And Jews under Islamic Rule in Medieval Spain

This is an incredibly important work that should be widely read by those interested in the clash between the West and the Middle East that caught the West off guard on September 11th, 2001. The clash goes all the way back to the very beginnings of Islam and the manner in which the Islamic religion and culture were spread by force, treachery and extortion throughout the Middle East, North Africa and eventually Spain. It only took 79 years from the death of Muhammad for the armies of Islam to begin the process of laying waste to the rich culture of Spain in 711 A.D. The notion of a beautiful convivencia of the three abrahamic religions in Spain under Muslim rule is unfortunately a demonstrable lie. Even more unfortunate is the degree to which the situation in Spain under the Muslims was exactly the opposite of convivencia.

Professor Fernandez-Morera painstakingly delves into Christian, Jewish and Muslim sources to paint a more accurate picture of life under Muslim rule in Spain. If there is any hope of having a peaceful convivencia between our cultures in the 21st century, then we must begin by telling the truth about what occurred in the past.

This book simply states the obvious about Islamic Spain in an eloquent way. Anyone with a logical mind would have suspected that life in Islamic Spain was as described here. Common sense dictates that anything else resembling paradise just could not have been. The situation being a matter of survival, each of the three groups had no choice but brutalize the other two and in the process itself.

A fascinating, albeit a bit too scholarly recounting of the history of Al-Andalus under Islamic rule.
Amazing amount of information I did not know about, and with it comes the insight that one should always be careful in adopting mainstream views. It is quite likely that the author selected quotes and sources that suited his argument, but then many scientists do that. The important aspect for me as a lay reader of history is that the account is plausible, the narrative consistent and the conveyance gripping.

Of course, the book also feeds into the current discourse of Islam versus the West or vice versa, especially on the aspect of tolerance of Islam regimes against the dhimmi and kaffirs. The author provides ample reference to the lack of such tolerance in Al-Andalus, and juxtaposes numerous examples of quotes of contemporary scientists who in the author's view chose to ignore or deny such intolerance.

The conclusion that I draw from reading this book is that past tolerance or intolerance are not useful indicators for current tolerance or the lack thereof.

One would wish more such enlightened books did fertilize the current discourse - not by invoking history as proof or counterproof in a debate, but as a call for openness and critical reflection on "widely accepted truths".

Fernández-Morera's real target is the culture of forgetting associated with the entire history of the Islamic conquest of Spain. He suggests that the habit of pretending Islamic Spain was a happy multi-cultural paradise rather than a society wracked by divisions and held together only through ruthless clerical power is related to a particular cultural agenda. Interesting; what are the particulars? Well, everything.

From the nature of the Visigoth culture to the religious reasons for the Islamic conquest to the nature of the architecture and the extent of the building projects; from the tolerance for Christians and Jews to the rights/treatment of women, everything you have heard said about this time is simply wrong, according to Fernández-Morera. And then these claims are backed up through archaeology, mostly, and through other sources. Highly recommended.

Bravo! A work of genius--- and a surprisingly easy read that I couldn't put down. Boy, does this author set the record straight. For too long have academicians fantasized about Al-Andalus and its happy Christian villages and enlightened Islamic rulers. The sources simply don't bear out the multi-culturalist fantasy, and this book proves it. Use of contemporary sources, including Christian, Hebrew and Islamic legal treatises, make this work humanly accessible and full of surprises, while supporting Dr. Fernandez-Morera's arguments as strongly as the stone foundations of the Christian West --- and East--- destroyed by the Islamic invaders, whose atrocities are mirrored in today's world. This work calls for a re-examination of what could have been, had the nascent Hispano-Roman-Visigothic culture not been interrupted by the invasions. The folly of American academia is exposed by quotes of their own foolish writings, which are systematically dismantled by close examination of the truth of daily life under Sharia law in "Al-Andalus," with its ethnic cleansing, racism, massacres and depravity. There are some real gems about the reality of Sephardic life. And finally, an American academic incorporates the latest Spanish scholarship on the subject. Dr. Fernandez--Morera's vision is unclouded by any political agenda and his scholarship is immaculate. You will keep reading the 95 pages of footnotes because the notes too are fascinating. A work of art--- Bravo! Bravo!

