Eschatological Soundscapes: Morisco Poetry for the End Times

Abstract Copied by an Aragonese Morisco in the early seventeenth century, the Coplas sacadas de los castigos del hijo de Edam challenge the narrative of cultural decline often attributed to Moriscos. Attending to the poem’s oral and aural contexts of diffusion reveals efforts to preserve the sounds of the Qurʾān through a quintessential Castilian verse form and the Latin script. By reconsidering the ends and means of Morisco poetry from the perspective of sound and transliteration, this article invites critical engagement with a significant Morisco composition that has yet to receive its due in scholarship.