Christianity And Islam In Southern Italy In The Second Half Of The Ninth Century

Almost always in the history of mankind, religion represented a very important part of the life of different communities or, later on, nations. In our times, in Europe, for example, religion does not have the same power and influence like it used to have in the past centuries. On the other hand, in the countries from the Middle East religion represents a way of life or at least it has a great influence on everyday living. For example, many legislative codes of the Arab countries are build up after religious codes of law. The goal of this article is to call attention to the political and religious encounters between Christians and Muslims in two major cities and principalities from southern Italy (Salerno and Benevento), in the second half of the ninth century. The article will emphasize, bringing historical proof of Latin translation of some papal registers, the fact that Christianity and Islam were only used as the interest required to be most useful for political advantage and territorial domination.