Inhalt: | This book charts the diachronic dimension of the processes by which Andalusi Muslim and Jewish elites created, asserted, refined, and adapted to new circumstances their respective claims of Andalusi and Sefardi singularity. The historical starting point for this inquiry-the mid-tenth century-is established by the textual evidence that has come down to us. The endpoint of this study's historical parameters is occasioned by social, religious, and political upheaval, collective trauma, and their jarring effects on cultural memory. For the Jews of Sefarad, the mid-twelfth century witnessed disruption within Andalusi Jewish society and transformation of its traditions. It saw the dispersal of most of the Jews of al-Andalus to the Iberian Christian kingdoms, to Provence, and to North Africa, where Andalusi Jewish exiles found refuge and Andalusi Jewish cultural production was relaunched in modified forms. For Andalusi Muslims, the Almohad military defeat at Las Navas de Tolosa in 1212, known in Arabic historiography as the monumental Battle of al-'Iqāb, and the Almohads' ensuing withdrawal from Andalusi territory signaled the end of the classical age of al-Andalus. Within a generation, Córdoba and Seville fell to Castilian control, leaving the Naṣrid kingdom of Granada-all that was left of al-Andalus-as the sole remaining outpost of an Islamic polity and society on Iberian soil down to 1492-- |
