Sellem Bin al-Sheikh Mansur : a Muslim magician in Catholic Malta

Abstract

This chapter seeks to re-construct the story of a Muslim slave in early seven teenth-century Malta, a task which offers various challenges. Primary sources which flesh out the lives of people on the margins of society are extremely sparse and, after hundreds of years, most of what exists is still in obscurity. The rich deposit of inquisitorial papers preserved at the Cathedral Archives in Malta help us to tell, at least in part, the story of Sellem Bin al-Sheikh Mansur, a Muslim magician held as a slave in Malta. Owing to these records we can get a glimpse of his past, his adaptation to the world of slavery and the limitations it imposed, his thoughts and his feelings. Every interrogation brings him closer to us and exposes his inner wish to lead a better life than that usually endorsed by slaves.