Legacies of Al-Andalus and the Reconquista in Spain

Many would be shocked to hear a description of Spain as an intersection of cultures, or a country defined by multiple religions. It is certainly true that these classifications would fall short in the present day, especially for one viewing Spain from the outside. The dominance of Catholicism in Spain is of course, undoubted, and the legacy of conservative, Christian rule is impossible to miss from an average Spanish household to the greatest monuments the nation possesses. However, this is only possible due to the removal of the other force in making the nation what it is today. Spain is firmly Christian in identity because of its attempted erasure of a previous identity that refuses to go away. Al-Andalus is explained away in Spain as a villain, a period of outside Islamic rule during which a noble resistance threw off oppression and forged a new nation, a process known as the Reconquista. In the formation of this new nation, the old, and Islam itself, were persecuted thoroughly and marked to be removed. The Reconquista, five centuries after its completion, remains Spain’s primary source of national mythology. In a more tolerant Spain, as immigrants take the same routes Umayyad conquerors took in their invasion so long ago, the legacy of Islam in the country has come to the forefront more than ever. This has been a relatively recent phenomenon and can be best observed in Spain’s past few decades. Since 1975, Spain has been a democracy where information on the past has been far more available and old national rhetoric has been challenged. Still, many Spaniards have denied the opportunity to look at their history in a more objective way. The contributions of Al-Andalus have become more recognized, however, the Reconquista has become mixed into modern ethnic nationalist rhetoric. The religion of Islam has a long and complicated history in Spain which creates problems for Muslims today. The legacy of Al-Andalus and the Reconquista shape a historical narrative in Spain towards Muslims and undermine their great contribution toward the country's past and present. Deeply entrenched Catholic fear and propaganda continue to keep Muslims, especially North Africans, an unwelcome minority in a country their ancestors largely helped build.

Before the Umayyad invasion and establishment of Al-Andalus, Spain was in a strange and precarious situation. Many forget that before Muslim rule, what is now Spain was an emerging medieval Christian kingdom under the Visigoths. This group had greatly troubled the fallen Western Roman Empire and created a kingdom from its former province of Hispania. Historical information on this point in history is scarce, but some studies give a decent idea of how the Visigothic state functioned and why it came to an end so easily. According to Francis Murphy, “the Visigothic state itself was composed of three main elements, by [about 650 AD] fairly well (though not perfectly) fused: the Visigoths, the older Roman families, and the Byzantines” (Murphy, 11). These interest groups were frequently in conflict, both within and outside the kingdom. Amidst near-constant war, the Visigoths made a critical mistake in state formation by having an elective monarchy. This not only led to succession conflicts, it left the monarchy open to attempts by kings to make their rule permanent and hereditary. This unstable monarchy saw a majority of its kings assassinated, deposed, or killed in battle (Murphy, 10).

Amid another succession crisis and open dissent towards the sitting king, the Umayyad Caliphate invaded the kingdom in 711. The Umayyads invaded with a relatively small army of around 10–15,000 under Tariq ibn Ziyad, the governor of Tangier. The Visigothic resistance would crumble in the face of this threat. The Visigothic king, Roderic, had brutally deposed his predecessor Wittiza, and much of the army that met the invaders was under the command of friends of Wittiza. It is said the army broke and betrayed Roderic, leading to his death and the deaths of many important Visigothic nobles. After this battle Visigothic authority disintegrated, and a power vacuum swept over Hispania which the Umayyads were happy to fill. Their army used primarily Berber troops, from a tribe in North Africa which was accustomed to raiding the Iberian peninsula (“Umayyad conquest of Hispania”). The North Africans who settled in the region would come to be known as Moors. In return for a relatively smooth conquest with little non-Visigothic resistance, Christians and Jews were given the same privileges as non-Muslim monotheists under the Caliphate. There was a relatively peaceful assimilation over the next few decades in Muslim-occupied territory, with many intermarriages between the former Christian rulers and the new Muslim settlers. This relative cooperation between Muslims and Christians would define Al-Andalus in histories of the time.

