The Peninsular War
- Date
- 1808–1814
- Category
- Military & conflict
- Region
- Iberian Peninsula (Spain and Portugal)
- Era
- Modern
- Significance
The Peninsular War erupted in 1808 after French armies, having transited Spain to occupy Portugal in 1807, turned on their Spanish ally and Napoleon installed his brother Joseph on the Spanish throne.
Popular uprisings, beginning with the Madrid revolt of 2 May 1808, spread across the Iberian Peninsula and drew Britain into a sustained land campaign alongside Spanish and Portuguese forces, eventually led by Arthur Wellesley, the future Duke of Wellington. The conflict is celebrated as one of the first wars of national liberation and for the large-scale guerrilla warfare that gave the very word 'guerrilla' its modern meaning, with irregular bands bleeding the occupying armies through ambush and attrition. The fighting tied down hundreds of thousands of French troops in a draining 'Spanish ulcer' until the Allies drove the French back over the Pyrenees in 1814. Beyond Europe, the crisis of legitimacy in occupied Spain triggered the independence movements that would dismantle Spain's American empire.
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Empires active in 1808–1814
- Russian Empire1721 CE – 1917 CE
- British Empire1583 CE – 1997 CE
- Qing Dynasty1636 CE – 1912 CE
- Spanish Empire1492 CE – 1976 CE
- Portuguese Empire1415 CE – 1999 CE
- Mughal Empire1526 CE – 1857 CE
Related military & conflict events
- Haiti declares independence after a successful slave revolution1 January 1804
- Napoleon's invasion of RussiaJune–December 1812
- Battle of Waterloo18 June 1815
- First Opium War and the Treaty of Nanking1839–1842 (Treaty of Nanking, 29 August 1842)
- The Taiping Rebellion1850–1864
- American Civil War and the abolition of slavery1861–1865 (Emancipation Proclamation 1 January 1863; 13th Amendment ratified 6 December 1865)
Further reading
The wider story
Conquerors: How Portugal Forged the First Global Empire
Fast-paced narrative of Portugal's seaborne empire.
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