Once upon a time, there were historians in western universities that actually held viewpoints contrary to a tolerant paradise in Islamic Spain. Really. No, I am not making this up. Take Gouguenheim, who argued that "medieval Islamic culture remained, with a (few) exceptions...generally unreceptive to the spirit of Greek civilization" (p 6).

Good luck today finding an historian with that opinion. Why is it that our universities never, ever allow diversity from liberal dogmas?

Archaeological discoveries overturn these liberal fantasies: the destruction of churches, the treasures buried by fleeing Hispano-Romans "consist largely of religious and dynastic paraphernalia that the Christian inhabitants...wanted to protect from Muslim looting" (p 13).

Nor is jihad an inner struggle in Muslim sources, where "they talk of war against infidels...a holy war" ( 23), of being rewarded with booty and women 'to be taken as sexual slaves" (p 25). "Moreover, extant letters from Islamic Spain that use the word jihad display no other meaning but holy war" (p 27).

As the Muslims swept across Spain, 'the Catholic kingdom of the Visigoths ...presented itself as a wonderland to the uncultured eighth century Berber invaders" (p 60). The sacking was "stupendous", Christians beheaded, cities plundered, and women and children enslaved.

The universities of Islamic Spain were actually "madrasas, centers for the study of religious texts" (p 65). Universities would have to wait several centuries to be invented by Christian Europe, a fact that is crystal clear, and yet unknown to a vast number of our modern historians.

"The oft-repeated assertion that Islam "preserved' classical knowledge...is baseless" (p 71).

In fact, the book argues that Islam was the cause of a slowing down of knowledge (p 76). and was the cause of the destruction of "hundreds of thousands of Greek manuscripts" (p 77), not to mention the taking of more than a million white slaves.

Muslims held no distinction between civil and religious law, unlike the Christian kingdoms which had inherited a flourishing civil court system. "The public spaces of the cities of this Golden Age of Islam were patrolled by a religious functionary...the muhtasib, who had the powers...to enforce sharia" (p 87).

Apostates were killed. Witches, too. Blasphemy earned either beheading or crucifixion. Sodomites were stoned to death. Anyone who drank a cup of wine would receive 80 lashes. Musical instruments were forbidden. Christians could not testify in court. Although some historians cite tolerance in Christian controlled cities, this is, of course, not proof of Islamic tolerance. In Muslim cities, Christians lived in Christian neighborhoods and lived under strict conditions and paid huge sums merely to exist. Muslims wouldn't even drink from a well used by Christians.

Muslims burned Christian relics, the bodies of their saints, and Christian churches. Vast numbers of Christians were crucified or beheaded. The nun Laura was tossed into a pot of molten lead. Yet most historians today grumble about the "'extremism' of the martyrs, not of the presumably tolerant Umayyad rulers who ordered the slaughter" (p 134).

On the other hand, Abd al-Rahman had "a harem of 6,300 women" (p 131) and "female sexual slaves...circumcised" (p 141). Many western historians today blather on about the freedom women enjoyed under Islamic rule. But a Muslim woman, a wife or daughter, was not allowed to leave her house except "with her husband's permission and only for absolutely urgent reasons" (p 148).

As for most of those famously free women, "most of the 'learned' women mentioned in the Muslim sources were slave girls" (p 154). Typical is Wallada, a poet, who was the the daughter of a sexual slave. Male children were also enslaved and used for sexual purposes.

Historians who blather on about the freedom of women in Islamic Spain should be told to write essay on why here were no female rulers in Spain under Islam, but quite number of female rulers in Christian Spain.

