The
Alhambra Decree (also known as the
Edict of Expulsion) was an edict issued on 31 March 1492 by the joint
Catholic MonarchsThe Catholic Monarchs is the collective title used in history for Queen Isabella I of Castile and King Ferdinand II of Aragon. The title of "Catholic King and Queen" was bestowed on them by the Pope Alexander VI. They married on October 19,1469, in the city of Valladolid; Isabella was eighteen...
of
SpainSpain , officially the Kingdom of Spain , is a country located in southwestern Europe on the Iberian Peninsula.
[The Spanish constitution does not establish any official denomination of the country, even though España , Estado español and Nación española are used interchangeably...]
(
Isabella I of CastileIsabella I was Queen of Castile and León. She and her husband, Ferdinand II of Aragon, laid the foundation for the political unification of Spain under their grandson, Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor....
and
Ferdinand II of AragonFerdinand the Catholic was King of Aragon , Sicily , Naples , Valencia, Sardinia, and Navarre, Count of Barcelona, de jure uxoris King of Castile and then Regent of that country also from 1508 to his death, in the name of his mentally unstable daughter Joanna the...
) ordering the expulsion of
JewThe Jews , also known as the Jewish people, are an ethnoreligious group originating in the Israelites or Hebrews of the Ancient Near East. The Jewish ethnicity, nationality, and religion are strongly interrelated, as Judaism is the traditional faith of the Jewish nation...
s from the Kingdom of Spain and its territories and possessions by 31 July of that year.
The edict was formally revoked on December 16, 1968.
Background
Beginning in the 8th century,
MuslimsThe Umayyad conquest of Hispania began as an army of the Umayyad Caliphate consisting largely of Berbers, inhabitants of Northwest Africa recently converted to Islam, invaded the Christian Visigothic Kingdom located on the Iberian peninsula...
had occupied and settled most of the
Iberian PeninsulaThe Iberian Peninsula, or Iberia, is located in the extreme southwest of Europe and includes modern-day Spain, Portugal, Andorra and Gibraltar and a very small area of France. It is the westernmost of the three major southern European peninsulas—the Iberian, Italian, and Balkan peninsulas...
. Jews who had lived in these regions since
Roman timesThe Roman Empire was the post-Republican phase of the ancient Roman civilization, characterised by an autocratic form of government and large territorial holdings in Europe and around the Mediterranean. The term is used to describe the Roman state during and after the time of the first emperor,...
, considered 'People of the Book', were given special status, and thus thrived under Muslim rule. During persecutions by Iberian Christians, such as the pogroms in Córdoba (1011) and Granada (1066), they were assisted by Muslims. Therefore Jews supported and sometimes even assisted their Muslim rulers never forgetting the harsh treatment they had suffered under the Visigothic rulers of the Iberian Peninsula prior to the arrival of Muslims to Iberia . The tolerance of the Muslim rulers attracted Jewish immigration, and Jewish enclaves in Muslim Iberian cities flourished as places of learning and commerce. Progressively, however, living conditions for Jews in
Al-AndalusAl-Andalus was the Arabic name given to the parts of the Iberian Peninsula and Septimania governed by Arab and North African Muslims , at various times in the period between 711 and 1492....
became harsher, especially after the fall of the Omayyad Caliphate to the Christian kingdoms.
The
ReconquistaThe Reconquista was a period of 800 years in the Middle Ages during which several Christian kingdoms of the Iberian Peninsula succeeded in retaking the Iberian Peninsula from the Muslims...
was the gradual reconquest of
Muslim IberiaAl-Andalus was the Arabic name given to the parts of the Iberian Peninsula and Septimania governed by Arab and North African Muslims , at various times in the period between 711 and 1492....
by the Christian kingdoms and had a powerful religious flavor: Iberia was being reclaimed for Christendom. By the 14th century, almost all of Spain and Portugal had been taken back from the
MoorsThe description Moors has referred to several historic and modern populations of Muslim people of Berber, Black African and Arab descent from North Africa, some of whom came to conquer and occupy the Iberian Peninsula for nearly 800 years. The North Africans termed it Al Andalus, comprising most...
.
