Christian Reconquest

Reconquista
A battle of the Reconquista from the Cantigas de Santa Maria
Date AD 722 (718) – 1492 Location Iberian peninsula Result All Iberian Muslim territories reclaimed by Catholic Monarchs Alhambra Decree
Belligerents
Kingdom of Asturias Kingdom of Galicia Kingdom of León Kingdom of Castile Kingdom of Navarre Kingdom of Aragon Kingdom of Portugal	Umayyad Caliphate Emirate of Córdoba Caliphate of Córdoba Almoravid Empire Almohad Caliphate Marinid Empire Emirate of Granada Various taifas

The Reconquista (Spanish and Portuguese for the "reconquest") is a name used to describe the period in the history of the Iberian Peninsula of about 780 years between the Umayyad conquest of Hispania in 711 and the fall of the Nasrid kingdom of Granada to the expanding Christian kingdoms in 1492. The completed Reconquista was the context of the Spanish voyages of discovery and conquest (Colón got royal support in Granada in 1492, months after its conquest), and the Americas—the "New World"—ushered in the era of the Spanish and Portuguese colonial empires. Since the mid-19th century, the idea of a 'reconquest' took hold in Spain associated with its rising nationalism and colonialism.

Western historians have marked the beginning of the Reconquista with the Battle of Covadonga (718 or 722), one of the first victories by Christian military forces since the 711 Islamic conquest of Iberia by the Umayyad Caliphate. In that small battle, a group led by the nobleman Pelagius defeated a caliphate's army in the mountains of northern Iberia and re-established the independent Christian Kingdom of Asturias.

Traditional historiography has stressed since the 19th century the existence of the Reconquista, a continuous phenomenon by which the Christian Iberian kingdoms opposed and conquered the Muslim kingdoms, understood as a common enemy who had militarily seized territory from native Iberian Christians. Some contemporary authors consider it proved that the process of Christian state-building in Iberia was indeed often defined by the reclamation of lands that had been lost to the Moors in generations past. In this way, state-building might be characterised –at least in ideological, if not practical, terms– as a process by which Iberian states were being 'rebuilt'.

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