racional, vol. 1, fol. 10); Josep Maria Llobet i Portella, ʻTextos historiogràfics sobre els jueus de Cerveraʼ, Tamid, 2 (1997), pp. 73–79. 100 ‘E és veritat que per tant com la aljama de la present vila an gran fidelitat e amor al senyor rey, no contrestant els fosen bon nombre, encara ampraren les aljames de Tàrrega, Belpug, Agramunt [e] Senta Coloma, e foren entre tots pus de LX, on avie XXX gramaylles de saques e los altres ab gramayles negres, tots ab caperons vestits, e avien entorn XXX dones juyes’ (Llibre verd del racional, vol. 1, fol. 19v); Llobet i Portella, ‘Textos’, pp. 76 and 79.



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symbolic of mourning.101 Women’s black garments were longer than those of the men.102 In the excavations of the Jewish cemetery of Tàrrega, a remnant of silk with silver, possibly the remains of a Jewish ritual shawl or shroud in which the body wrapped when buried, has been found. Wedding ceremonies lasted seven days and the bridegrooms donned the most splendid clothes they had. The bride was bedecked with jewellery and wore a face veil.103 Because of the 1384 conflict between Christian authorities and the Jewish community of Majorca over the application of sumptuary laws, it was established that the bride should wear the same dress and the same jewels throughout the wedding festivities.104

Conclusio ns Although we have tried to offer an overview of the clothing of the medieval peninsular Jews, there remains much that needs to be researched in this field of study. The documentation allows us to observe the customs of only a part of this community, usually the wealthiest. Jewish iconography tends to idealize, while the Christian iconography of Jews, in contrast, is parodic and pejorative and only shows the distinctive clothing that was imposed. As has been seen repeatedly, the most significant and evident differences between Jewish dress and that of the Gentile population were determined by the Christian or Muslim rulers. Jewish regulations, especially the prohibition of the sha’atnez or keeping the kashrut laws regarding animal parts, together with sumptuary laws and regional customs, shape the attire of these communities. The coats, cloaks, tunics, hoods, and especially the round badge of different shapes and colours sewn on dark apparel marked the imposed differentiation that extended to the whole Jewish population in an atmosphere that was increasingly hostile from the 14th century.

101 ‘Gramalla [Gramaylla] s. ‘Vestidura folgada amb mànegues i caperó, rossegant i sense cenyir,

usada en senyal de dol’ (Faraudo de Saint-Germain, Vocabulari de la Llengua Catalana Medieval [accessed 25 August 2021]). 102 Roderic Pita i Mercè, ‘L’aconteixement de la mort entre els jueus medievals lleidatans’, in Actes del III Congrés d’Història de la Medicina Catalana (Lleida: Seminari Pere Mata, Departament de Medicina Legal i Toxicologia, Facultat de Medicina, Universitat de Barcelona, 1981), pp. 191–207 (p. 201). 103 Secall i Güell, ‘Generalitats’, p. 29. 104 The secretaries of the Majorcan Jewish Community expressed concern that several chapters of these ordinances conflicted with Mosaic laws for wedding celebrations. See Aymerich Bassols, ‘L’art’, p. 488.

chapter 13

Silk as Reflected in Medieval Iberian Jewish Literature Naḥum Ben-Yehuda

I ntroductio n

T

his chapter analyses references to silk in medieval Iberian Jewish literature, variously in biblical and Mishnaic commentary, poetry, philosophical works, rabbinic responsa, and halakhic (Jewish legal) literature. These reflect the authors’ familiarity with the production and use of silk, and assumption that their readers share that awareness. Those who generally study the works cited here have no specialist knowledge of textiles in general, and particularly of silk. The recognition and discussion of allusions, metaphors, and identifications expands our appreciation of these authors. Conversely, these genres of Jewish literature as sources for information on silk, will be presented to textile scholars and historians, as a rule unfamiliar with this material.

H. asday I b n Sh aprut, M e naH. e m Ibn Saru q and th e ‘K h az ar Corre sp o nd e nce ’ 1 Ḥasdai Ibn Shaprut (c. 905 Jaen – 975 Cordoba) a Jewish scholar, served as private physician and subsequently as trusted advisor to the court of Umayyad caliph Abd al-Raḥmān III (912–961) in Cordoba. Ibn Shaprut was considered the ‘Nasi’ 1

This correspondence has been appended to many editions of Sefer ha-Kuzari since Judah, ha-Levi, Sefer ha-Kuzari, trans. by Yehudah ibn Tibon (Vienna: Israel ben Moses Zamosc, 1796). (More data infra.)

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(prince) of Andalusian Jewry. His personal secretary/scribe, Menaḥem Ibn Saruq (c. 910 Tortosa – 970) was a lexicographer and poet. Ibn Shaprut commissioned Ibn Saruq to compose what is known as the ‘Khazar Correspondence’. Today, this correspondence – written in biblical style Hebrew – is generally considered authentic, especially the section which concerns our topic.2 Praising his homeland, ‘Sepharad’ (the common Hebrew appellation for the Iberian Peninsula), he states: The land grows all kinds of fruit trees, and blooms with all kinds of trees on which silk is raised, for silk is quite abundant here. And in our land’s mountains and forests we gather ‘tolaˁat šani’3 [sic] in abundance, as well as many varieties of saffron.

The Hebrew term used here for ‘silk’ is the biblical meši.4 Ibn Saruq’s choice of abundant silk as a praise of al-Andalus is well documented.5 Tolaˁat šani6 is a biblical term, used often in the Book of Exodus7 as one of the textile components of the Tabernacle, as well as in various permutations in other books of

2 3

4

5

6 7

Arthur Koestler, The Thirteenth Tribe: the Khazar Empire and its heritage (New York: Random House, 1976), pp. 65, 69, 215. Underlined letters indicate ‘segholate’ pronunciation – the penultimate vowel receiving syllable stress; ‘š’ (s with caron) represents the ‘sh’ sound, and is conventional for the transliteration of Semitic languages. ‘I dressed you with decorated garments, and shod you with footwear of taḥaš skin, and donned you with linen headwear, and covered you with rich fabric (meši)’ (Ezekiel 16. 10). Meši is a hapax legomenon and has been mistranslated in Kitāb Jāmi’ al-Alfāẓ (Agrōn) of David ben Abraham al-Fāsī the Karaite in the 10th century CE as al-ḥarīr (silk). The use of meši to designate ‘silk’ took root from the 11th century in halakhic literature and is used with this meaning in Modern Hebrew; Nahum Ben-Yehuda, ‘Textile Production in the Iron Age’, in Clothing and Nudity in the Hebrew Bible, ed. by Christoph Berner (London: T&T Clark, 2019), p. 59; Benjamin J. Noonan, Non-Semitic Loanwords in the Hebrew Bible: a lexicon of language contact (University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press, 2019), pp. 149–50. However, no evidence of the existence of silk (from the Far East) in Babylonia during the 6th century BCE has been found. In light of enhanced familiarity with Ancient Near Eastern languages, reliable recent identifications have been offered from ancient Egyptian msy (a luxury garment) or Hittite maššiya (a scarf). R. B. Serjeant, Islamic Textiles: material for a history up to the Mongol conquest (Beirut: Librairie du Liban, 1972), p. 172; Maurice Lombard, Les textiles dans le monde musulman du VIIe au XIIe siècle (Paris: Mouton, 1978), p. 96; Cristina Partearroyo Lacaba, ‘Los tejidos de Al-Andalus entre los siglos IX al XV (y su prolongación en el siglo XVI)’, in España y Portugal en las rutas de la seda: diez siglos de producción y comercio entre Oriente y Occidente, ed. by Comisión Española de la Ruta de la Seda (Barcelona: Universitat de Barcelona, 1996), pp. 59–62. Discussed further in sections devoted to R. Abraham Ibn Ezra and R. Asher Ben Yeḥiel, pp. 327–30 below. Proposed date: XIXth Dynasty (13th century BCE); Anson F. Rainey and R. Steven Notley, The Sacred Bridge: Carta’s Atlas of the Biblical World (Jerusalem: Carta, 2014), p. 119.



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the Hebrew Bible.8 The generally accepted identification is an insect-derived reddish dyestuff – kermes. Kermes (or ‘grana’) is well attested as a costly dyestuff in medieval Iberia and throughout Europe, the Near East and Western Asia. The ‘kermes oak’, characteristic of the forests mentioned by Ibn Saruq, was the habitat of the kermes-yielding insects.9 Locating the insects may have been a speciality of Jewish workers.10 This expensive dyestuff, together with silk, were products which would certainly be impressive to the Khazarian king.

R. B aH. y a I b n Pa q ū d a and T h e Boo k o f D ir ec tio n to th e Dutie s of th e H e art R. Baḥya ben Joseph Ibn Paqūda was born and lived in Zaragoza (c. 1040–1090). He was the rabbinical judge of his community, a liturgical poet and a man of broad culture. His work The Book of Direction to the Duties of the Heart is difficult to categorise in any specific literary genre. It is, primarily, Jewish devotional literature, but also qualifies as philosophy, theology, ethics, asceticism, and mysticism. Often, the principles it expounds are illustrated with metaphors. The book was written in Judeo-Arabic, and later translated into Hebrew by Judah Ibn Tibbon between 1161 and 1180. Later translations include those of R. Yosef Qafiḥ11 and Binyamin Abrahamov.12 This chapter will compare different

8

9

10 11

12

Data from Akkadian language parallels and Iron Age Ancient Near Eastern material culture indicate the dyed textile material was sheep’s wool; Hayim Tawil, An Akkadian Lexical Companion for Biblical Hebrew: etymological-semantic and idiomatic equivalence with supplement on Biblical Aramaic (Jersey City, NJ: KTAV, 2009), p. 429; Ludwig Köhler and Walter Baumgartner, The Hebrew and Aramaic Lexicon of the Old Testament (Leiden: Brill, 2001), p. 1603; Ben-Yehuda ‘Textile Production in the Iron Age’, pp. 65–66; Salvatore Gaspa, Textiles in the Neo-Assyrian Empire: A Study of Terminology (Boston and Berlin: de Gruyter, 2018), p. 64; The Assyrian Dictionary of the Oriental institute of Chicago, Vol. 18 T, ed. by Erica Reiner and Richard I. Caplice (Chicago: Oriental Institute, 2006) p. 466a, ‘tūltu’. ‘In the period of Muslim Hispania it was said that the best “quermes” or “grana” was that of Al-Andalus, which abounded in the regions of Sevilla, Niebla, Sidonia and Valencia and was exported to all countries’; Joaquín Vallvé Bermejo, Al-Andalus: sociedad e instituciones (Madrid: Real Academia de la Historia, 1999), p. 31. Dr Julia Martinez, Universitat de València provided further insight into this topic. Serjeant, Islamic Textiles, p. 171, quotes the 8th- to 9th-century Arab writer al-D̲j̲āḥiẓ: ‘crimson is found in […] the land of Andalus, and only a sect of Jews knew how to find it.’ Yosef Qafiḥ, Torat Ḥovot HaLǝvavot l’ Rabenu Baḥya Ibn Paqūda (Jerusalem: Ha-Waˁad Ha-Kǝlali LǝYehudei Teman, 1972). This edition features the original Judeo-Arabic text in parallel to the Hebrew translation. A parallel edition of this translation omits the Judeo-Arabic (Jerusalem: Feldheim, 1994). Binyamim Abrahamov, Sefer HaHadrakha el Ḥovot HaLǝvavot l’ Rabenu Baḥya Ibn Paqūda (Ramat Gan: Bar Ilan, 2019).

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translations. Reading the textile terminology in the original Judeo-Arabic text is essential for proper comprehension.13 Leaving the Hebrew/Arabic semantic field and its convenient pair of terms, mašal-nimšal, poses a terminological challenge in English: I have used the terms ‘metaphor’ and ‘extended metaphor’; however, ‘parable’ is also correct. This literary device was used extensively by medieval Iberian Jewish authors,14 providing contexts familiar to readers, in order to reify abstract theological concepts. Textile-based metaphors have clearly been chosen by their respective authors with that principle in mind. In three instances R. Baḥya Ibn Paqūda uses textile-related imagery in his work to elucidate theological concepts. The knowledge of the duties of the heart is neglected, and is not written in a book which includes its foundations. If it is written, it is in an un-fastened form, in a book which does not encompass its branches.15

The original Judeo-Arabic text reads: (Qafiḥ, p. 18) ‘un-woven warp’ or (Abrahamov) ‘un-fastened warp’. Here the source-language meaning of the metaphor has clear significance only to those familiar with the loom and the weaving process, meaning that the warp yarns – before weft has been inserted – are unrelated to one another. That relationship between all duties of the heart is the central purpose of Ibn Paqūda’s book. This is the mašal: One of the kings distributed to his servants three ‘spools16 of silk17 yarn’ (Qafiḥ, p. 40) or ‘bolts of silk fabric’ (Abrahamov) in order to test their wisdom. The clever and intelligent servant selected from among the materials that he received; first – the best quality, and afterwards – the lower quality. He divided them into three types: excellent quality, medium quality and poor quality. Subsequently, he made from each type of silk the best garment that it is possible to make from that type of silk. He employed groups of experts to make garments of various forms and different colours. Afterwards he would adorn himself with them before the king at the appropriate times and places. The most foolish of the king’s servants made from all of the silks that he received, what the wise servant made with poor quality silk.18 The servant sold that product at a cheap price, and used the income to buy and eat delicious foods and drink delectable beverages and to enjoy various things.

13 I am greatly indebted to Binyamin Abrahamov, Nabih Bashir and Dolores Serrano-Niza for

their invaluable assistance; and to the late, very esteemed, Professor Federico Corriente.

14 See also R. Judah ha-Levi, pp. 326–27 and R. Abraham Ibn Ezra, p. 330, below. 15 Abrahamov, Sefer HaHadrakha, p. 27 (Introduction). 16 The Arabic term luz is unclear; Abrahamov, Sefer HaHadrakha, p. 43, n. 110. 17 Arabic Ḥarīr (with determiner: al Ḥarīr). 18 That being the ‘default option’, an unwise and lazy solution.



Sil k as R ef lect ed in M edieval Ib eri a n Jewi s h L i tera ture 32 3 When the king heard this, the clever and intelligent servant’s action found favour in his eyes. He brought him into his close company and granted him a high rank as his other dignitaries. He condemned the action of the foolish servant, banished him from his company and exiled him to the most desolate place in his land, and housed him with others who had angered the king.19

The moral of this extended metaphor is that God intends to test his creations (mankind) in this manner. One must be diligent to examine and grade the various subject matters of the Torah and subsequently allocate attention to each in its respective proper manner. The finest quality silk alludes to knowledge of the delicate spiritual topics, which are the internal knowledge, such as the ‘duties of the heart’ and modes of behaviour of the soul. Those one is obliged to perform continually. Medium quality silk alludes to knowledge of ‘duties of the limbs’, each at the proper time and in the proper place. Poor quality silk alludes to knowledge of history. History and other disciplines, such as mathematics and logic, are essential for use as introductions to metaphysics. In correlation, the clever servant used professional tools to prepare – as he desired – the silk given to him by the king. This extended metaphor, or parable, is particularly effective if one is familiar with the political background of the time. It may hint at one of the local rulers,20 whose manner may reflect the test, and respective reward and punishment, granted to the servants.21 The vital component, however, of the story and its intended moral, is familiarity with three grades of silk (Fig. 13.1).22 These must have been familiar to Jewish craftsmen, merchants and traders, and consumers in 10th-century Zaragoza. Behold, how strong the silk23 thread is after it has been twisted many times, and indeed you know that its origin is from the weakest thing – the saliva of the silkworm. And we observe that when we use a thick rope continually, it does not desist from weakening, until it is severed and will be very weak.24

19 Abrahamov, Sefer HaHadrakha, p. 43 (Introduction). 20 It may, however, be completely fictional.

21 The rulers of Zaragoza during R. Baḥya’s time were: Abū Ḏj̲aʿfar Aḥmad I b. Sulaymān b. Hūd

al-Muḳtadir (r. 1061–1082); Abū ʿĀmir Yūsuf b. Aḥmad I b. Hūd al-Muʾtaman (r. until 1085); Abū D̲j̲aʿfar Aḥmad II b. Yūsuf b. Hūd (r. until 1110). 22 K. Murugesh Babu, Silk: Processing, Properties and Application, 2nd edn (Duxford: Woodhead, 2019). ‘Waste from reeling industry’, pp. 213–14; ‘Spun silk and noil’, pp. 215–16; ‘Noil yarns’, p. 224. Maimonides (nn. 99–103) may be referring to the coarser silks now known as ‘Noil’, ‘Zeddana’, ‘Bobbly-Bourette’ and ‘Matka’, all appearing in Fig. 13.1. 23 Arabic: al-ḥarīr. 24 Abrahamov, Sefer HaHadrakha, p. 247 (Section VII: Explanation of the methods of repentance, and its characteristics and results, Chapter VII).

Fig. 13.1  Grades of silk (Bombyx mori) coarse to fine. Fabrics furnished courtesy of Whaleys Bradford Ltd. Photographed for Naḥum Ben-Yehuda by Isaac Canetti.



Sil k as R ef lect ed in M edieval Ib eri a n Jewi s h L i tera ture 32 5

The context of this double metaphor is: When one persists in sinning, even the comparatively lesser transgression grows and becomes severe. When one requests forgiveness for a severe transgression and refrains from it out of obedience to God, even the most severe transgression diminishes until one is finally cleansed of it. For the rope metaphor, Baḥya provides a biblical source: ‘Ah! Those who haul sin with cords of falsehood. And iniquity as with cart ropes!’ (Isaiah 5. 18). However, the silk metaphor is his own invention. To be effective, it requires knowledge of the production process of sericulture, beginning with the silkworm secreting liquid from its spinneret and spinning its cocoon, the subsequent unravelling and reeling of the filament, and ‘throwing’ – twisting several filaments together. Proper comprehension of Baḥya’s three metaphors, and subsequent enhanced understanding of his parallel theological messages, requires familiarity with all stages of silk production.

R . J u dah h a- Levi and The B ook of t h e Kuz ari Judah ben Samuel ha-Levi was a poet, religious thinker, and physician. Born in Toledo (or Tudela) between 1075 and 1080, he went as a youth to Granada, where he joined the circle of Jewish public figures and intellectuals. He also travelled around the Christian and Muslim areas of Spain.25 Late in life he travelled to Egypt and finally the Land of Israel, where he died in 1141. His treatise, The Book of Rejoinder and Proof in Support of the Neglected Religion, commonly known as The Kuzari, eventually became a major source of Jewish theology.26 Like Ibn Paqūda’s work, this treatise was written in Judeo-Arabic. Major Hebrew translations include: Judah Ibn Tibbon (12th century, Granada-Provence),27 Yehuda Even Shmuel (1972), R. Yosef Qafiḥ (1996) and Michael Schwarz (2017).28 Ha-Levi employs metaphors extensively in The Kuzari, of which two are textile-related. The context of the first of these is the human inability to perceive 25 Daniel Lasker, Introduction to Sefer ha-Kuzari: hu sefer ha-ṭaʻanah ṿeha-reʼayah la-dat ha-mushpelet

[The Book of Kuzari: the book of rejoinder and proof of the despised religion], ed. by Michael Schwarz and Daniel J. Lasker (Beʻer-Shevaʻ: Hotsaʼat ha-Sefarim shel Universiṭat Ben-Guryon ba-Negev, 2017), p. 11. This complicates the effort to discern exactly where he may have viewed his textile examples. 26 The previously mentioned ‘Khazar Correspondence’ was printed as an addendum to R. Judah ha-Levi’s book first in Johannes Buxtorf’s Latin translation, Liber Cosri (Basel: Georgii Deckeri, Acad. Typogr., 1660), and later in some subsequent editions. 27 The 1792 edition, Judah ha-Levi, Sefer ha-Kuzari, tr. Judah ibn Tibbon (see note 1) is the earliest available. Subsequent ones are essentially reproductions with new typesetting. 28 Yehuda Even Shmuel, Sefer ha-Kozari (Tel Aviv: Dvir, 1972); Yosef Qafiḥ, Sefer HaKuzari: Maqor v’Targum (Kiryat Ono: Makhon Mishnat HaRambam, 1997). An English translation, Hartwig Hirschfeld, The Kuzari. An Argument for the Faith of Israel (New York: Schocken, 1964) is available online: [accessed 25 August 2021].

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God properly in his complete unity, owing to His multiple and apparently contradictory facets: among them creator, ruler, judge and warrior; and attributes – wisdom, holiness, compassion and grandeur. The prophets, in contrast, possessed unique capabilities (an ‘inner eye’), and were able to comprehend and encompass these as metaphorical material reflections of God’s perfect oneness. One of God’s attributes is ‘Ruler of the World’. One who says that he has perceived God as ‘The tall white figure dressed in brocaded silk29 and on his head30 – a standard’31 is not mistaken.32

Ha-Levi means that he is not mistaken, because this is indeed one of the many different appearances which can be attributed to God. Of special interest is the garment. Ha-Levi’s Arabic text reads al-dībāj which textile specialists identify as luxurious silk brocade.33 Ha-Levi is not only himself familiar with this garment; he is convinced that it provides the suitable image of godly royalty for his readership. This type of garment was characteristic of the rulers and aristocrats of Muslim Spain. In the second case, Ha-Levi is presenting (in the words of the Khazarian king) ‘some of the remnants from the natural science that you possess’. He subsequently explains several excerpts from Sefer Yeẓirah (Book of Creation), the central subject of which is a discourse on cosmology and cosmogony and is of clearly mystical character. After he has presented the Divine attributes as described in Sefer Yeẓirah, Ha-Levi offers his own metaphor, intended to reify the distinctly separate stages of a human production process, in contrast to the unity of the Godly one. Imagine a silk34 weaver planning his work. The silk responds; becomes dyed just as he thought and obtains the patterns which he desires. The garment therefore comes into existence by his command and his planned design.35 29 Ibn Tibbon and Even Shmuel: ‘silk’; Qafiḥ: ‘stripes’. 30 Perhaps ‘above his head’?

31 Or: ‘flag’ (Schwarz and Qafiḥ). Ibn Tibbon and Even Shmuel: ‘crown’; Hirschfeld: ‘insignia’. 32 Schwarz and Lasker, Sefer ha-Kuzari, p. 222 (Fourth Essay, Section Three).

33 Dolores Serrano-Niza, Glosario árabe español de indumentaria según el Kitab al-Mujassas de Ibn

Sidah (Madrid: Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas, 2005), p. 105 ‫ديباج‬ ‫ ;ڍبج‬Serjeant, Islamic Textiles, p. 41, n. 9 says: ‘the word “brocade” will represent dībāj unless stated to the contrary’; and on p. 170 quotes al-Idrīsī: ‘There were to be found there [Granada, under the Almoravid dynasty] […] 800 factories for silk where they made precious mantles, brocades […]’; Lombard, Les textiles dans le monde musulman, p. 98 says ‘La grande spécialité d’Almeria parait avoir été le dībāğ, etoffe brochée d’argent.’ 34 alḥarīr. 35 Schwarz and Lasker, Sefer ha-Kuzari, p. 247 (Fourth Essay, Section Twenty-five). This description of silk pattern-weaving is virtually identical to that of R. Abraham ibn Ezra in his commentary to Exodus 26. 1 in context with the Tabernacle, p. 328 below. The two men were close friends.



Sil k as R ef lect ed in M edieval Ib eri a n Jewi s h L i tera ture 32 7 Once again, ha-Levi’s Judeo-Arabic text specifies a garment as aldībāj – silk brocade. In order to compose this metaphor, he had to be familiar with the production of silk – planning, dyeing and weaving; and, for effective reification, he must have been convinced that his readership shared that knowledge.

R . Ab rah am i b n Ez ra and Bibl ical e xe ge sis R. Abraham ibn Ezra was born in 1089 in Tudela. During the first period of his life, Ibn Ezra lived in al-Andalus and perhaps visited North Africa. He left Sepharad in 1140 and lived in several cities in France, Italy, and England, probably dying in England in 1164. He was a close friend of Judah ha-Levi, whose acquaintance he first made in Cordoba. Ibn Ezra wrote religious and secular poetry; and treatises on grammar, astronomy, astrology, theology, and mathematics. His biblical exegesis, however, is considered the magnum opus.36 Literate in Arabic, Ibn Ezra wrote, however, in Hebrew – for Jewish communities that knew no Arabic. He also wrote treatises in Latin for Christian scholars. And these are the gifts (materials for the construction of the Tabernacle) that you shall accept from them: gold, silver, and copper; blue [tǝkhelet], purple [argaman], and scarlet [tolaˁat šani], fine linen [šeš], and goats’ hair [ˁizim].37

R. Abraham ibn Ezra in his ‘long’ commentary38 explains that ‘purple’ (the Hebrew text reads argaman) is a shade of red, and ‘that colour will be found only in wool or silk’.39 At this point, it is unclear if he believes that the biblical material is actually silk. Regarding ‘scarlet’ (the Hebrew text reads tolaˁat šani),40 he explains that the colour is red, albeit different from the shade of argaman. He then continues: ‘Because it is called tolaˁat,41 “many” have said that it is silk.’ Ibn Ezra neither accepts nor rejects the ‘silk’ opinion; it remains an option. We have not identified his ‘many’ predecessors (or contemporaries) who may have offered that opinion. As mentioned above (regarding Ibn Shaprut), according to 36 Ayala Mishaly, Moshe A. Zipor and Uriel Simon, Shene perushe R. Avraham Ibn ʻEzra ʻal Megilat Ester

37 38 39 40 41

[Abraham Ibn Ezra’s two commentaries on Megilat Esther] (Ramat Gan: Bar Ilan University Press, 2019), pp. 14–16. All other quotations from Ibn Ezra’s works are from Mehokekei Yehuda – Ḥamisha Ḥumshei Torah, ed. by Y. L. Karinski (Vilna: Matz, 1927). Exodus 25. 3–4. Composed in Rouen, Normandy 1156–1157. His personal opinion. The Hebrew term for silk that Ibn Ezra uses consistently is meši. Cf. Ibn Shaprut and Zohar Amar supra. Cf. Exodus 16. 20 ‘But they paid no attention to Moses; some of them left of it until morning, and it became infested with maggots and stank.’ The Hebrew word for ‘maggots’ (or ‘worms’) is tolaˁim, thus providing a plausible basis for the ‘silk(worm)’ opinion quoted by Ibn Ezra.

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today’s knowledge, that identification is incorrect. However, to the best of Ibn Ezra’s knowledge, silk – a luxurious and readily dyeable fibre – would be an appropriate material for the Tabernacle. In his earlier ‘short commentary’42 to that same verse, he states simply that ‘tolaˁat šani is silk’. Twelve years later, he had become a trifle hesitant. As for the ‘tabernacle’ (the internal awning), make it of ten bolts (of woven cloth); made of twisted linen, and blue, purple, and scarlet yarns; with a design of cherubim skilfully worked into them.43

The Hebrew source text for ‘skilfully worked’ reads Maˁaśeh Ḥošeb (literally ‘thinker’s work’).44 Other terms used in this context are Maˁaśeh ˀoreg (literally ‘weaver’s work’) for the priestly mantle and tunics; and Maˁaśeh Roqem (literally ‘colour-weaver’s work’)45 for the screens of the tent and of the courtyard, and the priestly sash. Ibn Ezra will differentiate between these terms. In his ‘long commentary’ to this verse, he explains the ‘simple’ meaning: ‘Thinker’s work’ is neither ‘colour-weaver’s work’ nor ‘[plain] weaver’s work’, rather it is [the more sophisticated] method that by which silk46 garments [or fabrics] are made. Firstly, the form that ‘came into mind’ [literally ‘arose to the heart’] is calculation and thought. Next, he will draw it on a board, and he will put two yarns in count – to draw in from afar.47

Ibn Ezra describes here the process of silk pattern-weaving:48 thinking the form, plotting it out and calculating before actually inserting the weft. Not all of the details are clear to us, but the general concept is clear.

