Pork consumption, gastro-politics and social Islamisation in early al-Andalus (eighth to tenth centuries)

Abstract

This paper presents a novel perspective concerning the emergence of al-Andalus based on the study of food. This is a field of human behaviour that is highly informative in socio-cultural terms because of its links to ethno-religious identity. The aim is to demonstrate the usefulness of studying zooarchaeological evidence that provides information on the consumption of (or abstinence from) pork by different peninsular communities during the first centuries of al-Andalus. The results show the analytical potential of this line of research for examining the advance of the process of social Islamisation, understood as the fundamental dynamic of historical change in the shaping of Andalusi society, and one of the main mechanisms used by the Umayyad state to establish its power.