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Contro ogni previsione: uno scontro navale nel Mediterraneo moderno... 537

Moriscos (Muslim converts to Christianity from the Iberian Penin-
sula) living in Istanbul could be documented in the 1620s. In 1621,
42
as an annex to a report Haga sent to his government, a letter written
in Spanish and signed by Moriscos living in Istanbul was included.
Among the signatories, a certain «Mehmed de Abalos» was also pre-
sent, and Krstic has manifested that Mehmed de Ávalos presented
́
himself as «a captain of the Ottoman fleet» . It has been argued that
43
this Mehmed de Ávalos was very much likely to be a certain Antonio
de Ávalos, a Morisco elite who emigrated from Spain in 1610 and set-
tled in Istanbul, becoming a captain in the Ottoman naval establish-
ment . Given the two-decade-gap between this Antontio (Mehmed de
44
Ávalos) who started his new career in the Ottoman navy in 1610’s and
the petardier Antonio one comes across in Cafer Pasha’s preparations
in 1633, however, it is a meagre possibility that these two Antonios
could be the same person. In any case, it is safer to assume that they
were at least related by blood and contributed to the Ottoman mari-
time activities. Hence, it can be deduced that the Moriscos indeed
played a part in the Ottoman naval organisation and facilitated the
transfer of nautical knowledge from Western Europe to the Ottoman
navy with regard both to navigation and weaponry.
Given the vicissitudinous nature of early modern politics, loyalties,
or faith, a figure like Antonio de Ávalos was not exceptional. A better-
known example, for instance, would be Captain İbrahim b. Ahmad, or
al-Ribash as he was known in Spanish. Al-Ribash had also spent some
of his life in Sevilla where he became acquainted with maritime affairs,
becoming a master gunner before the expulsion of the Moriscos from
Spain and before, thus, moving to Tunis in 1609. While serving the Tu-
nisian corsairs, al-Ribash decided to pen down a treatise on firearms,
or «a manual of gunnery similar to contemporary Spanish ones». As his
command of written Arabic was not strong, he produced his Manual in
Spanish between 1630 and 1632. And when he found a fellow Morisco
trustworthy enough in Arabic to confide his work for translation in
1638, the resulting translation included information and illustration

42 Wiesner-Hanks suggested that some three hundred thousand Moriscos were
ordered to depart from Spain between 1609 and 1614, M. Wiesner-Hanks, Early
modern Europe, 1450-1789, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 2013, p. 111.
43 T. Krstic, The Elusive Intermediaries: Moriscos in Ottoman and Western Euro-
pean Diplomatic Sources from Constantinople, 1560s-1630s, «Journal of Early Mod-
ern History», 19, (2015), pp. 129-151, on pages 132, 142-143.
44 M.M.F. Chaves and R.P. García, The Perpetuation of the Morisco Community
of Granada, in J.A.R.S. Tavim, M.F.L. de Barros and L.L. Mucznik (edited by), In
the Iberian Peninsula and Beyond: A History of Jews and Muslims (15 th -17 th Centu-
ries), vol. 1, Cambridge Scholars Publishing, Newcastle, 2015, p. 86-116, on pages
101-102. I must thank the reviewers for this specific reference.

Mediterranea - ricerche storiche - Anno XX - Dicembre 2023
ISSN 1824-3010 (stampa) ISSN 1828-230X (online)