42 Composed in Lucca, Tuscany 1142–1145. Compare Maimonides infra, Commentary on the

43 44 45

46 47

48

Mishnah, tractate Kelim (27. 12): Zǝhorit ṭova, ‘Silk dyed with Kermes’ (Silk is not mentioned in the Mishnaic text itself). Exodus 26. 1. In modern textile terminology: ‘complex weaving’. This is the accepted identification, not ‘embroidery’. Ludwig Köhler, Walter Baumgartner and Mervyn Edwin John Richardson, The Hebrew and Aramaic Lexicon of the Old Testament, II (Leiden: Brill, 2001), p. 1291. Targum Onkelos to Exodus 26. 36 offers: ‘Maˁaśeh ṣiyyur’ (decorative or pictured work), or the variant: ‘Maˁaśeh ṣayyar’ (‘decorator’s work’), additional and important opinion(s) regarding the identity of this biblical term. Ibn Ezra is well aware of the translation used by Targum Onkelos. Note that Ibn Ezra supports the possibility that silk was used in the Tabernacle. Exodus 52. 6. Note the strikingly similar description by R. Judah ha-Levi, p. 326, above. In his commentaries to various books of the Bible, Ibn Ezra quotes ‘Rabbi Yehuda ha-Levi’ by name 24 times. Also possible: embroidery or tapestry.



Sil k as R ef lect ed in M edieval Ib eri a n Jewi s h L i tera ture 32 9

Although this passage was composed in Rouen, Normandy, Ibn Ezra may have viewed silk pattern-weaving performed by Muslims in al-Andalus.49 Ibn Ezra assumed his readership was familiar enough with that process to understand his commentary. At the end of this period, the king gave a banquet for seven days in the court of the king’s palace garden for all the people who lived in the fortress Shushan, high and low alike. [There were hangings of] white cotton [ḥur karpas] and blue-dyed wool [tǝkhelet], tied with ropes of fine linen [buṣ] and purple-dyed wool [argaman] […] 50

Most of these textile materials are familiar to us from the description of the construction of the Tabernacle in the Book of Exodus (linen and dyed wools). ‘Cotton’, however (karpas in the Hebrew text) is a biblical hapax legomenon.51 Later, however, Ibn Ezra, identifies them as hues, not textile materials: ‘These hues (white, “karpas”, blue and purple) are of silk fabrics’.52 Mishaly, Zipor and Simon, editors of Ibn Ezra’s commentary to Esther (p. 63) point out that silk is not mentioned in the Biblical text, it is an addition made by Ibn Ezra. In my opinion he had extrapolated from his interpretation of the material used in the Tabernacle. In Ibn Ezra’s eyes, standard luxurious textile is silk, just as he had seen in Muslim Spain. R. Abraham Ibn Ezra expounds on the difference between understanding the Hebrew Bible by its simple (pǝšaṭ) – and preferable – meaning, or by its allegorical (midrašic) interpretation: The ‘midraš’s interpretations are like garments which adhere to the body [‘the body’ signifying the simple meaning] – some are as fine as silk,53 others as thick as sackcloth.54

He uses familiar textile examples for his analogy. The ‘fine as silk’ type indicates delicately nuanced allegories which are difficult to comprehend. Whereas the ‘thick as sackcloth’ type indicates those which are straightfor49 R. Abraham Ibn Ezra left Iberia at the age of 50 (Mishaly et al., Shene perushe, p. 13) which

50 51 52

53 54

tends to indicate that most of his imagery derives from the earlier part of his life. Cf. R. Judah ha-Levi’s reference to al-dībāj. Dr Mariano Gomez, Instituto de Lenguas y Culturas del Mediterraneo y del Oriente Próximo, CSIC. Madrid, provided further insight into this topic. Esther 1. 6. Cf. Ben-Yehuda, Textile production, pp. 61–62; Noonan, Non-Semitic Loanwords, pp. 134–35. Quoted here is his first commentary to Esther (Rome, 1140–1142). In his second commentary to Esther (Rouen, Normandy 1150–1157), he maintains his opinion that these are hues, adding that karpas may be the (green) hue of celery (Apium graveolens). However, in that version he refrains from any mention of silk. Cf. Maimonides, Commentary on the Mishnah, Tractate Aholot 13. 6, p. 333, below, in which silk is the example for a very fine material. Lamentations – Introduction (composed in ‘rhymed prose’).

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ward and simply understood. According to Ibn Ezra, one must be careful to discern between the two.

I b n Ez ra’s Sef er YƏsod Moraˀ Ibn Ezra’s theological treatise, Sefer Yǝsod Moraˀ (Book on the Foundation of Awe) was written (in Hebrew) towards the end of his life (1158), in London. In section (a), he criticizes those scholars for whom ‘all of their (biblical) knowledge’ is restricted to ‘masora’ (literally ‘tradition’) – the systematic presentation and preservation of the consonantal text of the Hebrew Bible, and its vocalization and accentuation. According to Ibn Ezra, though greatly important, this is insufficient. Such knowledge excludes the significant and primary content of the Bible – its theological message. He provides two metaphors to illustrate the severity of this improper approach: first, a medical image, and then a second that employs Ibn Ezra’s beloved silk: The scholar of masora who did not learn any other discipline is comparable to a camel carrying silk. The camel is not beneficial to the silk, nor is the silk beneficial to the camel.55

Ibn Ezra likens the scholar of masora to the camel, a beast of burden essential for transporting goods with its own, albeit limited, intrinsic value just as the consonants, vowels and accents of the Hebrew Bible are essential as a linguistic basis to convey the theological message; whereas the scholar (or knowledge) of theology is likened to silk – a more valuable and prestigious material. Thus, theology is more important than linguistics. He does, however, add in reciprocity, that the theological content of the Hebrew Bible does not benefit the masoretic aspects. Ibn Ezra assumes the material aspects of the analogy are familiar enough to his intended readership to clarify his message.56 55 R. Avraham ibn Ezra, Yǝsod Moraˀ v’Sod Tora, ed. by Yosef Cohen (Ramat Gan: Bar Ilan

University, 2002).

56 Ibn Ezra could well have viewed camel trains during his travels in North Africa, but

archaeological evidence for the use of camels for cargo and transport in al-Andalus in this period indicates that he could also have seen them in Europe; José Antonio Riquelme Cantal, ‘Nuevas Evidencias Arqueológicas de la Presencia de Dromedario, Camelus Dromedarius, L., en el sur de la Península Ibérica: Cortijo de Los Robles (Jaén) y Torrevieja, Villamartín (Cádiz)’, Cuadernos de Prehistoria y Arqueología de la Universidad de Granada, 23 (2013), 347–64. The camels might have been carrying yarn, dyed or undyed, or woven fabric. We should, however, be cautious about extrapolating historical data from Ibn Ezra’s brief comment. Dr Miguel Ángel Ladero Quesada, Real Academia de la Historia, Madrid, Dr Mariano Gomez, Instituto de Lenguas y Culturas del Mediterraneo y del Oriente Próximo, CSIC. Madrid, Adela Fábregas, Doctora en Historia Medieval y Licenciada en Filología Semítica por la Universidad de Granada and Dr Julia Martínez, Universitat de València, have all provided additional insight into this matter.



Sil k as R ef lect ed in M edieval Ib eri a n Jewi s h L i tera ture 331

R. M oses M ai m oni des and Je wish L aw R. Moshe Ben Maimon (Moses Maimonides) was a Jewish exegete, legal decisor, adjudicator and responser, theologian and physician. Born in Cordoba in 1135, he emigrated at the age of twenty to Fez, Morocco, where he studied medicine. In 1165 he travelled to the Land of Israel and settled in Fusṭāṭ, Egypt, dying there in 1204. Maimonides’ Commentary on the Mishnah, finalised in 1168, is written in JudeoArabic.57 Begun in Fez and concluded in Fusṭāṭ, it nevertheless contains many recollections from his youth in al-Andalus.58 In this work, Maimonides mentions ‘silk’ fifteen times, notwithstanding its absence in the earlier sources which are the foundation for Maimonides’ opinions. This shows that he considered silk was relevant and an essential inclusion for the contemporary application of Mishnaic law. Concerning the susceptibility to legal impurity of various dining-associated textiles, tablecloth and pillow – keset (the first appearance of this term in his work), Maimonides provides a description, the Arabic term, and the material of which it can be made: ‘Wool, silk or linen.’59 When a woman who is currently a widow or divorcee claims that she was a virgin at the time of her marriage, if at that wedding she went out in a hinoma60 and with uncovered hair, these prove her virginity. Maimonides describes the hinoma as ‘A silk tent, in which the practice was to bring the virgin from her father’s home to the groom’s home’. 61 In no previous source is this ‘silk tent’ mentioned. Perhaps Maimonides had observed it. The household chores required of a wife are specified. If she has maid-servants, her duties are reduced in correlation to their number. If there are four 57 All quotations are from Mishnah ˁim Pirush Rabenu Moshe Ben Maimon, ed. by Yosef Qafiḥ

(Jerusalem: Mosad HaRav Kook, 1962–1966).

58 This point is vital in order to identify the locale of his descriptions. In his introduction,

he refers to himself as ‘The Sefaradi’ (an adjective indicating the person’s place of origin. (‘Sefarad’, is the usual Hebrew appellation for the Iberian Peninsula. See Ibn Shaprut, pp. 319–20, above). In his Commentary, he refers 22 times to an Arabic term used, or a practice accepted, or an item familiar in al-Mag̲h̲rib (North Africa). Once he mentions an halakhic decision which was rendered to a man in ‘Andalus’; twice, an Arabic term used in Sefarad (in contrast to the one used in Egypt); once he says, ‘The Sefaradim call it […]’ in contrast to the al-Mag̲h̲ribi term. He mentions an essay on geometry written in Sefarad; and, notably, mentions a food often eaten both in al-Mag̲h̲rib and the ‘Islands [Balearic?] of Sefarad’. Therefore additional information, albeit unidentified as such, may originate in al-Andalus. 59 Tractate Berakhot 8. 3. 60 This is a Greek loanword: ὑμέναιος, umenaios, originally meaning hymenaeus, the wedding or bridal song; Nurit Shoval-Dudai, Gloser ha-milim ha-sheʼulot min ha-yeṿanit u-min ha-romit ba-meḳorot ha-yehudiyim ha-betar-miḳraiyim (A Glossary of Greek and Latin Loanwords in PostBiblical Jewish Literature) [in Hebrew] (Jerusalem: The Academy of the Hebrew Language, 2019), p. 82. 61 Tractate Ketubot 2. 1.

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maid-servants, she may ‘sit in a katedra’62 (and is exempt from all duties).63 ‘Katedra’ is a rare word in Mishnah and as this is its first appearance, Maimonides explains that ‘katedra’ is an ‘apiryon’64 made of silk and other fabrics and wood, in which kings sit whilst travelling. Again, this may be a personal observation. A widow’s rights to inheritance take precedence over her offspring’s. Maimonides adds that she may continue to use the utensils and garments to which she is accustomed, even silk and gold ones.65 Witnesses must undergo exacting examinations to have their testimony accepted in court, including identification of details of dress worn by lender and/ or borrower. Maimonides provides an example: ‘Were the coins in a silk or wool pouch?’66 Maimonides reviews different views of ‘true bliss’ (which he subsequently rejects). One group believes that bliss is the Garden of Eden, which is a place of eating and drinking with no physical exertion or effort. There are houses made of gemstones, bedding of silk, and rivers flowing with wine and fragrant oils […] . 67

Textiles are susceptible to legal impurity. A minimum area of cloth is required to enable this susceptibility. Argaman (Tyrian purple) and zǝhorit ṭova (fine kermes), being high quality fabrics, are susceptible even at the smaller dimensions. The Mishnah does not identify the textile material itself, only the dyestuff. However, Maimonides identifies the kermes-dyed material as silk and adds his own clarification: Since Tyrian purple cloth and silk cloth are important and very expensive, they are susceptible to impurity even at the small dimension (3×3 fingerbreadths), and even if they were thrown away – because they are important.68

62 This is a Greek loanword καθέδρα, kathédra (‘seat of honour’) Shoval-Dudai, Glossary of Greek

and Latin Loanwords, p. 164.

63 Tractate Ketubot 5. 4. 64 This is a Greek loanword: φορεῖον, phoreion (litter, sedan-chair); Shoval-Dudai Glossary of

65

66 67 68

Greek and Latin Loanwords, p. 140. The term appears in the biblical book Song of Songs (3. 9) and in the Mishnaic tractate Sota (9. 14). Tractate Ketubot 12. 3. In Tractate Negaˁim (11. 10), a chapter deals with a garment which has become legally impure because of an ‘eruptive affection’ (Leviticus 13. 47–59, NJPS translation) and therefore must be burned. The decorative hems may, however, be saved. Maimonides adds: ‘Certainly if they are silk or gold and the like they may be saved, but in this case even wool and linen are exempt from burning.’ Tractate Sanhedrin 4. 1. Tractate Sanhedrin 10. 1. Tractate Kelim 27. 12. Cf. Ibn Shaprut (tolaˁat šani [kermes] and silk) and Ibn Ezra’s mention of this dyestuff used for silk (Exodus 25. 3–4 short commentary, Esther 1. 5–6), p. 329 above. Zǝhorit is a Targumic/Mishnaic term identical in meaning to tolaˁat šani.



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Actually, the kermes-dyed material of the Mishnah, in 3rd-century CE Land of Israel, was certainly wool. Maimonides reflects his own time and place. A cadaver is legally impure. This impurity can radiate from the room where the cadaver is into another adjacent room – through an open window of certain dimensions. If the window is of the proper dimensions, but material placed in it diminishes those dimensions, the impurity will be blocked and not radiate. If, however, that material lacks certain properties, it does not diminish the size of the window. One of these properties is substantiality. The paragraph mentions kakay, a currently unidentified material which is considered insubstantial, and therefore does not diminish the size of the window, and subsequently the impurity will still radiate from one side to the other. The interesting point is Maimonides’ description of kakay: Kakay is a white fine fibre found in large reeds, and it is similar to spiders’ gossamer … sometimes this fibre is very fine, even finer than silk fibres.69

Mishn eh Torah 70 Maimonides’ monumental compendium of Jewish law, Mishneh Torah, was composed in Hebrew in Fusṭāṭ (1168–1178). Many of the topics addressed therein had appeared earlier in his Commentary on the Mishnah; however he had often changed his mind. One who betroths a woman ‘by these garments which are worth fifty dinars’, if they are silk and the like those women yearn for, she is considered betrothed immediately, and appraisal is not required.71

The statement that ‘women yearn for silk garments’ is Maimonides’ own interpretation. That usage and all the following do not appear in Talmudic sources.

69 Tractate Aholot 13. 6. Note Ibn Ezra’s similar analogical use of silk, p. 329 above. 70 All quotations are taken from Mishneh Torah - HaYad Ha Ḥazaqa L’Rabeinu Moshe Ben Maimon,

ed. by M.D. Rabinowitz (Jerusalem: Mosad Harav Kook. 1984). In ‘Mishneh Torah’, whilst many of his observations of local practices or phenomena are identified as occurring in contemporaneous Egypt (14), he does mention practices of Babylonia, ‘The West’ (al-Mag̲h̲rib), The Land of Israel, and France (7). He mentions the scholars and experts of Sepharad (3). Perhaps most noteworthy are his phrases: ‘Common practice in all of our cities in Sepharad’, ‘Occurrences that were always with us in Sepharad’, and ‘those were daily practice in Sepharad’. All of this reflects his vivid memories of and identification with his homeland. It is therefore possible that additional (and unidentified as such) material may be judiciously identified as originating in al-Andalus. 71 Laws of Marital Relations 7. 18.

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A husband is obligated to furnish garments and jewellery for his wife, according to his financial means.72

Maimonides develops this to: A husband who has the means to purchase for his wife garments of silk and embroidery, and gold jewellery – but does not do so – the court compels him to purchase them for her.73

The Laws of Assessments and Proscriptions 3.16 decree that if someone consecrates his possessions or vows an amount to the Temple and does not have the required means to redeem or pay, his possessions will be confiscated for that purpose. Maimonides’ own examples, again pairing silk and gold, are: If he is wearing silk and gold garments, they are taken from him, and he is given other garments which are appropriate for his standard of living.74

Maimonides repeatedly includes silk and gold in his explanations. One who is engaged to guard a deposit (even being unsalaried) is responsible for the deposit’s safety, and if it is stolen, he is obliged to compensate the owner. This is the case if he had been irresponsible, and placed the object in an unsafe place. However, if it had been properly protected, he is exempt from paying compensation. Different materials have requirements for safekeeping respective to their value. Planks and stones may be placed outside, large bundles of flax may be placed in the yard, and common garments must be placed in the house. However, expensive silk garments or silver and gold vessels must be placed in a locked chest.75

When payment of the loan or debt is required and the borrower or debtor lacks the sufficient funds, his possessions may be confiscated – with exception of daily necessities. … He is left with clothing sufficient for twelve months, but not silk garments nor a golden turban […] 76

72 Laws of Marital Relations 13. 5. 73 The example of ‘silk and embroidered garments’ is Maimonides’ own interpretation. This

pair of terms/materials appears in Laws of Mourning 4. 2 as well (below p. 345). There the embroidery is gold. Most likely, Maimonides is paraphrasing Ezekiel 16. 10, 13, interpreting meši as silk, as discussed above (p. 320). Similar phrasing can be found several times in the secular Hebrew poetry of R. Moses Ibn Ezra ‘Abū Harūn’ (1055–1138 Granada), as well as the Jewish poet Yosef Ibn Ḥasdai (11th century, Cordoba-Zaragoza), in addition to the Arabic works of Andalusian Muslim poet Ibn ʿAbd Rabbih (860–940, Cordoba). 74 Cf. Mishnah Ketubot 12. 3, p. 331 above. 75 Laws of Borrowing and Deposits 4. 2. 76 Laws of the Moneylender and Borrower 1. 7.



Sil k as R ef lect ed in M edieval Ib eri a n Jewi s h L i tera ture 335

A basic prohibition for using lavish funeral shrouds is stated in the Talmud, but Maimonides furnished specific examples. Perhaps he had viewed certain practices and intended to admonish those who practiced them: It is forbidden to bury the dead in shrouds of silk or golden embroidered garments, even a very important person. For that practice demonstrates haughtiness and wastefulness […] 77

Responsa 78 There are 467 of Maimonides’ responsa extant, nine of which mention Andalus or Sefarad.79 An incident mentioned in a responsum may have occurred only once, may represent an infrequent phenomenon, or may be a common occurrence. In Responsum 57 Reuben divorced his wife. The divorcée claims that Simeon80 had given her silk ‘to make for him’ (either silk fibre to throw, or silk yarn to dye and/or to weave). She was paid for her work, and relinquished the salary to her husband in accordance with Jewish law. The work was never finished whilst she was married. Now she will finish the work, and she demands that Reuben return the money. Maimonides obligated Reuben to return his ex-wife’s money.81 Simeon evidently outsourced his silk production, and paid on a piecework basis. Apparently, the craftswoman was reliable and could be paid entirely in advance. In Responsum 151, plied silk yarn appears incidentally for use as a tape measure which does not stretch, and is therefore consistently accurate for the measurement of the circumference of a Torah scroll. From among available fibres, silk would be the most stable material for use – being a continuous strand.82 77 Laws of Mourning 4. 2. 78 All quotations taken from Yehoshua Blau, trans., She’elot u’Teshuvot Rabbi Moshe Ben Maimon

(Jerusalem: Makhon Yerushalayim, 1957–‫‏‬1960‫)‏‬.

79 In 39 of them, Egypt, Alexandria or Fusṭāṭ are mentioned as the locale of the occurrence being

reviewed, or of scholars whose opinion is mentioned. 18 mention ‘The West’ (al-Mag̲h̲rib). There is some overlap between the respective responsa. The vast majority do not mention any locale at all, and could possibly be from Cordoba (depending on their date – which is usually not indicated). The responsa which address silk and have no specific non-Iberian locale will be examined here. 80 ‘Reuben’ and ‘Simeon’ are standard pseudonyms in Talmudic and Rabbinic literature, used to protect the anonymity of those involved in the dispute. However, there is no doubt that the events mentioned actually occurred. 81 Cf. a similar case, albeit with less detail, regarding a divorcée, in responsa of R. Shlomo Ben Adret (1235–1310 Barcelona), Chapter 2, section 73; Solomon ben Abraham Adret, Teshuvot sheʼelot LehaRASHBA: Responsa of R. Solomon ben Abraham Adret: first edition, Rome ca. 1470, ed. by Shelomoh Zalman Havlin (Jerusalem: Jewish National & University Library Press, 1976). 82 Modern textile terminology uses ‘filament yarn’, in contrast to ‘staple fibre yarn’ such as cotton.

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Responsum 268 relates that a man purchased a prayer shawl, and in order to beautify his service to God through this commandment of wearing a tasselled garment, embroidered it with silk by excellent craftsmanship. He also embroidered on it a verse from the Bible. The embroidered verse was deemed to show disrespect for the Holy Scriptures, and he was required to cut it off and deposit in the genizah – a repository for holy items no longer in use. However, use of the embroidered garment itself could continue. This attests to use of silk for fine decorative embroidery on garments and religious vestments in particular.

Mixed materials A biblical prohibition forbids the mixing of sheep’s wool and flax-linen in garments.83 The Mishnah states a rabbinic injunction in which additional textile materials – šǝrayim and kalakh – are added to this prohibition. Because of their misleading impression, they may cause biblical law to be violated.84 There are several interpretations of these additional materials. We will endeavour to examine the suggestions. Various materials are permitted or prohibited to be used as wicks in an oil lamp on the Sabbath.85 One of the materials prohibited (because its capillarity is poor and causes the lamp’s flame to sputter) is kalakh, which Maimonides interprets as silk.86 The Babylonian Talmud in that tractate (20b) addresses that Mishnah and offers several lexical suggestions for kalakh: kulkha, guškara and metaksa including šǝrayim: silk (Middle Iranian šērāi).87 Maimonides explains as follows: Šǝrayim and kalakh are types of silk88 which are similar in appearance to either flax or wool. One of the silks is ‘soft, like flax’ and the other ‘hard and hairy, like wool’.89 That is the reason that those silks are forbidden in union cloth either both 83 Leviticus 19. 19, Deuteronomy 22. 11. 84 Tractate Kilˀayim 9. 2.

85 Tractate Shabbat 2. 1. 86 Maimonides Commentary on the Mishnah. Mishneh Torah, Laws of Shabbat 5. 5.

87 Sokoloff, Dictionary of Jewish Palestinian Aramaic, pp. 632–33; Sokoloff, Dictionary of Jewish

Babylonian Aramaic, p. 4140.

88 Arabic al-Ḥarīr. Maimonides derived this from both Talmudic discussions above. He does not

identify the specific silks themselves, and we will propose several possibilities.

89 Maimonides does not mention here the hue of this wool; however flax in its natural state

is ecru colour. We may therefore seek silks which are white, off-white and/or ecru/tan. In his later work Mishneh Tora (Laws of Kilˀayim 10. 2) he presents a redaction of this law, and mentions šǝrayim with no description whatsoever, presumably believing that it is selfunderstood. But he provides a different explanation for kalakh: sea silk (Pinna nobilis), ‘which is gold-coloured and extremely soft and similar to lamb’s wool and is therefore forbidden together with flax’. There are many instances of Maimonides changing his opinion from his Commentary on the Mishnah to the later work Mishneh Tora. Sea silk was indeed in use in Egypt at that time; see S. D. Goitein, A Mediterranean Society: The Jewish Communities of the Arab World



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Fig. 13.2  Above, natural linen textiles: left, dew retted flax; right, pool retted flax. Below, flax stricks: left, Beth Shean (Israel); right, Linho galego (Portugal). Materials: Naḥum Ben-Yehuda. Photographed for Naḥum Ben-Yehuda by Isaac Canetti.

together (šǝrayim and kalakh), or the flax-like silk with actual wool, or the woollike silk with actual flax.90

Since his description of the quality of flax and wool is surprising – generally speaking, flax is hard and wool soft, and his description the opposite – it is necessary to disambiguate the analogy. It is possible that his description does in fact reflect contemporaneous realia. One of the historical flax types in Portugal is the landrace linho galego91 (Fig 13.2) which produces very soft fibres – significantly

as Portrayed in the Documents of the Cairo Geniza, 6 vols (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1999), I, p. 106, IV, p. 182, ‘sea wool’. The wool he now describes is obviously very different from the al-Andalus ‘hard and hairy’ Churra wool. Its similarity to sea silk is its golden colour and/or soft texture. 90 The extrapolation is my own. 91 Joana Isabel Sequeira, O Pano da Terra (Porto: Universidade do Porto, 2014) pp. 231–32.

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softer than those of modern-day cultivars.92 Apparently a similar soft fibre was common in 12th-century al-Andalus. In medieval al-Andalus there were two main breeds of sheep: Merino and Churra.93 Merino sheep (Fig 13.3) produce fine, soft wool; Churra (Fig 13.4) produce long, hairy, rough/coarse wool. Churra wool fits Maimonides’ description well.94 Now we must set out to identify the silks – parallel in their similarities to flax and wool – to which Maimonides is alluding.95 The flax-like and/or wool-like silks Maimonides mentions may be either Bombyx mori96 silk or ‘wild silk’. Wild silks are non-mulberry silk, and ‘Unlike mulberry silk, which is pure white, wild silks are beige, dark brown, golden brown or pale green in their natural colours […]’ .97 Textiles woven from spun wild silk yarn are coarser and heavier than those made with reeled silk.98 There are several possible historical, albeit later, Iberian candidates for silks which match Maimonides’ above-mentioned characteristics of tan/ecru colour (Fig. 13.5), soft and ‘flax-like’; or off-white colour, hard and hairy ‘wool-like’:99

92 From personal observation. 93 This identification has been derived from the corroboration of various sources, among

94

95

96 97

98 99

them: ‘Tipos y calidades de lana’; A. Rodero Serano, J. V. Delgado and E. Rodero Ranganillo, ‘Primitive Andalusian Livestock and Their Implications in the Discovery of America’, Archivos de Zootecnia, 41 (extra) (1992), pp. 383–400: ‘they were famous for their meat but not for their wool, which is very coarse; they correspond to the present Lebrijano Churro Sheep’, p. 387; ‘the Churro Breed, probably belonging to the Lebrijano Churro type, today near extinction’, p. 397; Valerie Porter, Lawrence Alderson, et al., Mason’s World Encyclopedia of Livestock Breeds and Breeding (Wallingford: CAB International, 2016), p. 741: ‘Andalusian Churro’. Maimonides was probably familiar with Andalusi Merino wool as well, but chose Churra for the current context. See his commentary to Mishnah Tractate Ḥulin (11. 1) where he states that: ‘Wool from both male and female sheep is “soft and fit for wearing”, as opposed to “wool” [hair] from other animals [probably goats] which is coarse and therefore unfit for garments.’ Churra wool is certainly not as coarse as goat’s hair, but not as soft as Merino wool. It was used for coarse garments, such as ‘Burel’; Sequeira, O Pano da Terra, pp. 40–41, 190, 201–02. Later in his commentary to this tractate (Kilˀayim 9. 9) he states that it is forbidden to sew together (and wear) wool and linen cloths – even with silk or cotton thread (which are considered neutral). He is probably referring to ‘regular’ Mulberry/Bombyx silk, which is suitable indeed for fine strong sewing thread, and not to the ‘special’ ones mentioned in our current paragraph (9. 2). This law has been redacted in Mishneh Torah Laws of Kilˀayim 10. 3. Cf. ‘New’ responsa of R. Shlomo Ben Adret, Chapter 149, dealing with the sewing of wool to linen with silk or hemp thread. Also referred to as ‘mulberry silk’. Richard S. Peigler, ‘Wild silks: their entomological aspects and their textile applications’, in Handbook of Natural Fibres, ed. by Ryszard Kozlowski and Maria Mackiewicz-Talarczyk, 2 vols, 2nd edn (Sawston: Woodhead, 2020), I, pp. 715–45. Peigler, ‘Wild silks’, p. 718. Some of the following categories overlap in some degree. See Fig. 13.1 for examples of hairy and wool-like Bombyx mori fabrics.

