PIMSPontifical Institute
of
Mediaeval Studies

In the late fifteenth and early sixteenth centuries, the Mediterranean Muslim world, from Mamluk Egypt to North Africa and (former) Muslim Spain, experienced a series of sweeping changes, including civil war, foreign conquest, and forced conversion. In the face of such radical transformations of Muslim polities, some Muslims reacted by turning towards eschatological ideologies. This talk explores the ways in which millenarianism and notions of renewal manifested themselves in North Africa, and to an extent in Egypt. It also discusses how these trends influenced and impacted the construction of religious identity by the last Spanish Muslims in the wake of their forced conversion to Christianity in the early sixteenth century.

For more information on the Canadian Institute for Mediterranean Studies, please visit http://sites.utoronto.ca/cims or contact Alex Gropper at alexgropper@rogers.com.