664 Sicily
Vespers: A History of the Mediterranean World in the Later
Thirteenth Century (Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press, 1958); Helene Wieruszowski, Politics and Culture
in Medieval Spain and Italy(Roma: Edizioni di storia e let-
teratura, 1971).
Sicily Medieval Sicily was a large island in the central
Mediterranean, off the southern coast of ITA LY. It was an
important part of the BYZANTINEEMPIREin the seventh
century. During the revolt in 826, the Byzantine governor,
who was rebelling against the emperor, asked the AGH-
LABIDSof North Africa for help. This paved the way for an
army of volunteers, led by a Malikite scholar from AL-
QAYRAWAN, to begin a slow and difficult conquest. He
landed in 827 and finally took Palermo in 831; Syracuse
fell in 878. Much of the Greek population fled and was
replaced by Muslim settlers from North Africa; many
inhabitants stayed and the population became genuinely
mixed. There was considerable Arabization in terms of
language and culture. In 909 Sicily fell under the control
of the FATIMIDSand remained a frontier land, especially
after a Byzantine counterattack failed in 965.
ARRIVAL OF THE NORMANSThe collapse of Muslim Sicily began with a religious
crisis. In around 1030, religious differences intensified as
questions about the legitimacy of the Fatimid imamate
arose as the local Arab emirs fought among themselves.
The Muslim Sicilians’ appeal to the NORMANSof Calabria,
ROGERI and ROBERTGUISCARD. This proved fatal to
Muslim domination of the island. The Normans took
Palermo in 1072 and Syracuse in 1086, establishing a
competent administration on the island and carefully
resettling Muslims in locations vulnerable to Norman
forces. Roger I worked out an advantageous accord with
Pope URBANII that gave his dynasty effective control
over the Sicilian church on the island. There was consid-
erable religious toleration of Muslims, JEWS, and Greeks
on the island, especially under ROGERII. A literary and
geographical culture, elaborate court ceremonial, an
impressive palace, and religious architecture borrowed
from Byzantium and ISLAMmade the island a cultural
center that synthesized in many ways all the civilizations
of the Mediterranean Sea. This balance was maintained
until 1160, when WILLIAMI was forced by seditious
activities to reduce the level of his tolerance toward the
religions of those whom he employed in his administra-
tion. The HOHENSTAUFENdynasty from the mainland
took over in 1196, and with their rule much of the
island’s economy declined and was handed over to con-
trol by merchants from GENOAand PISA.
THE RETURN OF FEUDALISMFREDERICKII was the heir to the Mediterranean ambitions
of his grandfather, Roger II, but had to move the center of
his kingdom to APULIA, in southeastern Italy. He and his
successors were unable to finish a program of planning
and developing settlements on the island. The insurrec-
tion of the SICILIANVESPERSin 1282 provoked by French
or Angevin oppression led to an appeal to MANFRED’s
son-in-law, Peter III of Aragon (r. 1276–85). This new
regime tried to reconstitute a systematic FEUDALISMon
the island. A huge fiscal, naval, and military effort
allowed Frederick III to defeat the formidable coalition of
Angevin NAPLES, Capetian FRANCE, the PAPACY, and even
opposition within ARAGON. There followed nearly a cen-
tury of periodic conflict, leading to the economic exhaus-
tion of Naples as well as of the island, a long INTERDICT
on Sicilian churches, and a stultifying refeudalization of
the aristocracy over the towns. A later Catalan conquest
of 1392–98 reestablished yet another feudal framework of
exploitation. In 1412 the Aragonese Crown passed to the
cadet branch of the Trastámara family of CASTILEattach-
ing the island first to BARCELONA, then to Naples. From
there it became part of the Mediterranean empire of
ALFONSOV THEMAGNANIMOUSin the mid-15th century.
New economic, demographic, and cultural changes
occurred at the end of the 15th century with the resump-
tion of the export of grain and the development of new
products such as sugar and raw SILK. This enriched an
urban patriciate but failed to benefit the rural feudal
nobility. Sicily passed under the control of the Spanish
Crown under FERDINANDII and ISABELI in 1502. All of
these governments after the Vespers were exploitative of
Sicily and that led to political, social, and in the end eco-
nomic decline.
See alsoPALERMO; SARDINIA.
Further reading: Graham A. Loud and Thomas
Wiedemann, trans., The History of the Tyrants of Sicily by
“Hugo Falcandus,” 1154–1569(Manchester: Manchester
University Press, 1998); David Abulaffia, The Two Italies:
Economic Relations between the Norman Kingdom of Sicily
and the Northern Communes(Cambridge: Cambridge Uni-
versity Press, 1977); Aziz Ahmad, A History of Islamic
Sicily (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 1975);
Clifford R. Backman, The Decline and Fall of Medieval
Sicily: Politics, Religion, and Economy in the Reign of Fred-
erick III, 1296–1337(Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press, 1995); Stephan R. Epstein, An Island for Itself: Eco-
nomic Development and Social Change in Late Medieval
Sicily(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991);
Jeremy Johns, Arabic Administration in Norman Sicily: The
Royal Diwan(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press,
2002); Hugh Kennedy, “Sicily and al-Andalus under Mus-
lim Rule,” in The New Cambridge Medieval History,Vol. 3,
c. 900–c. 1024,ed. Timothy Reuter (Cambridge: Cam-
bridge University Press, 1999), 646–669; Denis Mack
Smith, A History of Sicily: Medieval Sicily, 800–1713(Lon-
don: Chatto & Windus, 1968); Donald Matthew, The
Norman Kingdom of Sicily(Cambridge: Cambridge Uni-
versity Press, 1992).