Fig. 13.3  Spanish Merino: left, fleece by permission of Sergio Nogales Baena; right top, sheep by permission of Proyecto dLana SL; right bottom, yarn, by permission of Proyecto dLana SL, photographed for Naḥum Ben-Yehuda by Isaac Canetti.

Fig. 13.4 Churra Lebrijana: left, fleece by permission of Sergio Nogales Baena; right top, sheep by permission of Sergio Nogales Baena; right bottom, yarn. Fleece and yarn photographed for Naḥum Ben-Yehuda by Isaac Canetti.

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Azache100 – Silk of inferior quality. A very black silk.101 Primitxol – Loose and very twisted silk. Primitxol can be coloured or black.102 Seda Filada – Spun on a distaff like flax. Stupa (tow) of silk. ‘Borra di seta’ – (fluff, lint, ‘wool’) of silk.103 Seda Grollera – [or Grosera (rough, coarse)] The coarse silk from the outside of the cocoon. Aducar, cadarro, atanquía (alanquia?), seda azache, seda de todo capullo…

Another possibility for the identification of Maimonides’ materials is wild silk coloured similarly to flax or natural wool. It is usually spun, not reeled, thus producing a rougher and fuzzier texture than reeled Bombyx mori silk. Two silk moths, Saturnia pyri (Giant Peacock Moth)104 and Pachypasa otus105 (Fig 13.6) may be candidates for this silk.106 Both are documented as being historically found in Europe. Saturnia pyri silk would be brown or golden brown if processed like most cocoons, for the cocoon itself is dark brown (Azache or Primitxol?). Processed silk of Pachypasa otus would be white or creamy, possibly grey. These two silk moths and their respective fibres provide candidates for both a flax-like and a wool-like silk.

100 Note that this and the following Spanish or Catalan terms were unknown to Maimonides.

101 Martín Alonso, Enciclopedia del Idioma: diccionario histórico y moderno de la lengua española (siglos

XII al XX): etimológico, tecnológico, regional e hispanoamericano, 3 vols (Madrid: Aguilar, 1982), II, p. 3729b; Federico Corriente, Diccionario De Arabismos y voces afines en iberorromance (Cordoba: Gredos, 2003), pp. 138–39 s.v. alchaz; Joan Corominas, Diccionario crítico etimológico castellano e hispánico, 6 vols (Madrid: Gredos, 1993–1996), I (1993), p. 429, s.v. azache; M. Garzón Pareja and Antonio Domínguez Ortiz, La Industria sedera en España: el arte de la seda de Granada (Granada: Archivo de la real chancillería, 1972), state: ‘This silk is characterised by inferior quality. It is extracted – after removing the fluff – from the first layers of the cocoon’, p. 339; Dolores Serrano-Niza. ‘Arabismos Relacionados con el Lexico de la Seda’, Revista De Filología, 25 (February 2007), 559–66 (p. 564). Miguel Gual Camarena, Vocabulario del comercio medieval (Barcelona: Ediciones El Abir SA, 1976), s.v. 102 ‘Primitxol’, in Diccionari català-valencià-balear, available at [accessed 25 August 2021]. 103 Diccionari Català-Castellà-Llatí-Frances-Italià, ed. by una societat de catalans, 2 vols (Alicante: Biblioteca Virtual Joan Lluís Vives, 2002; 1st ed. Barcelona: J. Torner, 1839), II, p. 765. 104 ‘Saturnia pyri’ (Satupy), in EPPO Global Database, available at [accessed 25 August 2021]. 105 ‘Pachypasa otus’ (Pacsot), in EPPO Global Database, available at [accessed 25 August 2021]. 106 See also: E. Handschin, ‘Wild Silk Moths’, Ciba Review, 53 (1946), 1915–22; Antoinette Rast-Eicher, Fibres: Microscopy of Archaeological Textiles and Furs (Budapest: Archaeolingua Alapítvány, 2016), pp. 277–78. John Peter Wild, Textile Manufacture in the Northern Roman Provinces (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1970), pp. 10–11. All of the above mention Aristotle’s Coan silk and its possible identification with these two silkworms.



Sil k as R ef lect ed in M edieval Ib eri a n Jewi s h L i tera ture 341

Fig. 13.5 Shades of wild silks. Fabrics furnished courtesy of Whaleys Bradford Ltd. Photographed for Naḥum Ben-Yehuda by Isaac Canetti.

R. Ash er B en Y eH. i el and Je wish L aw Rabbi, Talmudic commentator, Jewish legal adjudicator and decisor, Asher Ben Yeḥiel was also known by his Hebrew acronym ‘ha-Rosh’ (‘The head’). Born in 1250 in Cologne, he fled Germany in 1303, reaching Barcelona the following year, where he was welcomed with great honour by R. Shlomo Ben Adret. In 1305 he accepted the position of rabbi in Toledo where he remained until his death in 1327. There he became the accepted rabbinic leader of all Castile.

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a

b

c

d

Fig. 13.6  Silk moths and cocoons: a  top left: Saturnia pyri cocoons  b  top right: Saturnia pyri moth. c  bottom left: Pachypasa otus cocoons  d  bottom right: Pachypasa otus moth. Photos: courtesy of Richard Peigler.

His primary legal works, all either entirely written or redacted finally in Toledo include over 1,000 extant responsa.107 They are of the utmost significance in the study of halakhic development and give an insight into the cultural life of Spanish Jewry. Three responsa mention silk. A question regarding the biblical prohibition of ‘forbidden mixtures of diverse kinds kilˀayim’, (above p. 336), specifically concerns whether patches108 made in 107 All quotations taken from Sefer She'elot u'Tshuvot LaRav Asher b. r. Yechiel (New York: Grossman

Publishing House, 1954).

108 The (later) 16th-century terms for this were bordado de cortadura or aplicado; María Barrigón,

‘Hilos de oro tendidos, cortauras y matiz: joyas del Obrador de bordados de El Escorial’, Reales Sitios, 198 (2013) pp. 40–69, at p. 42.



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Fig. 13.7  Two fragments of fabric decorated with eagles and trees of life; al-Andalus, Almohad kingdom, 12th to 13th century. Linen warp and linen wefts; tabby with supplementary silk weft, polychrome silks. From the Collegiate Church of Sant Vicenç de Roda de Ribagorça; MEV 9188. Photo: © Museu Episcopal de Vic by permission of Anna Horns.

such a way that their warp is flax-linen and weft is silk109 (Fig. 13.7), which women sew on their [wool] garments (‘sarbal’) are permissible. R. Asher prohibits this 109 This textile is classified as union cloth, in this case media seda or filoseda: a classic medieval

weave, flax-linen (or cotton) warp and silk weft. The weave is often weft-faced (the silk weft concealing the flax-linen warp). Interestingly the statesman, biblical exegete, and theologian R. Isaac Abravanel (1437 Lisbon – 1484 Toledo – 1508 Venice) describes the very same weave. In his commentary to Exodus 26. 1 ‘The bolts of the Tabernacle are made of flax-linen warp – because it is strong – and the weft is silk’; R. Yizhak Abarbanel, Perush HaTora, ed. by Yehuda Shaviv (Jerusalem: Horev, 1996–2007). See Joana Sequeira, ‘The Salviati-Da Colle Company and the Florentine silks trade in Lisbon in the 15th century’, De Medio Aevo, 7.1 (2015), 47–62 (and especially pp. 58–59), indicating that Abravanel was (also) a silk merchant, and therefore intimately familiar with these products. Abravanel mentions silk in five additional contexts in his commentary to the Hebrew Bible.

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practice, because the sewing thread attaches the wool of the garment to the flaxlinen of the patch.110 The flax warp is not considered annulled by the silk weft.111 A monetary dispute regarding an alleged breach of contract concerns a transaction at market.112 Reuben (the plaintiff) charged Simeon (the defendant), and said as follows: ‘I went to the fair. You gave me both funds and merchandise. I was supposed to sell your merchandise there and bring you other merchandise. A condition of the contract was that I would receive one third of the profit from your sale of the new merchandise. In accordance with your commitment, I sold your merchandise [at the fair] in the city of Alba.113 I had to go from there to get my payment in Salamanca. Then I brought you the merchandise as specified in our agreement. Now I request from you that you give me the one third of the profit, just as you obligated yourself, and to refund the expenses that I put out for you’. Simeon [the defendant] countered: ‘No! Rather, you wanted to go to the fair and I told you that there was inexpensive tolaˁat šani [kermes].114 I gave you funds to 110 In opposition to Maimonides, R. Asher does not prohibit silk itself attached to either wool or

flax-linen. This will be presented in full infra.

111 Responsum Chapter 2, section 5.

112 Responsum Chapter 88, section 6.

113 This topographical name is featured in the manuscript edition, whereas the printed edition

states ‘Malaka’ – obviously an error. The famous fair of Alba de Tormes has been documented since 1255; Miguel-Angel Ladero Quesada, Las Ferias de Castilla Siglos XII–XV (Madrid: Comité Español de Ciencias Históricas, 1994), p. 39, ‘Regarding the purchase in Alba and the payment in Salamanca – this was not an uncommon phenomenon’. Alba’s fair would continue to be held throughout the Late Middle Ages, but, as in so many other cases, there is hardly any information, and none about its specific characteristics. It would be of regional scope but, owing to its proximity to Salamanca, it could attract merchants from other regions, among them Toledo. I would like to thank Dr Miguel Ángel Ladero Quesada for additional insight into this matter. 114 See Ibn Shaprut p. 320, above. However, the current juxtaposition of tolaˁat šani with the alternative merchandise, silk, requires new interpretation. In contrast to the 3 raw materials (silk, tolaˁat šani, and saffron) mentioned by Ibn Shaprut, here these may well be semi-finished (cloth) or finished goods (garments). Supportive of this proposition are: ‘Carmesí. - Variedad de tejidos de seda, asi denominado por su color rojo brillante, que empieza a ser mencionada en la documentación a partir de los últimos años del siglo XIII’ (a variety of brilliant red silk fabrics […]); Pedro Voltes Bou, ‘Nombres de antiguos tejidos de seda’, Boletín de la Real Academia de la Historia, 163 (1968), 217–26 (p. 22); Maria del Carmen Martínez Meléndez, Los nombres de tejidos en Castellano medieval (Granada: Universidad de Granada, 1989), notes that Carmesí is mentioned in 1295 (pp. 553–54), that in the 15th century it is described as ‘Tela de seda roja’ (pp. 277–82) and that Grana is mentioned from the 13th to the 16th century (p. 476–86): ‘Tejido de seda o de lana’ (p. 478), ‘la grana he sido le excrecencia o agallita que el quermes forma en la coscoja, y que exprimida produce color rojo’ (p. 477). Both Carmesí and Grana are commonly identified as ‘tolaˁat šani’. If this identification is valid, then the second option for purchase at the fair may have been undyed silk fabric, and the third option finished garments.



Sil k as R ef lect ed in M edieval Ib eri a n Jewi s h L i tera ture 345 purchase it, and vowed to give you one third of the profit. And that if you don’t find tolaˁat šani then buy silk. I told you that if you do not find either of those, then bring me garments which I will sell in my shop […]’

Another dispute shows the commerce of raw silk or silk yarn in 14th-century Castile was subject to price fluctuation:115 Question: Reuben sold to Simeon ten litras116 of silk, and stipulated that from the time that Simeon resells the silk, Reuben will get a certain percentage of the profit or loss. Simeon took the silk and weighed it. Afterwards when the time came to sell it he weighed it again and found it lacking one half litra. He (Simeon) now demands that Reuben must incur one half of the loss, as was originally stipulated – whatever the circumstances. For if Reuben had misled him at the start regarding the weight of the silk, he would have to recompense Simeon now for that entire amount, and since there is a doubt, he should lose his percentage. Reuben counters: ‘I gave him ten litras as promised. And the conditions of profit or loss do not address shortage of the material, for we did not consider the possibility that some of the material would be stolen or lost owing to your irresponsibility, only the factors of price increase or decrease’. Response: Since Reuben and Simeon are partners for profit or loss, they are partners as well for any other manner of deficiency. Therefore, Simeon must swear that he did not pilfer any material nor was he lax in his guarding of the silk. Then Reuben will compensate him for one half of the deficient material.

Another of R. Asher’s major works was his Commentary on the Mishnah,117 where he made use of Maimonides’ Mishnah commentary and often disagreed with him. According to Maimonides, the biblical prohibition of ‘forbidden mixtures of diverse kinds – kilˀayim’ – in garments applies strictly to flax-linen and sheep’s wool, whereas the rabbinic injunction adds certain types of silk and prohibits their mixture with either wool or linen. In contrast, R. Asher ben Yeḥiel presents a new and revolutionary viewpoint, and subsequently, an opposing halakhic (legal) decision on this issue. Both in his 115 Reponsum Chapter 89, section 2.

116 There is significant ambiguity regarding this terminology. Libra – not litra – would indicate

weight and subsequently identify the product as raw silk of spun silk yarn. In contrast, fabric was sold in Castile by length (‘varas’). In many regions of Castile, in the 15th century, the libra equaled 460 g, but that may not be the case in earlier times. It was customary to sell raw silk yarn in balls and by weight. The use of litra by R. Asher may reflect the Arabic ritl (arrelde) unit of weight. Dr Miguel Ángel Ladero Quesada, Real Academia de la Historia, Madrid, and Tawfiq Ibrahim, Correspondiente of the Real Academia de la Madrid have both provided insight into the topic. 117 Babylonian Talmud with commentators (Vilnius: Y. R. Romm, 1886).

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commentary to the Mishnah,118 and also in his ‘Pisqei Halakhot’ (legal decisions)119 he firstly paraphrases Maimonides’ position. Then he proceeds to quote Talmudic sources that all indicate the rarity and unfamiliarity of silk and therefore the fear that silk will be mixed with either wool or linen and mistakenly interpreted as the biblically forbidden diverse kinds. Notably, R. Asher does not distinguish between different types of silk, as Maimonides does, simply quoting the Talmudic terms, such as šǝrayim and mǝtaksa. At this turning point, he reports a legal decision which he rendered whilst still in Germany. Utilising his understanding of the rationale of the Mishnah (that an unfamiliar material could cause a mistaken impression), he had forbidden hemp to be sewn as lining for a wool garment, ‘because hemp is unfamiliar in Germany and it will be mistaken for linen’.120 Now, he takes the rationale in the opposite direction in Toledo, Castile: ‘Because now [here] silk garments are common among us and familiar to all, there is no reason to prohibit the sewing of silk lining to a wool garment or to use silk thread to sew a “sarbal” [garment] of wool.’121 This new and revolutionary halakhic ruling is subsequently quoted and adopted by R. Asher’s son, R. Jacob Ben Asher (1270–1340), in his own redaction of halakha;122 and in turn by R. Josef Caro (1488–1575) in the equivalent place in his work Shulḥan ˁArukh, who expressly adds that mixtures of either ‘silk and wool’, or ‘silk and linen’, are permitted.123

Conclusio ns Medieval Jewish authors demonstrate familiarity with silk variously thorough descriptions, figurative language and interpretations of religious law. They know of different grades of silk and show familiarity with manufacturing processes. They even projected their knowledge of contemporary Iberian silk on their imagining of biblical textiles, which was not, in fact, historically accurate. The data presented in this chapter demonstrates that medieval Iberian society in general had a great level of ‘textile culture’. In spite of the fact that most of them were not textile artisans themselves, they apparently understood clearly what these authors meant.

118 Tractate Kilˀayim 9. 2.

119 Babylonian Talmud ibid. Kilˀei Bǝgadim, Chapter 7.

120 Actually, the Mishnah does not prohibit this mixture! Apparently, R. Asher is convinced that hemp was familiar in the time (3rd century) and place (Land of Israel) of the Mishnah’s

redaction. That situation changed in Germany and required reassessment of the halakha.

121 In my opinion, R. Asher would employ this permit to linen and silk, as well. He does not

express his opinion regarding the mixture of hemp and wool in Castile.

122 ˀArbaˁah Ṭurim (Istanbul: Eliezer Sontsino, 1547), Yoreh De’ˁah, Chapter 298.

123 Shulḥan ˁArukh (Vilnius: Y. L. Romm, 1910) Yoreh De‘ˁah, Chapter 298. R. Josef Caro seldom

rules in favour of an opinion opposing Maimonides, as he has done in this instance.

chapter 14

The Garment and the Difference: The Attire of Portuguese Jews and New Christians (Conversos) during the Thirteenth to Sixteenth Centuries Susana Bastos Mateus

I n t r o d u c ti on: Sources, M eth od o l o gy and Chro no l o gy

D

uring the 13th century − in the case of Portugal, mainly from the 14th century onwards − a number of discriminatory measures were imposed on ethnic-religious minorities.1 These minorities, identified as different from other social groups, suffered progressively violent attacks that would culminate in the wellknown massacres of 1391 and the various attacks on Iberian Jewry throughout the 15th century.2 In addition to the physical violence and deaths, the consequences of these attacks were also felt in the context of religious conversions. Many Jews were forced, in a more or less coercive manner, into conversion to Christianity, which brought about a change in Iberian social reality. A situation of social conflict and growing distrust led to critical events such as the expulsion of 1492, the forced conversion in Portugal in 1497, and the establishment of the inquisitorial

1

For a general approach to the subject, see Maria José Ferro Tavares, Os Judeus em Portugal no século XIV (Lisbon: Guimarães Editores, 2000); Maria Filomena Lopes de Barros, ‘Judeus, Cristãos e Muçulmanos no Portugal Medieval’, Praça Velha, 36 (2016), 37–52. 2 David Nirenberg, ‘Conversion, Sex and Segregation: Iberian Jews and Christians after the Massacres of 1391’, American Historical Review, 107 (2002), 1065–93.

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courts in the different peninsular territories from the end of the 15th century up to the first three decades of the 16th century.3 This is the social and religious context on which our analysis is based: a changing world in which religious diversity was not tolerated. In the Iberian Peninsula of the 14th and 15th centuries, we can find two strong trends. On the one hand, a growing segregation of minorities motivated by the implementation of the decrees emanating from the Fourth Lateran Council (1215), and, on the other, a growing anti-Jewish mind-set experienced in the Iberian Peninsula that sought − at least in theory − not only to identify the Jews, but also, or even above all, with this ability to identify, to segregate them.4 These anti-Jewish attitudes, fuelled by rumours circulating orally in the streets, made it difficult for Jews and Christians to coexist in daily life. The identification of the Jews as ‘the other’ made the population look upon them as dangerous and subversive elements. In that perception of difference, some elements were fundamental, including clothing or publicly visible religious practices.5 One who is regarded as different can be identified by various characteristics: language, name, daily lifestyle and religious practices, the place where he lives and the garments worn in everyday life or in religious ceremonies. In the case of the Portuguese Jews it was easy to identify these elements, and thus know that one was in the presence of a Jew. Although there are not many descriptions of how the Jews dressed, the historian Maria José Ferro Tavares mentions some descriptions from the anti-Jewish book Ajuda da Fé contra os Judeos (Help of Faith against the Jews), written in 1486 by a newly-converted Jew, Master António. In one passage of the book, the author describes a group of rabbis present in a religious dispute. He emphasises that they were dressed in black clothes, as if they were in mourning. In the author’s words, these men also had long beards and a yellowish skin tone. That is, in this chapter of the book, Master António describes the Jews − in this case a group of rabbis − as having a distinctive dress style and, in addition, specific physiognomical features.6 These elements associated with the Jews – such as long beards or the wearing of caps – were widespread in the population, as can be seen in some quick and unexpected drawings made by 3

Maria José Ferro Tavares, Os Judeus em Portugal no século XV, I (Lisbon: Universidade Nova de Lisboa, 1982). 4 David Nirenberg, Anti-Judaism. The Western Tradition (New York: W. W. Norton & Company, 2013). 5 Some iconography from the 14th to 16th centuries shows expressions of this anti-Judaism, in which some elements that expressed the otherness conferred on the Jews are exacerbated. See Luís Afonso, ‘Iconografia antijudaica em portugal (séculos XIV–XV)’, Cadernos de Estudos Sefarditas, 6 (2006), 101–31; Francisca Pires de Almeida, ‘O corpo figurado dos judeus em Braga nos inícios do século XVI’, dgitAR – Revista Digital de Arqueologia e Artes, 2 (2015), 186–94 [accessed 12 April 2022]. 6 See the references in Maria José Ferro Tavares, ‘O Difícil diálogo entre Judaísmo e Cristianismo’, in História Religiosa de Portugal, ed. by Carlos Moreira Azevedo, Formação e Limites da Cristandade, 3 vols (Lisbon: Círculo de Leitores, 2000–2002), I (2000), pp. 53–89 (p. 80).



Th e At t ir e of P or t uguese Jew s a n d N ew C hri s ti a n s 349

Figs 14.1a and 14.1b  Drawings probably depicting Jews. Date unknown (1438–1569). Lisbon, Arquivo Nacional da Torre do Tombo, Ordem dos Pregadores, Mosteiro de Nossa Senhora da Piedade de Azeitão, liv. 18, fols 44v and 46v. Document reproduced with the authorisation of ANTT.

a notary in a codex that is now kept in the National Archives in Lisbon. In the two examples reproduced here it seems that these are representations of Jews according to the characteristics that were conveyed by the anti-Jewish literature of the time (Figs 14.1 a and b).7 7

The figures are two drawings in the margin of a manuscript concerning a Dominican foundation in Azeitão (near Setúbal). The book was written between 1438 and 1569. See Lisbon, Arquivo Nacional da Torre do Tombo (ANTT), Ordem dos Pregadores, Mosteiro de Nossa Senhora da Piedade de Azeitão, liv. 18, fols 44v and 46v. I would like to thank Pedro Pinto for drawing my attention to this manuscript.

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Unfortunately, research on Jewish life in Portugal until the expulsion/conversion of 1496–97 is problematic owing to a lack of conservation of documents produced within the Jewish communities before the general conversion. This has been pointed out several times by researchers, such as Maria José Ferro Tavares. In her book dedicated to Jews in Portugal in the 14th century, she cautioned: The Portuguese documentation concerning the century we have just studied is too lacunary and fragmented for us to draw firm conclusions about the life of Portuguese Jews as a religious minority, living in a predominantly Christian society. The sources consist generally of royal documents, legislative or otherwise, presenting us only with the Christian, and therefore partial, version of their existence in the national territory [Portugal].8

Sometimes, in archives scattered around the country, there are isolated and partial documents: a ketubah (a Jewish wedding contract)9 or some commercial deed. However, since most of the documents appear to have been destroyed, there is little hope of further discoveries of this kind. In addition to the total destruction of books and papers, documents were sometimes reused for other purposes. The scrolls and pages of books were scrapped and reused and sometimes used to bind new books.10 Perhaps as a result of this significant documentary gap, the majority of surviving archival documents concerning relations between Christians and Jews are items such as contracts, privileges granted by the monarch, and letters of pardon. What emerges from these papers are the main aspects of the experience of coexistence between the two groups. Relations between Jews and Christians were tense and, in a sense, separate, but the two social groups maintained many points of contact.11 Despite the restrictive measures that regulated relations between Christians and Jews, they maintained close proximity in trade relations, in the labour sphere and, in some cases, in neighbourhood relations.

8

Our translation. Tavares, Os Judeus em Portugal no século XIV, p. 149. Concerning examples of medieval ketubot in the Iberian Peninsula, see José Luis Lacave, Medieval Ketubot from Sefarad (Jerusalem: Hebrew University, Magnes Press, 2002). An example of ketubah appears in Maria Filomena Lopes de Barros, ‘A ketubbá, in Portuguese, from the Jews of Lisbon (15th century)’, Hamsa: Journal of Judaic and Islamic Studies, 4 (2017–2018), 33–45. 10 On these fragments of Hebrew books and scrolls, for the case of Portugal, see Pedro Pinto, ‘Fragmentos de pergaminho na Torre do Tombo: um inventário possível (1315–1683)’, Revista de História da Sociedade e da Cultura, 14 (2014), 31–84; António Augusto Tavares and Dov Cohen, ‘Novos manuscritos hebraicos’, Didaskalia, 25, 1–2 (1995) 189–94; António Augusto Tavares, ‘Manuscrito hebraico e aramaico em Lisboa’, Didaskalia, 7.1 (1978), 187–94. For a comparison with other areas of the Iberian Peninsula and Europe see the information and the databases of the project Within Books. Hebrew Fragments in European Libraries, online at [accessed 26 August 2021]. 11 Maria José Ferro Tavares, ‘O Difícil diálogo entre Judaísmo e Cristianismo’, in Moreira Azevedo, História Religiosa de Portugal, I, pp. 53–89. 9



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Other documentation that allows us to study the relations between Christians and Jews in depth is the legislation produced by the central administration − ordinances, chapters of the parliament (Cortes) − which produced the main legislation that moulded the daily life of the Portuguese Jews, presenting their rights but, above all, their duties and the limitations that were imposed on them.