However, there was one notable exception in the mountains of northwestern Spain, a region known as Asturias. A growing Christian resistance proved problematic to various Muslim lords attempting to conquer the region, a difficult one to invade due to its terrain. This group of fighters was led by Pelayo, a semi-legendary figure said to have been of Visigothic royal blood, a confusing claim considering the Visigothic monarchy was not hereditary (“Umayyad conquest of Hispania”). Whatever the case, a Muslim army that marched into Asturias in 722 to suppress the rebellion was destroyed, in a battle that would have far more important symbolic ramifications than practical (“Covadonga, Battle of “). This battle, at Covadonga, gave Asturias breathing room to consolidate as a small Christian kingdom and a center of resistance. Pelayo would come to be mythologized as a Spanish national hero, and Covadonga began an agonizing 770 year-long Christian reconquest of the Iberian Peninsula known as the Reconquista. Despite this military pressure, Al-Andalus would still flourish in a large part of this time period further south.

Al-Andalus is shrouded in mystery and myth, and contemporary values greatly impact how one portrays life under its rule. It has been pushed in various agendas with puff pieces stressing its tolerance and scientific achievement, and hit pieces suggesting it was less developed or tolerant than it is portrayed. “Al-Andalus” as a term is also confusingly applied and vague, so in this paper it will be used to refer to all parts of the Iberian peninsula which were under Muslim rule, from nearly the entire peninsula in the 8th century to the last sliver of the Emirate of Granada in 1492. What is clear is that Al-Andalus was widely praised among sources of the time it occupied, and it seems to have had a largely positive impact on scientific studies, art, and culture of the time by the standards of modern scholars. Many sources speak of it as a paradise of abundant resources and beautiful landscapes where a higher proportion than usual at the time lived comfortably. Muslim local rulers and caliphs are largely praised for this standard of living, and especially the efficiency in which resources such as water were made available for the population of cities and towns (Stearns, 362). On top of this, Al-Andalus is also remembered well for its incredible intellectual and scientific sector which produced countless works of literature and mathematic and scientific discoveries. There are not many who dispute claims that Al-Andalus was the most important Hebrew learning center in the world, and a center of Muslim achievement even amid the Islamic Golden Age (Wacks, 186). There is extensive proof the education one received in Al-Andalus was nearly unparalleled for the time: it produced “some of the most significant scholars, poets, musicians, philosophers, historians and thinkers of the medieval age — such as Ibn Arabi, Ibn Rushd (also known as Averroes), al-Zarqali (Arzachel in Latin), al-Zahrawi (Abulcasis in Latin) and Ibn Firnas” (Sekkar).

Many also characterize Al-Andalus as incredibly tolerant for the time, which is true compared to the rest of Europe. Still, it was not out of the ordinary in terms of the Islamic world. While there was not pure harmony between religions and Al-Andalus was certainly not a “paradise” as many claim, sources speak of the immense cultural and scientific achievements that came out of the peninsula under Islamic rule. There were few reports of religious violence, and frequent intermarriages of Muslims, Christians, and Jews, especially in order to establish political control. Christian Iberians were known to respect the studies and works of Islamic scholars of the time. Many Christians within Al-Andalus, who spoke Andalusian Arabic, would have contributed to the mass of works in Arabic which came out of this period. Some Christian monarchs, even while the Reconquista was ongoing, are recorded to have opened schools of Arabic to gain from superior scientific knowledge and dissect the passages of the Quran (Wacks, 187). The near-complete lack of religious revolts within Al-Andalus, and the explosion of them after the Christian takeover, speak heavily to this period of “Convivencia” (coexistence in English). However, political troubles would increasingly plague the various rulers of Al-Andalus, hastening its decline and opening it to outside threats.

