| Soltanatu di Aluezát ولاية سلطنة تينوختيتلان Wilayah Tenochtitlan | |||||
| Colony State | |||||
| |||||
| Capital | Tenochtitlan | ||||
| Languages | Mozarabic, Spanish, Arabic, Nahautl and other Mesoamerican languages | ||||
| Religion | Islam | ||||
| Government | Colonial/Sultanate | ||||
| - | ?? | Saladin | |||
| - | ?? | Amir | |||
| Jibril | |||||
| Historical era | Age of Exploration | ||||
| - | Established | Enter start year | |||
| - | Disestablished | Enter end year | |||
| Currency | Gold Dinars | ||||
The Sultanate of Tenochtitlan (Spanish: Sultanato de Tenochtitlan, Mozarabic: Soltanatu di Aluezát, Arabic: سلطنة تينوختيتلان Sultanat Tinukhtytlan) also known as Al-Wasat (Arabic: حزب الوسط) in many historical documents, was a Muslim kingdom and a colony state of the Andalusian Empire based on where modern-day Mexico City is based. It also covered the areas of Lake Texcoco in the Valley of Mexico near the Isthmus between Central and South America. The sultanate was found by Andalusian conquistadors as well Spanish-Mexican and native Mesoamerican converts to Islam that fought against the Spanish conquistadors and against their own Catholic counterparts for control of Mexico City and Tenochtitlan. This particular sultanate was the only Muslim kingdom in Latin America.
Much like the Spaniards, the Moors brought with them their culture and their influence, building many large forts and mosques in Central Mexico. It is of this reason that Central Mexico is often known as the "Moorish Region" or "Little Andalusia".
History[]
Governor's Conversion to Islam[]
As a result of Spain's various wars with Andalusia, Sultan Fajád II of Andalusia began funding expedition and competing with Spain and Portugal. Sultan Fajád II sent missionaries to Central America, who promised the various Mesoamerican chiefs a victory against the Spanish conquistadors if they converted to Islam.
A colonial governor from Tenochtitlan by the recorded name of José Cruz y Méndez had close ties with many Spanish soldiers descended from Reconquista veterans and those of Morisco women. Many of his servants were Morisco women who told him about the religion of Islam and even showed him Arabic texts in secret; the guy already had in the process of staging a rebellion against the Spanish Crown, being completely disgusted by their actions.
At the same time, Moorish missionaries from Al-Andalus and North Africa arrived, surprised to find the presence of Morisco women, beginning initial contact. ln the city of Tenochtitlan at the site of the ancient temples, José and his son Miguel fell sick until he said, "Allahu-akbar", a phrase taught to him by his Morisco servants and was healed. He was approached by a wondering Moorish missionary, by the name of Abu Nuwa who correctly taught him Islam, and thus, converted him. The governer changed his name to Saladín Cruz, and further preached Islam to the population. He also married one of his Morisco servants, a woman by the name of María, preaching Islam to her. She took the Arabic name Amira (Arabic: أميرة).
War Against Spain & Mamluk Alliance[]
Saladín's preaching of Islam alarmed Spanish soldiers in the region; having thought that they'd seen the last of the Moors after not only defeating them at first, but after the Catholic monarchs signed treaties with King Muhammad ibn Umayyah and his cousin Aben Aboo not to attack one another. Saladín had them executed before they could report to the Spanish Crown. Saladín now knew he could no longer wait, and with aid from the Moorish conquistador Muhammad Abu Walid, Sultan Saladín built an army consisting of a mix of Moorish conquistadors, and native Mesoamerican warriors and Spanish-Mexicans who converted to Islam. Catholic priests fled the Tenochtitlan region to Mexico City, where they reported the new Muslim converts. The Viceroyality of New Spain stationed in Mexico City sent soldiers to oust Saladín out of power, this attempted military coup failed as they were decisively defeated by Moorish conquistadors. Saladín issued a declaration of sovereignty of the Tenochtitlan region and sent militias to hunt down Spanish viceroys in Tenochtitlan. He later sealed his victory when he conquered most of Mexico City from Spanish armies. As a result, the new Moors of Mexico crowned Saladin as their king, where Spanish-speaking Muslims referred to him as Sultano Saladín Cruz de Tenochtitlan. He converted a large Catholic church in Mexico City, where he converted many practicing Catholics to Islam, and made efforts to rid Mexico of Catholicism.
