De Erroribus Sarracenorum: Islam through Inquisitorial Lenses

Islam was never a primary area of concern for medieval or early modern inquisitors, and indeed Muslims were theoretically not subject to inquisitorial jurisdiction. Nevertheless Christian apostasy to Islam was an undeniable reality throughout the premodern period, as was the maintenance of Islamic traditions by large populations of forcibly-converted moriscos. Baptized crypto-Muslims (like the better-known crypto-Jews or conversos) definitely qualified for denunciation and persecution as heretics, but inquisitorial officials were particularly ill-equipped to understand precisely what crypto-Islamic beliefs and practices actually entailed. This paper will survey some of the descriptive elements which commonly circulated in inquisitors’ manuals and related literature from the fourteenth to the early seventeenth centuries, revealing the selective and stereotyped portraits of Islam that came about as a result. Less-common or “outlier” manual literature will also be examined, showing the sorts of idiosyncratic views of Islam which could emerge in isolated milieux such as the Iberian New World territories of Mexico and Peru.