Peter Nolasco - Background

Background

Between the eighth and the fifteenth centuries medieval Europe was in a state of ongoing war with the expanding Moslem world. Arabs successfully managed to subjugate North Africa, most of Spain, Southern France and Sicily. In the Christian lands, the Saracens plundered all that could be transported: animals, provisions, fabrics, precious metals, money and especially men, women and children who would be sold for a good price. Privateering and piracy on the Mediterranean sea were aggressive and violent means used to harass Christian enemies and, above all, to obtain large profits and easy gains.

For over six hundred years, these constant armed confrontations produced numerous war prisoners on both sides. Islam’s captives were reduced to the state of slaves since they were war booty. Such was the condition of countless Christians in the Southern European countries in the thirteenth century. In the lands of Visigothic Spain, both Christian and Moslem societies had become accustomed to the buying and selling of captives. In territories under Saracens rule captives were also used as medium of exchange in commercial transactions. So much so that tenth-century Andalusian merchants formed caravans to purchase slaves in Eastern Europe. In the thirteenth century, in addition to spices, slaves constituted one of the goods of the flourishing trade between Christian and Moslem ports.