Juan Rena and the Frontiers of Spanish Empire, 1500–1540

Jose M. Escribano-Páez

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2020
• eBook ISBN: 9781000073690
• Edition: 1
• Topic: History
• Subtopic: European History
• Index: History

This book explores the political construction of imperial frontiers during the reigns of Ferdinand the Catholic and Charles V in the Iberian Peninsula and the Mediterranean. Contrary to many studies on this topic, this book neither focuses on a specific frontier nor attempts to provide an overview of all the imperial frontiers. Instead, it focuses on a specific individual: Juan Rena (1480–1539). This Venetian clergyman spent 40 years serving the king in several capacities while travelling from the Maghreb to northern Spain, from the Pyrenees to the western fringes of the Ottoman Empire. By focusing on his activities, the book offers an account of the Spanish Empire's frontiers as a vibrant political space where a multiplicity of figures interacted to shape power relations from below. Furthermore, it describes how merchants, military officers, nobles, local elites and royal agents forged a specific political culture in the empire's liminal spaces. Through their negotiations and cooperation, but also through their competition and clashes, they created practices and norms in areas like cross-cultural diplomacy, the making of the social fabric, the definition of new jurisdictions, and the mobilization of resources for war.

1 Defining the Frontier

Juan Rena’s Network and Spanish Expansion Into the Maghreb

Qui descendunt mare in navibus,

facientes operationem in acquis multis,

ipsi viderunt opera Domini

et mirabilia eius in profundo.

(Ps. 107:23–24)

Introduction

On Friday, May 18, 1509, the Castilian army led by Cardinal Francisco de Cisneros conquered the city of Oran, on the Algerian coast. The first eyewitness account of the battle remarked that God had blessed the Christian victory, first by making a cross and a double rainbow appear in the sky, then by enveloping the enemy’s army in a black fog, while vultures circled overhead in anticipation. Better still, as the battle progressed towards the end of the day, God provided additional assistance by preventing the sun from setting.¹ God’s support aside, the other decisive factor in the Christian victory was the chaotic retreat of the Muslim troops, who were unable to get back into the city. Even so, the first published account of this event explained the Muslims’ inability to enter the city as an additional miracle.² Actually, this was indeed a real miracle, but to fully appreciate the reality behind it, we first need to examine the psalm quoted above. In so doing we shift our focus to the world of merchants, those who “went off to sea in ships and plied their trade on the deep waters” because “they saw the works of the Lord, and his wonders in the deep.”

The conquest of Oran was the most important episode in the Spanish expansion into the Maghreb. This expansion was a by-product of the Catholic Monarchs’ ambitions and a key piece of a broader crusading strategy to recover Jerusalem. In the practical sphere, the plan was an adaptation of medieval traditions that considered North Africa as a stepping stone to the Holy Land. On a more theoretical level, this plan was an outgrowth of imperial theories of the day that considered political legitimacy as deriving from the fulfilment of religious obligations, such as the crusade.³ Given the religious motivation behind these plans, it comes as no surprise that many believed that God’s support played a decisive role in the battle for Oran. Nevertheless, as we will see, the groundwork for the conquest of the city was laid long before the Castilian army came on the scene. Prior to the Castilian attack on the city, a series of mediators had been acting there to facilitate discussions between the Spanish authorities and the various peoples of the Maghreb. One of them, Juan Rena, negotiated for both—the Catholic Monarchs as well as Maghrebi officials and dignitaries—during his time in the Maghreb. Using Rena as a starting point, we can reconstruct the complex network of merchants who monopolized these political mediations and examine the impact their activities had on shaping the frontier society resulting from the Spanish expansion into the Maghreb.