Politically, Al-Andalus began as a governorship, a province of the Umayyad Caliphate with an appointed governor. The province was centered at Córdoba in Southern Spain, now known as Andalusia. This would be the status quo for the first decades of Muslim rule in the Iberian Peninsula, with the governor not exercising too much power and leaving most to local rulers. The frontline between the Umayyads and the surviving Christian principalities was constantly shifting at this time, and there is little to inform one on this period until 750. In that year, the last surviving member of the Umayyad dynasty fled to Al-Andalus after his dynasty was overthrown by the Abbasids. He seized power in Córdoba and declared himself an emir of the exiled Umayyads, establishing the Emirate of Córdoba. This would continue until Abd-al Rahman III declared himself caliph in 929. This Caliphate would last little more than a century, but it is almost unanimously considered the height of art and science in Al-Andalus (“The Art of the Umayyad Period…”). In 1031, after a series of wars, the caliphate broke up into small kingdoms known as taifas. These would be ruled by local aristocracy and vie for dominance on the peninsula. There would be multiple periods in which Al-Andalus broke into taifas at the absence of central authority (“The Taifa Kingdoms”), but the fall of the Caliphate of Córdoba and beginning of the first taifa period is known as the beginning of the decline of Al-Andalus. Two North African Berber empires, the Almoravids and then the Almohads, would invade and establish their own authority as rulers of Al-Andalus. Far more fundamentalist in their interpretation of Islam, they would largely end the multifaith collaboration of “Convivencia”. Al-Andalus after the Caliphate would be characterized by violence and instability, and the eventual end of its existence: the final victory of the Reconquista.

The Reconquista, as much as Al-Andalus itself, is a frequently misunderstood thing used for various agendas. “Reconquista”, meaning reconquest, is a dubious term that was likely applied after the fact. The Reconquista probably did not begin as a religious struggle. The Christian principalities of northern Iberia, including the aforementioned Asturias, fought to expand their territory at both Al-Andalus’ and other Christian principalities’ expense. There was likely little Muslim authority in the North to begin with, being far from their seat of power in Andalusia, and the Christian kingdoms expanded in a fight for territorial integrity and survival. The Reconquista would be turned into quite literally a religious crusade around the time of the calling of the First Crusade. Many forget that Pope Urban II encouraged men to fight in Iberia along with the Holy Land. However, usually it is only Spaniards that truly refer to the Reconquista, as a whole, as a crusade. It is well understood by most that political and territorial expansion was the original motivation for the Christian kingdoms in Iberia, and far predated the calling of Crusades there (Cartwright). Despite the origins of the struggle, it was firmly a religious war by the 12th century. Already existing Christian military orders, such as the Templars, sent men to fight in Spain, and numerous orders would be established during the thick of the fighting in the 12th and 13th centuries. Campaigns backed by the popes in Iberia were largely treated as Crusades, with elements such as crosses on the battlefields, armies being funded by church taxes, and promises of Heaven for those who died in battle (Cartwright). These measures largely turned the tide of battle, and the Christians would win a string of victories, capturing the former Visigothic capital of Toledo in 1085 and the critically important Córdoba in 1236 (Green, 45). Al-Andalus would survive in the small Emirate of Granada until 1492, as King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella completed the Reconquista and unified Spain. However, it was not the Reconquista itself, but what happened after which proved so critically important to its perception and the formation of the modern Spanish state.

Life for Muslims under Christian rule during the Reconquista and before 1492 was, for the most part, not all that terrible. In most Christian kingdoms and municipalities, “Christian rulers created a status for Muslims similar to the standing of dhimmis in Muslim territories, including similar legal and religious freedoms” (Green, 47). This was a more second-class status than a Christian in Al-Andalus, as Muslims were not permitted to have any power in government and intermarriage was less common. There was intermittent persecution of Jews, the other major religious minority, but Muslims typically escaped these waves of violence. Things rapidly began to change in the 15th century, however, and they would irreversibly change after the completion of the Reconquista. In the late 15th Century, the number of Muslim rebellions in Christian territory spiked, likely indicating more repressive conditions. Nevertheless, even the final conquest of Granada did not look like a watershed moment to most Muslims, as Ferdinand and Isabella guaranteed that “no moor be forced to become a Christian” (Tremlett) even after the expulsion of the Jews in 1492. These promises would ring hollow within a decade. Islam was banned across Spain in 1502, and Muslims faced the same ultimatum: convert, leave, or die. An overwhelming majority decided to convert to Christianity, and these converts became known as moriscos. This, unfortunately, brought them as Christians under the authority of the Catholic Church’s brutal Spanish Inquisition, whose principal targets were converted Muslims and Jews. The Inquisition often aimed to expose them as impure Christians or as untrue converts, which made many associate converted Muslims and Jews with treachery and falsehood. The converts faced extreme scrutiny and were soon legally categorized as different from other Christians. The Spanish state instituted “Blood Purity Laws (estatutos de limpieza de sangre)… restricting the rights and freedoms of New Christians. These were meant to keep New Christians as second-class citizens, limit their professional and economic prospects, and reduce their social mobility” (Wacks, 188). Moriscos became increasingly persecuted and marginalized until their ultimate expulsion from Spain by Philip III in 1609.

