To be buried in Seville: the ambiguous integration of Italian merchants, 1480–1570

Abstract

ABSTRACT The hybridity of foreign merchants has received much scholarly attention, though the strategies undergirding the integration of Italians in Castile have been little explored. A selection of wills drawn up for Italian merchants living in Seville in the early sixteenth century gives some insight into these strategies. Five case studies, indicative of general trends presented by these merchants’ identification in wills and their burial preferences, demonstrate some of the ways they retained an Italian identity while cultivating Sevillian and Castilian connections.