When the Umayyad Caliphate conquered most of Iberia, tiny Christian holdouts survived in the northern mountains.
Over the next two centuries, these kingdoms of Leon, Castile, Navarre and Aragon gradually expanded south, reclaiming territory and pushed Muslim rule out of Europe.
By 1212, the battle of Las Navas se Tolosa shattered the last great Muslim power in Iberia, making a decisive turning point in the Reconquista.
Posted by RatioScripta
23 Comments
What follows is ethnic cleansing and genocide.
Fascinating how centuries of shifting borders and small mountain strongholds turned into a complete reshaping of the peninsula. Maps like this really show how long and complex the Reconquista actually was.
This is a fun series of maps, but I wish there were one from earlier; the Reconquista had already made quite a bit of progress by 910.
For example, here’s map of Iberia in 750: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Spain#/media/File:Map_Iberian_Peninsula_750-en.svg](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Spain#/media/File:Map_Iberian_Peninsula_750-en.svg) .
this map gives me serious GOT vibes😂 I mean, c’mon! It’s like watching the Starks reclaiming the North all over again
They’re coming. I can sense it.
Kind of odd that Grenada managed to survive for nearly 3 centuries more…..
were there borders between the emirates?
Once day I want to make an inverse map where all the Christian states are one colour and all the Islamic polities marked out in different colours. The implicit bias of maps like this is that all the Islamic Iberian states were a homogenous mass.
Technically all the Christian Spanish states were all vassals of the Pope so it would not even be technically incorrect.
At least this map makes some effort to label the differences- I’ve seen ones which literally just label the whole southern region as ‘Moorish’ throughout the entire epoch.
Kingdom of Aragon???
Sign me TF up!
Edit: I do know it’s *Aragorn* in LOTR but idgaf it’s close enough for me lol
Last map is wrong. Mallorca Valencia Murcia and the Guadalquivir were conquered in the 1230-40s
It’s the Moops!
Should have started from 750 to show how much they really achieved from being a small sliver of territory to taking over the entire Iberia Peninsula
Bad naming, Kingdoom of Aragon in this map was called Crown of Aragon, the Kingdoom of Aragon was only a part of it
I find it interesting that I never really hear the reconquista in the context of the crusades, because it’s basically the same thing.
Christian kingdoms around the 12th century looking to take back formerly christian lands that had been ruled by muslims for centuries at that point. Just that it was more successful long term than the holy land crusades.
One of the most successful decolonisations in history
Apart from the problematic and mostly outdated concept of Reconquista itself, the 1150 and 1212 maps are wrong, the name of the realm is Crown of Aragon, not Kingdom of Aragon, which was one of the components of this composite monarchy, alongside Catalonia, Valencia and Mallorca.
The best comeback ever
If granada could hold on for 50 years, an ottoman alliance would save from annihilation.
Adding the context that this wasn’t a centuries long religious war for a majority of the recnonquista, for long periods of time the Christian and Muslim kingdoms coexisted, perhaps not in peace but certainly a whole lot better than Christians and Muslims in other parts of the world, with frequent occurrences of marriages between religions and Christians allying Muslims to beat up other Christians and vice versa, you know, normal medieval statesmanship adapted for the region rather than a turbo crusade.
Spain was straight up one of the regions of best Christian – Muslim coexistence and it wasn’t until near the late stages that it become very aggressively a Christian conquest and expulsion of Non Christians
Bloody Castillians took the Basque provinces off of Navarra.. bored with fighting Moors no doubt
Not sure why it’s called the “reconquista”. By the time it took off, Iberia had been Muslim longer than it had been Christian.
> “Over the next two centuries, *THESE* kingdoms”
None of the León, Asturias, Castilla or Aragón kingdoms are linked to the visigothic kingdoms, from which the Umayyad originally took the lands. This whole rhetoric is false.
I like how mexicans are using the same tavric tp take Mexico back from USA