It is important to note the impact of these events on the perception of the Spanish state and what a true Spaniard is. Spain unified under Ferdinand and Isabella at the same time as these persecutions began, thus these became the first true defining acts of the modern state, to convert or relentlessly persecute non-Christians. Along with this was the other defining characteristic of Spain in this period: exploration and colonization. The two of these went hand in hand and influenced each other, as explained by Wacks: “because the Catholic Church had declared crusades to conquer Iberia, Spanish nobility implied a legacy of crusade. Conquistadors carried this mindset to the New World: that conquest and conversion of non-Christians was an inherently Spanish concern and central to their emerging national identity” (Wacks, 182). Crucially, it was not just being a Christian which was an integral part of being Spanish, it mattered how purely Christian you were. It also mattered that you were not Muslim, not even in the distant past. As seen with the moriscos, one could convert as the state wanted and still be considered impure or a contaminating force. In the end, the moriscos were expelled to consolidate this national identity. They did not go willingly, as they had called this land home for the past seven centuries whether it was named Al-Andalus or Spain. Philip III and his advisors believed that to become a true Christian state and complete the ideological Reconquista, the nation could only be made up of the purest Christians. There was a thirst by state and Catholic leadership to prove themselves and make up for the mere existence of Al-Andalus in the past by completely reversing course from both Islam and tolerance. What makes this so impactful today is that this repression, expulsion, and conversion coincided with the “Siglo de Oro”, the height of the Spanish Empire. Spain was the most powerful nation in the world at this time, and the art and literature which came out of this period are still famous today across the Western world. Spaniards are taught that this was Spain’s height, the greatest time in the country’s history. Ferdinand and Isabella are held up as the equivalent of founding fathers, the Fall of Granada is considered the founding moment of the nation, and Al-Andalus is considered an aberration which needed to be re-conquered. Spaniards created a national mythology and consolidated it by expelling anyone who proved it wrong. Soon after, the Spanish Empire declined, and most of the population would be poor, traditional, and fiercely Catholic for centuries after. An ordinary Spaniard did not have the freedom to form their own opinion on the state or this mythology until democratization in 1975, 366 years after the expulsion of the moriscos, and is still taught based on 500-year old ideals of national unity.

It would be inaccurate to say that Spain was completely stagnant in ideology or development in those 366 years. It is true that Spain did remain a conservative monarchy for a large majority of this time and was considered relatively undeveloped compared to its northern European counterparts. Still, the nation faced challenges and underwent radical changes, especially in the 20th century. Through this time, the Spanish state was brought down and modified multiple times, but the original national myth survived. It is almost improbable considering the circumstances. In 1931, the Spanish monarchy fell and was replaced by the Second Spanish Republic through a popular uprising. The Republic seemed to dismantle the fundamental points of the national myth, turning Spain heavily to the left and being anti-monarchy. More importantly, it was fiercely anti-Church and severely limited their power. It seemed Spain’s ideals of a strong Catholic monarchy, pure Catholicism, and a lack of outside influence were being tossed aside for good. More conservative elements of Spanish society would not allow this to happen. A military coup by Francisco Franco and a conservative faction known as the “Nationalists” was launched, which transformed into the Spanish Civil War. It is notable that during the war it was the Republic, and not the Nationalists, which made frequent use of anti-Muslim rhetoric. As the Nationalists largely used Colonial Moroccan troops, the Republic recalled the memory of the Reconquista and the old struggle against the Moors as a part of their propaganda and war effort. They especially focused on Orientalist stereotypes of Muslim brutality and societal backwardness (Allard, 4). It is truly astonishing that anti-Muslim sentiment was so entrenched in Spain that a socially progressive, leftist government felt comfortable using it while at the same time attempting to dismantle a regime built on anti-Muslim sentiment. The Nationalists would win the war, and Francisco Franco would establish an authoritarian, conservative, Church-influenced regime until 1975. The national myth and traditional institutions had taken heavy damage but were still potent enough to inspire many to fight for them. Throughout modernization, political chaos, and changes to the state in many directions during this period, anti-Muslim prejudice remained a relatively unchanged part of society. Changes to the Spanish state did not touch Spain’s Islamophobia as much as one would think, a theme that remains present.

