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Ancient Spain 2
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The earliest record of hominids living in Europe has been found in the Spanish cave of
Atapuerca which has become a key site for world palaeontology. Fossils found there are dated to
roughly 1,000,000 years ago.
Modern humans in the form of Cro-Magnons began arriving in the Iberian Peninsula from north
of the Pyrenees some 35,000 years ago. The most conspicuous sign of prehistoric human
settlements are the famous paintings in the northern Spanish Altamira, which were done ca.
15,000 BCE and are regarded, along with those in Lascaux, France, as paramount instances of
cave art.
The earliest urban culture documented is that of the semi-mythical southern city of Tartessos,
pre-1100 BCE. The seafaring Phoenicians, Greeks and Carthaginians successively settled along
the Mediterranean coast and founded trading colonies there over a period of several centuries.
Around 1100 BCE, Phoenician merchants founded the trading colony of Gadir or Gades (modern
day Cádiz) near Tartessos. In the 9th century BCE the first Greek colonies, such as Emporion
(modern Empúries), were founded along the Mediterranean coast on the East, leaving the south
coast to the Phoenicians. The Greeks are responsible for the name Iberia, apparently after the
river Iber (Ebro in Spanish). In the 6th century BCE the Carthaginians arrived in Iberia while
struggling first with the Greeks and shortly after with the Romans for control of the Western
Mediterranean. Their most important colony was Carthago Nova (Latin name of modern day
Cartagena).
The native peoples whom the Romans met at the time of their invasion in what is now known as
Spain were the Iberians, inhabiting from the Southwest part of the Peninsula through the
Northeast part of it, and then the Celts, mostly inhabiting the north and northwest part of the
Peninsula. In the inner part of the peninsula, where both groups were in contact, a mixed,
distinctive, culture was present, the one known as Celtiberian. The Celtiberian Wars or Spanish
Wars were fought between the advancing legions of the Roman Republic and the Celtiberian
tribes of Hispania Citerior from 181 to 133 BC.
Roman Spain
See also: Roman Conquest of Hispania and Hispania
Roman bridge in Cordoba
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Roman Iberia was divided: Hispania Ulterior and Hispania Citerior during the late Roman
Republic; and, during the Roman Empire, Hispania Taraconensis in the northeast, Hispania
Baetica in the south (roughly corresponding to Andalucia), and Lusitania in the southwest
(corresponding to modern Portugal).
Hispania supplied Rome with food, olive oil, wine and metal. The emperors Trajan, Hadrian,
Marcus Aurelius and Theodosius I, the philosopher Seneca and the poets Martial, Quintilian and
Lucan were born in Spain. The Spanish Bishops held the Council at Elvira in 306. The collapse
of the Western Roman empire did not lead to the same wholesale destruction of Western
classical society as happened in areas like Britain, Gaul and Germania Inferior during the Dark
Ages, even if the institutions, infrastructure and economy did suffer considerable degradation.
Spain's present languages, its religion, and the basis of its laws originate from this period. The
centuries of uninterrupted Roman rule and settlement left a deep and enduring imprint upon the
culture of Spain.
Visigothic Hispania (5th–8th centuries)
See also: Kingdom of Toledo
After the decline of the Roman Empire, Germanic tribes invaded the former empire. Several
turned sedentary and created successor-kingdoms to the Romans in various parts of Europe.
Iberia was taken over by the Visigoths after 410.
Visigothic kingdom by 500 CE, before the incorporation of the kingdom of the Suevi.
In the Iberian peninsula, as elsewhere, the Empire fell not with a bang but with a whimper.
Rather than there being any convenient date for the "fall of the Roman Empire" there was a
progressive "de-Romanization" of the Western Roman Empire in Hispania and a weakening of
central authority, throughout the 3rd, 4th and 5th centuries. At the same time, there was a process
of "Romanization" of the Germanic and Hunnic tribes settled on both sides of the limes (the
fortified frontier of the Empire along the Rhine and Danube rivers). The Visigoths, for example,
were converted to Arian Christianity around 360, even before they were pushed into imperial
territory by the expansion of the Huns. In the winter of 406, taking advantage of the frozen
Rhine, the (Germanic) Vandals and Sueves, and the (Sarmatian) Alans invaded the empire in
force. Three years later they crossed the Pyrenees into Iberia and divided the Western parts,
roughly corresponding to modern Portugal and western Spain as far as Madrid, between them.
