WI: Moors in the New World

A couple days ago, a thread recently got bumped asking what if, instead of expelling them to North Africa as OTL, Spain sent its remaining Muslim population to the Spanish Netherlands and Franche-Comte. Several people pointed out various problems with this idea. But another variation occured to me-what if the Spanish sent the Moors to the Americas sometime around 1580-1600? England did something similar with its Calvinist minorities just a little later, so I think its non-ASB, if a bit implausible. But what would be the effects? A Muslim Arab nation in the Americas? Would it become a haven for escaped slaves (many of whom were Muslim)? What other effects might we see?
 
Not entierly implausible, England brought in Hindus to the area latter on, and if the Crown saw moving them as far away as possible as effectivly eliminating them (maybe even working them hard to profit the crown for being Muslims) from causing troubles in the Iberia its possible. Most likely it would be a small, uninfluencial nation. The mos tlikely destination would be two islands in the late 16th century.....maybea Islamic Hispaniola and Cuba? They could make a interesting influence on the Age of Piracy...and they could be a influencial factor on the slave revolts of the period.

The only problem I see would be that theSpanish would eventually want to 'deal' with them, especially if they cause trouble when New Spain becomes really profitable in their eyes.
 
Well, I see a major ideological problem with this. The spreading of God's word and Catholic faith to those poor and infantile indians that had not had the occasion to be gifted with it was the driving auto-justificative element of the spanish imperialism as the mission civilisatrice and white man's burden was for the french and british latter. So, helping to spread a rival faith throught the New world doesn't seem very coherent with that conception.

However, as I said in the thread about the renish moriscos, the spanish moriscos were technically catholics. If they were sent to the Americas I expect they would be under certain conditions, mainly I can think in two:

-They will remain catholics and they will be obligated to baptise their offspring.

-Geographical concentrations of moriscos would be avoided, trying to spread them as much as possible around the empire, in order to minize their ability to create local influence or troubles.

Of course, most of the moriscos continued being muslims in more or less veiled ways. So, under these conditions, they could influence the spanish-american cultuture making it even more original, but always through underground ways, never openly. Thus, I can't see a muslim majority living in a spanish colony.
Another question would revolve around their place in the colonial society, and their rights regarding properties, specially regarding the encomiendas. Would them be treated equally to other spaniards or would them used as semi-slave workforce like in many parts of the crown of Aragon? and regarding that, Would it affect only to the castilian moriscos or would it include also the aragonese? Would them constitute a differentiated casta?

We can also take into acount the examples from OTL. There were some moriscos, as jews, in the spanish Americas. Obviously it's a different situation because they were few and sometimes under covert identities to hide their origin. Many of them were women forced to go to the Americas due to the lack of women among the colonizers, often made slaves by "right of war" after the uprisings of the morerías or captured in the mediterranean raidings so usual in both shores. They obviously mixed quickly with the "old christian" lineages. We have also the case of Cristobal de Burgos, an openly morisco who went to Peru with Pizarro's expedition and reached a high post in the vicerroyal administration. Another "famous" case is the so-called Emir Cigala, I have forgot his true name, sorry. That emir Cigala, is said, went to the Americas with a false identity, get rich in Potosí and returned to Spain. Also Diego de Almagro was accused several times of being morisco, though we can't take it as a serious evidence. We don't know much about the less remarkable moriscos in the Americas, specially because they used castilian names so it's very difficult to identify them in the documentation. It seems that most of them didn't have many problems in the colony, probably because neither at the time nobody could diferenciate a morisco from a "old christian" if its not told. There is mudejar influence in early colonial architecture, by the way. But once again I don't know at what point it can be projected to the OP's question, since in this case they would be a recognizable and marked minority and not more or less sporadic cases.

Cheers.
 
It's definitely not ASB, it's just hard of thinking of how. I've looked into this before myself. There was a sort of...joking plan by a bishop in Valencia (I believe) to relocate all Moriscos to Newfoundland- which was my focus when I first looked into it :D That was about as plausible as the Jews to Madagascar, but that's for another thread.

The problem is, as people pointed out to me, the New World was meant to be founded as a Christian land. Obviously it wasn't at all, but the point was to keep other religions out. Spain could renege on this but that's a consequence you'll have to consider if they decide to move large Islamic or crypto-Islamic/recently converted populations to the New World.

If you can somehow leapfrog those problems, Moors in the New World would be very interesting. There was always that African prince- I forget where he was from.. Mali? Somewhere around there, who supposedly took off to the New World. If you have him influence native populations more, or if he sets on a journey with the intent of actually coming back, perhaps some Moors will end up going over that way.
 
This happened to a certain extent in OTL. Lots of Moriscos (and also converted Jews) moved to the colonies, especially the deserts in Northern Mexico (modern American Southwest).
 
The thing is that Spain did want to ensure that the new world was entirely christian. Any conversos, moriscos or whatever wouldn't really be escaping the inquisition if they were in the Americas, after all there was an inquisition in New Spain that was just as brutal as the European version.

However historically there was always the fact that there were always communities of resisting Indians, africans, and creoles that existed in areas where the Spanish colonialists were too weak to rule. And throughout spanish colonial history Spain's grasp has been very weak.

Perhaps a few conversos could play a similar role as Gaspar Yanga, except it they would also convert their fellow Maroons.
 
I find it implausible that you can have large Moorish immigration into the New World unless Spain decides to send them to a place only reserved from them, probably too far away from their other colonies.
 
I have to agree that the Spanish themselves would not have set up a colony for expelled Muslims; converting the heathen to Christianity was a large part of the Spanish project in the New World. But if they did get sent to the Spanish Netherlands, say, then I wonder if that could open the door for a Dutch-sponsored Muslim colony later on, after Dutch independence. After all, the Dutch were a lot less concerned about spreading Christianity, and probably wouldn't object too strongly to establishing a Muslim presence in the New World, under the right conditions. It would allow them to A) get the Muslims out of the Netherlands while B) annoying the Spanish and C) providing a new source of revenue for the Dutch government. (Because of course part of the conditions for granting a charter to the colony would have to be that some of the profits be sent back to the Netherlands.) I think it sounds plausible, at least.
 
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