Since the fall of Francisco Franco’s regime in 1975, Spain has become a liberal democracy and greatly increased its standard of living. This has led to further dismantling of vestiges of the old conservative social order. Spain remains heavily Catholic but more tolerant, and the Church has far less of an impact in politics. The country has relatively relaxed abortion laws, and gay marriage has been legal since 2005. These are not simply progressive changes to the law; the Spanish population as a whole has become far more tolerant. In a 2013 Pew Research Center survey, Spain was found to be the country most accepting of homosexuality in the world (“The Global Divide on Homosexuality”). The nation has embraced its Muslim past in some ways. This past was always evident and hard to hide from, with Muslim architecture present in nearly all corners of Spain. Now that these sites have become a draw for visitors and money from all over, Spain embraces them more proudly. The Alhambra Palace in Granada and the Mosque-Cathedral of Córdoba have broken their own records of yearly visitors year after year recently, and Spanish newspapers report this news with a sense of national pride (Aidi). Despite being a country full of tourist attractions, the Alhambra is the most visited cultural site in Spain. Many, if not most, of the tourists visiting are Spaniards. Immigration laws have also been relaxed, leading to a return of Muslims. Moroccans are now the largest foreign population in Spain, approaching 700,000 in number (“Spain: Foreign population…”). In Madrid, Andalusia, and the Valencian Community, Muslims make up nearly 4% of the population. For the first time in centuries, there is a sizeable Muslim presence in Spain. Still, with all this change, old attitudes are hard to break. The rhetoric of the Reconquista survives today in Spain chiefly in discussions of Islam and immigration.

In the recent past, Muslims in Spain were typically formerly Christian converts with no family history of practicing Islam. This has changed with the influx of Moroccan immigrants in recent years, causing the discussion of Islam to be widely tied in with immigration. Recent terror attacks across Europe and gains by Vox, the far-right political party, have shifted this discussion even further. Spain today is in conflict on whether to suppress its Muslim past or embrace it, sometimes doing both. This pertains to its current Muslim population as well, and especially to Moroccan immigrants, who receive a considerably colder welcome than other large immigrant populations like Romanians. Others formerly marginalized, like homosexuals and the non-religious, have been beneficiaries of Spain’s new liberalization and tolerance. This applies to Muslims far less: “Muslims, especially Moroccan immigrants, are routinely ranked lowest in opinion polls about attitudes toward minorities (behind Roma and other migrant groups), and anti-’moro’ sentiment has only increased since the 2004 train bombings, attributed to Al Qaida” (Rogoezen-Soltar). Moroccans face the brunt of both anti-Muslim and general anti-immigrant sentiment. This can be attributed to both rising fear and antipathy against Muslims in Europe and the historical impact of Al-Andalus and the Reconquista.