After conquering Mexico City, Sultan Saladín made the journey and pilgrimage to Mecca and recorded his visit in the Anales de Saladíno, he traveled via Andalusian and Moroccan ships. He also made other visits such as Damascus, Cairo and Mount Lebanon. Muslim historians regard the sultan's visit to Mecca and establishment of a sultanate from such a tightly-held Spanish Catholic territory as "one of the greatest achievements and miracles from the Muslim World". The Mamluk sultans of Cairo were so impressed by Saladino's ability to stand and form a sultanate when all odds were against him, that the sultans of Cairo offered him a palace of his own and sent him gifts of gold, silver, crops and woman on his way back to Mexico. A year later, Sultan Cruz re-visited Egypt and decided to open up an alliance with the Mamluks of Cairo.
Cruz Dynasty[]
Saladín and his queen consort Amíra bore a son and named him Amír, to be the future sultan of Tenochtitlan. Saladín's first wife converted to Islam with the name Rama or Ráma, and her son, Saladín's first and step-son Miguel, took the name Salim or Salím. Although Saladín managed to carve out the borders of his kingdom, he failed to regulate an economy for it, despite having a trade relation with the Mamluk Sultanate of Egypt. Out of jealousy for his half-brother Amír, Salím rebelled and went forward to spread the Moorish rule and Islamic faith on his own. Sultan Saladín ordered soldiers to aid Salím, who reached the ancient city of Teotihuacan. Eventually, Salím and his band of Moorish soldiers would establish their state, with Salím proclaiming himself the Sultan of Teotihuacan. Salím sent messages to both Saladín and Fajád II in Andalusia. Saladín had stated that he would accept whatever Fajád II would say. The sultan of Al-Andalus approved for Salím to create an Andalusian Moorish colony state independent of the Tenochtitlan Sultanate. Moorish soldiers sent by both Sultan Fajád II and Sultan Saladín to aid Sultan Salím's armies fight destroy both Spanish or Mesoamerican forces that dared to fight him.
Finally convinced that his father Sultan Saladín actually cared about him, Salím allowed Teotihuacan to become administered by Saladín, on the condition that Salím continued to be rule as a sultan. The Moorish conquistador Abd-al-Qadir aided Salím in conquering the coasts of Mexico, as well as the Isthmus of Panama, to give the Moors coastal territory.
Fajád II of Al-Andalus then declared the formation of the Wilayah of New Al-Andalus, and appointed Saladín as the Wali of New Al-Andalus, a title and position very similar in function and authority to a Viceroy of New Spain. However, Saladín wanted the rank and position to go to Salím, feeling he deserved it. He signed a decree predetermining Salím as the next Wali, while Salím's half-brother was to be the succeeding sultan. Saladín adopted the title Wali-Sultan, to distinguish it from a lower-ranking sultans.
Great Mosque of Tenochtitlan, also known as the Great Mosque of Mexico City, built under the ruler of Sultan Jamalul and completed under Sultan Tapayaxi's reign
However, Salím died from small pox, introduced by the Spaniards. This left Amír to be both the Wali and Sultan of Tenochtitlan, therefore keeping the title of Wali Sultan. Meanwhile, he had his vizier, Abdul-Zamad become the next Sultan of Teotihuacan.
