The etymology of mancebo refers to the Vulgar Latin mancĭpus , which can be translated as “slave” . The term has various uses depending on the context.
The first meaning mentioned by the dictionary of the Royal Spanish Academy ( RAE ) refers to someone young . The concept is also used to refer to lower-category workers, apprentices or assistants .
A young man, in this framework, can be a page : an individual who worked in the service of a king or a nobleman. These young men were usually children or adolescents who were in charge of the internal service of the residence, performing different tasks.
The page or young man could be in charge of cleaning , carrying his master's weapons or carrying out administrative tasks, for example. The chamber page , meanwhile, served his master in the room.
Young men, on the other hand, can be domestic workers or servants . Sometimes, the working conditions of these employees are precarious since their rights are not respected.
In the American colonies, the criollos were known as young men of the land : the descendants born in America of parents from Europe . The Spanish conquistador Juan de Garay , to mention one case, promulgated orders to populate the new cities with young men.
A mancebía , on the other hand, is a place where prostitution is practiced. Also called lupanar, brothel or brothel, the brothel has facilities to facilitate intimate encounters between prostitutes and their clients.
Mancebo , finally, is a surname that appears in Spanish-speaking countries . The Spanish cyclist Paco Mancebo and the Mexican actor and playwright Gerardo Mancebo del Castillo have this last name.
We also cannot fail to mention the Moorish writer Mancebo de Arévalo , born around 1500 in Spain. Let us remember that the Moriscos were those Muslims of the Iberian Peninsula baptized after the conversion to which they had been subjected starting in 1502. The city in which he was born is Arévalo, which probably explains his last name, and he was someone's young man , that is, servant, the reason for his given name.
Those who knew him had a very favorable opinion of him. For example, they pointed out their experience and mastery of the Arabic, Latin, Greek and Hebrew languages . They also highlighted his skill in writing with Arabic characters from foreign languages, a concept called aljamía . For example, in many Arabic texts there are Romance fragments that are written with the Arabic alphabet. The literature produced by the Muslims of Castile and Aragon in the time of Mancebo de Arévalo, in fact, is known as aljamiado-morisca , precisely because it made extensive use of this technique.
According to one of the theories that have been put forward about the identity of this writer, it is believed that his real name was Gutierre and that he belonged to a family of merchants, in addition to having a prominent position among the Moors of his town and renown in local institutions.
He is also believed to have traveled throughout the country working in freight transportation, a trade known by several names, including muleteer and carter . Another of his occupations was pocería, that is, he dug wells in exchange for money. Regarding the aljamía, he used it to write several of his works in Spanish, all of them with an enigmatic style and a dark tone, focused on religion and with a large number of neologisms.
In his books he explored Islam from an evidently Jewish and Christian perspective , something that leads many to think that throughout his life he belonged to the three religions, first by force and then by his own decision, although in a clandestine