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Umayyad conquest of Hispania begins at Guadalete

711 CE·Military & conflict·Iberia (al-Andalus, Spain)·
711 CEDate
Military & conflictCategory
18Empires active
Date
711 CE
Category
Military & conflict
Region
Iberia (al-Andalus, Spain)
Era
Post-Classical / Medieval
Significance

In 711 CE a mainly Berber army under the commander Tariq ibn Ziyad, dispatched from North Africa by the Umayyad governor Musa ibn Nusayr, crossed the strait that now bears Tariq's name (Gibraltar, from Jabal Tariq) and invaded the Visigothic Kingdom of Hispania.

At the Battle of Guadalete that summer the Visigothic king Roderic was defeated and killed, shattering the kingdom's leadership and opening the Iberian Peninsula to rapid conquest. Within roughly seven years Muslim forces controlled most of Iberia, confining Christian resistance to small enclaves in the northern mountains of Asturias and the Basque country. The conquered territory became al-Andalus, a province of the Umayyad realm and later an independent emirate and caliphate, ushering in nearly eight centuries of a Muslim presence in the peninsula. Al-Andalus grew into one of medieval Europe's most prosperous and intellectually vibrant societies, a meeting point of Muslim, Christian and Jewish cultures whose libraries, philosophy, science and architecture would profoundly influence the wider Mediterranean world and help transmit classical and Arabic learning into Latin Christendom.

See the world map in 711 CE →More military & conflictThe Post-Classical / Medieval era

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Byzantium: The Surprising Life of a Medieval Empire

Judith Herrin

Vivid, thematic popular history by a top Byzantinist.

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