It was Sultan Amír who had to stabilize the economies of the new sultanate. Cruz introduced the new silver fils, since Central America was abundant in silver. Jamalul, the third sultan of the Cruz Dynasty handled social matters within the state. Jamalul's grandfather Saladín was successful in recovering the Arabic language of the Moriscos (which the Spanish worked to eliminate after the Reconquista), and thought his son to speak it along with Spanish. It is Jamalul who spread the Arabic language, and eventually required its use among the middle and lower classes. Many of the native Nahuatl Christians were never taught Arabic except for few who worked in the upper classes, mostly as servants. Jamalul married a native Nahuatl, and never converted her to Islam, but their son Tapayaxi ibn Saladin was raised Muslim. Jamalul also made Nahuatl a co-official language within the sultanate and renamed Tenochtitlan to Yathrib, the historical name of the city of Medina in Saudi Arabia. In addition, Jamalul hired writers to create a system of writing the native Mesoamerican languages in the Arabic and Almajiado scripts. As the latter sultan,
Entrances to the Great Mosque of Teotihuacan
Tapayaxi had a much decisive and harsh approach in the kingdom and changed his last name to "al-Barrakah", although his reign as sultan was far from a miracle. Sultan Tapayaxi wanted to "undo" and "reverse" the Reconquista. He tried to eliminate the Spanish and Latin influence in par to how Spain had worked to eliminate all Arabic from the Christianized Moriscos. He forced many to Nahuatl people to convert to Islam and attend mosque prayers every single day. He also destroyed many Catholic churches in Mexico City, and renamed it Alwasat which literally means "middle" in Arabic (الأوسط). Sultan Tapayaxa responded to the constant Spanish attacks against Mamluk merchant ships by destroying and raiding Spanish forts, attacking innocent territory outside the sultanate in Spanish-controlled Mexico. He also sent warships to attack innocent Spanish merchant ships. He had also planned to take the Yucatan Peninsula and Cuba from Spain but his son, Huitztecol rebelled against him and overthrew him from the throne to become the sultan. He adopted the name Al-Mansur. Al-Mansur married a Mexican mestizo from what is now Texas. Huitztecol ibn Mansur tried to fix the mess that Tapayaxa had, and provided refugee homes for Christians and allowed them to practice their religion freely. Sultan Huitztecol talked to Spanish Viceroys in New Spain-controlled Mexico to work out a peace negotiation which was signed and ratified in Madrid which ended hostilities between the Spanish Empire and the Tenochtitlan Sultanate.
The Sultans of Andalusia did not attempt to send armies to punish Huitztecol, instead, Sultan Jamal of Al-Andalus wanted to wait and see what would become of the peace-treaty.
Dissolution and Mexican Cession[]
When the Mexican Revolution started, Mohamad ibn Mansur had become the sultan. He nearly battled with Mexican revolutionary forces led by Miguel Hidalgo for control of Mexico City. However, Mansur and Hidalgo noticed that they shared a mutual hate for the Spaniards. The sultan moved the state's capital back to Yathrib. A brief Spaniard victory in Mexico City resulted in the Great Mosque of Alwasat being converted to a Catholic church and a cross was placed on the dome. Hidalgo's armies managed to push the Spaniards and their collaborators into Tenochtitlan once more where they were attacked by Mansur's armies. Mansur later met with Miguel Hidalgo in Mexico City to work out a peace agreement between the two. Mansur had no problem integrating his realm as part of a sovereign Mexican state free of Spanish rule. He was minorly worried about another Reconquista like treatment. However, religion was the last of Hidalgo's concern, despite being a Roman Catholic priest. Therefore, Mansur agreed to help the revolutionaries defeat Spain and cede his sultanate to the new nation that would become Mexico as long as Tenochtitlan's Muslim autonomy remained, and Mexico City's Muslims not be forced to convert to Roman Catholicism and that the Mosque of Alwasat be reverted back to a mosque. Hidalgo accepted the sultan's conditions; Mansur ceded Tenochtitlan to the new country of Mexico and became its state governor and many of Mexico City's Muslims migrated to Tenochtitlan, even though Hidalgo promised that he not force-convert them to Catholicism. Hidalgo allowed the church to be reverted back to a mosque as proof of the new friendship between him and Sultan Mansur.