Overt hostility against Jews became more pronounced , finding expression in brutal episodes of violence and oppression. Thousands of Jews sought to escape these attacks by converting to Catholicism; they were commonly called
conversoConversos and its feminine form conversa referred to Jews or Muslims or the descendants of Jews or Muslims who converted to Catholicism in Spain and Portugal, particularly during the 14th and 15th centuries...
s or
New ChristianNew Christian was a term used to refer to Iberian Jews and Muslims who converted to Roman Catholicism, and their known baptized descendants. The term was introduced by the Old Christians of Iberia who wanted to distinguish themselves from the conversos...
s. At first these conversions seemed an effective solution to the cultural conflict: many
converso families met with social and commercial success. But eventually their success made these New Christians unpopular with the church and royal hierarchies.
Many of the ruling Spanish, both secular and religious, viewed Jews with deep suspicion. The Jews were also seen as being collaborators with the Muslims.
These suspicions on the part of Christians were only heightened by the fact that some of the coerced conversions were undoubtedly insincere. Some, but not all,
conversos had understandably chosen to salvage their social and commercial prestige by the only option open to them - baptism and embrace of Christianity - while privately adhering to their Jewish practice and faith. These secret practitioners are commonly referred to as
crypto-JewsCrypto-Judaism is the secret adherence to Judaism while publicly professing to be of another faith; practitioners are referred to as "crypto-Jews"...
or
marranoMarranos or secret Jews were Sephardic Jews who were forced to adopt Christianity under threat of expulsion but who continued to practice Judaism secretly, thus preserving their Jewish identity...
s.
The existence of crypto-Jews was an irresistible provocation for secular and church leaders who were already hostile toward Spain's Jewry. The uncertainty over the sincerity of Jewish converts added explosive fuel to the fire of anti-semitism in 15th-century Spain.
Ferdinand and Isabella
The hostility toward Jews was brought to a climax by "The
Catholic MonarchsThe Catholic Monarchs is the collective title used in history for Queen Isabella I of Castile and King Ferdinand II of Aragon. The title of "Catholic King and Queen" was bestowed on them by the Pope Alexander VI. They married on October 19,1469, in the city of Valladolid; Isabella was eighteen...
" -
FerdinandFerdinand the Catholic was King of Aragon , Sicily , Naples , Valencia, Sardinia, and Navarre, Count of Barcelona, de jure uxoris King of Castile and then Regent of that country also from 1508 to his death, in the name of his mentally unstable daughter Joanna the...
and
IsabellaIsabella I was Queen of Castile and León. She and her husband, Ferdinand II of Aragon, laid the foundation for the political unification of Spain under their grandson, Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor....
, whose marriage in 1469 led ten years later to the union of the crowns of
AragonThe Kingdom of Aragon was an old kingdom in the Iberian Peninsula, corresponding to the modern-day autonomous community of Aragon , in Spain...
and
CastileA former kingdom, Castile gradually merged with its neighbors to become the Crown of Castile and later the Kingdom of Spain with the Crown of Aragon and the Crown of Navarre...
- two of the three consolidated kingdoms on the Iberian Peninsula. The eventual result, under their great-grandson,
Philip IIPhilip II was King of Spain and Portugal, Naples, Sicily, and, during his wife Mary Tudor's reign, King of England and Ireland...
, was the unification of all Iberia into one Kingdom of Spain, the precursor of the modern state now known as
SpainSpain , officially the Kingdom of Spain , is a country located in southwestern Europe on the Iberian Peninsula.
[The Spanish constitution does not establish any official denomination of the country, even though España , Estado español and Nación española are used interchangeably...]
.
Ferdinand and Isabella took seriously the reports that some crypto-Jews were not only privately practicing their former faith, but were secretly trying to draw other
conversos back into the Jewish fold. In 1480, the king and queen created the
Spanish InquisitionThe Spanish Inquisition was an ecclesiastical tribunal started in 1478 by Catholic Monarchs Ferdinand II of Aragon and Isabella I of Castile. It was intended to maintain Catholic orthodoxy in their kingdoms, and to replace the medieval inquisition which was under papal control...
to investigate these suspicions; under the authority of this new institution, thousands of converted Jews were killed within 12 years. It is not known how many, if any, had lapsed from their new Christianity, or were trying to convince others to do the same.
