etymologies and etiologies 25
to deliver a castle to the king, complaints that have the tempered air of
feudal disloyalty rather than religious contempt. In the same vein, King
Jaume had referred to al- Azraq, the leader of the Mudéjar rebellion, as
“our traitor ( proditor noster).”^51 In other words, from the perspective of
the Crown of Aragon, the Mudéjares were definitively insiders — disloyal
and treacherous but feudal subjects nonetheless. Their treason was not
only rebellion but also conspiracy with outsiders:
The Saracens [of Valencia] rebelled with soldiers from castles and forts against
the Lord King and his land, leading, moreover, Saracen spies from Granada
and North Africa into Valencia at the greatest cost and dishonor to his land
and all of Christendom.^52
Only in speaking of the Mudéjares in this second sense — as conspir-
ators — did King Pere’s language take on the cast of eschatology, present-
ing them as enemies of Christendom.
The jenets, by contrast, are never spoken of as rebels. In fact, they are
never spoken of as the king’s subjects or, indeed, subjects of any one king
or kingdom in these early documents. While some appear to be attached to
specific castles within Valencia, others, one learns from war reports, have
entered Valencia by land from Naṣrid Granada or by sea from North Af-
rica during the rebellion.^53 A surrender treaty — negotiated directly with
Mudéjar leaders — reveals, moreover, that the Crown was fully aware of
the jenets’ disaggregated organization.^54 At the end of August 1276 , Pere
signed an agreement with “shaykh Abrurdriz Hyale Abenayech, knight
Abenzumayr Abenzaquimeran, and the wazīr Abulfaratx Asbat,” who
represented several castles in Valencia. The Muslim leaders would pay
the Aragonese king an unspecified amount and vacate their strongholds
within three months. And significantly, they agreed that none of their
“jenets and other cavalry of Moors, in this land, in Granada, or any other
place... would do harm to the kingdom of Valencia or any other part of
the king’s land.”^55 In addition to confirming that the jenets were scattered
“in this land,” “in Granada,” and indeed, “any other place,” the surrender
treaty appears to insist that the jenets were a particular and distinct form
of cavalry — different from “other cavalry of Moors”— although in what
sense remains unclear.
What might the term Moor tell us about the jenets? Although the ori-
gins of this word are unknown — perhaps Semitic (mahourím) or Greek
(Μαύροίςτιος)— by the classical period, the Latin Mauri indicated the in-
habitants of the Roman provinces of Mauretania.^56 And at least in a general