‘Dressi ng the Je ws’ : s e g r eg ati on m easures and id e ntity marke rs There is also a significant lack of sources attesting to the type of clothing used by Portuguese Jews and whether it differed significantly from the rest of the population. However, one aspect was very striking and contributed to this separation of the Jewish population: the use of distinctive badges. The decisive moment in the implementation of this segregationist measure was the Fourth Lateran Council, held in 1215.12 In Canon 68 of the text issued by the Council, great concern is expressed about the relationships between Christians, Jews and Muslims. It warns that while in some territories there exist differences in dress between Jews and Christians, some confusion has arisen in other regions, which has allowed inappropriate relations to develop between women and men of different religions. The decree is issued to avoid this behaviour, regarded as scandalous: In some provinces, a difference of dress distinguishes the Jews and Saracens from the Christians, but in others confusion has developed to such a degree that no difference is discernible. Whence it happens sometimes through error that Christians mingle with the women of Jews and Saracens, and, on the other hand, Jews and Saracens mingle with those of the Christians. Therefore, that such ruinous commingling through error of this kind may not serve as a refuge for further excuse for excesses, we decree that such people of both sexes (that is, Jews and Saracens) in every Christian province and at all times be distinguished in public from other people by a difference of dress.13 12 There is an extensive bibliography on the Jewish question in the Fourth Lateran Council;

see, among others, Linda Ray Beckum, ‘The Fourth Lateran Council of 1215: Church reform, Exclusivity, and the Jews’ (PhD dissertation, University of Kentucky, 2005); Edward Synan, ‘The Church and the Jews after the Fourth Lateran Council (1215)’, in Truth is a Divine Name: Hitherto Unpublished Papers of Edward A. Synan, 1918–1997, ed. by Janice L. Schultz-Aldrich (Amsterdam: Rodopi, 2010), pp. 135–49. 13 We use the English translation that is provided in Disciplinary Decrees of the General Councils, text, trans., and commentary by H. J. Schroeder, OP (St Louis, MO: B. Herder Book Co., 1937), pp. 290–91. The original text of the Canon: ‘In nonnullis provinciis a Christianis Judaeos seu Saracenos habitus distinguit diversitas: sed in quibusdam sic quaedam inolevit confusio, ut nulla differentia discernantur. Unde contingit interdum, quod per errorem Christiani Judaeorum seu Saracenorum, & Judaei seu Saraceni Christianorum mulieribus

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The measures arising from the directives of the Fourth Lateran Council were applied intermittently in Portugal, especially during the reigns of Afonso IV (r. 1325–1357) and Pedro I (r. 1357–1367). Despite the many exemptions, the measures entailed harsh penalties for those who did not comply. Punishment could range from confiscation of the clothes worn on the occasion to 15 days in jail. Monetary compensation was also envisaged for those who had provided the information to the officials about those who did not comply with the rules.14 The representatives of Portuguese towns and cities in parliament made repeated requests for the king to impose the use of distinctive signs. These complaints were repeated in several assemblies, such as those held in Santarém (1468) and Évora (1481).15 The regulation about the use of distinctive signs had been embodied in the Ordinances of the kingdom, corresponding to the norms of the reign of João I (r. 1385–1443). The complaints refer to the absence of wearing the hexagonal badge, but also to the way this badge was displayed on clothing. The regulations on the use of distinctive badges were very clear. They should be the size of the royal seals, red in colour and six-pointed, placed on the outer garment ‘above the mouth of the stomach’, and always visible with nothing to cover them. Sometimes the badges displayed were too small or placed in areas that did not allow them to be seen clearly; or, the rule being that the star be six-pointed, had only two or three points, or were uneven and neglected. Sometimes the fabric was dirty or in a poor condition.16 The use of these distinctive signs has some expression in the Portuguese art of the second half of the 15th century. The altar panel The Adoration of São Vicente de Fora (c. 1472), shows the representation of a Jew – in this case probably a rabbi, wearing black robes – wearing the six-pointed sign (Figs 14.2a and b). The measures implemented in Portugal are similar in other European kingdoms and express the main objective, to identify and separate groups from different religious minorities. Already in the text of Las Siete Partidas by Alfonso X, King of Castile, Leon and Galicia (r. 1252–1284), this same concern can be found, reflecting the spirit conveyed in Lateran Four: commisceantur. Ne igitur tam damnatae commixitionis excessus per velamentum erroris hujusmodi, excusationis ulterius possint habere diffugium: statuimus ut tales utriusque sexus, in omni Christianorum prouincia, & omni tempore, qualitate habitus publice ab aliis populis distinguantur’, in Acta Conciliorum et Epistolae Decretales, ac Constitutiones Summorum Pontificum, VII, Ab anno MCCXIII. ad annum MCCCCIX, ed. by Jean Hardouin and Claude Rigaud (Paris: Ex Typographia Regia, 1714), col. 70. See also pp. 190, 199-200, 299 of this volume. 14 Joaquim de Assunção Ferreira, Estatuto Jurídico dos Judeus e Mouros na Idade Média Portuguesa. Luzes e Sombras, na convivência entre as três religiões (Lisbon: Universidade Católica Editora, 2006), p. 275. 15 See Henrique Gama Barros, ‘Judeus e mouros em Portugal em tempos passados’, Revista Lusitana, 34 (1936), 165–265 (pp. 175, 178). 16 Ordenações Afonsinas [Facsimile edition], ed. by Mário Júlio Brito de Almeida Costa and Eduardo Borges Nunes (Lisbon: Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian, 1984), liv. 2, tít. 86.



Th e At t ir e of P or t uguese Jew s a n d N ew C hri s ti a n s 35 3

Figs 14.2a and 14.2b  A Jew in a black outfit with the red sign on his clothes. Detail of the painted altarpiece The Adoration of São Vicente de Fora (c. 1472) Lisbon, Museu Nacional de Arte Antiga. Photograph by Georges Jansoone. Reproduced under CC-SA-3.0. Image free of rights.

Many crimes and outrageous things occur between Christians and Jews because they live together in cities, and dress alike; and in order to avoid the offences and evils which take place for this reason, we deem it proper, and we order, that all Jews, male and female, living in our dominions shall bear some distinguishing sign upon their heads so that people may plainly recognize a Jew, or a Jewess.17

At the municipal level, we can also verify the steps taken to promote the implementation of the segregationist measures emanating from the Fourth Lateran Council, both at the level of the delineation of areas of residence, and with regard to the use of differentiating markers. At the end of the 14th century, during the reign of João I, the monarch ordered Pedro I’s legislation to be proclaimed in the streets of Lisbon. This law forbade Jews and Muslims to circulate at night outside the Moorish and Jewish neighbourhoods and ordered both groups to take their 17 We use the English translation by Jacob Rader Marcus, The Jews in the Medieval World. A Source

Book: 315–1791, rev. edn with intro. and updated bibliography by Marc Saperstein (Cincinnati, OH: Hebrew Union College Press, 1999), pp. 43–44. It makes reference to the seventh Partida, T. 24 ‘De los Judíos’, 11th law, ‘Como los judíos deuen andar señalados para que los conozcan’; see the original in Las Siete Partidas glosadas por el Licenciado Gregorio Lopez (Salamanca: por Andrea de Poronariis, 1555), fol. 76.

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distinctive signs with them habitually.18 According to the monarch, his predecessor kings were very concerned about ‘the Jews and Moors who were enemies of the Catholic faith, and out of contempt for it committed themselves to doing evil deeds to Christian women’. Facing the danger of this ‘so grave a sin’, it was determined that after sundown ‘no Jew or Moor should be found outside his Judiaria and arrabalde’.19 Regarding the distinctive markers, the king mentions the complaints that ‘the Jews and Moors of this city walk without aljuba and distinctive badges because they have our letters of permission and so they do not bring them [the badges]’.20 In the light of this situation, the king decided to heed the complaints and asked the city’s ruler (corregedor) to ‘preach for this city that all the Moors and Jews should abide by the ordinances’.21 This legislation clearly sought to separate social groups and was particularly concerned to deter sexual relations from taking place between Jews and Muslims and Christian women. To this end, external identification was fundamental, but always accompanied by spatial segregation. In 1395, agreeing with regulations determined by the municipality of Lisbon, the monarch once again insisted on the need for Jews and Muslims to be confined to sleep in their own neighbourhoods, even those who were just passing through: ‘that none of the so-called Jews or Moors slept outside in the lodges of Christians’.22 The documentation issued by the Royal Court shows the difficulties in enforcing the segregational regulations. On the one hand, the reiteration of the punitive measures in the Cortes’ assemblies is proof that there were difficulties of implementation and that numerous infringements occurred. On the other hand, there were many privileges and exceptions to the use of distinctive marks.23 The monarchs started to use these exemptions as forms of privilege, in exchange for some services. Often the privilege was associated with others, such as those relating to the place of residence, or payments of certain taxes. An example is the case of the Jew Marracoxim, who was a royal tailor. King Afonso V (r. 1438–1481) gave him a letter of privilege on 8 November 1475 (Fig. 14.3), in which he conferred a number 18 The document is dated 3 December 1390 and is addressed to the Corregedor of the city of

19

20 21 22

23

Lisbon, published in Livro dos Pregos, ed. by Inês Morais Viegas and Marta Gomes (Lisbon: Câmara Municipal de Lisboa, 2016), p. 348. Viegas and Gomes, Livro dos Pregos, p. 348. Our translation. The Portuguese word ‘judiaria’ refers to the Jewish neighbourhood; ‘arrabalde’ is the term used to define the neighbourhood that was outside the walls of urban space, where the Muslim population often lived. See Raphael Bluteau, Vocabulario Portuguez & Latino, 10 vols (Coimbra: No Collegio das Artes da Companhia de Jesus, 1712–28), I (1728), p. 543. Viegas and Gomes, Livro dos Pregos, p. 348. Viegas and Gomes, Livro dos Pregos, p. 348. Lisbon, Arquivo Municipal de Lisboa – Arquivo Histórico (AML-AH), Chancelaria Régia, Livro dos Pregos, doc. 248, fol. 186. Document dated 3 June 1395. Our translation. Published in Viegas and Gomes, Livro dos Pregos, p. 350. François Soyer, The Persecution of the Jews and Muslims of Portugal. King Manuel I and the End of Religious Tolerance (1496–7) (Leiden and Boston: Brill, 2007), p. 67.



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Fig. 14.3  Letter of privilege to the Jew Marracoxim (1475). Lisbon, Arquivo Nacional da Torre do Tombo, Chancelaria de D. Afonso V, liv. 9, fol. 13. Document reproduced with the authorization of ANTT.

of important benefits which were quite exceptional in view of the anti-Jewish environment at that time. In the letter, the monarch granted him residency of the city of Évora or of another city in which he would reside. This benefit gave him access to the privileges usually granted to vizinhos (local inhabitants). Marracoxim was also exempt from wearing the distinctive marker.24 Afonso V allowed him not to pay various taxes that the Jews usually paid, as was the case with the sisa judenga.25 He could also bear weapons during the day and the night. The privileges were granted in merit of the ‘services we received from him, both for being in our Court, and in the places of Africa and the kingdoms of Castile’ (see Fig. 14.3).26 As we can see, this letter granted very broad privileges and set the beneficiary equal to the group of the main urban elite. Maria José Ferro Tavares, through a meticulous survey of documents in the Royal Chancelleries, has assembled a significant collection of letters of privilege 24 Lisbon, ANTT, Chancelaria de D. Afonso V, vol. 9, fol. 13: ‘non seja hobrigado trazer signall nem

o mostrar’.

25 ‘Sisa judenga’ was a specific tax that the Jews should pay to the king. See Raphael Bluteau,

Vocabulario Portuguez & Latino, VII, p. 663; Antonio Moraes Silva, Diccionario da lingua portuguesa, II (Lisbon: Typographia Lacerdina, 1789), p. 192. 26 Lisbon, ANTT, Chancelaria de D. Afonso V, vol. 9, fol. 13: ‘serviços que dele reçebemos asy andando em nossa corte como nas partes dafriqua e em estes nossos rreignos de castella’.

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related to the exemption of Portuguese Jews from wearing distinctive markers.27 The large volume of these exemptions – a total of thirty-six individuals benefited, between 1409 and 1492, according to the survey made by Tavares – seems to indicate not only a lack of effective implementation of segregationist measures, but the attempt by several individuals − many of them belonging or being close to the court environment − to obtain royal privilege that would allow them to circumvent the discriminatory measures.28 Most of these beneficiaries, apart from moving in the courtly environment, were also merchants and financiers for the monarchs themselves. In this sense, the lending of money to the monarchs could justify the receipt of the privilege. Thus we find in Tavares’ list names like those of the merchants Guedelha Palaçano, Samuel Abravanel, José Negro, José Crescente, Moisés Navarro, Isaac Abravanel, David Negro and Jacob Beatar, among others.29 All of them were members of the Jewish mercantile and financial elite of the 14th and 15th centuries. Following Tavares’ study, we also find that most of these benefits were granted during the reign of Afonso V, which seems to demonstrate the importance of the financial contribution of this Jewish elite to the finances of the Portuguese Court during that reign.30 In addition to the distinctive markers – which were indeed the most widely used external expression of separation of a religious minority − the distinction between groups was also made by prohibiting the use of certain fabrics. More delicate and expensive fabrics, like silk, were in themselves a mark of higher social status. Through the material used to make a garment, it was possible quickly to decode the origin and social status of the individual in question. Once again, the main documentary sources we have for the implementation in Portugal of restrictive legislation on the type of fabrics used by religious minorities are the complaints made by representatives of the general populace in the parliament (Cortes). These protests began in some assemblies held throughout the 14th century, where representatives complained about the existence of many exceptions to the mandatory use of the distinctive hexagonal sign. During the reign of Afonso IV, in the assemblies of 1325 and 1331, the king imposed important measures to regulate the use of distinctive signs, as well as prohibitions on the use of gold and silver necklaces, and also the obligation for Jews to wear short beards. In their interventions, the representatives stressed the importance of complying with the norms of the Lateran Council.31 27 Maria José Ferro Tavares, Os Judeus em Portugal no século XV, II (1984), pp. 779–828 (table 9).

The author presents an exhaustive list of privileges granted to the Jews by Portuguese kings.

28 This interpretation can also be found in Soyer, The Persecution of Jews, pp. 67–68. 29 On the Jewish families receiving these benefits, see Tavares, Os Judeus em Portugal no século XV,

I, pp. 222–24.

30 Tavares, Os Judeus em Portugal no século XV, I, p. 225. 31 See Cortes Portuguesas. Reinado de D. Afonso IV (1325–1357), ed. by A. H. de Oliveira Marques

Maria Teresa Campos Rodrigues and Nuno José Pizarro Pinto Dias (Lisbon: INIC, Universidade Nova de Lisboa, 1982), pp. 16–35.



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For the 15th century we can mention two examples. In 1451, in the Cortes of Santarém, complaints arose about the use of fine clothes similar to those of Christians – by religious minorities, which did not allow the easy identification of those individuals.32 The monarch had decided to accept the complaints of his subjects. He reiterated legislation limiting the fabrics that could be used by Jews and Muslims, allowing the wearing of more sumptuous materials only for festivities and ceremonial entries of monarchs into cities.33 In the Cortes of Alvito-Évora in the session of 1482, there were again complaints about the clothes worn by the two religious minorities. In the case of the Jews, the charge was that they wore too sumptuous clothing, especially individuals who, in many cases, being mere tenants, should not have dressed so richly. Again, the king showed sensitivity to the complaints and accusations. He reiterated the obligation to distinguish clearly between the elements of the three religions, as determined by the Conciliar norms of 1215. The hexagonal distinctive sign should always be visible.34 In the face of accusations of sumptuousness, the monarch also reiterated the prohibition of the use of silk fabrics by Jews.35 The documentation from the various assemblies of Cortes also shows the constant concern of the population with the easy identification and differentiation of individuals in public spaces. All such complaints reflected the general atmosphere of antisemitism which was gradually increasing in various parts of Europe, fuelled by various narratives regarding the character of Jews and the danger of their presence within Christian societies.36 This atmosphere also generated a deep fear of confusing the identification of individuals’ origin and, for this reason, the recurrence of complaints of failure to use distinctive markers and differentiated clothing is noticeable. The rapid identification of individuals through external elements was considered essential. However, the end of the 15th century brought a new challenge to Portuguese society. With the general conversion of the Jews in 1497, the Jews were considered Christians and the segregationist measures were no longer applied. However, right away many doubts were raised about the sincerity of the conversion. Some theologians also questioned the validity of a massive and violent baptism. Nevertheless, the immediate consequence of conversion was the emergence of a new social figure: the New Christian (converso). This element would come to be viewed with great distrust, often considered as a secret Jew and an enemy of 32 Lisbon, ANTT, Suplemento de Cortes, mç. 2, fol. 44v. 33 Maria Filomena Lopes de Barros, ‘Body, Baths and Cloth: Muslim and Christian perceptions in

Medieval Portugal’, Portuguese Studies, 21 (2005), 1–12 (p. 10).

34 Lisbon, ANTT, Núcleo Antigo, no. 118, fols 172v–173. 35 Soyer, The Persecution of the Jews, p. 67.

36 In a recent book, François Soyer analyses the construction of conspiracy theories about Jews

in the Iberian Peninsula and the permanence of these narratives throughout the Modern Era and even up to the present day; François Soyer, Antisemitic Conspiracy Theories in the Early Modern Iberian World. Narratives of Fear and Hatred (Leiden and Boston: Brill, 2019).

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Christianity. Being integrated into society, without being easily identified, made conversos more dangerous in the eyes of civil and ecclesiastical authorities.

Th e i m pact of baptism: N e w Ch ri sti ans, new b o d ie s, ne w cl o the s? In Portugal, the chronology regarding the conversion of populations of Jewish origin seems to have been different from that which occurred in the territories which comprised present-day Spain. After the end of the 14th century, several episodes of violence against Jews and their property are documented, but the conversions resulting from these episodes seem to have been sporadic.37 It was only in 1497 that there occurred a profound social change that constituted, in reality, a crisis in Portuguese society. Baptism was a synonym for a new birth and its performance, in theory, implied profound changes in the body and spirit of the neophyte.38 With baptism, the life of these former Jews was transformed. The ritual allowed them direct access to Christian society. An interesting example is the case of Master (Mestre) António, the author of the famous anti-Jewish treatise already mentioned, Ajuda da Fé contra os Judeos, written in 1486 and copied by the chronicler Cristóvão Rodrigues Acenheiro, in 1534.39 Master António was a Court Physician of João II (r. 1481–1495) and a Jew who converted to Christianity. According to the references in his work, this treatise of anti-Jewish polemic must have been written soon after his conversion.40 The work, centred on theological questions, also presents various precepts of the Jewish religion. For example, it mentions some practices concerning the funeral customs of the Peninsular Jews. Such a typology of texts would be of great use in the 16th century when the intention was to collect the Jewish practices that were supposedly performed secretly by the newly converted and that were liable to be denounced as examples of apostasy and, as such, punishable by the Holy Office (see Fig. 14.4).41 The example of Master António is also important because, given the high social status in which he operated, within the Court and close to the king, his voluntary conversion could have a stimulating effect to encourage the conversion of other 37 Although several cases of conversions are known in the 15th century, the motivations for

38 39 40 41

religious conversion are varied: love for a Christian, fear in general, escape from punishment, among others. See some cases studied by Tavares, Os Judeus em Portugal no século XV, I, pp. 440–43. On the impact of the General Conversion, see Elias Lipiner, Os baptizados em pé. Estudos acerca da origem e da luta dos Cristãos-Novos em Portugal (Lisbon: Vega, 1998), pp. 13–52. See the manuscript in Lisbon, Biblioteca Nacional de Portugal (BNP), Cod. 6967. Lisbon, BNP, Cod. 6967, fol. 2. See Monitório do Inquisidor Geral [1536], in Collectorio de diversas letras apostolicas, provisões reaes e outros papeis em que se contém a Instituyção & primeiro progresso do Santo Oficio em Portugal… (Lisbon: Nas casas da Sancta Inquisição, 1596), fols 4–6v.



Th e At t ir e of P or t uguese Jew s a n d N ew C hri s ti a n s 35 9

Fig. 14.4  First paragraph of the Monitório do Inquisidor Geral (1536), containing a list of Jewish practices that should be reported to the Inquisition. In Collectorio de diversas letras apostolicas …, Lisbon, 1596. Biblioteca Nacional de Portugal. Image free of rights.

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Portuguese Jews. Perhaps for this reason, the episode did not escape the gaze of the chronicler Garcia de Resende who, in his Chronicle of King João II (written in the first half of the 16th century), reports in detail the events that occurred during the baptism of Master António. In Chapter 91 ‘Of the honour that the king did to master António’, he wrote: Master António, the chief surgeon of these kingdoms, was a Jew, and when he became a Christian, the king celebrated and conferred on him great honour, because he had good will and was a learned man. And when he was baptized the king went with him to the door of the church and took him by the hand with much honour and dressed him very well in rich garments that the king gave him of his own. And the king was his godfather. And after he was baptized, when they wanted to put the hood on him, it had mistakenly not been put in the pot. And while someone was searching for a towel, the king said, ‘For such a holy thing it is not necessary to take so long’; and before them all he unbuttoned his doublet42 and took the sleeve off his shirt and ripped it up and took it off so that they could put the hood on him. In this way, he honoured those who had turned to the faith of Our Lord Jesus Christ.43

In this description of Master António’s baptism, there are many symbolic elements of great relevance that should be highlighted. First of all, it should be emphasised that this conversion was voluntary (at least in the version of this event provided by Resende and used in subsequent works). The fact that it was a voluntary choice of the individual is praised by the monarch who clearly chooses to associate himself with this event. The king sponsors the baptism ceremony, presenting himself as a tutelary figure and one who guides, literally taking the neophyte by the hand (‘o leuou pela mão’). The baptism ceremony was of great importance and solemnity. Besides being the godfather of the neophyte, the king offered him clothes of great richness, as if symbolizing that the new religious condition, embraced by Master António, was equivalent to the possibility of wearing other types of garments, including more expensive fabrics. On the other hand, at the moment of the ritual − symbol of a true rebirth − the king took a piece of 42 For this garment see the description in Maria Hayward, ‘Doublet’, in Encyclopedia of Medieval

Dress and Textiles of the British Isles c. 450–1450, ed. by Gale R. Owen-Crocker, Elizabeth Coatsworth and Maria Hayward [accessed 26 August 2021], first published online 2012. 43 Our translation. Garcia de Resende, Crónica de D. João II e Miscelânea (Lisbon: Imprensa NacionalCasa da Moeda, 1991), ch. 91: ‘Mestre Antonio sororgiam-mor destes reinos foy judeu, e quando se tornou christão, el-rey folgou muito e lhe fez muita honra, porque lhe tinha boa vontade e era bom letrado. E quando foy baptizado el-rey foy com ele aa porta da ygreja, e o leuou polla mão com muita honrra e muito bem vestido de vestidos ricos que el-rey deu de seu corpo e foi seu padrinho. E depoys de baptizado quando lhe quiseram poer o capelo não vinha no bacio por esquecimento. E querendo yr por huã toalha pera della se tirar, disse el-rey: “Pera cousa tam sancta nam he necessário tanto vagar”; e perante todos desabotoou o gibam e tirou a manga da camisa fora, e dela rompeo e tirou de que lhe poseram o capello. Que desta maneira honrrava os que se tornavam aa fe de Nosso Senhor Jesu Christo.’



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white cloth from his own garments so that the ceremony could be finished, a gesture of intimacy that also reveals the support that the monarch sought to give to his protégé, but also an example to all those who voluntarily desired to convert to Christianity. Anyone who wanted to embrace Christianity voluntarily would always have the king’s protection. Contrary to these individual and voluntary conversions and baptisms, carried out with the sponsorship and close proximity of the monarch, in 1497 an event occurred that would radically change the Portuguese situation in relation to religious minorities. The forced baptism of the Portuguese Jews decreed by King Manuel I (r. 1495–1521) gave rise to a new social reality and balance, with the introduction of the converso element into Portuguese society.44 The contemporary descriptions of the General Conversion (1497) are unanimous in confirming the great violence of the event.45 Contrary to what we have seen in the description of the baptism of Master António − with his rich garments, and being brought to church by the hand of the king − the mass conversion of the Jews in 1497 was characterised by the anonymity of the huge crowds who were gathered near the churches, and by the violence that the authorities inflicted over the bodies of the future converts. The chronicler Damião de Góis mentions a deep sorrow felt by those who were forced to be baptized: ‘great terror mixed with many tears, pain and sorrow’.46 His chronicle contains no descriptions of any sumptuous costumes required by such an important event. On the contrary, when reading the words of Samuel Usque in his remarkable work of 1553, Consolação às Tribulações de Israel, the image that the reader gets is that of a shapeless mass of oppressed bodies, with their clothes dirty and torn. First, the young people up to twenty-five years of age were converted: ‘some by their legs and arms and others by their hair and beards, dragging them with force to the churches and there they poured their water, and touching some with it and barely reaching others they imposed on them names of Christians’.47 This was followed, with even more violence, by the conversion of the parents and older people: ‘dragging them by their 44 Tavares, Os Judeus em Portugal no século XV, I, pp. 483–500; Soyer, The Persecution of the Jews, pp.

182–240; Elias Lipiner, Os Baptizados em Pé; Maria José Ferro Tavares, ‘Expulsão ou integração’, in Maria José Ferro Tavares, Judaísmo e Inquisição. Estudos (Lisbon: Presença, 1987), pp. 17–66. 45 Soyer, The Persecution of the Jews, pp. 182–240. 46 Our translation. Damião de Góis, Crónica do felicíssimo rei D. Manuel I, 4 vols (Coimbra: Imprensa da Universidade, 1926), I, p. 41. See also the reflection of Giuseppe Marcocci, ‘Remembering the Forced Baptism of the Jews: Law, Theology, and History in Sixteenth-Century Portugal’, in Forced Conversion in Christianity, Judaism and Islam. Coercion and Faith in Premodern Iberia and Beyond, ed. by Mercedes García-Arenal and Yonatan Glazer-Eytan (Leiden and Boston: Brill, 2019), pp. 328–53. 47 Our translation. Samuel Usque, Consolação às tribulações de Israel, III, ed. by Mendes dos Remédios (Coimbra: França Amado – Editor, 1907), Diálogo Terceiro, 29–30: ‘a huns pelas pernas e braços, e a outros pelos cabelos e pelas barbas arrastando per força os levarom tee as ygrejas e aly lhe deitarom a sua agoa, e tocando com ela huns e mal alcançando outros lhe ympuserom sobre ysso nomes da cristandade’.