In 1492, Ferdinand and Isabella completed the
reconquistaThe Reconquista was a period of 800 years in the Middle Ages during which several Christian kingdoms of the Iberian Peninsula succeeded in retaking the Iberian Peninsula from the Muslims...
by forcing the surrender of the Muslim kingdom of
GranadaGranada is a city and the capital of the province of Granada, in the autonomous community of Andalusia, Spain.- Overview :The city of Granada is placed at the foot of the Sierra Nevada mountains, at the confluence of three rivers, Beiro, Darro and Genil, at an elevation of 738 metres above sea...
(Granada had in fact been a
vassal stateThe term vassal state commonly refers to any state that was subordinate to another in the pre-modern international system. The vassal in these cases was the ruler, rather than the state itself...
to Spanish royals for more than two centuries). The surrender of the city of Granada placed yet another large Islamic population under their rule, and Ferdinand and Isabella decided to act.
The Edict
The king and queen issued the Alhambra decree less than three months after the surrender of Granada. In it, Jews were accused of trying "to subvert their holy Catholic faith and trying to draw faithful Christians away from their beliefs."
Some Jews were even only given four months and ordered to leave the kingdom or convert to Christianity. Under the edict, Jews were promised royal "protection and security" for the effective three-month window before the deadline. They were permitted to take their belongings with them - except "gold or silver or minted money".
The punishment for any Jew who did not leave or convert by the deadline was death. The punishment for a non-Jew who sheltered or hid Jews was the confiscation of all belongings and hereditary privileges.
As a result of this expulsion,
Spanish JewsSephardi Jews are a subgroup of Jews originating in the Iberian Peninsula, usually defined in contrast to Ashkenazi and Mizrahi Jews.-Definition:A...
dispersedThe Jewish diaspora , the presence of Jews outside of the Land of Israel, is a result of the expulsion or emigration of Jews from Israel...
throughout the region of North Africa known as the
MaghrebThe Maghreb , also rendered Maghrib , meaning "place of sunset" or "western" in Arabic, is a region in North Africa. The term is generally applied to all of Morocco, Algeria, and Tunisia, but in older Arabic usage pertained only to the area of the three countries between the high ranges of the...
. They also fled to south-eastern
EuropeEurope is, by convention, one of the world's seven continents. Comprising the westernmost peninsula of Eurasia, Europe is generally divided from Asia to its east by the water divide of the Ural Mountains, the Ural River, the Caspian Sea, the Caucasus Mountains , and the Black Sea to the southeast...
where they were granted safety in the
Ottoman EmpireThe Ottoman Empire or Ottoman State , also known by its contemporaries as the Turkish Empire or Turkey , was an empire that lasted from 1299 to November 1, 1922 The Ottoman Empire or Ottoman State (Ottoman Turkish: دَوْلَتِ عَلِیَّهِ عُثْمَانِیَّه Dawlet-il ʿAliyyat-il ʿOs̠māniyye, Modern Turkish:...
and formed flourishing local Jewish communities, the largest being those of
ThessalonikiThessaloniki , Thessalonica, or Salonica is the second-largest city in Greece and the capital of the Greek region of Macedonia. It is honorarily called the Συμπρωτεύουσα Symprotevousa of Greece, as it was once called the συμβασιλεύουσα symvasilevousa of the Byzantine Empire...
and
SarajevoSarajevo is the capital and largest city of Bosnia and Herzegovina, with a population of 304,614 people in the four municipalities that make up the city proper, and an estimated urban area population of 421,289 people in the Sarajevo Canton . It is also the capital of the Federation of Bosnia and...
. In those regions, they often intermingled with the already existing
MizrachiMizrahi Jews or Mizrahim, , also referred to as Edot HaMizrach are Jews descended from the Jewish communities of the Middle East, Central Asia and the Caucasus. The term Mizrahi is used in Israel in the language of politics, media and some social scientists for Jews from the Arab world and...
(Eastern Jewish) communities.
