Elizabethan drama organized itself around Christendom versus its enemies

Evidence

In Marlowe’s other masterpiece, The Jew of Malta, the structure also establishes “an organizational scheme of Christendom versus its enemies.” While in The Jew of Malta these conflicts are more overt, displayed in the revenge of the title character against the Christians who surround him, in Tamburlaine, the title character’s Muslim identity is expressed through the essentially “medieval” conception of Islam and of Christian/Muslim oppositions. — Sophia Rose Arjana, Muslims in the Western Imagination, 280

Categorization

• XREF: The structural Christendom-vs-enemies binary parallels later Orientalist and crusade rhetoric; useful as a through-line linking medieval romance structure to Renaissance stage.