Infidels_ A History of the Conflict Between Christendom and Islam - Andrew Wheatcroft [214]
48. It is curious that he uses “Spaniards,” rather than “Christians,” as the parallel term to “Muslims.”
49. Castro, Structure, pp. 248–50.
50. Spanish has retained a rich vocabulary of locality, which perhaps echoes this tradition of segmentation: barrio (neighborhood), rincón (quarter), querencia (favorite place; now usually a bullfighting term).
51. See Dana Reynolds, “The African Heritage and Ethnohistory of the Moors,” in Van Sertima, Golden Age, pp. 93–150.
52. This is Derrida’s dissémination. Typically, he denies its meaning: “In the last analysis, dissemination means nothing, and cannot be reassembled into a definition.” But the word “dissemination” is a Derridean pun, filled with multiple connotations. It embodies the sexual act of in-semination, and no one can tell as a consequence how heritable qualities will change or transmute down the generations. However, dissemination is itself the act of spreading, and not knowing where the seed will fall or where it will implant and grow. Thus there has to be a common framework of meaning if communication is to take place at all, but the consequences of dissemination mean that this transfer of meaning is always subject to distortion. See Jacques Derrida, Positions, trans. Alan Bass, Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 1981, pp. 44–5. I am grateful to Professor Nick Royle for drawing my attention to this relatively clear statement of a Derridean position.
53. Américo Castro observed that “nothing is more revealing than language.” But equally, nothing is more confusing and uncertain. Anwar Chejne, who has written a useful history in English of the Arabic language, also presents a picture of the particular development of Arabic in Al-Andalus; see Chejne, Muslim Spain, pp. 182–95. But even Chejne’s presentation is uncertain about the exact interconnection between the languages. The linguistic mélange of Al-Andalus included a great variety of spoken dialects—Arabic, Berber, and Romance—and written Arabic and Latin, the former advancing and the latter declining. There is later evidence that many northerners had some knowledge of spoken Arabic. There is no real support in Spain for Norman Daniel’s suggestion, in respect of Norman Sicily, that the “continued use of three languages” created a multicultural or tolerant society. See Daniel, The Arabs, p. 146, and Buxó, “Bilingualismo y biculturalismo,” pp. 177–92.
54. Alvarus wrote profusely. His main works were his letters (Epistulae), Memoriale sanctorum, Vita Eulogii, and Liber apologeticus martyrum, all contemporary with the events he described. On the effect of martyrs in Cordoba, see Dozy, Spanish Islam, pp. 268–9.
55. Jessica Coope, in her excellent account of the martyrs movement and of Perfectus, draws rather different conclusions. She notes that the Church of St. Acisclus was a center of “radical” Christianity, and that the Muslims sought deliberately to entrap Perfectus. However, rather than resisting their entrapment, he participated in it with fatal results. The same body of evidence (and that provided by partisans, Eulogius and Alvarus) is capable of a number of interpretations. But all the sources tend toward the volatility of the religious situation in Cordoba at the time. See Coope, Martyrs, pp. 18–19.
56. Ibid.
57. The material for this section is drawn from Dozy, Spanish Islam, pp. 268–307.
58. Wolf, Christian Martyrs, analyzes the movement in depth. He makes the case that the movement was not masterminded by Eulogius but, rather, that he portrayed the events in a way that would make their message more powerful. In particular, he countered the arguments that they were not true martyrs because they performed no miracles, and that