Through this focus on Rena and his network, this chapter offers a corrective to earlier interpretations of Spanish expansionism in the Maghreb. Historians have explained the Spanish conquests in this region as a result of an obvious military superiority.⁴ No doubt, the Spanish wielded unprecedented military power in the region, but the important role of mediators like Rena shows the extent to which the Spanish authorities were forced to negotiate with local actors. Hence, this chapter will show that, instead of a simple conquest through the force of arms, the Spanish expansion into the Maghreb melded military force, diplomacy from below, and the forging of alliances with local figures. This emphasis on the importance of negotiation in this specific instance of expansionism makes it possible to connect it with current, more nuanced understandings of European expansion that reassess the notion that European ascendancy was the result mainly of superior military efficacy.⁵ In addition, by focusing on Rena and his network, this chapter will shed new light on the role of mediators in the process of European expansion. Recent studies have shown that those who acted as go-betweens were in fact key figures in the process of European expansion, especially in the Americas.⁶ In this new line of inquiry, go-betweens have been depicted as individuals who facilitate encounters between the inhabitants of two different worlds and in doing so are able to influence the outcome of meetings and negotiations and to exploit their position in this triadic relationship for their own benefit.⁷ Within the field of Mediterranean studies there is a growing effort to construct a similar portrait of go-betweens, especially in studies on the complex diplomatic relations between the rival Christian and Muslim polities and more recently on the shaping of bilingual administrations.⁸ In both cases, the descriptions of these actors and their activities focus on explaining how they profited from bridging the gaps separating vastly different cultures. Sanjay Subrahmanyam has offered a very interesting counterpoint by underlining the many difficulties that go-betweens faced.⁹ Rena and the rest of the characters appearing in this chapter illustrate how profitable and dangerous mediating could be. However, by analyzing their activities, I aim to move beyond the debate about their capacity to profit from their mediations, in order to emphasize their role in establishing practices that facilitated cross-cultural interactions on the frontiers of empire. Hence, in this chapter I first describe the diplomatic negotiations surrounding Spanish expansion on the Maghrebi coast. I go on to analyze the activities of Rena and other mediators like him who carried out these negotiations. Finally, I aim to show that their activity was of paramount importance because they helped to shape this new imperial frontier.

A Negotiated Expansion

In the early days of 1492, after years of fierce resistance against the Castilian army, the Nasrid kingdom of Granada surrendered.¹⁰ This episode was the prelude to the worldwide expansion of the Spanish Empire. Without a doubt, the most consequential chapter in this history was the conquest of America, but there was another, equally important yet lesser-known chapter: the Maghreb.¹¹ Between the final years of the fifteenth century and the opening decades of the sixteenth, various Spanish authorities, noblemen, and clerics turned their attention to this region and began to formulate plans to conquer it. Rather than imposing their rule over a vast territory, they aimed at controlling the main ports on the Maghrebi coast in order to protect Spanish territories from corsair raids as well as to expand Spanish control over the Mediterranean. The presidios that were established following the annexation of different coastal enclaves were also crucial in securing maritime connections between the Iberian and the Italian peninsulas. In the end, the Spanish did not make spectacular gains; nonetheless, this can be understood as a key episode in the history of Spanish expansion. In fact, the men who organized these early efforts to push out the imperial frontiers developed and refined some successful formulas that later proved to be effective in conquering other regions. One of these formulas was the combined use of armed coercion and diplomatic negotiation. Far from being an exception, the Maghreb was a laboratory where a widespread and common practice, the mixture of organized violence and negotiation, was adapted to the specific characteristics of the region.

Between 1497 (the conquest of Melilla) and the summer of 1510 (the conquest of Tripoli), several Maghrebi enclaves were incorporated into the domains of the Spanish Empire in one way or another. After the first tentative attempts to capture some minor coastal towns failed, the Catholic Monarchs tried a new strategy, sending a seigniorial army to conquer Melilla in 1497. Their next important conquest did not come until the summer of 1505, when they took Mers el-Kébir (“the Great Harbor” in Arabic), on the Algerian coast. Three years later a naval expedition failed to capture Honaine, the second most important port in the kingdom of Tlemcen. Despite this failure, the following year an army led by Cardinal Cisneros took Oran, the main coastal city in Tlemcen. As a consequence of this victory, many of the coastal towns and villages began to voluntarily surrender to the Spanish authorities. In 1510, Pedro Navarro (the captain general of the Spanish army in Africa) took Béjaïa, a port city in Algeria’s Kabylie region. Shortly after, the ruling elite of Algiers signed a pledge of vassalage to King Ferdinand the Catholic. That same summer, Navarro continued his campaign towards the east and captured Tripoli. However, a failed expedition against the Island of Djerba put a...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Series
• Title
• Copyright
• Dedication
• Contents
• List of Figures
• Acknowledgments
• List of Abbreviations
• Introduction
• 1 Defining the Frontier: Juan Rena’s Network and Spanish Expansion Into the Maghreb
• 2 The Making of a Frontier: Noble Authority and Jurisdictional Pluralism Between Southern Iberia and the Maghreb
• 3 Political Incorporation From Below: Juan Rena and the Integration of Navarre Into the Spanish Empire
• 4 Constructing a Maritime Frontier: Politics and Sea Power in the Mediterranean World During the Age of Charles V
• Conclusion
• Index