Culture[]
Religion[]
Islam was the state religion, and was practiced by 95% of Tenochtitlan's population, the Sunni section of Islam. After Saladín and the Moors converted he and his family to Islam, he and his descendants worked alongside Moorish missionaries to convert most of the recognizable population to Islam. The sultanate's population contained a mix of native Mesoamericans, Spanish Mestizos, (whites) and Moors. Eventually, as Moorish migration to the sultanate continued, the settlers would marry with the locals and gradually become the majority of the population. The native "indios", or Indians remained Roman Catholics since they never encountered Islam. It is however, under the reign of Sultan Jamalul and Sultan Tapayaxi that many Nahuas and other natives encountered Islam and adopted it. Even those who did not convert to Islam adopted Islamic practices, such as the non-consumption of pork, fasting, zakat (charitable works), and adopting Moorish clothing, thus resembling the Catholicism practiced by the Moriscos during the Reconquista in the Iberian Peninsula. The natives who did convert followed a form of Folk Islam as they or their ancestors did Folk Catholicism, as Animism and ancient practices remained predominant within the native populations and often held practices and rites that the other Sunni Muslims saw as "shirk".
Language[]
Spanish was the language in the sultanate amid its early days, as it was in the entire Mexican mainland. During Spain's Reconquista period, the Spanish Crown had worked to eliminate the Arabic language in the kingdom and force all Moriscos to adopt to the Christian Spanish and abandon Arabic. Thanks to the Moorish expeditions, conquest as well as Saladin Cruz's Morisco servants who still remembered much Arabic, it was widely spoken among the Cruz family. During the reign of Jamalul Cruz, the Arabic language became spoken among the entire upper classes where it remained their language. While the Catholics were actually never taught Arabic at first, with the exception of few servants to the upper class Muslim converts, the Catholics kept their faith but would begin adopting Moorish culture, including speaking Arabic. Many of the clergy began to speak Arabic in their masses, and build churches with Moorish influence. Thus, the Catholicism practiced in Central Mexico under Sultan Jamalaul's reign beared striking identical resemblances to the Catholicism that the Moriscos practiced after being forcefully converted during the Reconquista. Jamalul Cruz also reintroduced the Aljamiado script, the Arabic script used to the write the Spanish language that was banned by the Spanish Crown during the post-Reconquista era. Cruz also worked with Nahuatl Muslim converts to write the Nahuatl in the Aljamiado script, in case they be Muslim. Cruz also made Nahuatl an official language in the state. During Sultan Tapayaxa's rule, the Spanish language faced the endangerment of elimination as he tried to eliminate all Spanish and/or Christianity in the sultanate until his son Huitztecol ibn Mansur overthrew him and became the sultan.
Economy[]
The early years of the sultanate was marked by a barter-trade system. The staple crops of the region included maize (corn), chili, oregano, squash and rice which was brought over by the Europeans. Sultan Saladino Cruz also decided to set up an economic trade with the Mamluk Sultanate in Egypt, decided that there needed to be a currency. The silver fils was a currency introduced by prince and latter sultan Amir Cruz. Three types of currencies were used in the sultanate, the fils which was the main unit of currency used for trade with the Mamluks and the people of Tenochtitlan and the ptas, which remained in de facto use after the Spanish lost their hold of southern Mexico. The Mamluks exported olives, wheat and barley to Tenochtitlan who in turn, exported indigenous spices. One problem that the Mamluks ran into was the constant attack by Spanish naval blockades. Sultan Tapayaxa al-Barrakah in turn, sent armed ships to attack innocent Spanish merchant ships, which Spain led an unsuccessful response to.