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legs, others by their beards and hair, punching and beating them, they took them to the churches where they poured water on them’.48 The descriptions of the forced baptism are vague, without presenting many details. Clothing, when mentioned, appears as a mark of Jewish identity that some refuse to lose. Usque reports that several individuals refused to be baptized and, in some cases, preferred to put an end to their lives and those of their children. In one example, he mentions a father who ‘covered his six sons with his taleciod, and wisely forced them to die by the law [of Moses] one by one, and with them he killed himself in the end’.49 The use of the tallit,50 which covers the boys condemned to death, appears almost as a symbol of Portuguese Judaism facing its annihilation. The General Conversion marked the end of Judaism in Portugal. The physical spaces of Jewish neighbourhoods (the Judiarias) were progressively destroyed and the visible signs of Jewish life were also erased. The passage from Jews to conversos was a traumatic process. The newly converted were viewed with great distrust by the general population who doubted the sincerity of their conversion to Christianity. A significant part of the population considered that these individuals kept their fidelity to Judaism in secret. One of the great consequences of the conversion was to foster the integration of the descendants of Jews into the rest of society, something that the Iberian monarchs had tried to avoid since the implementation of segregationist measures in the 14th century. Officially, from 1497 onwards, there were no more Jews in Portugal. The Jewish presence in Portuguese territory was only acknowledged when the kingdom was visited by some Jewish representatives mainly from North Africa or when some of these individuals – from the Italian or Ottoman Jewish communities − arrived in Portugal seeking to convert to Christianity. The image of Judaism became more ‘orientalising’, often corresponding to the use of turbans and yellow capes typical of the Italian cities or the customs of the Levantine Jews.51 The Jews who visited Portuguese territory after the General Conversion also brought with them, by royal decree, after 1537,52 the use of the same distinctive 48 Our translation. Usque, Consolação, Diálogo Terceiro, XXX: ‘arrastandoos pellas pernas, outros

49

50 51 52

pellas barbas e cabelos, dando-lhes punhadas, e espancandoos, as ygrejas onde lhes deitarom a agoa os leuarom’. Usque, Consolação, XXX: ‘fazendo cobrir os seus seis filhos com seus taleciod, com huã sabia pratica esforçandoos a morrer pela ley hum a hum, com eles todos ao cabo se matou’. The same description is taken up later by Yosef Ha-Kohen, still in the 16th century. In his Valley of Tears (ˁemeq ha-Bakha), he mentions: ‘Cubrío un hombre de ellos con tallits de oración a sus hijos y habló a sus corazones para que honrasen el Santo de Israel’; Yosef Ha-Kohen, El Valle del Llanto (ˁemeq ha-Bakha). Crónica hebrea del siglo XVI, ed. by Pilar León Tello (Barcelona: Riopiedras Ediciones, 1989), p. 124. The Hebrew word tallit is a fringed garment, worn as a prayer shawl. Lipiner, Os baptizados em pé, pp. 275–315. See Duarte Nunes de Leão, Leis Extravagantes e reportório das Ordenações. Reprodução facsimile da edição “princeps”das Leis Extravagantes, impressa em 1569 (Lisbon: Fundação Calouste



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hexagonal badge that had characterised the Jewish existence in previous centuries. In fact, these travellers, who were only visiting Portugal for a brief period, ultimately became known as ‘Jews with a mark (judeus de sinal), for the notorious identifying hexagonal badge they had to carry on their robes.53 The references that we find about clothing related to the Jewish environment in Portugal concerned the context of religious practices. Civil and religious authorities searched for signs of Jewish practices carried out by the conversos and drew up lists of ceremonies and rituals supposedly performed by the Jews seeking to identify the potential Jewish practices that the newly-converted continued, secretly, to perform. The basis for this suspicion was the belief that New Christians remained at their core Jewish. The inquisitors’ identification of the secret Jew was based on everyday practices, many of them associated with the external image that New Christians transmitted.54 In other words, the attentive gaze of the neighbours identified some behaviours as proper to this secret Jewish practice. Wearing clean white clothes on a Sabbath became synonymous with a secret Jewish practice and as such was part of the lists of deviant behaviour to be reported to the Holy Office (Fig. 14.4).55 The denunciations were made by neighbours and sometimes even relatives. Those who denounced often took inspiration from the inquisitorial text itself to denounce heterodox practices. They sometimes listened to the list of behaviours considered heretical when they attended a sermon in a church. Often, even without knowing it, they translated what their eyes saw and adjusted it to the categories created by the inquisitors. Thus, a mantle or shirt already worn could easily be transformed into clean or new clothing to honour the Sabbath.56

Gulbenkian, 1987), fol. 122: ‘Dos judeus e mouros que andão sem sinal.’

53 Maria José Ferro Tavares, ‘Judeus de sinal em Portugal no século XVI’, Cultura, História e

Filosofia, 5 (1986), 339–63.

54 For examples of some of public behaviours censured by the Inquisition, see David Gitlitz,

Secrecy and Deceit: the Religion of the Cripto-Jews (Albuquerque, NM: University of New Mexico Press, 2002). 55 ‘Monitório do Inquisidor Geral’, fol. 4v. 56 We find several examples of this type of misleading testimony in the inquisitorial sources of the early years of the Holy Office. This is the case of Catarina de Orta, sister of the famous botanist Garcia de Orta. In 1547, Catarina was arrested by the Lisbon Inquisition. In the accusation testimonies, some neighbours claimed that she wore new clothes during the Sabbath. However, in the course of the trial, other testimonies were incorporated into the records and it was possible to understand that Catarina de Orta was wearing only normal clothes and, in some cases, already very well used. The denouncers described a distorted reality, either by malice or influenced by the incentive to denounce promoted by the ecclesiastic authorities. Lisbon, ANTT, Tribunal do Santo Ofício, Inquisição de Lisboa, proc. 4317, f. 41–41v.

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Conclusio ns The scarce documentation we have for the case of Portugal does not allow us to reconstruct in a meticulous and reliable way the habits and forms of the Portuguese Jews’ garments at the dawn of the General Conversion of 1497. However, it is clear that since the 14th century the wave of segregation that swept through Europe had also reached Portugal. The identification of the Jew was an imperative. The authorities wanted to be sure that the Jew was recognised in all circumstances and could not be assimilated into Christian society. Thus the use of the identificatory badge became mandatory on Portuguese territory. These markers show that the external identity of the Jew was shaped as opposed to the Christian, asserting his profound otherness. More than having his own clothing, the Jew had distinguishing signs or some specific garment (like the yellow hats used by Italian Jews) that set him apart from the rest of society. The 15th-century religious conversions created deep social instability. The so-called voluntary conversions took the form of a grand ceremony in which clothing played a key role. In the case of Master António’s baptism there was a certain solemnity due to the fact that the King himself attended the ceremony and offered his own clothes to the Neophyte. In later forced mass conversions, however, all that ritual disappeared, and clothes also lost their importance. From the 16th century onward, the distinction of the descendants of Jews through clothing became more complex and difficult. In modern Europe, in confessional societies such as the Iberian ones, the descendants of those Jews forcibly converted at the end of the 15th century continued to be seen as dangerous and suspicious elements that needed to be watched. The ecclesiastical authorities, and above all the Holy Office (established in Portugal in 1536), sought to implement control mechanisms that would make it easy to identify the conversos. In a society where all the individuals were Christian, the search for some kind of differentiation and separation was focused on religious features (mostly corresponding to domestic practices) and served as a basis for further persecution in Inquisitorial times.

General Index Towns and cities are located according to present-day geography. Names such as al-Andalus are indexed by their lexical element, thus Andalus, al-Andalus. Illustrations are listed by figure number and are given in italics. Abbasid Caliphate ​167, 172, 180 Abbey of Santa María la Real de las Huelgas, Burgos, Spain see Burgos ʽAbd al-Raḥmān ibn Muʿawiya, first Umayyad ruler of al-Andalus ​174 ʽAbd al-Raḥmān II, Emir of Cordoba ​99, 128, 179 ʽAbd al-Raḥmān III, Emir of Cordoba ​131, 319 ʽAbd al-Raḥmān Sanchuelo, ʿAmirid ruler of al-Andalus ​178 ʽAbd al-Malik ibn Habib ​169 Abrahamov, Binyamin ​321–322 Abravanel, Isaac, Rabbi, theologian and merchant ​343n.109, 356 Abravanel, Samuel, merchant ​356 Abū ʿĀmir Yūsuf b. Aḥmad I b. Hūd al-Muʾtaman, ruler of Zaragosa ​323n.21 Abu Bakr al-Tujibi, public notary ​184 Abū Ḏj̲aʿfar Aḥmad I b. Sulaymān b. Hūd al-Muḳtadir, ruler of Zaragosa ​323n.21 Abū D̲j̲aʿfar Aḥmad II b. Yūsuf b. Hūd, ruler of Zaragosa ​323n.21 Abu Hayyan al-Tawhidi, Arab philosopher and writer, al-Risala al-Baghdadiyya ​167 Abu l-Baraqat al-Balafiqi, Andalusi judge ​ 177 Abū l-Faraĝ al-Iṣfahānī, Kitāb al-Agānī ​211 Abū-l-Jayr, agronomist ​128–129 Afonso IV, King of Portugal ​196–197, 352, 356 Afonso V, King of Portugal ​158–159, 161, 199, 354–356, 14.3; General Ordinances of the Realm ​199

Africa ​26; East Africa ​150; North Africa ​ 14, 24n.55, 36, 124, 154, 163, 171, 174, 177–178, 196–197, 203, 327, 330n.56, 331n.58, 362; West Africa ​152, 163; Africanisation ​14 Akkadian language, ancient Semitic language of Mesopotamia ​321n.8 Alarcón now Cuenca, Castilla La Mancha, Spain, laws ​238n.15 Alarilla, now Guadalajara, Castilla La Mancha, Spain ​238n.15 Alba de Tormes, now Castile and Leon, Spain, medieval fairs ​344n.113 Albarracín de Martínez Ruiz, Joaquina ​ 182n.68 Albarracín, Aragon, medieval fairs ​89 Alcañices, Treaty of ​32 Alcántara, Hispanic military order ​16 Alcaraz, now Albacete, Castilla La Mancha, Spain, laws ​238n.15; rug making ​65 Alcobaça, Portugal ​156, 164; Cistercian Monastery ​148, 155, 161 Alcover, now Catalonia, Spain ​303n.34, 304; Municipal Archive, ‘Lligall de documents solts’  304n.35 Além-Tejo, medieval comarca of Portugal, now Alentejo ​142, 144, 153–154, 156n.83, 163–164, 196; Alentejo blankets ​ 163–164, 6.1 Alenquer, now Lisbon district, Portugal ​142 Alexander II, Pope ​25 Alexander III ‘the Great’, King of Macedon, Letter of Aristotle to Alexander ​256 Alexandria, Egypt ​335n.79

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Alfonso de la Cerda, burial textiles ​ 261n.108, 10.7 Alfonso II, King of Aragon ​30, 33 Alfonso III, King of Aragon ​34 Alfonso III, King of Asturias and Leon ​25 Alfonso IV (Alfons in Catalan), King of Aragon ​316 Alfonso V, ‘the Magnanimous’, King of Aragon ​96 Alfonso VI, King of Castile and Leon, Imperator totius Hispaniae ​13 Alfonso VII, King of Castile and Leon, Imperator totius Hispaniae ​11n.2, 13, 29, 32 Alfonso VIII, King of Castile ​7, 235, 239n.18, 245, 251, 253n.79, 261, 10.3; burial textiles ​248, 259 Alfonso X, ‘the Wise’, King of Castile, 17, 24n.55, 32, 71, 207, 214, 240, 245–246, 250n.63, 10.3, 10.5; burial textiles ​66, 260; Cantigas de Santa María ​209n.8, 211, 237, 241, 259; gloves ​66; Las Siete Partidas ​235, 257, 352; Libro de axedrez, dados e tablas ​298; Libro de los juegos 180, 235n.5, 259, 10.5; stained glass of Leon Cathedral ​259 Alfonso XI, King of Castile ​7, 32, 55n.65, 235, 260 Alfonso, illegitimate son of Alfonso X of Castile, burial textiles ​246, 10.3d Algarve, medieval comarca of Portugal ​26, 144, 153, 155n.73, 198 Alhambra palace see Granada Aljubarrota, Battle of ​35, 1.2 Almazán, Treaty of ​32 Almeida, Adriana ​158n.102 Almería, now Andalusia, Spain ​48, 62, 84, 125, 128, 132, 134–135, 137, 157, 159, 176, 185; agronomic school ​128 Almizra, Treaty of ​26, 32 Almohad dynasty, caliphate and empire ​ 14–15, 25, 36, 130, 171–173, 186, 197n.44, 13.7 Almoravid dynasty and empire ​14–15, 25, 36, 174, 186–187n.18, 306 Alto Palancia, now Castellón, Valencia, Spain, medieval administrative district ​ 99, 118 Al-Turtushi, Ibrahim ibn Yaʿqub, Jewish merchant and travel writer ​170

Álvaro Zamora, María Isabel ​221n.44 Alvisquer, Santarém, Portugal ​195 Alvito-Évora, Portugal, Cortes ​357 Amado, José, Jew of Lisbon ​194n.28 Amin, al-Amin, Caliph of the Abbasid dynasty, Baghdad ​180 ʿAmirid dynasty of al-Andalus ​178 Andalus, al-Andalus, medieval Muslim Spain, Andalusi culture, people and textiles ​1, 4, 6, 12–16, 20–21, 23–24, 30, 36–37, 42, 48–49, 59, 61, 70, 84, 90, 99–100, 123–139, 167–187, 196, 200–201n.57, 208–214, 220, 222, 298, 305, 320, 327, 329–331, 333n.70, 334n.73, 335, 337n.89, 338, 13.7; Andalusi dialect ​ 220n.37, 223; Sharq al-Andalus (eastern al-Andalus) 124 Andalusia, present day area of Spain ​ 12n.4 Andarax, now called Láujar de Andarax, Almería, Andalusia, Spain ​135 Anderson, Ruth Matilda ​219 Anes, Constança, inventory ​162 Anjou dynasty ​266 António, Master, court physician and New Christian ​358–361; Ajuda da Fé contra os Judeos ​348, 358 Arabs, Arab culture and people ​7, 15, 36–37; Arab dress and textiles ​2, 189–205; Arabic language ​7, 167–187, 207–232 see also Judeo–Arabic; Arabic script on textile ​99, 213–214, 224, 244 Aragon, county ​28; Crown of ​1, 4–5, 18, 19n.38, 24, 26, 29n.76, 30–34, 37, 70–71, 73, 77–81, 85–89, 91, 93–122, 191, 193, 258, 270, 280–281, 307; dynasty ​30–31, 33; medieval kingdom ​19, 28–29, 34, 73, 75, 79–81, 87, 89–90, 93, 115–117, 265; Aragonese culture and people ​162, 189–190, 192, 197–198, 204, 254, 306n.57; ‘Aragonese Union’  34 Archivo Real y General de Navarra (Spain, Navarre, Royal and General Archives of Navarre) 267 Arguin, now Mauritania, North-West Africa ​ 163 Armenia, Asia ​172 ʿAsim al-ʿUryan, Berber chief ​174 Astruga, wife of Yosseph de Beses, testatrix ​ 307n.64



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Astudillo, Palencia, Spain, palace ​1.1 Athens, now Greece, medieval state and duchy ​93 Aveiro, now Centro, Portugal, Museu de Aveiro/Santa Joana ​52 Avis (Joanine) dynasty ​35 Awwam, Al-Awwam, 12th–century Arab agriculturist ​44n.14, 45n.20, 48, 128–129 Aymerich Bassols, Montse ​304n.43 Ayyubid dynasty, medieval Sultanate of Egypt ​172 Azeitão, Setúbal, Portugal, Dominican foundation ​349n.7, 14.1a, b Azores, archipelago, Portugal ​149 Babylon (Babylonia), Babylonian culture ​ 23, 320n.4, 333n.70 Badajoz, Treaty of ​32 Baeza, now Jaen, Andalusia, Spain ​134 Bagà, now Catalonia, Spain ​78, 88, 116 Baghdad, now Iraq, medieval Abbasid Caliphate ​167, 180; dress of Caliphs ​ 172 Bakrī, al Bakrī, Abū ‘Ubayd, Andalusi scholar and geographer ​125, 170 Balearic islands see Formentera, Ibiza, Majorca, Minorca Banner of Navas de Tolosa see Burgos Banu Qasi, rulers of Tudela region in al-Andalus ​179 Banyala, al-Banyala, now called Albanilla, Murcia, Spain, tablecloths ​134 Barcelona, now Catalonia, Spain  77–78, 85–86, 94–95, 97, 105, 115, 119, 284, 299–300, 302–305, 307, 313–314, 341, 4.4; Acords de Barcelona (Agreements) 301; Arxiu Històric de la Ciutat de Barcelona (Historic Archive), Llibre del Consell ​ 299n.21; Registre d’Ordinacions ​299n.22; Arxiu Reial de Barcelona (Royal Archive)  299n.19; Cathedral of the Holy Cross and Saint Eulalia, cloisters, sculpture ​303n.36; Council ​95, 98; county ​28, 30, 93; dynasty ​33, 80; Museu d’Història de la Ciutat de Barcelona ​296n.3; Museu del Disseny ​ 52 Barcelona Haggada (England, London, British Library, MS Additional 14761)  311–313

367

Barkai, Ron ​26n.63 Barracas, now Castellón, Valencia, Spain ​ 116 Barrigón, María ​1–2, 7 Barros, Maria Filomena Lopes de ​6 Bashir, Nabih ​322n.13 Basin of Játiva (or Xativa) see Valencia, Museo del Almudín Bastos Mateus, Susana ​8 Batalha, Leiria, Portugal, Monastery of Saint Mary of the Victory ​1.2 Bayad, hero of Hadith Bayad wa–Riyad ​179 Bayonne, now Pyrénées–Atlantiques, France ​240 Baza, now Granada, Andalusia, Spain ​132, 185 Bearn region, now Pyrénées–Atlantiques, France ​117 Beatar, Jacob, merchant ​356 Beatriz, Duchess of Beja ​153 Beatriz (Beatrice) of Swabia, Queen of Castile ​238; burial textiles ​245, 261 Beatriz [of Portugal], Queen of Castile (Dona Beatriz) 161 Beauvais, now Hauts-de-France, France ​97 Becket, St Thomas, ‘chasuble’ of see Fermo Bedouins ​14 Beira, medieval comarca of Portugal ​144, 150–151, 153–154, 159, 164 Beirante, Ângela ​142 Béjaïa, now Algeria ​177 Ben Adret, Shlomo, Rabbi ​11, 297, 307, 313–314, 335n.81, 338n.95, 341 Ben Asher, Jacob, Rabbi ​346 Ben Yeḥiel, Asher (‘ha–Rosh’), Rabbi ​ 320n.6, 341–346; Commentary on the Mishnah ​345–346; ‘Pisqei Halakhot’ 346; Responsa ​342–345 Benedict XIII, anti-Pope ​303 Ben-Yehuda, Naḥum ​1–2, 7 Berbers, indigenous people of North Africa ​ 174 Berceo, Gonzalo de, Vida de santo Domingo de Silos ​248n.55 Berenguela, Infanta of Castile and Leon, señora of Las Huelgas ​238 Berenguela, Queen of Castile, burial textiles ​ 62, 183, 2.1 Berga, now Barcelona, Catalonia, Spain ​ 78, 80, 88, 115, 304n.43

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Berja, now Almería, Andalusia, Spain ​135 Bernat Calvó, Saint, chasuble of ​61 Bernis Madrazo, Carmen ​172, 213, 219–220, 226, 228, 230 Berry dynasty ​266; Duke of ​277 Bertrán, Diego ​303n.34, 304n.45 Bible, Deuteronomy 22. 5 297n.7; 22. 11  297n.5, 336n.83; 22. 12 297n.6; 25. 5–10 314; Esther 329; 1. 5–6 332n.68; 1. 6 329n.50; Exodus  320, 329; 15. 20  12.3; 16. 20 327n.41; 25. 3–4  327n.37, 332n.68; 26. 1  328n.43, 326n.25, 343n.109; 26. 36 328n.45; 52. 6 328n.47; Ezekiel 16. 10 320n.4; 16. 10, 13  334n. 73; Isaiah 5. 18 325; Lamentations 329n.54; Leviticus 13. 47–59 332n.65; 19. 19 336n.83; Numbers 15. 37–41 297n.6; Song of Songs 3. 9 332n.64; Targum Onkelos 328n.45; Torah  323, 335 Biure, Ramon Arnau de, Abbot of Sant Cugot de Vallès, cloak of ​62 Black Death ​93 Blanca (Blanche of Navarre), Queen of France ​284 Blanca (Blanche), Infanta of Portugal, señora of Las Huelgas, burial textiles ​261n.108 Blanca I, Queen of Navarre ​34 Boabdil see Muhammad XII Boinebroke, Johan, clothier and merchant ​ 73 Boniface VIII, Pope ​250n.63, 251n.66 Borja, now Aragon, Spain ​90, 285 Borrego Díaz, Pilar ​50 Bourbon dynasty ​266 Bourgogne dynasty ​266 Brabant, now Belgium, France and Netherlands, medieval duchy, region in the Low Countries ​76, 91, 97, 270, 276; Brabantine culture ​276–277 Brafome, Muslim of Setúbal ​201 Braga, Portugal ​148, 162 Bragança (Braganza), Portugal ​90, 160; Casa dos Sirgos ​160, 163–164; culture ​ 160; ducal family ​159–161 Brazil ​35 Bristol, England ​76, 86, 105, 115, 117, 163, 270–272, 283 Brittany, now France, medieval duchy ​99,

117, 272; Duke of ​272, 275, 293 Brother Haggada (England, London, British Library MS Oriental 1404)  308, 315 Broudy, Eric ​50 Bruges, now Belgium, medieval capital of Flanders ​71, 97, 105, 116, 137 Brussels, now Belgium, medieval county ​ 88, 97, 105, 115, 276–277, 284 Burgo de Osma, Soria, Spain, cathedral, textiles ​52 Burgos ​75, 81, 86, 89–90, 238; Abbey of Santa María la Real de Las Huelgas, burial textiles ​2, 52, 55n.67, 57, 172, 234, 244n.42, 245–246, 248, 253, 260– 263; Banner of Navas de Tolosa ​65; Cathedral ​52, 234, Cathedral chapel of the Constables, cope ​244n.42; Iglesia de Quintanaortuño, chasuble fragment ​52, 215n.25; Monastery of Santo Domingo de Caleruega, burial textiles ​52, 64, 234, 261; Patrimonio Nacional ​52 Burgundy, Burgundian culture and people ​ 242n.35, 272n.14 Byzantium, Byzantine culture ​61, 226 Cairo, Egypt, Geniza archive ​129 Calatrava, Hispanic military order ​16 Calendar of Cordoba see Cordoba Caleruega, Burgos, now Castile-Leon, Spain, Real Monasterio de Santo Domingo de Caleruega, burial textiles ​52, 64, 234, 261 Cambrai, now Nord, France, medieval church principality ​71, 152 Camino de Santiago (Way of St James), pilgrimage route ​15 Camprodon, now Girona, Catalonia, Spain ​ 78, 88, 95, 115–116 Canfranc, now Huesca, Aragon, Spain ​117 Cantabrian Sea, southern part of Bay of Biscay ​76, 244 Cantera Montenegro, Enrique ​20 Cantigas de Santa María  209, 211, 224, 234–235, 237–238, 248, 251, 259, 308, 313, 10.1, 10.2; Italy, Florence, Biblioteca Nazionale Centrale di Firenze, MS B.R.20 (Códice Florentino)  235n.5, 237; Spain, Madrid, Real Biblioteca Monasterio de San Lorenzo de El Escorial (RBME), MS



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B. I.2 (Códice de los Músicos)  235n.5; MS T. I.l (Códice Rico)  209n.8, 235n.5, 238, 10.1, 10.2 Capetian dynasty ​34 Cardona, now Barcelona, Catalonia, Spain  78, 115 Carlos II, King of Navarre ​265–266, 285 Carlos II, King of Spain ​103, 277 Carlos III, King of Navarre ​76, 85, 265–266, 272, 275, 277–278, 284–286, 289–291 Carlos, Infante of Navarra ​284 Carlos, Prince of Viana ​269n.9 Caro, Josef, Rabbi, Shulḥan ˁArukh ​346 Carota, Fotes, Muslim adulteress of Santarém ​202n.66 Casket of Leyre see Navarra, Museo de Navarra Caspe, Compromise of ​31 Castany Saladrigas, F.  54 Castelló d’Empúries, Girona, Spain, Museu d’Història dels Jueus ​296n.3 Castelló de la Plana, Valencia, now Spain ​ 96 Castigos de Sancho IV, 13th–century treatise ​ 246, 249 Castile, now Spain, county ​28; Crown of ​ 4–5, 18, 26, 29n.76, 30–31, 35, 71–73, 76, 79, 82, 89–90, 99, 307; medieval kingdom ​ 2, 13, 16, 20, 24, 28–30, 32–34, 36, 72–76, 78–81, 83–88, 91, 116, 126, 160, 190–193, 197–198, 204, 302–303, 341, 345–346, 355; Castilian culture and people ​233–263, 292–293, 308, 313; Castilian language ​ 207–232 Castro Marim, now Faro, Portugal ​155n.73 Castro, Americo ​20 Catalonia, now Spain ​5, 74–75, 87–89, 137, 116–117, 193, 312n.78, 313, 316; coinage ​ 302n.33; county of Crown of Aragon ​77; medieval kingdom ​93–94; Catalan language ​307; principality ​19, 34, 78 Catarina (Catherine) de Lancaster, Queen and Regent of Castile, laws (pragmática) 193 Catholic Monarchs, Fernando (Ferdinand) II and Isabel (Isabella) I of Castile and Aragon ​24n.55, 159–160n.155, 185, 194, 227 Catlos, Brian A.  20, 26 Cazorla, Treaty of ​32

369

Cerdanya, area now spanning France and Spain, medieval county within Catalonia ​ 77–79, 81, 94–95 Cervera now Lleida, Catalonia, Spain ​81, 89, 95, 304n.43, 305n.53, 316; Libre verd del racional de Cervera ​316 Ceuta, North Africa ​35 Chalons, now Chalons-en-Champagne, France ​97 Champagne dynasty ​34; fairs ​87–88 Chester, England ​271, 283 Chinchilla, now Albacete, Castilla La Mancha, Spain ​73; carpet/rug making ​ 65, 124 Christ, Jesus, feasts of ​112; purity of ​112 Christianity, Christendom ​14, 16n.21, 23, 157n.93, 189–190, 197, 204; Christian culture and people ​2, 4–7, 12–18, 20–21, 23–28, 30, 37, 59, 69–70, 84, 91, 96, 100, 109, 126–127, 136, 155n.73, 158, 167–172, 176, 177n.4, 181–183, 186, 190, 192, 194–195, 198, 200, 202–204, 207–208, 211–213, 216–218, 222, 226, 228–232, 244, 295–299, 230, 303n.34, 304–306, 311–312, 316–317, 325, 327, 350–351, 354, 357, 361, 364; ‘New Christians’  347, 358, 361–362, 357–360; ‘Old Christians’  223 Cidade das Rosas, Portugal, archaeological site ​50 Cisneros, Francisco Jiménez de, Spanish Cardinal ​216n.31 Cistercian order ​15, 148 Clemente Ramos, Julián ​16 Cleveland, Ohio, USA, Museum of Art ​52 Cluniac order ​15 Coimbra, Portugal, city and county ​35, 150, 164; Cortes ​201 Colchester, now Essex, England ​115 Conímbriga, Portugal, archaeological site ​ 50 Copenhagen, Denmark, Kongelige Bibliotek ​ 312 Córdoba de la Llave, Ricardo ​49 Cordoba now Andalusia, Spain  20, 90, 103, 126, 132, 179, 184–185, 319, 327, 331, 334n.73, 335n.79; Calendar of Cordoba ​42, 45, 128; ivory pyxes ​ 175, 178; medieval kingdom ​12n.4; medieval caliphate ​28, 30, 70, 132; silk workshops ​99

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Corriente, Federico ​209, 210n.11, 230, 322 Courtrai, now West Flanders, Belgium ​97, 106, 115, 279–280 Covarrubias Orozco, Sebastián de ​219– 220, 222, 227 Covarrubias, now Burgos, Castile and Leon, Spain, Iglesia parroquial (ex Colegiata) de san Cosme y san Damián, textiles ​52 Covilhã, now Castelo Branco, Portugal ​ 153n.66, 155 Crescente, José, merchant ​356 Crusades, Crusaders ​14, 16n.21, 26, 172; Crusade of Barbastro (Huesca)  25 Cuenca, now Castilla La Mancha, Spain ​ 51n.51, 73, 83, 238n.15, 281n.56; rug/ carpet making ​65, 124 Cyprus ​275; Cypriot (or Cyprus) gold ​46

