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452 Rubén González Cuerva

in this case we witness a courtly encounter . Nevertheless, Rothman’s
15
argument that «all inter-imperial communication is mediated» is also
16
valid in this encounter between Charles V and Mulay Hassan. The two
monarchs spoke through interpreters and their meeting was preceded
by the negotiations of a group of go-betweens from Genoa and
Granada. The Genoese, both as merchants and renegades, were the
main European community in Tunis since the thirteenth century and
benefitted from the profitable trade conditions set by the Hafsid
dynasty . The preliminary contacts between Mulay Hasan and the
17
emperor appear to have been made through a Genoese renegade who
is named in the sources as “Chimea” or “Ximaa” and was sent to the
imperial court in November 1534 to beg for military support . Another
18
Genoese, Arnolfo Camughi, perhaps a merchant or even a captain of
Mulay Hassan’s Christian guard, sought help from the Knights of St
John in Malta and from the imperial Viceroy of Sicily . A third
19
Genoese, the merchant Luigi Presenda, equally experienced in
Maghrebian affairs, continued the contacts on behalf of Charles V.
Presenda was given written instructions by the emperor, and letters
for Mulay Hassan and his allies, but was not given the official title of
ambassador to minimise the risk to the emperor’s reputation.
Presenda negotiated with Mulay Hassan and drafted the conditions of
the imperial support, but his ambiguous status made him looking
more like an enemy spy than an official diplomat . His mission ended
20

15 N. Planas, Diplomacy from Below or Cross-Confessional Loyalty? The “Christians
of Algiers” between the Lord of Kuko and the King of Spain in the Early 1600s, «Journal
of Early Modern History», 19:2-3 (2015), pp. 153-173.
16 E.N. Rothman, Afterword: Intermediaries, Mediation, and Cross-Confessional
Diplomacy in the Early Modern Mediterranean, «Journal of Early Modern History», 19:2-
3 (2015), p. 249.
17 E. Marengo, Genova e Tunisi, 1388-1515, Tipografia Artigianelli di S. Giuseppe,
Roma, 1901; R. Salicrú Lluch, La diplomacia y las embajadas como expresión de los
contactos interculturales entre cristianos y musulmanes en el Mediterráneo Occidental
durante la Baja Edad Media, «Estudios de Historia de España», 9 (2007), pp. 77-106.
18 L. del Mármol Carvajal, Libro tercero, y segvndo volvmen de la primera parte de la
descripción general de Affrica, con todos los sucessos de guerra, y cosas memorables…,
René Rabut, Granada, 1573, p. 247v; S. Boubaker, L'empereur Charles Quint et le roi
Mawlay al-Hasan (1520-1535), in S. Boubaker, C. Ilham Álvarez Dopico (eds.),
Empreintes espagnoles dans l'histoire tunisienne, Trea, Gijón, 2011, pp. 20-21.
19 J. A. de Funes, Coronica de la ilustrissima milicia cit., p. 134; Anfrano Camughi to
the Viceroy of Sicily, Tripoli, 24 December 1534, Ags, E, 462, in É. De La Primaudaie,
Documents inédits sur l’occupation espagnole en Afrique (1506-1594), A. Jourdan, Alger,
1875, p. 92; S. Boubaker, L'empereur Charles Quint cit., pp. 20, 33, 47-48, 50.
20 Memorias de Luis de Presenda, Madrid, 7 November 1534, Ags, E, 462, in É. De
La Primaudaie, Documents inédits cit., pp. 87-92; Instructions by Charles V, Madrid, 14
November 1534, in P. de Sandoval, Historia de la vida y hechos del emperador Carlos V,
en casa de Bartholome Paris, Pamplona, 1614, pp. 195-201; Charles V to Mulay Hassan,

Mediterranea - ricerche storiche - Anno XVII - Agosto 2020
ISSN 1824-3010 (stampa) ISSN 1828-230X (online)