ARTS OF INTIMACY

'Christians, Jews, and Muslims in the Making of Castilian Culture'. Toledo, or Tulaytula as it was during the Islamic years, is at the centre of medieval Castilian culture, and this book is the result of profound research into the way in which the city's three constituent religions, Christianity, Judaism and Islam, collaborated in creating the celebrated Castilian culture with its spectacular literary and artistic achievements. The authors start their story in 1492 at the end of that Golden Age, when Columbus was setting off for the New World at the same time as Ferdinand and Isabella, the monarchs of Castile, defeated the kingdom of Granada, Spain's last Islamic territory, and also expelled the Jews living in the kingdom of Castile. The new nation-state of Spain would henceforward initiate the Inquisition in a savage assertion of Christian supremacy. 400 years earlier, the Christian armies of Leon and Castile had captured Toledo and started a period of extraordinary cultural diversity. Toledo had been the Visigoth capital before the Umayyad conquest, and in Tulaytula the Castilians encountered a city in which social relations were negotiated in a much less confrontational way than in the north, and in which courtly life and kingly virtue were already powerfully expressed through the arts of palaces, gardens, sciences, song and learning. The city had incorporated cultural difference into its very structure through a system of taxation. Woven into the text of the book are sections on key milestones, including the role of the monastery of Cardena in creating the cult of The Cid, the transformation of the mosque of Bab-al-Mardum by the Knights of St John, the role of the Almoravids, who promoted jihad against the Christian kingdoms, the monastery of Las Huelgas, decorated with Islamic motifs yet placed under the protection of the Pope. A 13th century manuscript shows a Christian consulting a Muslim text during a game of chess. Sumptuous photography of the Alhambra Palace in Granada showcases Muslim art while the synagogue of Samuel Halevi in Toledo reveals the delicate stratigraphy of Jewish ornament. 395pp, softback, illustrated throughout with colour photos and facsimiles.