A great historical research that debunks the myth of the Andalusian paradise of Islamic rule that many of the so-called revisionist historians fantasized about. This book delves deeper into the historical reality of the horrible persecutions that the mozarabic Christians and Jews have been subjected to. It speaks about the martyrdom of the Christians who dared to live out their Christian faith, and who dared to challenge the Islamic precepts. I think the writer should have done more research on the bloody suppression of the progressive Muslim writers and thinkers of the time who challenged the bloody nature of the Quran like Averroes. Averroes was badly persecuted by the Muslim rulers of Andalusia to recant his ideas or else perish by the sword and that conflict ended by burning all his books and emprisoning him. Also the continuous civil wars between the last of the ommayyad princes that ended by the end of the ommayyad rule in Andalusia and the capture of Andalusia by Almoravids who came from Morocco and the West of Africa, under the leadership of Yourself ibn Tashfin who was nothing but a mob leader who used to terrorize the African clans in the west of Africa to subject them forcibly to islam. Almoravids created a terrorist states in what was Andalusia at that time. Then they started to fight among themselves and the Almohads who were the rulers of Morocco started ruling Andalusia which was reduced at that time to just the South of What is now Spain due to their losses at the hands of the Christian kings of Navarro and Castille with direct help from the kings of France. The Almohads didn't last long and ended with the fall of Grenada in 1493 at the hands of the Fernando and Isabella and capitulation of Boabdil the last of the Muslim rulers of Grenada. All throughout thus long history, there was a horrendous persecution of the Christians in Andalusia. A must read book that debunks this mythic fantasy of Muslim paradise in Andalusia. Great work Dario Fernandez-Morera.

In Muslim-controlled Spain, how did Islam accomodate Christians and Jews in the period 711 to 1492 A.D.? Contemporary accounts often allude to these centuries as a Golden Era of art, science and inter-faith tolerance, presided over by enlightened Muslims.Professor Fernández-Morera offers an opposing view.
Using various accounts from Muslim, Christian and Jewish sources, we are presented with a Spain twisted by religious tension and marked by periodic uprisings, mass exportation of Christians to North Africa, and subordinate dhimmi status for Jews and Christians living under Muslim rule, forced to pay a tax for “protection.”
Some Jews, at certain times, did hold responsible positions, but their advancement relied less on tolerance and more on an individual Caliph’s distrust of fellow Muslims and the ulama—the religious council that enforced the Maliki version of Sharia law governing Spain at that time.
Given each faith’s exclusionary practices, the subsequent invasion of Spain by even more religiously strict North Africans, and the unrelenting pressure of the Christian reconquest, there seemed little inclination for interfaith dialogue. In Fernández-Morera's work, peace only descended after one faith or the other had been subsumed by the victors.
While readable, the book carries almost a hundred pages of endnotes and bibliography, basically a third of the overall text. I’m glad the author did his homework, but this imbalance left one feeling the main body might be a bit thin.

Highly scholarly books are not often also topical among the general public. This book is a spectacular exception. That is because anytime you discuss matters of Islamic culture, past or present, you are currently assured of immediate controversy. No matter how painstaking your esearch, or how scientifically objective your findings: If they do not conform absolutely 100% to the tenets and foregone assumptions of true believers and their fanatic Leftist acolytes you risk ostracism in Academia and outright threats in the general public. 

Unable to refute the abundant evidence and the arguments presented, angry academics will focus on secondary issues or attack the author himself. This author took a heroic risk when he untertook the long overdue reexamination of Medieval Islamic Andalusia, and found that the rosy adulation which that culture enjoyed for so long was largely fake! The sober facts are that it was instead a period of the same strife, mutual hatred, zealous persecution, and perpetual violence that characterize Islamic reality to our present day. This book is truly an eye-opener -  and by the way, already an international hit: It has appeared in a Spanish translation and a French edition has been announced.

Interesting history of Andalusia. The author erects a strawman, that Andalusia was a paradise, and then knocks it down. But who said it was a paradise? Apart from this overly cute writer's trick, it is an informative and readable book.

This book apart from demolishing the view in much of academic that Islamic Spain was some multi-faith, multicultural paradise where everybody got along just fine. The book explains to me why so much of the culture (particularly the bad aspects) of Spain and Portgual is indebted to the Arabs, which was exported to the Americas.

