The Infamous Year: 1492

2022-08-31

Jacob Perkins

This blog post is the first of a series of posts, one per chapter, inspired by

One Nation, Under Gods: A New American History⁠

by Peter Manseau (a recent find at the Seminary Co-op in Hyde Park). This is the main text I refer to in this article.

“Granada, last refuge from a tiring life. Eternal garden, shows remnants of paradise that still remain, in only very few privileged places on earth.” -Chateaubriand

The French writer Chateaubriand captured the essential ‘location’ relative to the wider axes of regional religiopolitics of Granada and her crowning citadel-palace (pictured in the cover photo at the top of this page), the Alhambra. American schoolchildren are often taught a rhyme to help them remember that it was the year 1492 when Cristóbal Colón (Christopher Columbus) set sail from Palos de la Frontera in Spain. The rhyme goes: “In the year 1492, Christopher Columbus sailed the ocean blue...” The

full poem⁠

goes on to tell the rest of the story as usual, but this narrative conveniently forgets a few elements.

A few years ago on Columbus Day, being the snarky scholar I am, I added a line so the poem reads,

“In the year 1492, Christopher Columbus sailed the ocean blue

As he went about his way, he found a many men to slay

Without a thought of what to do, Columbus killed and enslaved all he came to

A ‘Christian’ zealot many say, it is with great dread I say “Happy Columbus Day!”

All jest aside, it is critically important to correct such incomplete and often outright incorrect narratives, written by the imperialist victors with the purpose of praising and bringing glory to...well...the imperialist victors (and their God(s))!

In his first chapter (”A Meeting of the Gods”), Peter Manseau provides some examples of pre-Colón arrivals to the Americas. One common example is that Norse Vikings met indigenous Canadians as early as the tenth century - a story many Americans have become familiar with as legend. He also reveals to us other possible explorers who ‘discovered’ the Americas, including Chinese explorers who sailed across the Pacific, rather than the Atlantic, their map labeling what must be the American continents Fusang. The story that piqued my interest, however, was of Muslim explorers from North Africa!

So the story is this: in the eleventh century, (the Christian) Roger II of Sicily commissioned (the Muslim) Abu Abdallah Muhammad Ibn Muhammad Ibn Abdallah Ibn Idrisi (henceforth referred to as Idrisi) on a mapmaking mission Westward. While not entirely clear, Idrisi’s writing seems to indicate that people with red-tinted skin, little body hair, and beautiful women captured his expedition team on an island across the “Gloomy Sea.” Cartographer Ahmed Muhiddin Piri also documented South America’s location relative to the West coast of Africa, perhaps a direct result of Idrisi’s discovery.

These stories of ‘discovery’ clearly demonstrate that Cristóbal Colón did not discover anything, but stumbled across an already inhabited area and, being unsuccessful in his search for gold, took land and captives to lessen the disappointment of his Spanish Catholic patrons, Ferdinand and Isabella.

Ah yes, Ferdinand and Isabella. This brings us back to the stunning Alhambra, palace without compare, and last remaining monument of the vast Islamic empire that was Al-Andalus. In the fateful year of 1492, this final remnant of Al-Andalus fell to Catholic armies as Muhammad XII, or Boabdil, the last of the Nasr Granadan kings, fled his beloved Iberian homeland to exile in North Africa. Shortly after, on the very same day that Christopher Columbus set sail for the ocean blue, Ferdinand and Isabella signed the Alhambra Decree, an edict of expulsion of all practicing Jews from Spain. The expulsion of Muslims from Spain was a longer process, but most practicing Muslims had already fled for the southern shore of the Strait of Gibraltar.

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