Dozy, Reinhart ​219, 228 Duarte (Edward), King of Portugal ​161, 198

Eañes de Çamora, Rodrigo, fur supplier ​ 245n.43 Ebro, river ​20, 23n.48, 98 Ecija, Seville, Spain ​20 Eguílaz y Yaguas, Leopoldo ​224 Egypt, 61, 125, 325, 331n.58, 333n.70, 335n.79, 336n.89; Egyptian language ​ 320n.4 El Cantar del Mío Cid, 12th–century epic  251 El Cid, protagonist of El Cantar del Mío Cid see Díaz de Vivar, Rodrigo El Comtat, now Alicante, Valencia, Spain ​ 99 Elvas, now Portalegre, Portugal ​142 Endrei, Walter ​50 Dalías, now Almería, Andalusia, Spain ​135 England ​68, 70, 76, 83, 91, 121, 163n.132, Daniel, St, textile of ​62 190, 204, 270–271, 279, 283, 290, 293, 327; Datini, Italian merchant company, records ​ culture, trade and people ​72, 77, 98, 125, 129; research ​119; Settimana di 115, 125, 157, 163, 270–272, 274 Studi Datini ​119 Enrique I, King of Castile ​261 de Albaquí, Pedro, inventory ​221n.44 Enrique II, King of Castile ​85 de Alcalá, Pedro, Arabic-Spanish Enrique III, King of Castile ​32 lexicographer ​230 Enrique IV, King of Castile ​172n.21, 194, de Alcega, Juan, tailor, Libro de geometría, 253n.79 práctica y traça el cual trata de lo tocante al Entre-Douro-e-Minho, medieval comarca of oficio de sastre ​228, 9.6 Portugal ​144, 148–149, 151, 164 de Góis, Damião, chronicler ​361 Ervededo, now Chaves municipality, Vila de Orta, Catarina, victim of Inquisition ​ Real, Portugal, foral ​158 363n.56 Estremadura, medieval comarca of Portugal ​ de Orta, Garcia, botanist ​363n.56 144, 150, 153, 155–156, 164 de Ortega, Juan, St, priest, chasuble ​214 Estremoz, now Évora, Portugal ​142 de Resende, Garcia, chronicler ​360 Europeanisation ​14 de Valera, Diego, Doctrinal de príncipes ​27 Even Shmuel, Yehuda ​325 Desrosiers, Sophie ​54, 57 Évora (Évora-Viana de Alvito), now Diago Hernando, Máximo ​5 Alentejo, Portugal ​142, 151, 154, 156, Díaz de Ceballos, Gonzalo, chamberlain ​ 159, 352, 355; blankets ​154, 156, 162; 236 Cortes ​163, 199, 201, 357 Díaz de Vivar, Rodrigo (El Cid)  248 Evreux, Normandy, now France ​274; Diccionario de la Lengua Española ​220 dynasty ​34, 266n.3 Dinis, King of Portugal ​35, 155n.73, 158 DISTAFF (Discussion, Interpretation and Fábregas, Adela ​6 Study of Textile Arts, Fabrics and Fāʽiq al-Siqlabī, chief of tiraz ​132 Fashion) 1 Fanjeaux, now Aude, France ​88, 278–279 Domínguez, Alfonso, royal tailor ​242 Far East ​64, 244, 320n.4 Douai, now Nord, France ​71, 73, 106, 115, Fāsī, al-Fāsī, David ben Abraham ​320n.4 283 Fatwas, Islamic legal opinions ​126–127, Douro, river ​159 129, 138



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Fayyum (al-Fayyum, Faiyum), Egypt ​125 Felipe, Don, Infante of Castile, burial textiles ​57, 59n.80, 242n.32, 245 Fermo, Marche, Italy, Cathedral of the Assumption of Mary, ‘chasuble’ of St Thomas Becket ​68 Fernando de la Cerda, Infante of Castile, burial textiles ​ 45n.17, 57, 62, 66, 246, 260, 10.3b, 10.4 Fernando I (Ferran I in Catalan), King of Aragon ​33–34 Fernando I, King of Portugal ​35, 149, 161 Fernando II (Ferdinand), King of Aragon, as Fernando V, King of Castile, ‘the Catholic’ ​11n.2, 27, 30, 93, 160 Fernando II, King of Leon ​29 Fernando III, ‘the Saint’, King of Castile ​ 17, 30, 32, 207, 240; burial textiles ​17, 259 Fernando IV, King of Castile ​32, 263 Fernando, Duke of Guimarães, Duke of Bragança (Dom Fernando) ​159–160 Fernando, Infante of Castile ​242 Ferran I see Fernando I, King of Aragon Ferrans, Pero, chief muleteer ​238 Ferrer Bassa, Jaume, 13th- to 14th-century painter ​312 Ferro Tavares, Maria José ​348, 350, 355 Fez, now Morocco ​177, 331 Fierro, Maribel ​26n.63 Fiñana, now Almería, Andalusia, Spain ​ 132 Flanders, Flemish area ​72–73, 76, 87, 97–98, 117, 143, 162, 270, 279, 293; Flemish products ​73, 76–77, 85, 87, 97–98, 113, 115, 125, 157, 162–163, 274, 276, 279 Florence, now Tuscany, Italy, medieval republic ​85–86, 121, 137, 281, 286 Foix-Albret dynasty ​34; Countess of Foix ​ 277 Formentera ​33 Fourth Lateran Council ​8, 24, 190–192, 199, 299, 348, 351–353 France, French area ​6, 33–34, 57, 70–79, 81, 85, 88–89, 91, 94–97, 99, 113, 115–117, 121, 152, 252n.75, 259n.92, 266–267, 277, 291, 298, 327, 333n.70; French culture, people and products ​78–79, 94, 96–97, 108, 152, 161–162, 242n.35, 266

37 1

Franch Benavent, Ricardo ​3 Frankia, Frankish culture and people ​15, 272n.14 Frederik I, Holy Roman Emperor ​157 Freising, Otto of, chronicler ​157 Fuchs, Barbara ​195 Fusṭāṭ, Egypt ​331, 333, 335n.79 Galicia, now Spain; medieval kingdom ​ 82–83, 85; Galician culture ​170–171, 201n.57, 203, 352 García Arenal, Mercedes ​212 García de Campos, Diego, chancellor, Planeta ​261 García Fitz, Francisco ​14, 23, 26 García Marsilla, Juan Vicente ​240n.26, 265 García Ramírez, King of Navarre ​29, 34 García Sánchez, Expiración ​36, 44 García, Martín, clothing maker ​242 Garibrois Ballesteros, Mercedes ​234 Gascony, former Basque province of medieval France ​88, 99, 115 Gaul, ancient region of western Europe, now France, Belgium, Germany, Italy, Luxembourg, Netherlands and Switzerland, Gaulish culture and people ​ 171 Genoa, now Liguria, Italy, medieval republic ​ 84, 102, 119, 130, 157; Arte della Seta ​ 102; Genoese culture and people ​102 George, St, emblem of ​111 Germany ​62, 87, 89, 116, 121, 298, 341, 346; German culture and people ​171, 242n.35, 87 Geulen, Christian ​27 Ghent, now East Flanders, Belgium ​71–72, 87, 97, 115, 279–280, 283 Gibraltar, Battle of the Strait ​30 Gil de Zamora, Fray Juan, 13th- to 14th-century scholar of the Franciscan order ​256 Girona, Catalonia, Spain ​78, 88, 95, 115–116, 299, 312n.78, 314; Cathedral of St Mary, ‘Tapestry of the Creation’  ​68 Golden Haggada (England, London, British Library, MS Additional 27210) ​308, 313, 316, 12.3 Gomez, Mariano ​329n.49, 330n.56 Gómez Barroso, Pedro see Maestre Pedro Gómez-Moreno, Manuel ​2, 62, 228, 246, 261

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Gonçalves, João, carpenter ​162 Gondar, Erzsébet ​46 González, Julio ​252 Granada, now Andalusia, Spain, city and medieval Nasrid emirate ​15–16, 20, 24n.55, 29n.76, 30–31, 34, 36–37, 70, 84, 100, 102–103, 108, 124–125, 128, 132, 135– 138, 169–170, 173, 176, 178, 185, 193–194, 197, 207, 211–212, 218, 221–224, 231, 298, 325, 326n.32, 334n.73; Alhambra palace ​ 1.3, house of the Partal, wall paintings ​ 176, Sala de los Reyes, paintings on leather ​172, 178; Museo de la Alhambra ​ 52; agronomic school  128; Cuarto Real de Santo Domingo  135; Inventarios de bienes moriscos del reino de Granada (siglo XVI) ​209; language ​211, 227 Greece, Greek culture ​23; Greek language ​ 216, 229, 231, 331n.60, 332nn.62, 64 Gregorian Reform ​15 Gregory IV, Pope, Liber pontificalis ​42 Gregory IX, Pope ​299, 302 Guadalajara, Spain ​48, 238n.15 Guadalquivir, river ​12n.4 Guadalupe, Cáceres, Spain, Royal Monastery of Santa María of Guadalupe ​52; embroidery workshop ​68 Gual Camarena, Miguel ​52, 72, 77 Guarda, Portugal ​153n.66, 155 Guardamar, now Alicante, Valencia, Spain ​ 118 Guerrero Lovillo, José ​228 Guichard, Pierre ​23 Guicherd, Félix ​54 Guide to the Perplexed (Hebrew translation Moreh Nevukhim) see Maimonides Guillem, maestro ​277 Guimarães (Vimaranes), now Braga, Portugal ​82, 90, 148–149; Duke of ​159; Museu Alberto Sampaio ​52 Guipúzcoa, Spain, Basque area ​116 Gutierre, Don, archbishop ​253n.80 Gutiérrez Baños, Fernando ​234, 239, 244 Hadith Bayad wa-Riyad, 13th-century Arabic love story ​178–179, 183 Hague, The, now The Netherlands ​ 279–280 Hakam, Al-Ḥakam I, Emir of Cordoba, palatine annals ​128

Hakam, Al-Ḥakam II, Umayyad Caliph of al-Andalus ​131–132, 176, 180 Ha-Kohen, Yosef, Valley of Tears ​362n.49 Ha-Levi, Judah ben Samuel, Rabbi, The Book of the Kuzari ​322n.14, 325–327, 328n.47, 329n.49 Hebrew, language and documents ​296, 312n.78, 320–322, 325, 327–330, 331n.58, 333, 334n.73, 341, 343n.109, 350n.10, 362n.50; Hebrews ​220 see also Jews Henry II, King of Castile and Leon ​32 Henry of Champagne, crusader ​172 Hinojosa Montalvo, José Ramón ​306n.57 Ḥisba, Islamic doctrine upholding law and supervising market transactions ​47, 126, 129, 169, 175, 181, 186 Hispania/España ​12–13, 18 Hispanic monarchy (also called ‘the Catholic monarchy’) 5, 11, 28, 37 Hispano-Moresque Haggada (England, London, British Library, MS Oriental 2737) ​308, 313, 316, 12.4 Hittites, ancient Anatolian people, Hittite language ​320n.4 Holland ​89, 116, 293 see also Netherlands Holy Land ​16n.21, 155n.73 Honorius III, Pope ​302 Huesca, now Aragon, Spain ​88, 95, 116 Ibiza ​33 Ibn ʿAbd Rabbih, poet ​334 Ibn ʿAbdun, author of a hisba treatise ​169, 181, 184, 186 Ibn al Khaṭīb, Ibn al-Jaṭīb (Lisan al-Din Ibn al-Khatib), Andalusi historian and poet ​ 124, 135–136, 178, 185, 222 Ibn al-‘Awwām, agronomist ​129 Ibn al-Haddad, teacher ​177 Ibn al-Jaṭīb see Ibn al Khaṭīb Ibn al-Mawwaq, Granada jurist ​173 Ibn al-Walīd, Muḥammad, secretary of ṭirāz ​ 132 Ibn Baṣṣāl, agronomist ​128–129 Ibn Butlan al-Baghdadi, physician ​181n.62 Ibn Ezra, Abraham (Avraham), Rabbi, Biblical exegete and philosopher ​305– 306, 320n.6, 322n.14, 326n.35, 327–330; Biblical exegesis ​327; Sefer Yǝsod Moraˀ (Book on the Foundation of Awe) ​330, 343n.109



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Ibn Ezra, Moses, ‘Abū Harūn’, Rabbi, poet ​ 334n.73 Ibn Habib, ʿAbd al-Malik, Andalusi scholar ​ 169, 179–183 Ibn Haǧǧāǧ, agronomist ​128–129 Ibn Ḥasdai, Yosef, poet ​334n.73 Ibn Ḥawqal, geographer and traveller ​ 124–125 Ibn Hudayl, 14th-century scholar ​37 Ibn ʽIḏārī, historian ​131 Ibn Iflīlī, Abd Allāh ibn Aḥmad, director of ṭirāz ​132 Ibn Khaldun, historian ​172 Ibn Luyūn, Nasrid botanist ​127–129 Ibn Mardanish, ruler of the Eastern Andalusi territories ​171–172 Ibn Paqūda, Baḥya ben Joseph, Rabbi, The Book of Direction to the Duties of the Heart ​ 321–322, 325 Ibn Ṣabbāḥ, ʽAbd Allāh Ibn aṣ-Sabbāh al-Aṣbahī al-Andalusī, traveller ​136 Ibn Saruq, Menaḥem, ‘Khazar Correspondence’ ​319–321 Ibn Shaprut, Ḥasdai, Rabbi ​319–320, 327, 331n.58, 332n.68, 344n.114 Ibn Sīdah (Abū’l-Ḥasan ʻAlī ibn Ismāʻīl), Andalusi lexicographer of Arabic ​220 Ibn Tibbon, Judah, translator ​321, 325 Ibn Wāfid, agronomist ​128–129 Ibrahim, Tawfiq ​345n.116 Iça Gidelli (Isā ibn Jābir), Breviario Sunni ​194 Idrīsī (Muhammed al-Idrisi), Andalusi geographer ​124, 133 Illescas, now Toledo, Castilla La Mancha, Spain ​230 India ​35 Innocent IV, Pope ​113, 301 Inquisition ​100, 363nn.54, 56, 14.4 Iradiel, Paulino ​115 Iran, Iranian language ​336 Ireland, Irish culture ​163 Isabel (Elizabeth), St, Queen of Portugal ​ 254n.80 Isabel (Isabella) I, Queen of Castile and Aragon, ‘the Catholic’ ​11n.2, 30, 32, 160n.115, 211, 213, 230; testamentary documents ​213 Isabel (Isabella) of Portugal, Holy Roman Empress, Queen Consort and Regent of Spain ​230

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Isfahan, now Iran, formerly Persia ​167 Islam, religion of Muslims ​11–13, 15, 26, 28, 70, 84, 173, 182–183, 200, 202–203, 212; Islamic culture and people ​1, 3–7, 11–16, 20–21, 23–25, 28, 30, 33, 36–37, 42, 47, 49–50, 100, 123, 127, 154, 157–158, 164, 167–170, 172n.21, 173–174, 176–178, 181–182, 185–186, 196, 202, 204, 207, 211–214, 216–218, 222, 226, 228–229, 231 see also Muslims Islamic Agricultural Revolution ​127 Israel ​297n.8, 325, 331, 333, 346n.120 Italy, Italian culture and people ​6, 62, 64, 69–70, 77, 84–87, 89, 91, 100, 103, 116, 121, 159n.107, 163n.132, 242n.35, 270, 327, 362, 364 Iznatoraf, Spain, municipal charter of ​ 51n.51 Jaca, Aragon, Spain ​117 Jaen, now Andalusia, Spain ​12n.4, 48, 134, 319 Jaime II, King of Majorca ​75, 77–78, 95 James, St (Santiago) 254n.80; pilgrimage route ​15 Járó, Márta ​46 Jaume I, King of Aragon ​299, 301 Jaume II, King of Aragon, Sardinia and Corsica, Valencia, Count of Barcelona ​ 191, 305 Jerez, now Cádiz, Andalusia, Spain, Cortes ​ 191–192, 241; Ordinance of ​71–72, 82 Jerome, St, Colegio del Arte Mayor de la Seda of Valencia ​103 Jerusalem ​16n.21 Jews, Jewish culture and people ​6, 192, 194n.28, 204, 295–364, 12.2, 14.2, 14.3; Judaism ​11, 202, 297n.8, 362 Jihad ​14, 24, 26 Jiménez de Rada, Rodrigo, Archbishop of Toledo, burial textiles ​3, 62, 66–67, 245, 246n.49, 253n.79 Joan II see Juan II, King-Consort of Navarre, King of Aragon Joan of Arc, St ​182 Joanna (Joan) Queen of Navarre ​277 João I, King of Portugal ​35, 202, 352–353 João II, King of Portugal ​160n.111, 162, 195, 358, 360 Johan, Pero (Pedro Juan), tailor ​240, 242

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Johana, Infanta of Navarre ​275 Juan I, King of Aragon ​193 Juan I, King of Castile ​237n.10, 254 Juan II (Joan II in Catalan), King-Consort of Navarre, King of Aragon ​34, 316, 269n.9 Juan II, King of Castile ​32, 253n.79 Juana, Queen of Castile ​222–223 Jubiles, las Alpujarras, Granada, Spain ​135 Judeo-Arabic, Jewish dialects of Arabic or classical Arabic written in Hebrew script ​ 321–322, 325, 327, 331 Jurdán de Urrias, Pedro, knight of Navarre ​ 291

Leonor (Eleanor of Castile), Queen of Navarre ​284, 289 Leonor (Eleanor of England) Plantagenet, Queen of Castile, burial textiles ​45n.16, 57n72, 59, 67, 245, 248; stole and maniple ​ 65 Leonor, Infanta of Castile, Queen of Aragon, burial textiles ​245–246, 261, 10.3, 10.6 Leonor, Infanta of Castile, burial textile ​ 64, 261 Leonor, Infanta of Portugal, Queen of Aragon (Dona Leonor), inventory ​158 Leonor, Queen of Portugal ​195 Lérida [Castilian] see Lleida [Catalan] Khazars, medieval Turkic people ​321, 326; Levant, Levantine culture and people ​362 ‘Khazar Correspondence’ see Ibn Saruq Librada, St, ‘Santa Librada’, textiles of ​62 King, Donald ​57 Libre verd del racional de Cervera (Spain, La Kochi (Cochin), now Kerala, India ​150 Segarra, Historic Regional Archive) ​316 Libro de la Coronación de los reyes de Castilla La Conquista de Ultramar, 13th-century y León (Spain, Madrid, Real Biblioteca romance chronicle ​246 Monasterio de San Lorenzo de El Escorial La Plana, now region of Castelló de la Plana, (RBME), MS & III.3) ​235 Spain ​99 Libro del Axedrez, Dados y Tablas (Libro de los La Ribera, now region of Alzira, Valencia, Juegos), Spain, Madrid, Real Biblioteca Spain ​99 Monasterio de San Lorenzo de El Escorial Ladero Quesada, Miguel Ángel ​13–14, 20, (RBME), MS T. I.6) ​180–181, 183, 235, 28, 344n.113, 345n.116 259, 10.5 Lagardère, Vincent ​42, 123, 138 Libros de Apeo y Repartimientos (Christian Lamta people, Lamtuna people, Berber land registers) ​127 tribal population in North Africa ​186 Liétor, now Albacete, Castilla La Mancha, Languedoc, medieval province of France ​ Spain, rug making ​65 71–73, 77–79, 94, 96–97, 270, 278 Liguria, Italian region around Genoa ​102 Las Alpujarras region, now Granada and Lima, river ​149 Almería, Spain ​134–135, 137 Limoges, now Haute-Vienne, France ​115 Las Huelgas see Burgos, Spain, Abbey of Lisbon, Portugal ​85, 150, 157–158, 164, Santa María la Real de las Huelgas 194n.28, 197–199, 202–203, 343n.109, 349, Lateran Councils see Fourth Lateran 353–354, 363; Arquivo Nacional da Torre Council; Third Lateran Council do Tombo ​14.1; Cortes ​150; Museu Latin culture ​14, 21, 23, 189, 204; language ​ Nacional de Arte Antiga, painted altar 57, 94, 144, 158n.100, 200n.53, 217–218, panel ​ 14.2 228, 232, 299n.17, 312n.78, 325n.26, 327 Lleida (Lérida), now Segria, Catalonia, Spain ​ Laxaga, Beltrán de, knight of Navarre ​291 115, 194; bishop of ​191; Cortes ​192; Leeds, UK, International Medieval Congress ​ Council ​250; Museu de Lleida ​296n.3 1–2 Logroño, now La Rioja, Spain ​244n.43 Leon, now Spain, city and medieval Lomax, Derek ​30 kingdom ​13, 28–30, 32, 45, 254; Lombard, Maurice ​123, 131, 133 Cathedral of Santa Maria, stained glass ​ London, England ​76, 88, 106, 115, 271–272, 234, 259, gifts ​253; Collegiate Church 330; Victoria and Albert Museum, of San Isodoro, textiles ​52, 65; Leonese textiles ​52, Ziyad pyx ​171n.12 Empire ​11n.2 López Dapena, Asunción ​234



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López de Coca, José Enrique ​138 López, Íñigo, Count of Tendilla, Captain General of Granada ​211 Loulé, now Faro, Portugal ​151; inventories of orphans ​162 Lourie, Elena ​21 Louvain, now Louvaine, Flemish Brabant, Belgium ​115 Lubb ibn Musa, Banu Qasi ruler of Tudela ​ 179 Lucas de Iranzo, Miguel, constable of King Enrique IV ​194 Lucca, now Tuscany, Italy ​84–85, 100, 137, 286, 328n.42; Lucchese migrants ​121 Lugo, now Galicia, Spain, Cathedral of Santa Maria, textile gift ​254 Luis, Infante of Navarre ​278 Luna, Cardinal ​277 Luza, Moorish female potter ​202 Lyon, France ​59, 121; Council of ​113; Musée des Tissus ​52

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78–80, 87–88, 93–95, 98–99, 301–302, 304, 317 Malaga, now Andalusia, Spain ​103, 132, 134–135, 137, 185 Mansûr, al-Mansûr (Abu Yusuf Yaqub al-Mansur), Almohade caliph ​197n.44 Mantilla de los Ríos, Socorro ​3 Manuel I, King of Portugal, Duke of Viseu and Beja ​31, 35, 195, 361 Manuel, Don Juan, El Libro de los Estados ​24, 237 Maqqarī, al-Maqqarī, biographer and historian ​131 Maranges i Prat, Isidra ​107, 109, 111 María de Almenar, burial textiles ​59, 246, 261, 2.4, 2.6, 10.3 María de Molina, Queen of Castile ​238, 242, 244 Marín, Manuela ​4, 6, 203 Marinid Sultanate ​15, 24n.55 Marques, Antonio Henrique Rodrigo de Oliveira ​201 Madeira, archipelago, Portugal ​149 Marquesa, Doña, laundress ​240 Madrid, Spain, Fundación Lázaro Galdiano ​ Marracoxim, royal tailor ​354–355, 14.3 52; Instituto Valencia de don Juan ​52, Martí, Macià, shopkeeper ​113 ‘music cloth’ ​64; Museo Arqueológico Martin I (Martí in Catalan), King of Aragon ​ Nacional ​52, 68n.112; Museo Nacional 33, 305 del Prado de Madrid ​4.3; Patrimonio Martines, Johan, keeper of the king’s Nacional ​52; Royal Palace, portrait of clothes ​239 Isabel I of Castile ​211 Martínez Meléndez, María del Carmen ​52, Madrigal, now Madrigal de las Altas Torres, 82, 104, 107, 109, 111 Ávila, Castile and Leon, Spain, Cortes ​ Martínez Martínez, María ​231 194, 304 Martínez Ruiz, Juan ​209, 216, 220–221, Maestre Pedro (Pedro Gómez Barroso the 224, 230–231 Elder?), Libro del consejo e de los consejeros ​ Martínez Sopena, Pascual ​31 17 Martinez, Julia ​321n.9, 330n.56 Magalona [historical city], Bishop of ​301 Martínez, Pero, muleteer ​238 Mag̲h̲rib, al-Mag̲h̲rib (Magreb), north-west Mártir, Pedro, ambassador ​227 Africa, now Algeria, Libya, Mauritania, Mary, St, Cantigas ​209n.8, 235n.5; feast day ​ Morocco and Tunisia ​14–15, 134, 171, 111, virginity of ​112 174, 187, 331n.58, 333n.70, 335n.79 Matheo, Juan, chamberlain ​253, 236 Maíllo Salgado, Felipe ​14 Matheos, Ferrando, ring supplier ​245n.43 Maimonides, Moses (Moshe Ben Maimon), Maurofilia/maurophilia ​195, 212–213 Rabbi ​323n.22, 331, 344; Commentary on Mecca, now Saudi Arabia ​125 the Mishnah ​328n.42, 329n.53, 331–333, Mechelen, now Antwerp, Belgium ​97, 106, 336nn.86–89, 338, 340, 345–346; Guide 115, 276, 283 to the Perplexed ​312; Mishneh Torah ​ Medina del Campo, now Castile and Leon, 333–335, 336n.89; Responsa ​335 Spain, Assembly ​303; medieval fairs ​ Majorca (Mallorca), now Balearic Islands, 83, 90, 151, 163 Spain, medieval kingdom ​5, 19, 33, Medina Sidonia, Andalusia, Spain ​48

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Mediterranean sea and region ​3, 23, 28, 44, 70, 84–85, 93, 99, 117, 128, 134 Melis, Federigo ​129 Menéndez Pidal, Faustino ​18 Menéndez Pidal, Gonzalo ​213, 220 Menéndez Pidal, Ramón ​29n.76, 212 Mértola, now Beja district, Portugal ​135, 154 Michael, St, archangel, brotherhoods in Valencia ​97, 100, 4.1; fair at the feast of ​89 Miguelles, Pedro, tailor ​241 Milan, now Lombardy, Italy ​117 Milhou, Alain ​37 Minorca (Menorca), now Balearic Isles, Spain, formerly Islamic State, part of Crown of Aragon and part of Kingdom of Majorca ​33 Mishaly, Ayala ​329 Mishnah, collection of Jewish oral traditions ​ 297, 328n.42, 332–333, 336, 346 see also Ben Yeḥiel, Commentary on the Mishnah; Maimonides, Commentary on the Mishnah Monastery of Santa Maria de Huerta, Soria, Spain see Soria Mondego, river ​150 Monresin, Don Bartolomé, textile supplier ​ 248n.43 Montemor-o-Velho, now Coimbra, Portugal ​ 150 Monteros de Espinosa, royal guard ​251 Montivilliers, now Normandy, France ​106, 274–275 Montoliu, now Aude, France ​115 Montpellier, now Hérault, France ​71, 79, 85, 88, 95, 293, 299 Montpensier, Count of ​277 Monzón, now Huesca, Spain ​97; Cortes Generales ​97, 115, 193 Monzón, Olga Pérez ​260 Moors, Moorish/Moresque culture and people ​37, 159, 191, 194, 196–198, 201, 228, 244, 250n.62, 354; Moorishness ​6, 190–198, 202, 204, 212; inventories of goods of Moors ​209, 216 Moreima, Moorish female potter of Santarém ​202 Morella, now Castellón, Spain ​115 Moresque see Moors