The sort of view for example that unmarried women who aren't virgins are considered whores prevalent in societies of the Iberian Peninsula and Latin America even to the present day, is directly a result of influence from the Arab culture which dominated much of the Iberian Peninsula. Not to mention such institutions such as the inquisition were borrowed from the Arabs.

Fantastic!!!!! I've read several books on this topic from the 1800s, mid 20th century and also many textbook chapters. This is far and away the most thorough, balance and solidly factual treatment of the issue.
If you have any interest in Spanish history, Islamic history or want to get started----this is it.

Dr. Fernandez Morera has produced the book that I wish existed many years ago. Those who have read widely from old books or primary sources would have reached some of his conclusions. However, his synthesis and explanations are elegant and comprehensible to novice and expert alike. This is possible because he explains the relevant terminology up front. This allows even novice readers to participate in this expert level discussion of Spain under Muslim conquest.

Don't miss this book.

For those who are aware of the reconquest of Spain occurring at this very moment, this book is a wake-up call. Al-Andalus was once and thus will forever remain Muslim land. So says Islamic doctrine. This book is required reading if you are concerned over the future of the Civilized world.

What appears to be a formidableand valuable scholarly study suffers serious flaws in formatting that make the Kindle version a great nuisance. Beginning in chapter 1, any attempt to click the linked footnoting superscript causes my kindle to reboot! It is impossible to recommend the Kindle version of this book until either the store or the publisher repair the formatting.

The author of “The Myth of the Andalusian Paradise” protests that writers with whom he agrees are unable to have their books published by university presses and are accused of “scholarly Islamophobia.” His own book was published by ISI books, part of the politically conservative Intercollegiate Studies Institute.
The book is certainly scholarly. (The text ends on page 240 and is followed, in a small font, by 96 pages of notes and 12 of bibliography.) So is it scholarly Islamophobia?
The title leans in that direction because, although I have long read and heard of the “Golden Age” of Muslim Spain, the description of it as paradise is new. No one I am aware of ever said it was a paradise. The Golden Age designation was comparative, not absolute. Historians have long said that Jews have generally fared better when ruled by Muslims than by Christians.
The Muslim rule in Spain was followed by Catholic rule, which inaugurated the Inquisition. This was certainly worse than the Muslim era. Jews and Muslims both suffered from the Crusades. Turkish Muslims did perpetrate genocide of the Christian Armenians, but the Nazi holocaust perpetrated by Hitler and his henchmen, who were all Catholics, was worse than that.
The author claims that jihad means war, not inner struggle as many Muslims in the West tell us. Those Muslims, he says, cite various parts of the Quran to support their position that Islam is a compassionate religion. In other words, they cherry-pick the text. But I wonder to what extent the references in the author’s many notes were not also cherry-picked to show the worst of Muslim rule.
In addition to this, I must criticize the many repetitions throughout the book, for instance the description of Christian churches that were demolished or remodeled to become Muslim mosques.
To summarize, this book is scholarly but too narrowly focused on the evils of Islamic rule, so Islamophobia is not a bad description. I give it thumbs down.

What appears to be a formidableand valuable scholarly study suffers serious flaws in formatting that make the Kindle version a great nuisance. Beginning in chapter 1, any attempt to click the linked footnoting superscript causes my kindle to reboot! It is impossible to recommend the Kindle version of this book until either the store or the publisher repair the formatting.

