Conquerors, Brides, and Concubines. Simon Barton

Mariem, who left her husband in the village of Alasquer and moved to the city of Valencia in the company of another Muslim man, Cutaydal, some time prior to 1491, and was later tricked into working in the brothel of the morería (Muslim quarter) of Valencia, was probably not untypical.⁸⁴

      In reality, however, the boundaries between prostitution and concubinage were by no means clear-cut, and in the later medieval period there is evidence of former prostitutes entering into what have euphemistically been described as “domestic service contracts” with Christian men. The Christian Sancha Bolea, a resident of Daroca, who in her own words “became by chance a wayward woman, because a man there, in Zaragoza, took my maidenhood and dishonoured me, and I was on the verge of going to the brothels,” entered into such a contract with another Christian, Juan de Madrid, in 1460. Sancha’s predicament and motivation were clearly laid bare as she declared:

      In order to have some goods and not end up in the brothels, I have decided to come and live with you and serve you of my own free will. And [thus] I begged and asked you to take me into your house as housekeeper or servant, to stay with you and sleep with you, and to do with my body as you wish.⁸⁵

      In return for this undertaking, Juan de Madrid agreed to pay Sancha the sum of 200 sueldos. It is likely that for numerous marginalized, impoverished Muslim women similar arrangements such as these offered them a welcome, if often temporary, sense of security.⁸⁶