The supernatural in early Spanish literature, studied in the works of the court…

This pioneering 1923 study examines how the supernatural permeated the literary output of Alfonso X's thirteenth-century court, revealing a medieval worldview where the miraculous and the monstrous were indistinguishable from everyday reality. Callcott analyzes supernatural elements across Alfonso X's major works, particularly the Cantigas de Santa Maria and the Siete Partidas legal code, to trace how Christian doctrine, Islamic occult traditions, and pre-Christian folklore intertwined in medieval Spanish consciousness. The study argues that supernatural belief wasn't mere superstition but a fundamental lens through which medieval Spaniards understood their world, interpreted suffering, and negotiated power. For scholars and general readers alike, this book opens a door into a vanished mental universe where angels and demons, miracles and curses, were taken for granted as readily as weather or monarchy.