Historical person
Miguel de Luna
c. 1550–1615
Miguel de Luna was a Granadan Morisco physician, Arabic interpreter and translator who worked for the Spanish crown during the reigns of Philip II and Philip III. In 1592 he published what he claimed was a translation of an ancient Arabic chronicle of the conquest of Spain. The work recast the Muslim invaders as honourable and tolerant and developed an alternative version of Roderic’s fall, but its supposed source is now recognised as Luna’s own fabrication.
Luna is also widely associated with Alonso del Castillo and the production or interpretation of the Lead Books of Sacromonte, texts that attempted to reconcile Arabic language and culture with an ancient Christian history for Granada. His writings illuminate the intellectual strategies available to Moriscos facing surveillance, forced assimilation and eventual expulsion, while also raising difficult questions about forgery, translation and historical authorship.
Non Fiction
Non Fiction featuring Miguel de Luna (2 books)
Biographies, histories and other non-fiction are listed separately from the historical novels above.