Moriscos, Morisco population, former Muslims converted to Christianism and their descendants living in Spain (until 1609) ​168, 195; Paños moriscos ​288; see also Mudejars Motis Dolader, Miguel Ángel ​306n.57 Moura, now Beja, Portugal ​196–198 Mozambique, East Africa ​150 Mozarabs, modern term for Iberian Christians under Muslim rule, Mozarabic culture ​171, 217 Mu’ammal al-Qastali, a lord of Valencia ​ 248 Mudejars, Muslims remaining in Iberia after the Christian reconquest, Mudejar culture ​2, 20, 23, 62, 95, 100, 126, 168, 192, 211, 218; see also Moriscos Muhammad ben Yūsuf ben Nasr, sultán of Arjona, Emir of Granada ​36 Muhammad I, Umayyad emir of al-Andalus ​ 179 Muhammad II, Emir of Granada ​24n.55 Muhammad XII (Boabdil; traditional numbering), Nasrid Sultan of Granada ​ 24n55; marlota of ​229 Muhammad XIII (traditional numbering), ‘el-Zagal’ ​24n. 55 Muhammad, Muḥammad ibn ʿAbd Allāh, Prophet, founder of Islam ​174, 180 Münzer, Hyeronimus, German traveller Viaje por España y Portugal ​185, 210–211, 222 Murcia, now Spain, medieval Taifa kingdom, later part of Castile ​20, 33, 132, 134 Muret, Battle of ​33 Muslims, Muslim culture and people ​1, 5–6, 12, 15, 20–21, 24, 26–27, 30, 37, 45, 70, 84, 90, 108–109, 136, 141, 153, 157, 164, 170–176, 180–183, 185–187, 189–205, 211–214, 217, 220, 223, 226, 228, 232, 238, 244, 263, 295, 298–299, 305, 311, 317, 325–326, 329, 334n.73, 351, 353–354, 357 see also Islam Naples, now Campania, Italy, medieval kingdom ​34, 93, 98 Narbonne, now Aude, France ​71–75, 77, 79, 89–90, 95–96 Nasrid dynasty ​58, 127, 130, 135, 172, 178,



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194, 229, 1.3; Nasrid culture and people ​ 124, 127, 135–138, 176 Nasrid kingdom, medieval emirate see Granada Navarra, medieval kingdom of Navarre, now Navarra, Spain ​4, 7, 28–34, 71, 73–74, 76, 79, 81–82, 85, 88–90, 116, 253n.80, 265–294, 11.1, 11.3; Fueros de Navarra (General Charter of Navarre ​ 301; Museo de Navarra, casket of Leyre ​ 171n.12 Navarro Espinach, Germán ​3, 5, 86 Navarro, Moisés, merchant ​356 Navas de Tolosa, Battle of ​30; Banner of ​ 65 Near East ​321; languages ​320n.4, 321n.8 Negro, David, merchant ​356 Negro, José, merchant ​356 Neopatria, now Greece, medieval duchy ​93 Nerdiel (Verdiel), Gil, textile merchant ​ 244n.43 Netherlands, The ​ 121, 152 see also Holland Netherton, Robin ​1n.1 New York, USA, Cooper Hewitt Museum ​ 52; Hispanic Society of America ​52; Metropolitan Museum ​52 Niebla, Huelva, Spain ​20, 48, 321n.9 Nieto Soria, José Manuel ​11n.1 Nirenberg, David ​200n.55, 299n.19 Nogales Rincón, David ​5 Nómina de los gastos en vestidos y paños para la compaña del rey (18 septiembre de 1294), list of royal expenditure ​252 Normandy ​270, 274, 276, 278 North Africa, North Africans ​14, 24n.55, 36, 124, 154, 171, 174, 177–178, 197, 203, 327, 330n.56, 362

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Order of the Temple (Knights Templar), military order ​155n.73 Orihuela, now Aicante, Valencia, Spain ​ 118 Orleans dynasty ​266 Osés Urricelqui, Merche ​7, 76 Ostend, now West Flanders, Belgium ​97, 118 Ottoman Empire, culture and people ​362 Oviedo, now Asturias, Spain, Cathedral of San Salvador, textile gifts ​254 Owen-Crocker, Gale R. ​1–2

Palaçano, Guedelha, merchant ​356 Palencia, now Castile and Leon, Spain, Cortes ​193 Palmer, Caroline ​2 Pamiers, now Ariège, France ​74–75, 88, 115, 278 Pamplona, now Navarre, Spain ​227, 312; cathedral ​284, 291; General Charter of Navarre (Fueros de Navarra) ​301 Paradise ​16 Paris, France ​137; Musée de Cluny ​52; Paris cloth ​108, 110; Parisian products ​ 100 Pechina, now Almería, Andalusia, Spain ​ 125, 132, 135 Pedro I, King of Castile ​30, 1.1 Pedro I, King of Portugal ​196–198, 201, 352–353 Pedro II (Pere II in Catalan), ‘the Catholic’, King of Aragon ​33, 302n.33 Pedro III (Pere III in Catalan), King of Aragon ​34, 299 Pedro IV, ‘the Ceremonious’, King of Aragon ​30, 78, 111–112, 192, 258n.89 Pedro, Infante of Castile ​252, 261n.108 Occitania, Occitan region, historic region Pedro, master tailor ​252 now overlapping France, Italy, Monaco Pere d’Urg, Bishop of La Seu d’Urgell, burial and Spain ​33, 75, 97 textiles ​61 Oliveira Martins, Raquel ​149n.33 Pere III see Pedro III, King of Aragon Omar II, Umayyad Caliph ​298 Pereira, Gonçalo, Archbishop of Braga, Oña, Burgos, Spain, church ​52; gloves of ​67 ‘Embroidered tunic of Oña’ ​68 Peres, Roy, clothing maker ​243n.40 Order of Aviz, Military Order of Saint Pérez de Hita, Ginés, novelist and poet ​ Benedict of Aviz, Portuguese military 227 order ​156 Pérez Monzón, Olga ​260 Order of Christ, Portuguese military order ​ Perez, Ferrán, alfayate ​242 155 Pérez, María, laundress ​240

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Pérez, Nicolás, tailor ​240 Pérez, Pablo, alfayate ​241 Perpignan, now Pyrénées-Orientales, France ​74, 77–79, 80n.39, 88, 89n.91, 90n.93, 96, 98, 115, 278, 299; craft guild ​ 94; Ordinacions de Perpinyá (Ordinations of Perpignan) ​302 Persia, Persian culture ​23, 226 Petronilla I, Queen of Aragon ​30, 93 Philippe IV, King of France ​240 Pinto, Pedro ​162n.124, 349n.7 Pliny ‘the Elder’, Gaius Plinius Secundus, 1st-century Roman naturalist and author ​44n.13 Poridat de Poridades, medieval treatise ​249 Porto (Oporto), Portugal ​142, 148–151, 157, 159; University of, CITCEM (Centro de Investigação Transdisciplinar ‘Cultura, Espaço e Memória’) 2 Portugal, medieval county; medieval kingdom; Portuguese culture and people ​1–6, 8, 18, 24, 26, 29–32, 34–35, 48, 50, 74–77, 82–85, 89–91, 109, 141–164, 189–205, 230, 253n.80, 337, 347–364, 1.2; Portuguese Foundation for Science and Technology ​143n.15 Portugal, Pedro, royal employee ​252n.76 Prato ‎Haggada (USA, New York, The Jewish Theological Seminary Library, MS 9468) ​ 316 Prato, Italy, Archivio di Stato di Prato ​ 129 see also Datini Provence ​325 Puigcerdà, Cerdanya, now Girona, Catalonia, Spain ​74–75, 78–81, 88–89, 115–116, 280–281, 315; guild ​95; Museu Cerdà ​296n.3 Pyrenees, mountains and region ​71, 77–79, 91, 117, 265 Qafiḥ, Yosef, Rabbi ​321, 325 Quintanaortuño, Burgos, Spain, church, textiles ​52, 214n.25 Rada, Rodrigo Jiménez de, archbishop ​ 253; burial textiles ​3, 62, 64n.94, 66–67, 245–246 Ramadi, al-Ramadi, Cordoba poet ​184–185 Ramón Berenguer IV, Count of Barcelona ​ 30, 93

Reims, now Marne, France ​107, 292–293 Retuerce Velasco, Manuel ​50 Ribagorza, now Huesca, Aragon, Spain, medieval county ​28, 117 Riera Melis, Antoni ​77, 97–98 Rio do Ouro, now Morocco, Africa, formerly [Spanish] Western Sahara ​152 Ripoll, now Girona, Catalonia, Spain ​ 78, 88, 115–116, 280–281; Monastery of Santa Maria, sculpture ​303n.36, 12.1 Riyad, character in Hadith Bayad wa–Riyad ​ 179 Rocabertí, Benet de, Archbishop of Tarragona ​303n.34 Roda de Isábena, Huesca, Spain, Cathedral san Vicente de Roda de Isábena, textiles of the bishop ​52, 61n.82 Rodrigues Acenheiro, Cristóvão, chronicler ​ 358 Rois de Burgos, Juan, amo (housekeeper) 252 Rome, now Italy, Roman culture and people, Roman Empire ​12–13, 23, 25n.59, 113, 144, 152, 171; Roman liturgy ​ 15; see also Latin culture Ronda, now Málaga, Spain ​185 Rouen, now Normandy, France ​71, 274, 302n.30, 327n.38, 329 Roussillon, now France, medieval county ​ 77, 94–95 Ruiz, Juan, Archpriest of Hita, poet ​212 Ruiz, Teófilo F. ​234, 244 Rylands Haggada (England, Manchester, The John Rylands University Library, Heb. MS ​6) 308, 313, 315–316 Saint-Omer, formerly Flanders, now Normandy, France ​71–72, 252n.75 Saladin, Al-Nasir Salah al-Din Yusuf ibn Ayyub, first Sultan of Egypt and Syria, founder of Ayyubid dynasty ​172 Saladrigas Cheng, Silvia ​55 Salamanca, now Castile and Leon, Spain ​ 344; University ​219 Salazar y Acha, Jaime de ​236 San Isidoro de Leon, Real Colegiata Basílica de san Isidoro de León, textiles ​52, 65 San Juan de las Abadesas, now Girona, Catalonia, Spain ​280 San Millán de la Cogolla, La Rioja, Spain,



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37 9

Monastery, portable altar with textile ​ Serra da Estrela, mountains ​153–154, 61 155n.75 Sancho I, King of Majorca ​95 Serrano-Niza, Maria Dolores ​1, 7, 52, Sancho I, King of Portugal ​148 322n.13 Sancho III, King of Castile ​29 Setúbal (formerly Shaṭūbar), Portugal ​201 Sancho IV, King of Castile ​32, 236–238, Seville, city and medieval kingdom, now 240, 242–245; accounts ​72, 234, 241, Andalusia, Spain ​12n.4, 20, 30, 48, 244, 251–252; Castigos de Sancho IV ​246, 102–103, 128, 132, 159, 181, 184, 240; 249 agronomic school ​128; Cathedral of St Sancho VII, King of Navarre ​34 Mary, burial textiles ​66, 234, 245, 259; Sancho, Infante of Castile and archbishop of Cortes ​191 Toledo, burial textiles ​260 Shepherd, Dorothy G. ​62, 88 Sancho, Infante of Castile, natural son Sicily, now Italy, medieval kingdom ​33, of Alfonso XI, burial textiles ​55n.65, 61, 84, 93, 98–99, 153, 197n.43 67n.106 Simancas, now Castile and Leon, Spain, Sancho, Infante of Castile, son of Alfonso Archivo General de Simancas ​127n.26, X ​24n.55 242n.35 Sanhaja people, Berber tribal population in Simon de Montfort the Elder, 5th Earl of North Africa ​186 Leicester ​33 Sant Joan d’Empúries, county of Empúries Simon, Uriel ​329 (Ampurias) in medieval Catalonia ​115 Solsona, now Lleida, Catalonia, Spain ​115 Sant Joan de les Abadesses, Girona, Spain ​ Somport route, Pyrenees ​117 78, 81, 88, 115–116; Monastery, ‘cloth of Soria, town and province, now Spain ​82; the witches’ 61 Church of Santa María del Rivero, Santa María de Huerta, Soria, Spain, sculptured capitals ​177; Convent of Convent, burial textiles ​3, 52, 62, 245 Santa Maria de Huerta, textiles ​3, 52, Santarém, Portugal ​144, 150, 156, 164, 62, 245 202, 352; Cortes ​199, 201, 357; Costumes Soyer, François ​357n.36 (Customs) of Santarém ​144 Spain, Spanish culture and people ​1–2, 17, Santiago, now Santiago de Compostela, 20, 28, 52, 55, 93, 115–117, 208, 211–213, Galicia, Spain, Camino de Santiago ​15; 232, 342; language ​7, 55, 112, 210, Cathedral of Santiago de Compostela, 213n.23, 214–216, 218, 220, 231–232, textiles ​52, 253; military order ​16 237n.12, 340n.100 Saqati, al-Saqati, author of a hisba treatise ​ Strabo, 1st-century Greek geographer and 169, 175–176, 180, 183–184 historian ​44n.13 Saracens (a term originally used by Suares, Doña Marina, employee and Christian writers for Muslims of any provider of textiles ​252 origin) ​199, 301, 351 Sardinia, now Italy, medieval kingdom ​33, Tagus, river ​144 93 Taifas, Muslim-ruled principalities ​36, 70, Schwarz, Michael ​325 128 Seco de Lucena Paredes, Luis ​221, 223 Talmud ​333, 335–336, 341, 346 Secreto de los Secretos, medieval treatise ​248 Tamarite de Litera, now Huesca, Aragon, Sefarad, Hebrew name for Iberia ​331n.58, Spain ​116 335 Tapestry of the Creation see Girona Segorbe, Castelló, autonomous community Tarazona, now Aragon, Spain ​74, 80, 81, of Valencia, Spain ​118 304; Tarazona-Zaragoza, Cortes ​34 Segovia, Spain ​82–83; Cathedral of the Targum Onkelos see Bible Virgin Mary, burial textiles ​52 Tarragona, now Catalonia, Spain ​303, Sequeira, Joana Isabel ​1–2, 6, 84–85 305; archive of the Archdiocese, notarial

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manuals ​304n.45; Cathedral, chapel of Santa Helena (formerly of Santa Llúcia), murals ​302, 12.2; Council ​250; Monastery of Santa Maria de Santes Creus, burial textiles ​52 Tàrrega, now Catalonia, Spain, Jewish Necropolis ​296, 314, 317; Museu Comarcal d’Urgell ​296n.3 Teobaldo I, King of Navarre ​34 Terrasa, Spain, Centre de Documentació i Museu Tèxtil ​52 Teruel, medieval town, now province, Aragon, Spain ​80, 89, 118; guild of wool weavers and dyers ​96; Museo de Teruel ​ 296n.3; Jewish Necropolis ​315 Tetuan, now Morocco ​182n.68 Tignarī, Al-Tignarī, agronomist ​128 Tirieza, now Murcia, Spain ​135 Tognetti, Sergio ​121 Toledo, now Castille La Mancha, Spain ​ 48–49, 86, 102–103, 161, 238, 325, 341– 342, 343n.109, 344n.113, 346; agronomic school ​128; Army Museum ​229; Cathedral of St Mary of Toledo, burial textiles ​52, 68n.112, 234, 260, inventory ​ 238, 253n.80, 254, liturgical textiles ​ 263; Cortes ​193; ‘School of Translators’ ​ 23n.48; Museo Sefardí ​296n.3; Jewish Necropolis ​315; Visgothic Kingdom ​5, 25–26, 28, 32 Tomar (Thomar), Santarém, Portugal ​156, 195 Torah ​323, 335 see also Bible Toro, now Castile and Leon, Spain, Cortes ​ 303 Torre de Moncorvo, now Bragança, Portugal ​148, 150, 164 Torrox, now Malaga, Andalusia, Spain ​138 Tortosa, now Baix Ebre, Catalonia, Spain ​ 192, 320; Customs of Tortosa ​191, 193, 196, 301 Tóth, Attila ​46 Toulouse, now Haute-Garonne, Occitanie, France, city and medieval county ​33, 75, 88, 115, 278; guild ​95 Trás-os-Montes, medieval comarca of Portugal ​144, 158–159 Trastámara dynasty ​33, 266 Tudején, Treaty of ​32 Tudela, now Navarre, Spain ​179, 325, 327;

Cathedral, retable ​11.2; fairs ​90 Tujibid dynasty of Calatayud ​26n.63 Tunisia, Tunisian culture ​124, 203, 213, 227 Turkey, Turkish culture and people ​ 185n.84 ’Udrī, al-’Udrī, Andalusi geographer ​128 ʿUmar ibn al-Khattab, Caliph of the Rashidun Caliphate ​179, 182 Umayyad dynasty, originally caliphate in Damascus, Syria, caliphs/emirs in al-Andalus ​15n.15, 30, 174, 176, 178–180, 319; Umayyad people ​175 Ummah, the Islamic community in the Iberian peninsula ​13 Urban IV, Pope ​303n.34 Usque, Samuel, Consolação às Tribulações de Israel ​361–362 Valencia, Spain, medieval kingdom and city ​ 5, 19–20, 33–34, 48, 54, 71, 73–75, 77–79, 81, 84–86, 89– 90, 93–94, 96–100, 102–103, 105, 107–109, 113, 115–116, 118–119, 121, 125, 134, 192–193, 240n.26, 248, 300–303, 305–307, 311, 321n.9; Archivo del Reino de Valencia 118; Art de Velluters ​102–103, 4.2; Book of Ordinances of Silk Dyers ​ 11, 4.1; brotherhoods ​96–97, 102, 108; Cathedral, textiles ​113; Colegio del Arte Mayor de la Seda ​103; Cortes ​ 98; Council ​100; Charitable Foundation of Wool Artisans ​96; Manifest de les Sedes ​ 119; Museo del Almudín, Basin of Játiva (or Xativa)  175; Tall del Drap del General, tax ​118, 121 Valero, St, dalmatic and cloak of ​64 Valladolid, now Castile and Leon, Spain ​ 160; Cortes ​191–192, 250; Convent of San Pablo, burial textiles ​234; fairs ​74, 86, 89; Laws of Ayllón ​303; Ordenamiento ​303; provincial council ​ 297; ‘Regulations’ (taqanot) ​297, 311n.70, 315 Valls Pujol, Esperança ​7 Valls, now Tarragona, Catalonia, Spain ​97 Vallvé, Joaquín ​42 Valois dynasty ​266, 284 Vascos, Toledo, Spain, archaeological site ​50 Vaz, Álvaro, Christian adulterer ​202



G ener al In dex

Venice, now Veneto, Italy, medieval republic ​62, 85, 100, 343n.109 Verdun, now Meuse, France ​116 Vial, Gabriel ​54, 64n.91 Viana do Castelo, now Norte, Portugal ​ 148–149 Vic, now Catalonia, Spain ​78, 88, 116, 302 Vicente, Gil, Portuguese dramatist ​143, 155–156 Vienne, Council of ​155n.73 Vila do Conde, now Porto, Portugal ​149–150 Vilafranca de Conflent, formerly Catalonia, now Villefranche-de-Conflen, PyrénéesOrientales, France ​78 Vilafranca del Penedès, now Alt Penedès, Catalonia, Spain ​115, 305 Vilapenxa, now Alt Penedès, Catalonia, Spain ​115 Vilariça, stream ​150 Vilforte, now Villefort, department of Losera, region of Occitania, France ​115 Villalcázar de Sirga, Palencia, Spain, church of Santa María la Blanca, burial textiles ​ 52, 57, 234, 245 Villarroel González, Óscar ​11 Violant, Queen of Aragon ​285 Violante (Violant/Yolanda) of Aragon, Queen of Castile ​246 Weiditz, Cristoph, German artist ​181, 210, 215, 222, 231, 9.1, 9.5 Wervicq, now West Flanders, Belgium and,

381

as Wervicq-Sud, Nord, France ​97, 107, 115, 279–280 Wortley Montagu, Lady Mary, English writer ​185n.84 Xàtiva, now Valencia, Spain, regulations (taqanot) ​304 Yecla, now Murcia, Spain ​135 Yemen ​125 Ymena, Moorish female potter of Santarém ​ 202 Ynqueira, Ugíjar, now Granada, Spain ​127 Ypres, now West Flanders, Belgium ​71–73, 97, 106, 115, 270, 279–280 Yusuf al-Fihri, governor of al-Andalus ​174 Yūsuf Ibn Ibrāhīm Ibn Yūsuf al-Laḥmī, notary of Lisbon ​202 Zahrā’, al-Zahrā’, Madinat al-Zahra, Cordoba, Andalusia, Spain ​132 Zamora, now Leon, Spain ​82; Synod of Zamora ​193 Zaragoza (Saragossa), capital of medieval kingdom of Aragon, Spain ​75, 80, 86, 88, 94–95, 98, 105, 107, 116, 194n.28, 281, 321, 323 Zipor, Moshe A. ​329 Ziyad pyx see London, England, Victoria and Albert Museum Zorita de los Canes, Spain, municipal charter of ​51n.51

Index of Textile Terms Illustrations are listed by figure number and are given in italics. Ceremonies Baptism ​272, 357–358, 360–362, 364 Bride and bridegroom ​203, 311n.70, 315–317 Ceremonial ​49, 73, 112–113, 178, 184, 194–195, 235, 243–245, 251, 254, 256–259, 263, 266–267, 277, 280, 284, 294, 314, 316–317, 348, 357, 360–361, 363–364 Coronation ​112, 235, 256n.83, 257n.85, 258, 260, 266, 284, 289–290 Dowry ​113, 214, 230 Entourage ​180, 195, 238, 269, 272, 294 Funeral ​59, 184, 243, 251n.66, 257–260, 261n.104, 266, 277, 282–283, 316, 335, 358; mourning ​161, 184n.78, 257n.85, 272, 282–284, 312, 316–317, 334n.73, 348 Gifts (gifting) ​157, 253–254, 254nn.79–80, 260, 263, 266, 269, 272n.17, 291, 294, 327 Grave goods ​45n.16, 55n.69, 234, 248n.56, 257, 259, 261; burial ​52, 210, 257; tomb (entombment) ​52, 55n.65, 57, 59, 66, 234, 245–246, 256n.83, 259–261 Marriage ​115, 160n.115, 200n.54, 203, 266, 285, 311n.70, 331 Sabbath ​336, 363 Sanctity ​112–113, 245 Wedding ​251, 257, 272, 275, 277, 317, 331, 350 Clothing and its ornamentation Adorra, durrā‛a ​210, 217, 226, 228, 232 Alambuz, al-lubūs (dress) ​203 Albarcas ​217 Albornoz, al-burnūs ​105 (cloth) ​196– 199, 218

Alcandora, qandúrah ​210–211, 218, 231–232, 311 Aldifara ​191 Alfamares ​212 Alfame, al–lifām (veil) ​203 Alfareme, alhareme ​203n.72, 210, 218–219 Alfiniame ​217 Alifafe ​217, 223 Aljaremes (gauze head coverings) ​213 Aljuba, al-ğubba, algiubbas, algupa, ĝubba ​ 191, 193, 196–199, 203, 210, 217–218, 226–228, 231–232, 245, 305, 308, 354 Aljubetes (hoods) ​199 Almaizar ​210, 217–221, 223, 232 Almalafa, milḥafa, liḥāf ​210, 221–225, 232 Almasía, almejías, almexia, almeixia ​301, 312 Almuzas (hoods) ​243 Ameatada, a metad (in halves) ​214 Balandraus ​198–199 Ballugas ​217 Barragá, Barragán ​105, 217 Belt ​100, 109, 171, 175–176, 181, 250n.65, 296, 298, 306, 308, 314, 316 Bordado de cortadura, aplicado ​342n.108 Braid ​183, 231, 308, 313, 315 Breast band ​307 Buckles ​250nn.64–65, 315–316 Buttons (buttoning) ​109, 214, 226–227, 230, 261, 305, 307–308, 315–316, 360 Calzas (hose) ​243, 250n.64, 252n.76 Camisa ​201 Capa ​68n.111, 124n.7, 238n.16; capas aguaderas ​250; capa cerrada, capuz ​ 312

3 84

Index of T ex t i l e Term s

Capell de seda ​115 Capellar ​194, 218 Caperó ab cugulla ​304 Caperon ​311, 316 Capirote ​252n.76, 272, 275, 283, 284n.60, 291n.85, 311, 313 Capsana ​299–300, 303, 312–313 Capuz ​312 Cassock ​172 Chain ​308, 315–316 Chemise ​109, 115, 306 Chias (a long veil) ​301 Cloak ​62, 68n.112, 112, 115, 193–194, 196–197, 199–201, 209, 220–226, 229, 231, 245, 250, 252–254, 259, 272, 299–303, 305, 308, 311–313, 316–317 Còfies trenades, cofias de tranzado ​313 Collar ​171 Cottes ​275; cote–hardies ​278 Cuffs ​171, 214, 228, 230–231 Doublet ​163, 201, 227, 271–272, 289, 360, 216 Embroidery ​46, 56, 67–68, 133n.49, 135, 171, 185, 213–214, 223, 231, 241, 248–249, 254, 290–291, 308, 311, 315–316, 328n.45, 334–336 Enxeravia (head cover) ​203 Escapularios ​198–199 Fringe ​100, 219, 230, 297, 307, 362n.50; tassel ​297, 336 Galotges, galotxes ​314 Garment – long ​170–172, 175, 180, 191, 196–197, 199–201, 277, 280, 301–303, 305, 307–308, 311n.73, 312, 317, 12.4; short ​ 108, 175–176, 201, 275, 308, 311 Garnacha, garnatxa ​112, 172, 311 Gibões (doublets) ​201 Glima ​300 Gonella ​112, 307 Gores ​242 Gramalla ​300–301, 304–305, 311, 317n.101 Headdress ​53n.56, 55, 86, 173, 176, 183, 209, 211–212, 217, 219–221, 224, 232, 272n.15, 312–313, 316; cap (capellar) ​ 194; capero(n) ​112, 301, 304–305, 311, 313, 316; capirote ​272, 275, 283, 311, 313; coif ​292, 313, 316; hat ​113, 124, 298, 306, 308, 313, 364; hood ​199, 253n.76, 254, 272n.15, 299, 301, 308, 313, 316, 360; turban ​100, 176, 178–179, 194,

219, 298, 306, 313, 334, 362 Hinoma ​33 Houppelande ​271–272, 275, 280–281, 283–284, 289–291 Jauras (women’s loose–fitting hose)  216 Jewellery (jewels) ​180, 184, 203–204, 237, 248, 267, 294, 296, 314–317, 334 Jupon ​281, 290 Kerchief ​301 Lace(s) ​227, 250n.64, 314; laced garments ​ 308; lacing ​261, 10.6, 12.3 Lining ​59, 62, 65, 167, 230, 249, 259, 281, 284, 290–291, 301, 346, 2.4 Litham, mulaththamun ​187 Liturgical garments ​65, 112, 248, 263 Manta de Évora ​154 Manta da terra ​156 Manta do Alentejo ​154, 164 Mantéis da terra ​162 Mantle ​124, 272, 275, 280, 289, 299, 301, 308, 311–313, 326n.33, 328, 363 Manto (cloak) ​222, 245 Marlota ​194, 210, 215, 217–218, 226–232 Mobatana ​217 Moorish shirts ​213, 231 Open garments ​170, 177, 199, 200–201, 204; closed (enclosed) ​garments ​ 199–200, 204, 301, 312 Pantalón ​217, 306 Pellote ​218, 228, 245 (sideless overgown), 252, 253n.76, 259, 261n.104, 308 (pelisse), 10.4 Qalansuwa ​178 Raincoat ​299 Riding cloak ​229–230, 272 Rodella ​299, 303n.37 Rope ​109, 148, 158, 316, 323, 325, 329 Royal wardrobe ​235, 252–253; cámara, 243, 259, 263 Sarbal ​343, 346 Saya ​107, 232, 243, 245–246, 252, 253n.76, 259, 260n.96, 261, 307 (kirtle), 10.3c, 10.6 Shirt ​109, 112, 116, 163, 174–175, 192n.8, 211, 213, 231–232, 248, 271–272, 292, 360, 363 Shoes ​112, 115, 162, 191, 216, 250n.64, 313–314; footwear ​110, 115, 209, 211, 217, 250n.65, 313, 320n.4, 311–312, 338 Sirwal ​181 Sleepwear ​245



