Islamic Spain 1250-1500

This book presents a remarkable account of the political history of Andalusia(Muslim Spain) during the last phase of its existence. The author adoptsa cyclical approach in the sense that he traces the creation of the Banu Nasrkingdom in Granada, its development, and its decline and fall. He studies theperiod of each ruler in chronological order from the establishment of thekingdom of Granada to its collapse. Instead of limiting himself to descriptionor repetition, he chooses to adopt an analytical approach which permits himto deepen our insight regarding the period of each ruler. He reproduces a clearpicture which combines internal political developments and external relationswith the Christians.The author studies the history of the Muslims of Granada as well as thosein Christian Spain up to the Christian conquest of Granada. He is correct inincluding these two categories, for the religious, cultural, and linguistic criteriaunite these two groups, and also because their fates became similar after thefall of Granada in 1492. Thus both groups can be considered “Moriscos,” a topicwhich Harvey started working on over thirty years ago.The book is not easy to read, because it reflects many years of researchand has tremendous cultural weight. To the author’s obvious strenuous intellectualeffort, one may add his intellectual integrity as a distinguished scholarwho is credible in the West and in the East alike, somethmg which not all orientalistscan claim. He is critical of the history which he studies and its sourceswithout being offensive; the distorting influence of a personal dimension foundin other historians is here minimized. The author criticizes himself before beingcritical of others. His manner of presenting and interpreting history is convincing,as his intentions are exclusively scholarly. The author is a memberof a breed that is not very common in the politically oriented European andNorth American universities with regards to anything related to Islam andMuslims. This is not to say that he is beyond criticism, however, as the bookcould be faulted for not having relied directly on some of the fundamental andprimary Andalusian sources. We could disagree with his approach and suggestother approaches. Fortunately for his readers, the author is perhaps moreconscious of his limitations than anybody else, which is also why he did whathe proposed to do so admirably ...