Scholars disagree about how many Jews left Spain as a result of the decree; the numbers vary between 130,000 and 800,000. Many (likely more than half) went to
PortugalPortugal , officially the Portuguese Republic , is a country located in southwestern Europe on the Iberian Peninsula. Portugal is the westernmost country of mainland Europe and is bordered by the Atlantic Ocean to the west and south and by Spain to the north and east...
, where they only eluded persecution for a few years (see
Portuguese InquisitionThe Portuguese Inquisition was formally established in Portugal in 1536 at the request of the King of Portugal, João III. Manuel I had asked for the installation of the Inquisition in 1515, but it was only after his death that the pope acquiesced...
). The Jewish community in Portugal (perhaps then some 10% of that country's population ) were then declared Christians by Royal decree unless they left, but since their departure was severely hindered by the King (who needed their expertise for Portugal's overseas enterprises), the vast majority was forced to stay as nominal Christians.
Other Spanish Jews (estimates range between 50,000 and 70,000) chose in the face of the Edict to convert to Christianity and thereby escape expulsion. Not surprisingly, their conversion served as poor protection from church hostility after the
Spanish InquisitionThe Spanish Inquisition was an ecclesiastical tribunal started in 1478 by Catholic Monarchs Ferdinand II of Aragon and Isabella I of Castile. It was intended to maintain Catholic orthodoxy in their kingdoms, and to replace the medieval inquisition which was under papal control...
came into full effect; persecution and expulsion were common. However, recent
Y chromosomeThe Y chromosome is the sex-determining chromosome in most mammals, including humans. In mammals, it contains the gene SRY, which triggers testis development, thus determining sex. The human Y chromosome is composed of about 60 million base pairs.- Overview :...
DNA testing conducted by the
University of LeicesterThe University of Leicester is a research led university based in Leicester, England, with approximately 20,000 registered students - about 13,000 of them full-time students and 7,000 part-time and/or distance learning...
and the
Pompeu Fabra UniversityPompeu Fabra University is a public university in Barcelona, Catalonia, Spain.Founded in 1990, it is named after the Catalan grammarian Pompeu Fabra....
has indicated that around 20% of Spanish men today have direct patrilineal descent from Sephardic Jews. The result is in contradiction or not replicated in all the body of genetic studies done in Iberia and conflicts with mainstream historiography (denies
NeolithicThe Neolithic Age, Era, or Period, or New Stone Age, was a period in the development of human technology, beginning about 9500 BCE in the Middle East that is traditionally considered the last part of the Stone Age...
,
RomanAncient Rome was a civilization that grew out of a small agricultural community founded on the Italian Peninsula as early as the 10th century BC. Located along the Mediterranean Sea, it became one of the largest empires in the ancient world....
,
GreekAncient Greece is the civilisation belonging to the period of Greek history lasting from the Greek Dark Ages ca. 1100 BC and the Dorian invasion, to 146 BC and the Roman conquest of Greece after the Battle of Corinth. It is generally considered to be the seminal culture which provided the...
,
PhoenicianPhoenicia what is now modern day Lebanon, was an ancient civilization centered in the north of ancient Canaan, with its heartland along the coastal regions of modern day Lebanon, extending to parts of Israel, Syria and Palestine...
,
GermanicThe Germanic peoples are a historical ethno-linguistic group, originating in Northern Europe and identified by their use of the Indo-European Germanic languages which diversified out of Common Germanic in the course of the Pre-Roman Iron Age...
, Alani,
SlavicThe Slavic Peoples are an ethnic and linguistic branch of Indo-European peoples, living mainly in eastern and central Europe. From the early 6th century they spread from their original homeland to inhabit most of eastern Central Europe, Eastern Europe and the Balkans...
,
ArabArab people or Arabs are an ethnic group whose members identify along linguistic, cultural or genealogical grounds...
and other contributions to modern Iberians) and has been questioned by the authors themselves and by
Stephen OppenheimerStephen Oppenheimer , a British physician, a member of Green College, Oxford and an honorary fellow of Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine, carries out and publishes research in the field of genetics....
.
