CASE STUDY 5: OVERLAPPING AGENDAS: THE CAREER OF MAHOMET, ALAMINUS OF BORJA (1276–1302)

Summary

The consolidation of administrative offices and the formation of micro-dynasties within aljamas did not always have results as destructive and dramatic as the experience of Huesca under Abrahim Abengentor. In other cases, the role of Muslim officials was more ambiguous, and some worked quite effectively to protect the rights of the community and its members, particularly when its agenda coincided with their own. The career of Borja's alfaquinus of the last quarter of the thirteenth century fits this model well and makes a fitting counterpoint to the “bad” official of the previous case study.

Mahomet filius Alfaquini Ismahel de Porta was appointed to the posts which his father had held in the last month of Jaume I's reign, becoming the alfaquinus, alaminus, scriptor, and sabasala of the Muslims of Borja. As an aljama official Mahomet was entitled to tax franquitas, which was also extended to the members of his immediate family. Naturally, this generated opposition on the part of the community, which endeavored to bring the alfaquinus into the tax-paying population. Thus, in 1277 the aljama (presumably represented by its adelantati) succeeded in obtaining an order from Pere II to the effect that all of the town's Muslims should contribute to royal taxes; “office-holders” (“tenentes officia”), which could only have meant Mahomet, were specifically included. Thereafter the issue lay dormant for more than fifteen years until 1293, when the aljama complained again, provoking Jaume II to order the town's baiulus Sarracenorum to see that the alfaquinus, the exarici (doubtless the Templar vassals), and other franci contributed taxes for their realencho holdings.