Part of Iago's Motivation in Othello was that he was Spanish

Over on the Quora website, in a post by David Melinkoff, I learned something new that changes my interpretation of Iago in Shakespeare's Othello. It's that "Iago" is not an Italian name.

Iago's apparently a common name in the Galician language (a language with many similarities to Portuguese, but which is spoken in Spain). Spaniards are more likely to be called Santiago (St. James), like the old man in Hemingway's Old Man and the Sea. Alternatively, "Diego" and "Tiago" may be corruptions of Santiago. Instead of thinking "Sant Iago," people may have thought "San Tiago."

In contrast, the Italian version of "James" is "Giacomo, Iacopo or Jacopo, Giacobbe, Giacomino, Giaco, Giamo, Mino." Quite different.

The significance of Iago's ethnicity is that Moors and Spaniards have a history. To be specific, the Reconquista is a period of 780 years in which the Christians of Spain gradually "reconquered" the Muslim-ruled areas of the Iberian Peninsula. It concluded in 1492, but the relations between Christian Spain and its non-Christian subjects led to later tensions. In 1492, Moors in Granada had to convert or be expelled. In 1502, Queen Isabella made Catholic faith compulsory in Castille. In 1526, Charles V ordered the same within Aragon. Philip III systematically expelled the descendants of Muslim Moors (Moriscos) between 1609 and 1614 and succeeded in ridding his kingdom of about a quarter million of them.

This relates to Iago's motive for hating Othello, which is a problem and a half to understand. Coleridge called it "motiveless malignity." Others suggest jealousy and envy, but these do not seem to be primary motives.

However, Shakespeare most likely wrote Othello in 1603, when the long-standing antagonism between Catholics and Moors in Spain was still at work. His audience would have been well aware of it, and would not need it explained. Think of the racial slurs that Iago aims at Othello--"an old black ram," "barbary horse," "lascivious Moor." These seem to spring from a culture that is long-experienced at despising darker people. In an American context, they'd be at home in the Deep South, where racial hatred and repression have had a long history. I don't feel they would come to people as readily in a cosmopolitan city such as Renaissance Venice, though it had its own ethnic tensions.

------

Here is the answer I had given on the question "

Would the events of ‘Othello’ still have happened if Othello were a white person with the same personality as the original Othello?" Obviously, I now disagree with my last paragraph, but I still think the rest is correct:

Othello was a Moor to emphasize that he was an outsider. That shows us how extraordinary his success has been, to rise to the top levels of Venetian power; it also shows us how important Desdemona was to him. She is the only one who sat him down and demanded that he tell her about his life and all his suffering. She wanted to know the story behind every scar and cried for how hard his life had been. Her sympathy utterly melted Othello, so that he took the extraordinary risk to his position, and perhaps to his life, of secretly marrying Desdemona. The two of them eventually won her father’s support, but it was a near-run thing.

So, it’s important to the story that Othello be an outsider. He didn’t necessarily have to be a Moor.

I think he also had to be from a Mediterranean culture that operates according to the honour-shame complex (https://www.ucl.ac.uk/anthropolo...). Men can earn honour, in these societies, but women can only lose it. If they do lose it, then only violent punishment of the women can restore the family’s honour. It’s important that Othello feel that he had no alternative but to kill Desdemona, although he still loved her. In the end, he loved his honour more.

So, I think that Othello could have been an Arab or a Turk or a Spaniard or a Greek as easily as he was a Moor. The story wouldn’t have worked as well if he had been, let’s say, a Dane.