Many of these "New Christians" were eventually forced to either leave the countries or intermarry with the local populace by the dual
InquisitionThe term Inquisition can apply to any one of several institutions charged with trying and convicting heretics within the Catholic Church...
s of Portugal and Spain. Many settled in North Africa or elsewhere in Europe, most notably in the Netherlands and England (see
Sephardic Jews in the NetherlandsAs a result of the Inquisition, many Sephardim left the Iberian peninsula at the end of the 15th century and throughout the 16th century, in search for religious freedom. Some of them found their way to the newly independent Dutch provinces: independent from the reign of Spain, Sephardic Jews from...
,
History of the Marranos in EnglandThe History of Marranos in England consists of the Marranos' contribution and achievement in England.-Arrival of Marranos:Toward the middle of the seventeenth century a considerable number of Marrano merchants settled in London and formed there a secret congregation, at the head of which was...
).
Don Isaac Abravanel and the Alhambra decree
Legend does claim that Don
Isaac AbravanelIsaac ben Judah Abrabanel, , also spelled Abravanel or Abarbanel, commonly referred to as The Abarbanel, was a Portuguese Jewish statesman, philosopher, Bible commentator, and financier.-Biography:...
, who had previously ransomed 480 Jewish converts of Malaga from the Catholic monarchs by a payment of 20,000
doubloonThe doubloon , was a two-escudo or 32-reales gold coin, weighing 6.77 grams . Doubloons were minted in Spain, Mexico, Peru, and Nueva Granada...
s, now offered them 600,000
ducatThe ducat is a gold coin that was used as a trade currency throughout Europe before World War I. Its weight is 3.4909 grams of .986 gold, which is 0.1107 troy ounce, AGW, actual gold weight.-History:...
s for the revocation of the edict. It is said also that Ferdinand hesitated, but was prevented from accepting the offer by
TorquemadaTomás de Torquemada was a fifteenth century Spanish Dominican, first Inquisitor General of Spain, and confessor to Isabella I of Castile. He was famously described by the Spanish chronicler Sebastián de Olmedo as "The hammer of heretics, the light of Spain, the saviour of his country, the honour...
, the grand inquisitor, who dashed into the royal presence and, throwing a crucifix down before the king and queen, asked whether, like
JudasJudas Iscariot, "Yehuda" ' was, according to the New Testament, one of the twelve original Apostles of Jesus. Among the twelve, he was apparently designated to keep account of the "money bag" Judas Iscariot, "Yehuda" ' was, according to the New Testament, one of the twelve original Apostles of...
, they would betray their Lord for money.
The 1988 novel
The Alhambra Decree by David Raphael contains a fictionalized response to the Alhambra decree attributed to Rabbi Don
Isaac AbrabanelIsaac ben Judah Abrabanel, , also spelled Abravanel or Abarbanel, commonly referred to as The Abarbanel, was a Portuguese Jewish statesman, philosopher, Bible commentator, and financier.-Biography:...
. It is commonly (and mistakenly) cited as genuine.
See also
- History of the Jews in Spain
Spanish Jews once constituted one of the largest and most prosperous Jewish communities under Muslim and Christian rule in Spain, before they were expelled in 1492...
- Jewish refugees
In the course of history, Jewish populations have been expelled or ostracised by various local authorities and have sought asylum from antisemitism numerous times...
- Jewish diaspora
The Jewish diaspora , the presence of Jews outside of the Land of Israel, is a result of the expulsion or emigration of Jews from Israel...
- Edict of Expulsion
In 1290, King Edward I issued an edict expelling all Jews from England. Lasting for the rest of the Middle Ages, it would be over 350 years until it was formally overturned in 1656...
- Expulsion of the Moriscos
On April 9, 1609, King Philip III of Spain decreed the expulsion of the Moriscos. The Moriscos were the descendants of the Muslim population that converted to Christianity under threat of exile from Ferdinand and Isabella in 1502. From 1609 through 1614, the Spanish government systematically...
- Edict of Fontainebleau
The Edict of Fontainebleau was an edict issued by Louis XIV of France, also known as the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes of 1598, which had granted to the Huguenots the right to practice their religion without persecution from the state...
- 1731 Expulsion of Protestants from Salzburg