Reconquista and Technology
Overview
Reconquista and Technology
The Reconquista refers to the period of, mainly, military efforts by Christians to reconquer land on the Iberian peninsula taken by Muslims by the early eighth century. The Reconquista lasted from the early eighth century to 1492, when the last of Muslim forces were forced from the southern edge of Iberia. It occurred within the context of wars during the Middle Ages between Christian and Muslim forces over control of southwest and south-central Europe. However, this period in Iberian history was marked not only by conflict between Christians and Muslims, but also by peaceful coexistence, including cultural exchanges.
Learning Outcome
- Identify the dynamics of trade and political power that led to European exploration of the New World.
Key Terms / Key Concepts
reconquista: Christian reconquest of Iberia from the eighth through the fifteenth century C.E.
Arianism: a Christian doctrine concerning the Trinity that came to be seen as unorthodox, even heretic
Christopher Columbus - Genoese explorer credited with the discovery of the Americas
Prelude to the Muslim Conquest of Iberia: Catholicism’s Triumph over Arianism
Before the Muslim invasion of Iberia, Catholicism established its primacy in the peninsula at the conclusion of a brief struggle with Arianism during the sixth century. Although the period of rule by the Visigothic Kingdom (c. 5th – 8th centuries) saw the brief spread of Arianism, Catholic religion coalesced in Spain at the time. The Councils of Toledo debated creed and liturgy in orthodox Catholicism, and the Council of Lerida in 546 constrained the clergy and extended the power of law over them under the blessings of Rome. In 587, the Visigothic king at Toledo—Reccared—converted to Catholicism and launched a movement in Spain to unify the various religious doctrines that existed in the land. This put an end to dissension on the question of Arianism. Subsequently, Catholicism consolidated its control and domination over Iberia with the Reconquista and the Spanish Inquisition that followed. These developments have influenced the evolution of Spain and Iberia to the present.
Background to and Beginning of the Reconquista
The Reconquista “reconquest”) is a period in the history of the Iberian Peninsula, spanning approximately 770 years. Historians traditionally mark the beginning of the Reconquista with the Battle of Covadonga (most likely in 722), and its end with Columbus’ 1492 expedition. The successful conclusion of the Reconquista is associated with Portuguese and Spanish colonization of the Americas. Between the initial Umayyad conquest of Hispania in the 710s and the fall of the Emirate of Granada, the last Islamic state on the peninsula, to expanding Christian kingdoms in 1492, the Reconquista progressed slowly and unevenly.
The Arab Islamic conquest had dominated most of North Africa by 710 CE. In 711 an Islamic Berber raiding party, led by Tariq ibn Ziyad, was sent to Iberia to intervene in a civil war in the Visigothic Kingdom. Tariq’s army crossed the Strait of Gibraltar and won a decisive victory in the summer of 711 when the Visigothic King Roderic was defeated and killed at the Battle of Guadalete. Tariq’s commander, Musa, quickly crossed with Arab reinforcements, and by 718 the Muslims were in control of nearly the whole Iberian Peninsula. West Germanic Franks stopped the Muslim advance into western Europe at the 732 Battle of Tours.
In the summer of 722, a decisive victory for the Christians took place at Covadonga, in the north of the Iberian Peninsula. In a minor battle known as the Battle of Covadonga, a Muslim force was sent to put down the Christian rebels in the northern mountains, but it was defeated by Pelagius of Asturias, who established the monarchy of the Christian Kingdom of Asturias. In 739, a rebellion in Galicia, assisted by the Asturians, drove out Muslim forces; Galicia then joined the Asturian kingdom. The Kingdom of Asturias became the main base for Christian resistance to Islamic rule in the Iberian Peninsula for several centuries.
Warfare between Muslims and Christians
Medieval Spain was the scene of almost constant warfare between Muslims and Christians. Muslim interest in the peninsula returned in force around when Al-Mansur sacked Barcelona in 985. Under his son, other Christian cities were subjected to numerous raids. After his son’s death, the caliphate plunged into a civil war and splintered into the so-called “Taifa Kingdoms.” The Almohads, who had taken control of the Almoravids’ Maghribi and al-Andalus territories by 1147, surpassed the Almoravides in fundamentalist Islamic outlook, and they treated the non-believer dhimmis harshly. Faced with the choice of death, conversion, or emigration, many Jews and Christians left.
The Taifa kingdoms lost ground to the Christian realms in the north. After the loss of Toledo in 1085, the Muslim rulers reluctantly invited the Almoravides into the conflict with Christian forces, who invaded Al-Andalus from North Africa and established an empire. In the 12th century the Almoravid empire broke up again, only to be taken over by the invasion of the Almohads, who were defeated by an alliance of the Christian kingdoms in the decisive battle of Las Navas de Tolosa in 1212. By 1250, nearly all of Iberia was back under Christian rule, with the exception of the Muslim kingdom of Granada, the last state in Iberia to be taken back from Muslim forces. The reconquest of Granada marked the end of the Reconquista. Despite the Reconquista, the Muslim presence in Iberia left lasting legacies in technology, architecture, the arts, and literature.