The author of “The Myth of the Andalusian Paradise” protests that writers with whom he agrees are unable to have their books published by university presses and are accused of “scholarly Islamophobia.” His own book was published by ISI books, part of the politically conservative Intercollegiate Studies Institute.
The book is certainly scholarly. (The text ends on page 240 and is followed, in a small font, by 96 pages of notes and 12 of bibliography.) So is it scholarly Islamophobia?
The title leans in that direction because, although I have long read and heard of the “Golden Age” of Muslim Spain, the description of it as paradise is new. No one I am aware of ever said it was a paradise. The Golden Age designation was comparative, not absolute. Historians have long said that Jews have generally fared better when ruled by Muslims than by Christians.
The Muslim rule in Spain was followed by Catholic rule, which inaugurated the Inquisition. This was certainly worse than the Muslim era. Jews and Muslims both suffered from the Crusades. Turkish Muslims did perpetrate genocide of the Christian Armenians, but the Nazi holocaust perpetrated by Hitler and his henchmen, who were all Catholics, was worse than that.
The author claims that jihad means war, not inner struggle as many Muslims in the West tell us. Those Muslims, he says, cite various parts of the Quran to support their position that Islam is a compassionate religion. In other words, they cherry-pick the text. But I wonder to what extent the references in the author’s many notes were not also cherry-picked to show the worst of Muslim rule.
In addition to this, I must criticize the many repetitions throughout the book, for instance the description of Christian churches that were demolished or remodeled to become Muslim mosques.
To summarize, this book is scholarly but too narrowly focused on the evils of Islamic rule, so Islamophobia is not a bad description. I give it thumbs down.

Where are the standards? This book is an anti-Islam polemic masquerading as objective scholarship. But the greatest evidence of muslim tolerance in Spain is that after 700 years, Christians existed in Spain, but after 100 years of Castilian rule, Muslims did not. When the Christians had the power to expel the Christians, they did. When the Muslims had the same power, they did not. The author creates all these reasons why it was justified to expel the Muslims, but he doesn't cite the same reasons as why it would be justified for the muslims to do the same. He goes out of his way to apologize for the acts of the Castilians and exposes his double-standard way of thinking.The problem with this book is that it has no standards.

It's references are selective. The main premise is to dispute the idea of a tolerance in Islamic Spain. I would agree that an overly rosy picture of confessional harmony in Islamic Spain is not historically accurate, but the idea that Islamic Spain was not unusual in Europe at the time is not historically accurate either.

One could argue that the unusualness of Islamic Spain was not a positive one, but one must first set the standards by which to judge Islamic Spain. If you are attempting to answer the question of whether the Muslim rulers in Spain were tolerant to Christians and Jews, then you must first define the word 'tolerant' and then set a standard for it. In this case, the standard must be a contemporary one or, in order words, a comparison between the Islamic Spain and one of its' Christian or even Jewish contemporaries, e.g. Frankish Gaul (there was no France at the time), Lombard and other rulers of Italy, Byzantium, Khazar Empire, etc.) The standard cannot be a comparison with the post-bellum American South or with Aparthied South Africa. How much sense would it make that the name of this book were changed to “Apartheid Islamic Spain”? This type of anachronistic thinking doesn’t make historical sense and we should use our modern notions of personal liberty and rights to judge the relative tolerance of 8th century Spain.

So, if this author had established standards to measure the level of tolerance of Islamic Spain and then go on to show that the level of tolerance in Islamic Spain was at or lower than its’ contemporaries, then, maybe we would have a book that could contribute to the understanding of the historical nature of Islamic Spain. Perhaps the author is simply responding to the rosy picture of Islamic Spain produced by other authors. However, adding one extreme to another does not equal a better picture, it just leads to arguing from extremes that do not aid understanding (to better understand this phenomenon read Cass Sunstein’s great little book “Going to Extremes”).

So let’s just say that the standard is simply the pairwise comparison on certain issues between Islamic Spain and the contemporaries mentioned above but also including the rulers that preceded and followed Islamic Spain, i.e. the Visigoths and Castile-Aragon. And we should answer whether Islamic Spain was positively different or not? And the analysis should be from the minority perspective, i.e. if you were a Muslim living under Christian rule, or a Christian living under Islamic Rule. And we should start by saying that being a religious minority was not going to be comfortable anywhere in the lands surrounding the Mediterranean. Using another commentators “myths” we have the start of our issues.