Index of T ex t il e Term s

Sleeves ​171, 175, 177, 191, 193, 196–197, 199, 201, 204, 214, 226, 228–229, 231, 250n.64, 272n.14, 299, 301, 304–305, 307–309, 311, 360 Sobretabardo see tabard Surcoat ​118, 163, 272, 308 Tabard, over–tabard, sobretabardo ​243, 250n.63, 252n.76, 272, 301, 304, 311 Tabardo aguadero ​250n.63 Tallit (prayer shawl) ​297, 306–307, 336, 362 Tapins, patins (Catalan), chapines (Castilian) 314 Tashmir ​175 Taylasan ​186 Tight garments ​170–171, 175, 200–201, 201n.57, 228, 242, 261, 308 Tikka ​181 Tovallola ​313 Trim (trimming) ​100, 108–110, 191, 213–214, 230, 308, 315–316 Trousers ​171 Underclothing, underwear ​105, 116, 174, 209, 231, 245, 306–307 Veil, veiling ​55n.65, 86, 100, 102, 108–109, 111, 124, 158, 173, 179, 182–187, 193, 200, 203, 219, 301, 313, 316–317 Zaragüelles ​213 Zurame ​217

385

Bayadère ​57 Beatilla, beatille (Christian veil) ​100, 109 Belvin ​97 Bifa, befa ​72, 105 Blanc ​105, 303n.34 Blancos narboneses ​75 Blanquet, Blanqueta ​72, 98, 105, 239, 243, 281–282 Blao ​239, 252 Bocací ​292 Bocarán, bocaram ​292–293 Bordat ​108 Bragal ​149, 152, 162 Bretaña ​292 Bristó, Bristol ​105, 115, 117, 163, 270–272, 283 Broadcloth ​76, 279 Brocade, Brocado ​62, 100, 102–103, 113, 116, 134, 195, 227, 229, 286–287, 290, 294, 326–327 Brocat ​109 Bruges ​71, 97, 105, 116, 137 Bruixelles, Bruxellas (Brussels) ​105, 115 Bruneta, brunet, brunetas prietas ​71, 75, 96–97, 105, 282 Burell ​105, 117, 151, 154–157, 161–163, 338n.94 Burlap ​87, 293 Cadāwīr ​124 Cloths Cadins ​98, 105 A la francesa 79 Cambrai ​71, 152 Aceituní, Atzeituní 109, 290n.76 Camellí ​105, 107 Ad spinam piscis 57 Camelín, camelina ​72, 252, 253n.77, 297 Aixalò, Xaló, Chalón (Châlons-sur-Marne) ​ Camelote, Camellot ​292n.94, 308 97, 105 Camisalium ​107 Albornoz 105, 196–197 Camocà ​109, 287 Albraxí 109 Campredon (Camprodón) ​115 Alcotón, cotó 107 Çancaran ​109 Almáfega ​157, 161–162 Canells (wristbands, Lligassa de Dona) ​109 Alquicel ​105 Cànem ​107 Alquinal (Muslim veil) ​109 Canemàs, canemasseries ​107–108 Aranya ​105 Canvas ​116–117 Areste, arista ​53, 57–59, 62 Canyamàs ​107 Attābī, Atabis, tabis ​133, 287 Carcassona (Carcassonne) ​115, 278 Bagadell ​109 Cardona ​78, 115 Baldachin ​267 Carisea ​107 Baldaquí ​109 Carmesí ​110, 344n.114 Barchent ​87 Cendal branco mourisco de Lisboa ​158 Barchinona (Barcelona) ​115 Cendal, cendat, sendal ​55, 107, 109, 164, Barragà, Barragán ​105, 217 290n.80

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Index of T ex t i l e Term s

Cerristopa ​107 Chamellot ​108 Choltrai ​137 Ciclaton ​248 Cisclató, Siclató ​109 Cloth of Besançon ​293 Cloth of Brittany ​293 Cloth of Castile ​293 Cloth of England ​293 Cloth of Flanders ​293 Cloth of Holland ​293 Cloth of Maçen ​293 Cloth of Montpellier ​293 Cloth of Navarre ​293 Cloth of Reims ​293 Colcestre (Colchester) ​115 Cordellat ​97, 105, 116, 118 Cortray (Courtrai) ​115 Cotonia, cotonina, cotonines ​107–108 Crera ​107 Dabiqi ​125 Damasco (damask fabric) ​110 Damask ​64, 102, 110, 119, 230, 246n.48, 287 Davanteres (front panels of chemises, Lligassa de Dona) ​109 De la gran suerte ​270 Diaspre ​109 Dībāj, al-dībāj, dībāğ ​133, 326–327, 329n.49 Djordjāni ​133 Doay (Douai) ​106, 244n.43 Domàs ​110, 290n.79 Domasquí ​110 Drap d’aur ​111 Drap d’Or i de Seda ​110 Drap de Bristol ​117 Drap de cotó ​107 Drap de la Terra ​97, 106 Drap de lli, draperies del lli ​107–108 Drap de Seda ​110–111, 316n.99 Drap Florentí, Florentín ​106, 110 Draperies légères ​108 Draps de la terra ​97 Draps de lana ​95, 111 Draps de peçols ​98 Duay (Douai) ​115 Escarlata ​72, 106, 110, 242, 243n.39, 250n.63, 252, 277n.39, 284nn.61–62, 285n.65 Escarlatina ​110 Estam, Estambre ​106

Estameña, estameña ​106, 281–282 Estamfortz, Estanfort (Stanford) ​106 Esterliz ​107 Estopa ​107, 144n.19, 152 Estopazo ​107 Estopilla ​107 Fabric – long ​55, 117, 219 Felpa ​106 Feltre ​106 Ferret ​106 Figured ​51, 54n.62, 59, 64, 246n.48 Filafort (Vilforte) ​115 Filempua ​107 Florentí, Florentín ​106, 110 Imperial ​110 Llenç de París (white cloth) ​107–108, 110 Frisa ​72, 281–282 Frisó, Frisón ​98, 105–106 Fustian, fustán, fustany, fustani, fustane ​ 95, 116–117, 163, 221, 292–293 Galabrún ​106 Gant (Ghent) ​72n.7, 115 Gascunya (Gascony) ​115 Gauze ​213, 305 Girona ​115–116 Grana (cloth) ​106 Ḥarīr, al-Ḥarīr ​320n.4, 322n.17 Herbatge ​106 Hiniesta (a kind of esparto) ​117–118 Holanda ​292 Holla ​133 Horts dels corders ​108 Hustela ​281–282 Ipre, Ypres ​71–73, 106, 115, 270, 279–280 Ispahānī ​133 Jamete, xamete, xamit, xamito ​238n.16, 246, 253n.78 Lampas ​51n.50, 62, 64–65, 246, 2.7 Lana (cloth) ​106 Larest ​57 Lenço ​148, 152, 161 Lenço francês ​161 Lérida (Lleida) ​115 Lienço, llenç, lenç ​107–108 Lienzo ​224, 292–293 Limos (Limoges) ​115 Llenç de París, Paris cloth ​108, 110 Llera ​106 Lli ​108 Lligassa de Dona (women’s accessories) ​110



Index of T ex t il e Term s

Llistes pintades (coloured trimmings, Lligassa de Dona) ​110 Lohan (Louvain) ​115 Londres (London) ​106, 115, 272nn.18–21 Malaga silk ​137 Marca genovesa ​103 Màrrega ​106 Marromat ​110 Melines, Mellinas (Mechelen) ​106, 115 Mescla ​106 Meši ​320, 327n.39, 334n.73 Mi’djar ​133 Mitó ​106 Mixed (fibres, dyes) ​47, 126, 297n.5, 336, 346; diverse (materials) ​293, 342, 345– 346; union (cloth) ​336, 345n.109; filosilk (filoseda, media seda) ​126, 343n.109 Montoliu ​115 Moriella (Morella) ​115 Mostreuiller (Montivilliers) ​106, 275, 285n.65 Negro de Narbona ​75 Olandas ​116 Orlanda, orlande ​107–108 Ostedes ​108 Palmella ​105–106 Palmeta ​281–282 Pamias (Pamiers) ​115 Panna tartarici ​53, 64, 244, 263 Pannus d’areste ​53 Paño bermejo ​238n.16, 246n.51, 308 Pano d’Alcobaça ​156 Pano de Leiria ​164 Pano de Santarém ​156 Pano de Vila do Conde, pano de treu ​150 Pano Meirinho ​153 Paño tinto ​71n.7, 252 Panos de cor ​155 Paños moriscos ​288 Panyo, panyo de lino ​106–107, 307 Pardillo ​106 Pardo ​72, 163 Pelada ​105–106 Perpenyan (Perpignan) ​115 Petabino ​106 Picolat (satin) ​110 Presset ​106 Prieto ​72 Púrpura, Porpra ​110 Puycerdán (Puigcerdà) ​115

387

Rançal ​107 Ras, raso, rases ​73, 87, 110, 292n.97 Raz (Arras) ​106 Reixats (mesh, Lligassa de Dona) ​110 Ripol (Ripoll) ​115–116, 281 Rodeos, Rodeo clar, Rodeo espès ​100, 108, 110 Sackcloth ​87, 117, 329 Saial, Sayal ​107, 117, 157, 281–282 Salia (Saia), Saya ​107 Samit, samite ​45n.17, 51n.50, 51n.52, 57, 59, 61, 100, 110, 251 Sant Johan de Ampurias (Sant Joan d’Empúries) ​115 Sant Johan de las Abadessas (Sant Joan de les Abadesses) ​115 Santomer, Santomeres ​72, 252 Sarga, Sarja ​72, 107, 281–282 Sargil, sarzil, sarcil ​98, 105, 107, 117 Sarpillera ​107, 117 Satin ​64–65, 110, 119, 160, 246n.48, 261, 263, 286, 288, 290–291 Sayes ​108 Setí, Cetí (satin) ​110 Siglaton ​133 Solsona ​115 Spanica ​42 Spaniscum ​99 Tabby ​55, 59, 61n.81, 62, 64, 246, 2.2, 10.3, 13.7 Taffeta, Tafetà, Tafatà, Tafatán ​102, 110, 136, 287–288, 290, 291nn.85, 87, 308 Tapestry ​55, 65, 68, 99, 112, 134, 261, 263, 291, 328n.48 Tapet, Tapete ​110 Taqueté ​59, 61, 64, 100 Tartarí ​111, 261 Taurís ​111 Tela de sedassos (fabric for making sifters, sieves or strainers) ​111 Tecido de seda ​288 Tela ​107, 267, 292, 344n.114, 9.4 Tela de França ​107 Tela de Reims ​107 Telas crudas de Bretanya ​117 Telas de Flandes ​117 Teleria de drap de lli ​108 Terçanell, tercianelas (cloth for standards and adornments of music instruments) ​ 108, 111

3 88

Index of T ex t i l e Term s

Tercenel ​288 Terliz ​293 Textores lane et lini ​107 Tinto y grana ​72 Ṭirāz ​99, 128, 130–133, 176 Toalhas francesas ​152 Tolosa (Toulouse) ​115 Tornasol ​107 Tornay (Tournai) ​107 Trapo de canyamiça ​107 Trasimirgos ​126 Twill ​55, 57, 59, 61–62, 64, 118, 151n.47, 246n.48 Valançina ​72, 252 Vel (women’s veil made of a mixture of silk and cotton) ​111 Velvet, vellut 64, 85, 100–103, 108, 111–113, 116, 119, 160, 229–230, 286, 288–290, 311, 4.2; Vellut doble (doubled velvet) ​111; Vellut senar (single velvet) ​102, 111; Vellut vellutat (velvety velvet) ​111 Verga (Berga) ​115 Vermella de scarlata ​112 Vermeyls ​112 Verví (Wervicq) ​105, 107, 115, 137 Vervin ​97–98 Viado ​107, 239 Vilapenxa ​115 Villafranca (Vilafranca del Penedès) ​115 Wool cloths (woollen and worsted) ​44, 78, 85, 88, 96, 105, 112, 115, 117–118, 151n. 47, 153, 161, 193, 270n.10, 222n.47, 239n.21, 243–244, 245n.43, 252n.75, 270, 272, 276–277, 279–281, 11.3, 11.6 Ypres see Ipre Zaragoza ​98, 107, 281

220–221, 224, 235, 237, 243, 246, 248, 263, 269, 293 Guecheceril (bed canopy) ​216 Household textiles ​116, 162, 252, 266–267, 269, 291–292 Interior decoration ​209, 220, 246, 251 Keset ​331 Mantas ​154nn.71–72, 6.1 Mattress ​118, 291 Pillow ​45n.16, 57n.72, 66–67, 111, 172, 183, 237, 246, 248, 257, 259, 331; cushion ​ 109, 111–112, 141n.2, 211–212, 251, 290, 2.1, 2.6, 2.8, 10.3 Quilt ​162 Sheets ​152, 162, 219–224, 238n.16, 291 Shrouds ​167, 168n.4, 257, 260, 317, 335 Tablecloth ​291, 331 Tent ​328 Towel ​162, 221n.44, 267n.7, 291, 360 Trappings (for horses) ​269 Upholstery ​248

Identity Appearance (personal) ​7, 16, 175, 177, 179, 181, 182, 184, 187, 191, 199, 203, 204, 277, 285, 294; of God ​326 Army ​175–176, 178, 186 Class (social) ​85, 87, 121, 124, 175–178, 183, 185, 187, 211–213, 220, 224n.47, 313 Cross-dressing (cultural) ​171–172, 179 Customs (personal) ​21, 186, 211, 216–217, 223, 237, 252, 254n.79, 256, 295–297, 301, 306n.55, 317, 358, 362 Dancers ​184 Dirty fabric, clothes ​352, 361 Distinction ​113, 184, 187, 189–192, 195, 201, 204, 213, 216, 230n.73, 235, 243, 250, Furnishings 261, 263, 296, 298–299, 303, 305–306, 308, Katedra, apiryon ​332 311, 317, 348, 351–352, 354–357, 362, 364 Bedclothes ​162, 226 Dress code ​173, 182, 187, 189–190, 198, Bedcover ​279; bedspread ​109, 110, 112, 200, 201n.57, 204–205 213, 221n.44, 223–224 Exoticism ​211–212, 263, 294 Blanket ​125, 154, 156, 162–163, 220, Falconer ​252, 279, 281 223–224, 226, 237, 311 Gender ​178, 180n.57, 181–182, 187, 203 Carpet ​65, 124, 133, 135, 211–212, 251; rug ​ Heraldry ​237, 254, 259–260, 351 65, 167, 251 High quality ​73, 77, 82–83, 85, 87, 90, 98, Cushion see pillow 125, 133, 135, 155, 177, 192–193, 214, 219, Curtain ​100, 109, 111, 133, 162, 172, 246, 274–275, 277, 332 251, 290 Identity ​186, 193–194, 198, 204, 207, Furnishing ​116, 162, 172, 210, 212–213, 212–213, 222, 295–296, 351, 362, 364



Index of T ex t il e Term s

Image (personal) ​172, 173, 175–176, 181, 183, 240, 256, 259n.91, 265, 275, 277, 285, 294, 312, 326, 361, 362, 363 Imitation ​16n.21, 64, 75, 78–79, 82, 84, 113, 124, 172, 211, 213, 281n.56; copying ​113 Infidel (and believer) ​16n.21, 176, 187, 244, 298 Lion keeper ​281 Luxury ​43, 48–49, 52, 59, 73, 84, 86, 98, 108– 109, 113, 116, 121, 125, 130–133, 136, 152, 157, 160, 163–164, 176, 189, 193–195, 199, 203, 212–214, 224, 229, 233, 237, 242–244, 248, 250, 251, 257, 259, 261, 263, 265–267, 277n. 39, 281, 296, 298, 304, 311n. 70, 316, 320n.4, 326, 328–329; lavishness ​266, 285, 294, 335; magnificence ​117, 135, 230, 235, 243, 251, 256, 263, 265–266, 285, 294; ostentation ​176, 213; pageantry ​ 245; pomp ​266, 285; splendour ​130, 265, 277n.38, 285, 316; sumptuousness ​ 111, 185, 213n.22, 237–238, 242, 246, 248, 265, 277, 290–291, 311, 357, 361; theatrics ​ 285 Marker ​171, 201n.57; sign ​172–173, 189, 197, 213, 215, 272, 296, 299, 303, 305, 312, 316, 352–353, 357; badge (rodella, capsana) ​189–190, 193, 197, 199, 201–202, 204, 299, 301–305, 312, 317, 352, 363–364, 12.1, 12.2, 14.2; cowl ​193 Modesty ​173, 175–176, 181, 200, 297; nakedness (nudity) ​173–175; transparency ​180–183, 305 Otherness ​190, 200, 204, 211, 348n.5, 364 Page (courier) ​281 Palace (royal) ​112, 133, 172, 179–180, 211, 251, 266, 329; court ​15, 25, 73, 75, 85, 111, 113, 125, 128, 131, 134, 157, 162, 168n.4, 170, 175–176, 178, 180, 183, 192, 194, 214, 233–235, 238, 240, 243n.35, 245, 251–254, 256, 259, 263, 265–267, 269–270, 272, 274, 276–280, 281–285, 287–294, 299, 304, 311, 319, 329, 356, 358, 1.1, 1.3 Prostitute ​184, 192, 194 Scholar ​170, 173–174, 176–178 (ʿulama’), ​ 180, 186, 319, 330, 333n.70, 335n.79 Segregation (segregationist) ​201n.55, 250, 348, 351, 353–354, 356–357, 362, 364 Slavery ​152, 163, 176–177, 179–181, 183–187, 201–202 Soldier ​175–176, 178, 194

38 9

Sumptuary laws ​121, 143, 169, 189, 193, 214, 250, 295, 304, 315, 317 Valet ​281 Production and raw materials Alfayate see tailor Artisan ​77–79, 84–85, 94–98, 100, 102, 142, 158–159, 202, 346 Azache ​340 Blanket maker ​96 Bombyx mori ​42 Borra di seta ​340 Camel hair ​252n.75 Clothier ​73, 338, 340 Cotton ​41, 45–46, 64, 87, 94–95, 100, 107–108, 111, 115–118, 124, 126–128, 153, 163n.132, 176, 203, 220, 223–224, 230–231, 261, 266, 270, 292, 302, 329, 335n.82, 338n.95, 343n.109 Craftsmen, craftsmanship ​51, 59, 68, 95–97, 100, 102, 242–243, 323, 336 Dyes, dyestuffs, dyers ​41, 46n.24, 47–49, 61, 71, 75, 78, 95–98, 100–101, 108–109, 113, 115–117, 119, 124, 126–128, 130–131, 133, 138–139, 141, 155–156, 179–180, 214, 222n.47, 231, 238n.14, 252n.75, 261, 263, 270, 274–275, 277n.38, 285, 294, 304, 321, 326–30, 332–333, 335, 345n.114 Finishing ​78, 118, 153 Fleece ​44, 152, 164, 13.3, 13.4 Fuller’s earth ​128 Fur ​112, 124, 191, 249, 267, 284–285, 289, 301, 304, 308, 311; skin ​267, 320n.4 Goat fur, goat hair ​107, 124, 327, 338n.94 Grana, kermes ​48, 344n.114 Hemp ​42, 94, 105, 107–108, 115–117, 144, 148, 150, 164, 338n.95, 346 Jute ​45; hessian ​105, 107, 117 Kakay ​333 Kalakh ​336–337 Knitting, knitted fabric ​66, 68 Linen ​45–6, 67, 76, 82–84, 87, 94–95, 105, 107–108, 112, 115–118, 125, 148–149, 151–152, 161, 163, 203, 220, 222, 224, 230–231, 238, 248, 266, 270, 292, 297, 301, 305–308, 311, 313, 316, 320n.4, 327, 329, 331, 332n.65, 336, 338n.95, 343–346; flax ​ 41, 44–45, 89, 123–129, 141, 144, 148–152, 158, 163–164, 176, 297, 334, 336–338, 340, 343–345, 13.2

3 9 0

Index of T ex t i l e Term s

Linho alcânave  144, 150 Linho galego ​144, 150, 337, 13.2 Linho mourisco ​144 Loom ​50–51, 55, 57, 59, 62, 77, 97, 100, 102–103, 108, 117, 126, 133–135, 142, 159–160, 261, 322 Master ​97–98, 102, 108, 113, 121, 252; apprentice ​97, 102 Mǝtaksa ​346 Metal, gold ​46, 59, 68, 85–86, 100, 102, 109, 111–113, 117, 135–136, 152, 192–193, 214, 221, 226, 229–230, 237–238, 246, 248–249, 254n.80, 258, 261, 263n.108, 269, 287, 289–291, 304, 308, 311, 314–316, 327, 332, 334–335, 336n.89, 337n.89, 356; silver ​ 46, 61, 100, 109, 193, 203, 214, 229, 237, 258, 269, 302, 304, 308, 314–317, 327, 334, 356; copper ​46, 315, 327; metallic thread ​41, 46, 55, 59, 64–65, 67, 2.7 Mulberry tree, leaves, silk ​42, 128–129, 134, 137–138, 158, 338 Passementerier ​108 Precious stones ​67, 237, 249; gem stones ​ 332; pearls ​67, 193, 230, 249, 291, 315 Primitxol ​340 Ramie (nettle) ​41, 45 Saffron ​48, 134, 320, 344n.114 Sea silk (Pinna nobilis)  336–337n.89 Seda Filada ​340 Seda Grollera, Aducar, cadarro, atanquía (alanquia?), seda azache, seda de todo capullo ​340 Selvage ​55, 64–68, 70–71, 84–86, 91 Šǝrayim ​336–337, 346 Silk ​41–43, 46, 55, 59, 61–62, 65, 94, 99–103, 107–113, 115–116, 119, 121, 123, 125–126, 128, 130–131, 133–138, 141, 147, 157–161, 163–164, 176, 199, 203, 211, 219, 221n.44, 224, 229–231, 238n.16, 243, 250n.65, 253n.78, 254, 259, 260n.96, 261, 263n.108, 286–292, 298, 301, 305, 307n.63, 308, 311, 317, 319–320, 322–323, 325–346, 357, 4.1, 4.2, 13.1, 13.6, 13.7 Spinning ​44, 46–47, 138, 149, 159n.107, 325; twist ​43, 55, 62, 323, 325, 328, 340 Staple, long ​45, 152, 338; short ​45, 152–153 Tablet weaving ​51, 65 Tailor, tailoring ​141n.2, 142, 203, 222, 226, 228, 231, 240, 241n.31, 242, 243n.39,

266–267, 280, 283–284, 308, 311, 354; alfayate ​240–242, 252; sartorialism ​ 170, 175, 177, 194, 277n.38 Throwing of silk, thrower ​159, 325 Tolaˁat šani (kermes) ​320, 327–328, 331n.68, 344–345 Vegetable fibre ​41, 61, 144, 270n.11, 291–293, 11.9 Weave (structure) ​50, 55–57, 59, 61–62, 64–65, 100, 109–110, 242, 246n.48, 261, 343n.109; warp and weft ​45n.17, 50–51, 55, 57, 59, 61–62, 64–65, 97–98, 102–103, 109, 126, 151n.47, 163n.132, 246, 261, 322, 328, 343–344, 2.2, 2.3, 2.5, 2.7, 13.7 Weaving, weavers ​43–44, 46–47, 50–51, 54, 59, 62, 65, 77, 84, 96, 100, 102, 105, 107–109, 111, 113, 133, 138, 142, 148–149, 156, 322, 326–329, 335, 4.2 Wild silk ​338, 340, 13.5 Wool (sheep’s) ​41, 43–45, 68, 71–72, 76–78, 82–83, 85–86, 88, 90, 94–99, 105–108, 112–113, 115–118, 121, 123–125, 129, 141, 151–157, 158, 161, 163–164, 177, 193, 203, 221, 224, 229–231, 237, 239n.21, 243–245, 252n.75, 266–267, 270–282, 286, 288, 291–293, 297, 301, 304, 306, 311, 321n.8, 327, 329, 331–333, 336–338, 340, 343–346; churra ​82, 152n.59, 155n.75, 337n.89, 338; merino ​44, 82, 152–153, 155, 338 transhumance ​82 Yarn ​43–44, 50, 55, 65, 98, 117, 159n.107, 164, 322, 323n.22, 328, 330n.56, 335, 338, 345; thread ​43, 45n.17, 46, 50, 55, 57, 59, 61, 64–68, 85–86, 97–98, 100, 102–103, 109–111, 126–127, 152n.54, 164, 246, 261, 297n.6, 315, 323, 338n.95, 344, 346, 2.2, 10.3, 13.3, 13.4 Trade Commerce ​75, 130, 345 Consumption ​76, 79, 94, 98, 103, 115–117, 134, 143–144, 156, 161, 164, 234, 244n.41, 286 Draper, drapery ​96–97 Export, exporter ​44n.12, 48, 69–70, 75–77, 79, 82–84, 86–87, 90–91, 97, 116–117, 119, 125, 134, 136–137, 151, 321n.9; import ​ 78–79, 85, 98, 125, 159, 163; imported goods ​70–71, 73, 76–78, 82–83, 86, 90–91, 116, 118, 126, 152, 162, 163n.132, 193, 279



Index of T ex t il e Term s

Fairs ​74, 82–83, 86, 87–90, 117, 149, 151, 163, 344–345 Guild ​82, 94–96, 102–103, 108; brotherhood ​34, 96–97, 100, 102, 108 Market, marketing, marketplace, market regulations ​47, 69–71, 74, 78–80, 83, 86–88, 94–99, 102–103, 107–108, 115–121, 126, 129, 133, 136–137, 143, 149, 151–152, 157, 160–161, 163, 169, 175, 270, 276, 278, 344 Shipping, ship ​72, 85, 130, 149

39 1

Trade, trader ​47, 53, 69–91, 94–95, 98, 100, 102, 108–109, 115–119, 121, 127, 129–130, 132–137, 143, 150, 152, 158, 160, 162–163, 168, 176–177, 181, 323, 343n.109, 350 Transport ​72, 74, 132, 238, 239n.19, 330; camel ​174n.30, 330; mule, muleteer ​ 86–87, 238–239, 252 Warehouse ​131; stockpiling ​132 Workshops ​46, 52–53, 59, 61, 65, 68, 94, 98–99, 130–134, 156, 161, 164, 241, 279, 312

MEDIEVAL AND RENAISSANCE CLOTHING AND TEXTILES Previous volumes in this series: I The Troyes Mémoire: The Making of a Medieval Tapestry Translated by Tina Kane II Medieval Dress and Textiles in Britain: A Multilingual Sourcebook Edited by Louise M. Sylvester, Mark C. Chambers and Gale R. Owen-Crocker III Dressing the Scottish Court, 1543–1553: Clothing in the Accounts of the Lord High Treasurer of Scotland Melanie Schuessler Bond IV Refashioning Medieval and Early Modern Dress: A Tribute to Robin Netherton Edited by Gale R. Owen-Crocker and Maren Clegg Hyer