Ecurb
10-26-2025, 11:57 AM
Cervantes' Don Quixote is the canonical Western Novel -- one of the first and still one of the best. Modern readers unfamiliar with the context and setting may see it differently from readers in 16th and 17th century Spain. The famous scene (familiar even to those unfortunates who have never read the novel) in which the Don mistakes windmills for giants may have resonated differently in the Spain of the reconquesta and Inquisition. If Jews and Muslims were indistinguishable from Christians in their appearance -- but remained crucially distinct -- why shouldn't windmills resemble giants?
Conversos (Jews and Muslims who either converted or pretended to) often made a point of disguising their identities. One reason ham is a popular street food in Spain is that Conversos liked being seen in public eating these forbidden foods to solidify their new identity. In the novel, Dulcinea is "the best hand at salting port in all La Mancha" -- which may have suggested she was a Converso of Morisco. When the Don's relatives burn his "chivalrous romances" to cure him of his fancies, the actual Inquisitors were burning all books written in Arabic (which was the "Lingua Franca" of educated Mediterraneans for the previous 9 centuries). The great libraries of Muslim Spain were consigned to the flames, as were some of those reading the Arabic books. It seems to me this adds some poignancy to the book burning scene which might not be recognized by modern readers.
Conversos (Jews and Muslims who either converted or pretended to) often made a point of disguising their identities. One reason ham is a popular street food in Spain is that Conversos liked being seen in public eating these forbidden foods to solidify their new identity. In the novel, Dulcinea is "the best hand at salting port in all La Mancha" -- which may have suggested she was a Converso of Morisco. When the Don's relatives burn his "chivalrous romances" to cure him of his fancies, the actual Inquisitors were burning all books written in Arabic (which was the "Lingua Franca" of educated Mediterraneans for the previous 9 centuries). The great libraries of Muslim Spain were consigned to the flames, as were some of those reading the Arabic books. It seems to me this adds some poignancy to the book burning scene which might not be recognized by modern readers.