1. “Religion was not a factor.” Of course religion was a factor. But it was so for the contemporaries: Francia under Charlemagne waged war on Saxons in the name of Christianity; the Byzantines waged war on the Bulgars in the name of Christianity as well. So, Islamic Spain was not more or less tolerant on this issue.

2. Western Europe was backwards. This has nothing to do with Islamic Spain. I suppose the myth is that the Islamic conquest ended Spain’s backwardness. That has nothing to do with whether Islamic Spain was more tolerant than its’ contemporaries, unless you equate lower levels of tolerance with backwardness. However, for our purposes, the issue is to establish the level of tolerance. I don’t see how this relates. However, it should be noted that Spain was always seen as backward, in Roman times and in pre-Roman times. It was the wild, wild, west of the ancient world. The Byzantines and the rulers of Italy would have seen Spain as backwards. And of course, as throughout Western Europe literacy declined with the fall of the Western Roman Empire. These are just facts, but I don’t know if they contribute to our analysis in a material way.

3. Islamic Spain brought tolerance to Europe and was enlightened. Once again we are measuring the tolerance, so we must establish that tolerance existed before we could attempt to judge its effects.

5. Muslim Spain was a feminist utopia. Obviously, not true. But in the sense that women were not property and could inherit, then Islamic Spain was more tolerant than Francia. Women in Byzantium could inherit, but Roman law still gave the pater familias the power of life and death over his wife or daughter. Islamic Spain was more tolerant to women than its’ contemporaries.

6. "Jews lived happily and productively in Spain." They certainly were productive as the decline in Castilian Spain’s productivity after the Jews were expelled would show. In comparison with the contemporaries, the treatment of Jews was more tolerant in Islamic Spain. The Visigoths placed forced many Jews to convert to Christianity. Islamic Spain did not. Castilian Spain expelled the Jews entirely and the inquisition was created to root out secret Jews. There was never an Islamic inquisition. The author cites some anecdotes about suspicion of secret Christians, but that cannot compare to a Church organized institution. The author was able to make the distinction (although inaccurate) between Jihad and the Crusade, but could not make this distinction. (Technically, only the leader of the muslims, i.e. Caliph, can declare a jihad. That’s why in response to the first crusade, the muslims asked the Caliph in Baghdad to declare one.)

The Byzantines were probably equally tolerant of the Jews as Islamic Spain, but the percentage of Jews in Byzantium was much less. The same low percentage was found in Francia. So where Jews were a sizable minority, Islamic Spain was more tolerant. Furthermore, where did most Jews go when they were expelled? Not Christian Europe, but Ottoman Europe and Asia. Also, Maimonides also left Spain fleeing intolerant Muslim rulers, but where did he go? Once again, not Christian Europe, but Muslim Egypt, ruled by...Salahuddin Ayyubi.

7. Muslim Spain was a fairyland for Christians. Obviously, this is not true. The standard here should be one of existence. It was simply unlawful to be Muslim in a Christian land. In all of the Christian territories, you could be a type of “accepted” Christian or a Jew (except in Castilian Spain), but not a Muslim or Pagan. In fact, you couldn’t even be an Arian Christian in the west. The author refers to Arianism as a heresy, but I’m sure the Arians didn’t see it that way (by the way Constantine was an Arian, so I guess he wasn’t a Christian, but a heretic.) Clearly, being allowed to exist is more tolerant than not being allowed to exist. So, Islamic spain was more tolerant simply by allowing the existence of Chrisitians. That's an incredibly low standard, but what does it mean that the contemporary Christian rulers couldn't meet this impossible low standard.

8. Fernandez-Morera writes that the popular idea that Islam preserved classical knowledge and passed that knowledge on to Christian Europe "is baseless." This claim is simple wrong. When the Castilians captured Toledo, the Archbishop Raimondo asked for scholars across western Europe to come and examine the library. If this knowledge existed in western Europe, then why come to Toledo? If this knowledge already existed in the catholic areas of Spain, then why come to Toledo? If this knowledge could be obtained from Byzantium, then why come to Toledo?

