Islamic Heritage and Morisco Identity: Women and Property in Rural Granada at the Dawn of the Sixteenth Century

Abstract

Through an assessment of the data recorded in two books of habices (Span., libros de habices – inventories of goods from Islamic pious endowments) dated 1527 and 1530, this study examines the situation of Morisco women in the Alpujarra, a rural area of Granada, just three decades after the forced conversion of the Muslim population to Christianity. Various aspects of the economic and social position of these women are explored, paying particular attention to their participation in the legal framework related to property ownership and the transfer of their possessions in the form of bequests. Although the study focuses primarily on the Morisco period, its most immediate precedent, Islamic and Mudéjar Granada, is not forgotten.