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Al-Andalus and Reconquista (8th–15th centuries)
Main articles: Al-Andalus and Umayyad conquest of Hispania
By 711 Arabs and Berbers had converted to
an industrial city and it is a municipality in
Islam, which by the 8th century dominated
north-central Spain, upon the Rio Pisuerga
all the north of Africa. A raiding party led
and within the Ribera del Duero region. It is
by Tariq ibn-Ziyad was sent to intervene in a
the capital of the province of Valladolid and
civil war in the Visigothic kingdoms in
of the autonomous community of Castile
Iberia. Crossing the Strait of Gibraltar, it
and Leon, therefore is part of the historical
won a decisive victory in the summer of 711
region of Castile. The name "Valladolid" is
when the Visigothic king Roderic was
linked with the Arabic name for the city ‫دلب‬
defeated and killed on July 19 at the Battle
fo ytiC ehT gninaem ‫ال ول يد‬Al- Walid The
of Guadalete. Tariq's commander, Musa bin
rulers of Al-Andalus were granted the rank
Nusair quickly crossed with substantial
of Emir by the Umayyad CaliphAl-Walid I
reinforcements, and by 718 the Muslims
in Damascus. After the Umayyads were
dominated most of the peninsula. The
overthrown by the Abbasids, some of their
advance into Europe was stopped by the
remaining leaders escaped to Spain under
Franks under Charles Martel at the Battle of
the leadership of Abd-ar-rahman I who
Poitiers in 732.
challenged the Abbasids by declaring
Cordoba an independent emirate. AlAndalus was rife with internal conflict
Caliph Al-Walid I paid great attention to the
between the Arab Umayyad rulers and the
expansion of an organized military, building
Visigoth-Roman Christian population.
the strongest navy in Ummayad era, it was
this tactic that supported the ultimate
expansion to Spain. His reign is considered
as the apex of Islamic power. Valladolid is
Limits of the Kingdom of Castile and Kingdom of Aragon in 1210.
In the 10th century Abd-ar-rahman III declared the Caliphate of Cordoba, effectively breaking all
ties with the Egyptian and Syrian caliphs. The Caliphate was mostly concerned with maintaining
its power base in North Africa, but these possessions eventually dwindled to the Ceuta province.
Meanwhile, a slow but steady migration of Christian subjects to the northern kingdoms was
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slowly increasing the power of the northern kingdoms. Even so, Al-Andalus remained vastly
superior to all the northern kingdoms combined in population, economy, culture and military
might, and internal conflict between the Christian kingdoms contributed to keep them relatively
harmless.
Muslim interest in the peninsula returned in force around the year 1000 when Al-Mansur (also
known as Almanzor), sacked Barcelona (985). Under his son, other Christian cities were
subjected to numerous raids.[1] After his son's death, the caliphate plunged into a civil war and
splintered into the so-called "Taifa Kingdoms". The Taifa kings competed against each other not
only in war, but also in the protection of the arts, and culture enjoyed a brief upswing. The Taifa
kingdoms lost ground to the Christian realms in the north and, after the loss of Toledo in 1085,
the Muslim rulers reluctantly invited the Almoravides, 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 Almohad invasion, who were defeated in the decisive battle of Las Navas
de Tolosa in 1212.
The Almohads, who had taken control of the Almoravids' Maghribi and Andalusian territories by
1147, far surpassed the Almoravides in fundamentalist outlook, and they treated the dhimmis
harshly. Faced with the choice of either death or conversion, many Jews and Christians
emigrated.[2] By the mid-13th century Granada was the only independent Muslim realm in Spain,
which would last until 1492.
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