Convivencia, Romances Moriscos, and Religious Conflict Today

August 2026

Last month, Governor Ron DeSantis of Florida announced his intention to designate CAIR, an Islamic advocacy group, as a terrorist organization. The move follows a similar designation by Texas Governor Greg Abbot late last year, in a state that has seen rising Islamophobia and openly anti-Muslim rhetoric in recent months. Abroad, the US continues to be entangled in a senseless conflict with Iran, and the genocide in Gaza has not ended despite “ceasefire.” Religiously motivated hate and violence are not uncommon, and in the West this is especially true for Muslims.

Religious tolerance, however, is widely accepted as a desirable attribute of a progressive society. Some still seek historical examples of peaceful religious interaction in the face of current violence. Of these, one of the most prominent and commonly referred to is the Convivencia: the period of Muslim rule in Iberia in which Judaism, Christianity, and Islam co-existed in peaceful harmony. Cultural exchange abounded, and cities like Córdoba flourished artistically, economically, and politically. Today the great Mosque-Cathedral still stands there as a symbol of the extensive interaction between Islam and Christianity.

The Convivencia is a shining point of hope in the struggle for religious tolerance. If hundreds of years ago the three Abrahamic faiths could coexist without the violence that we continue to see today, it follows that peace could be achieved again on a broader scale. The Convivencia chronologically sits right in between the Muslim invasion of the peninsula and the Catholic Reconquista. It was contemporary with the Crusades. Even in this violent context, there occurred religious harmony. If it was possible then, why not now?

Well, perhaps even in history it didn’t really go that way. The Convivencia sounds too good to be true, and that it may be. There has been intense debate around the idea and its historicity since it was proposed in the ‘40s. The controversy is further complicated by accusations of motivated historical interpretation for politico-religious reasons. The current scholarly consensus, however, is that this is largely a mischaracterization of Al-Andalus in this period and that of course, the truth is multi-faceted and complex.

So, perhaps the fairy-tale land of the Convivencia doesn’t really exist, but that doesn’t mean there are no lessons to be learned from the uncommon amount of inter-religious contact that occurred in medieval Iberia. On the contrary, I find the concept of learning from these kinds of historical examples to be a useful way of understanding our modern world.

The poetic genre of Romances Moriscos represents a less often cited representation of this religious interaction. They are less clear-cut than a hypothetical era of complete harmony, but I believe they offer a nuanced, entertaining, and grounded view of the ways Christians and Muslims interacted in the region.

The calling-card of Romances Moriscos and the aspect that makes them famous (though not as famous in the English-speaking world as they should be) is that they are poems by Christian authors in which Muslims are portrayed as sympathetic and virtuous protagonists. Beyond that, their depiction is not as flat caricatures or simple stereotypes. The Moorish heroes experience love and heartbreak, victory and defeat. This depth may be surprising, as in modern Western media the first inclusions of groups outside the dominant culture were often cartoonishly racist. I believe this points to a distinct view of racial and religious groups among Christian Spaniards in which Moors were exotic enough to be exciting as subjects of storytelling, but not so “other” that they ceased to be fully human.

Romances also have the advantage of being popular literature. They’re not the view of some elite educated class estranged from the feelings of the common people of the time. Romances were accompanied by music and performed by minstrels, passed down orally and often only recorded much later. This also means that each poem is not the perspective of a single author, but rather a living piece of literature that underwent transformations and revisions by a series of people. Many Romances survive in multiple, varying versions, even across different languages. In my view, this makes them a remarkable window into how the Christian kingdoms viewed Muslims during their era, and they produce a very different picture than most would expect.

Their status as musical compositions meant for general consumption also makes them simply fun to read, which is an aspect that should not be discounted. Obscure, centuries old foreign literature is often impenetrable to the average reader, but I believe art from societies so different from our own is at its most potent when it can be enjoyed by non-experts. Romances have an infectious rhythm; their octosyllabic lines roll off the tongue; their narratives are full of dynamism and passion. This vivaciousness makes them an ideal candidate for revival in the modern era.

Needless to say, Romances Moriscos are not without their limitations. For example, most, if not all, of the poems are not actually as old as the time period they depict. Romances were first collected in the 15th century, but they often center around events hundreds of years earlier. It’s near impossible to know when any poem was first composed due to their being transmitted orally, but certain inaccuracies and anachronisms make it clear that many of the authors had considerable distance from the time period they speak of.

The other major limitation is that we can’t truly know how these poems were viewed by the average person during the time in which they were performed. Were they seen as general caballerismo literature where the race and religion of the protagonist didn’t much matter beyond adding a layer of exoticism? Were they seen as humorous in their depictions of Moors as sympathetic characters? Or were they viewed as a sincere, empathetic, and entertaining portrayal of an other? I think none of these are fully accurate. Despite their mystery and complexity, however, I find Romances Moriscos to be a valuable tool in understanding a perspective on religious interaction so distinct from any modern view.

I believe that in order to unravel monumentally complicated issues like conflict between world religions, one has to be open-minded and view the problem from as many angles as possible. Exposing yourself to a real, difficult, and composite perspective that is wildly different from your own is one of the most important ways you can broaden your horizons. To me, this is what Romances Moriscos have to offer the modern reader.

An idea like the Convivencia feels like an imposition of the present onto the past, an attempt to understand history through a modern lens. The very concept of “tolerance,” for example, didn’t exist until the Reformation. Romances Moriscos, on the other hand, feel more like meeting the past where it is. They are true popular literature of a time long gone, so steeped in its culture that they carry the full-bodied alienness of the medieval age. They are strange and foreign, but to me, that’s exactly what makes them worth reading.