The answer was that this knowledge could not be found in Western Europe at all. And it did not come through Byzantium for two reasons: (1) western Europeans weren’t interested when they had access to Byzantium and (2) when western Europeans were interested, the catholic church and Byzantium were in schism. This leads to another important fallacy of the author’s work. That the muslims destroyed the unity of the Mediterranean. No, that was done by the heretical Arian Christian Goths, Vandals, and Lombards centuries before. There was no unity at the beginning of the Islamic conquests. The author argues that since the Muslims destroyed that unity then knowledge could not flow to the West. However, this just illustrates that the author is working toward an agenda. The Danube river valley and Italy were always in contact with Byzantium and these links were never “broken” by Muslims. If scholars wanted to travel to Byzantium, they could have done so. The point is that they were not interested.

And this leads to the last point that the scholar assumes but is also false. The idea that Roman civilization and culture (including Byzantine culture) was interested in Greek learning. The book “Terry Jones’ Barbarians” goes into great detail of the Roman disdain for Greek theoretical thinking. The Romans were conservative and retarded Greek thinking and the Christian church also was suspicious of Greek thinking. These are facts. Why is it that there are no great commentaries to the ancient greek philosophers from the Roman and Byzantine times? Why is it that the great commentators are Muslim and later western European? Because the Romans and Byzantines simply weren’t interested. The author quotes the story of Cyril. But his example is illustrative, one can preserve without enhancing (the charge levelled against muslims), so Cyril knew of the philosophies but he did not advance them. Why? Because his religious mission was more important to him. If he had spent his time developing philosophy instead of a Slavic alphabet to convert the Slavs maybe he would be a great philosopher. But like so many other Greeks that was not his choice.

Lastly, the author presents some imagined counterfactual that the visigoths were on the verge of something great but it was aborted by the muslim conquest. Beyond the fact that the rapidity of the conquest shows that the visigoths weren't on the verge of anything great, this counterfactual suggests that the visigoths would go on to do something that the franks, germans, English and Italians would not do for another 700 years even without a muslim conquest weighing them down. The audacity of this claim is laughable.

Through a lack of standards, this author does nothing but present a lop-sided view of Islamic Spain.

In my opinion the writer seems biased. The book judges the ending era of Muslim Spain instead of the 711-1492 period as a whole. The book clearly describes the time when this civilization was declining, without referencing proper timelines.

This book comes with a histrionic burb: "Historians, journalists, and even politicians uphold the Muslim kingdom in medieval Spain – “al-Andalus” – as a multicultural paradise, a place where Muslims, Christians, and Jews lived in harmony. There is only one problem with this popular account: it is a *myth*."

In fact, of course, discussions of Convivencia have always been discussed the problems and limits of religio-communal co-existence in Spain. There has been no attempt to claim everything was perfect.. For example The problems were widely discussed, for example, at the major 1992 Exhibition on Convivencia at the Metropolitan Museum in New York.

Morera's move here is to claim that Al-Andalus was presented as a "paradise", and then his game of hype gets going.

It is interesting in looking at online boosters of Morera's book that they emphasize very much that he has good academic qualifications and a very respectable job at Northwestern University. Such boosters fail to mention, however, that _The Myth of the Andalusian Paradise_ is not published by an academic press (was it refused I wonder) but by an avowedly right-wing political organisation founded by William Buckley called " Intercollegiate Studies Institute, Inc." I note that even the reviewer in the avowedly conservative Weekly Standard sees the problems.

This is a sham piece of scholarship, a poorly executed deconstruction of a straw man. The author is a specialist in Cervantes, i.e. late 16th / early 17th century Spanish literature, not medieval history as preserved in Arabic sources (which he cannot read). He fails to cite fundamental pieces of scholarship in the field, a problem that would have been noted before publication had this book been published by a reputable press and undergone peer review. Those interested in the subject matter should instead read works by historians such as Brian Catlos, David Nirenberg, and Maribel Fierro, who engage with the complexity of the societies of al-Andalus without resorting to base polemic.