In Granada, the last heartland of Al-Andalus, studies and interviews of Muslim residents show their concern with how their cultural expression will be received by others. This is ironic in a nation where the ugliest aspects of the Reconquista continue to be present and sometimes celebrated. Spain’s patron saint, Saint James, is nicknamed matamoros (meaning “Moor Slayer”). Towns in Spain and former Spanish colonies bear this name, and millions of Spaniards praise him every Sunday (Wacks, 182–183). The Reconquista is still very present, and Spain’s violent past has produced strange, archaic traditions: “In the city of León during Holy Week, it is traditional to drink wine mixed with lemonade, a practice still referred to as ‘killing jews’ (matar judíos)” (Wacks, 186). This is considered completely normal. Yet when Muslims take pride in their historic cultural achievement and impact on Spain, it is seen as traitorous: “Migrants articulate their pride and sense of belonging as descendants of the Moorish conquerors that built [Granada] and are thus cast as dangerous, unacceptable, and un-Spanish” (Guia, 246). The past has mixed with the present to form a brutal and unfair double standard. Christian violence is entrenched in Spanish culture and celebrated, while Muslim presence and legacy is considered intimidating. Spaniards cannot change the past, but they could start by letting go of the rhetoric of the Reconquista, which portrays all Muslims as inherently non-Spanish. Unfortunately, it seems the tide is turning in the other direction.

Muslims in Spain have also been a victim of the rise of the far-right, anti-immigration rhetoric, and scapegoating for terrorist attacks. This has been especially true after the rise of ISIS and various terror attacks in Europe by extremists. After the Charlie Hebdo attacks in January 2015, for example, a wave of both overt and subtle Islamophobia was present in Spain even reaching the highest levels of government. Anti-Islam group Pegida established a branch in Spain called for mass rallies in front of mosques in Madrid and Valencia, and multiple mosques were vandalized (Aidi). This sentiment took a softer form as the government passed an anti-terrorism pact in response to rising public anger in early 2015. Many have noticed that the pact has multiple provisions advising officials to look out for “at risk” behavior, which seems to be thinly veiled language concealing an intent to monitor Muslims more closely. These concerns were affirmed after a document detailing the Seville Police Department’s new policy was leaked: “law enforcement was told to look out for are Arabs taking photos in ‘non-tourist areas’, or using laptops while seated inside a car. Police were also told to focus on Algerians as they tend to be ‘conflictive’” (Aidi). Some do not try to hide this tense attitude toward Muslims, and instead embrace it. Spain’s far-right nationalist party invokes the old national myth frequently and will not shy away from anti-Muslim rhetoric. Vox has seized on the popular discontent which led to the anti-terrorism pact and added vitriol to it. They filmed “a propaganda video in which Mr. Abascal leads a group of men on horseback to launch a ‘Reconquista’ to recover Spain from the hands of the infidels. Invoking God and the fatherland, the group has attacked immigrants” with familiar accusations of jobs taken and women assaulted, and no factual backing (Caparrós). Vox uses women and the economy in these accusations to mask their real policy, which advocates tax cuts for the rich and the slashing of gender-equality laws. These policies would hurt women and the working class far more than immigrants. A large portion of Spain does not seem to notice nor care. Vox has gained seats in the Spanish legislature each of the last few elections, now holding 52 and gaining 15% of the vote across Spain in 2019. Far-right parties across Europe are generally fiercely nationalist and use nationalist symbols, but Vox has an unprecedented amount of material to seize on. The Reconquista has obviously always been used in Spanish nationalism because it still largely defines the Spanish nation. These symbols connect with a large part of the Spanish electorate because the national myth remains potent, and Spanish nationalism goes hand in hand with Islamophobia. It is familiar to see Muslims labeled foreigners or invaders and be blamed for a distant historical past, and watch different movements call for their further marginalization. Time will tell if history will repeat itself.

Spain lives in the shadow of its distant past perhaps more than any other country on Earth. It is unusual to see 1,300-year-old invasions and 600-year-old crusades brought up frequently in political discourse, but Al-Andalus and the Reconquista remain strikingly relevant. The weaponization of history has caused Muslims in Spain untold suffering and continues to do so. Al-Andalus’ contribution to Spain has been more frequently acknowledged, but this has not had a great enough effect in removing old prejudices and power dynamics. Spain cannot let go of its old national myth nor its destructive tenets, though it has made progress. Unfortunately, it appears that progress was far more artificial and prone to reversal than any could have thought.

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