History

A Short Introduction to Spanish History: Pre-history to the Unification of the Crowns
Almost nowhere in the world has a history quite as rich, full of incident – and at times, almost hard to believe – as Spain’s. Spanish history, in short, is utterly compelling. Here, we go through some of the key moments of the periods leading up to the Unification of the Crowns, and the creation of modern Spain...

Early Spanish History
Spanish history proper begins with the Middle Palaeolithic period (100,000-40,000BC), and the arrival of the Neanderthals. While many fascinating archaeological sites remain from the Neolithic and Bronze Ages, it was the founding of Cadiz by the Phoenicians in 800 BC, of a Greek trading settlement at Ampurias in 575BC and the arrival of the Carthaginians in 237BC that was to prove particularly significant. A pattern had been established: occupation of the Iberian Peninsula.

The Years of Occupation: Spanish History from the Romans to the Moors
Although Spanish history had even up to this point been defined by the arrival of outsiders (whether Neanderthals from Africa or Carthaginians, Greeks and Phoenicians) it was the end of the Second Punic War and, from 206BC, the beginning of Roman occupation when something approaching the first semblances of modern Spain began to develop.

As the Roman Empire slid into decline, Alans, Sueves and Vandals began to invade Spain in the 5th century AD. After a short period of Sueve rule, Spain came under Visigoth control in 456; they were to rule much of the Iberian Peninsula until they were in turn overthrown by a series of Moorish raiding parties from 711-20. By the end of this period, the invaders controlled much of what now constitutes Spain.

The 9th and early 10th centuries were to be a highpoint of ‘Al-Andalus’ (as the new Moorish land came to be known) – a time when the wonders of Cordoba and Medina Azahara were built. Only in 1009, with the emergence of factions (taifas) and internal struggles, did Christian forces begin to make inroads into Moorish territory (significantly with the fall of Toledo by Alfonso VI in 1085) and the seeds of the reconquest were sown.

The Reconquest
The 11th-14th centuries were to be defined by warfare between the Moorish and Christian forces. And while in the South of Spain, the glories of Al-Andalus continued to mount – culminating with the building of the Alhambra in Granada in the mid-14th century – the tide was slowly turning. Valencia fell to Rodrigo Diaz (El Cid) in 1099, shortly followed by 1118 by Zaragoza.

It was at Las Navas de Tolosa in 1212, though, that a truly symbolic victory was to be registered: the southern heartlands of Al-Andalus now stretched away in front of the Christian forces. Cordoba fell in 1236 at the hands of Ferdinand III of Castile, to be shortly followed by Seville in 1248. Only Granada was to hang on, grimly and subserviently, for another couple of centuries.

The Birth of a Nation
1469 was to be a remarkable year in Spanish history. On the 19th October in the Palacio de los Vivero in Valladolid, Ferdinand of Aragon and Isabella of Castile and Leon were married. Almost immediately, with renewed military might they applied themselves to smashing the final remnants of Al-Andalus. The strategic town of Alhama de Granada fell in 1482, Malaga fell in 1488 and the city of Granada itself – the last bastion of Moorish Spain – was defeated in 1492.

In the same year Christopher Columbus was to discover the New World; in 1494 the Treaty of Tordesillas demarcated the country’s new-found empire. The Golden Age of Spanish history had begun.