Spanish Inquisition
The most prominent legacy of the Reconquista was the Spanish Inquisition. Around 1480, Ferdinand II of Aragon and Isabella I of Castile, known as the Catholic Monarchs, established this campaign of religious expulsion that targeted Muslims and Jews. It was intended to maintain Catholic orthodoxy in their kingdoms and to replace the Medieval Inquisition, which was under Papal control. It covered Spain and all the Spanish colonies and territories, which included the Canary Islands, the Spanish Netherlands, the Kingdom of Naples, and all Spanish possessions in the Americas.
People who converted to Catholicism were not subject to expulsion, but between 1480 and 1492 hundreds of those who had converted (conversos and moriscos) were accused of secretly practicing their original religion (crypto-Judaism or crypto-Islam); they were arrested, imprisoned, interrogated under torture, and in some cases burned to death, in both Castile and Aragon. In 1492 Ferdinand and Isabella ordered segregation of communities to create closed quarters that became what were later called “ghettos.” They also furthered economic pressures upon Jews and other non-Christians by increasing taxes and social restrictions. In 1492 the monarchs issued a decree of expulsion of Jews, known formally as the Alhambra Decree, which gave Jews in Spain four months to either convert to Catholicism or leave Spain. Tens of thousands of Jews emigrated to other lands such as Portugal, North Africa, the Low Countries, Italy, and the Ottoman Empire. Later in 1492, Ferdinand issued a letter addressed to the Jews who had left Castile and Aragon, inviting them back to Spain if they had become Christians. The Inquisition was not definitively abolished until 1834, during the reign of Isabella II, after a period of declining influence in the preceding century.
Most of the descendants of the Muslims who submitted to Christian conversion—the Moriscos—were later expelled from Spain after serious social upheaval, when the Inquisition was at its height. The expulsions were carried out more severely in eastern Spain (Valencia and Aragon) due to local animosity towards Muslims and Moriscos perceived as economic rivals; local workers saw them as cheap labor undermining their bargaining position with the landlords. Those that the Spanish Inquisition found to be secretly practicing Islam or Judaism were executed, imprisoned, or expelled. Nevertheless, all those deemed to be “New Christians” were perpetually suspected of various crimes against the Spanish state, including continued practice of Islam or Judaism.
Attributions
Licenses and Attributions
CC LICENSED CONTENT, SHARED PREVIOUSLY
- Curation and Revision. Provided by: Boundless.com. License: CC BY-SA: Attribution-ShareAlike
CC LICENSED CONTENT, SPECIFIC ATTRIBUTION
- Title Image - "Moorish army (right) of Almanzor during the Reconquista Battle of San Esteban de Gormaz, from Cantigas de Alfonso X el Sabio". Attribution: Unknown author, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons. Provided by: Wikipedia. Location: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Cantigas_battle.jpg. License: CC BY-SA: Attribution-ShareAlike
- Alhambra Decree. Provided by: Wikipedia. Location: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alhambra_Decree. License: CC BY-SA: Attribution-ShareAlike
- Battle of Covadonga. Provided by: Wikipedia. License: CC BY-SA: Attribution-ShareAlike
- Reconquista. Provided by: Wikipedia. License: CC BY-SA: Attribution-ShareAlike
- Visigothic Kingdom. Provided by: Wikipedia. License: CC BY-SA: Attribution-ShareAlike
- Kingdom of Asturias. Provided by: Wikipedia. License: CC BY-SA: Attribution-ShareAlike
- Spanish Inquisition. Provided by: Wikipedia. License: CC BY-SA: Attribution-ShareAlike
- Arianism. Provided by: Wikipedia. License: CC BY-SA: Attribution-ShareAlike
- History of Spain. Provided by: Wikipedia. License: CC BY-SA: Attribution-ShareAlike
- Catholic Monarchs. Provided by: Wikipedia. License: CC BY-SA: Attribution-ShareAlike
- Francisco_de_Goya_-_Escena_de_Inquisiciu00f3n_-_Google_Art_Project.jpg. Provided by: Wikipedia. License: Public Domain: No Known Copyright
- La_Rendiciu00f3n_de_Granada_-_Pradilla.jpg. Provided by: Wikipedia. License: Public Domain: No Known Copyright
- Spanish Golden Age. Provided by: Wikipedia. License: CC BY-SA: Attribution-ShareAlike
- Habsburg Spain. Provided by: Wikipedia. License: CC BY-SA: Attribution-ShareAlike
- Morisco. Provided by: Wikipedia. License: CC BY-SA: Attribution-ShareAlike
- El Escorial. Provided by: Wikipedia. License: CC BY-SA: Attribution-ShareAlike