Moors

I

Introduction

Moors, various Muslim peoples of northern African ancestry whose dominance in Spain in the Middle Ages made a lasting contribution to European culture.

II

Origins

The word Moors derived originally from the Latin Mauri, the inhabitants of the ancient province of Mauretania in what is now northern Morocco and western Algeria. In Spanish this became Moros, the name given to the Arabs and Berbers who invaded Spain from North Africa in 711, and to their descendants, the Muslim population of al-Andalus (Muslim Spain). When the last Muslims were expelled from Spain in 1492, Moros survived in the diminutive form (Moriscos) for those who had accepted conversion to Christianity, until they too were expelled in 1610.

As “Moors”, Moros passed into English in the later Middle Ages with the variable meaning of Spanish and Moroccan Muslims and black Africans, whence the term blackamoor and William Shakespeare’s play Othello, the Moor of Venice. By the 19th century it was used historically for the Muslims of Spain, and as the name of their descendants in North Africa; by the early 20th century it was used for all Moroccans. Moors was also a name for the Muslim nomads of the western Sahara and the western Sudan, whence the name Mauritania for the modern country. With the sole meaning of “Muslim” it found its way east to the Muslims of Sri Lanka and as Moros to those of the Philippines.

III

Conquest of Spain

The history of the Moors in Spain begins with the native Christian population, largely converted to Islam following the Arab conquest of the peninsula (as far as the Cantabrian Mountains and the Pyrenees) from 711 to 715. There followed a period of immigration and settlement by Arabs and Berbers between 711 and 755 and the establishment of an Islamic state under the Spanish Umayyad dynasty that lasted from 755 to 1031. Over these 300 years, although Spanish continued to be spoken, Arabic became the dominant language of a wealthy and cultured society with an Islamic structure and a strong sense of its own identity in the country it called al-Andalus.

The cultural identity of al-Andalus was defined by a three-way relationship: with the home of Islam in the Middle East; with Muslim North Africa; and with the Christian kingdoms in the north of the peninsula. To the Middle East it felt inferior, but as the representative of its civilization in the far West, it felt much superior to the uncivilized Berber tribes of North Africa and, of course, the “barbarian infidels” to the north. While the Umayyads at Córdoba were strong, they dominated both of these neighbouring peoples, but when their caliphate collapsed in the 11th century, al-Andalus and its inhabitants were caught between the two. Córdoba with its splendid mosque ceased to be the capital, and al-Andalus became a land of city-states, of which the most important was Seville.

The arts and sciences flourished at their princely courts, not least that of gardening with the techniques of botany and irrigation that had transformed the agriculture of the country. Militarily, however, these states were no match for the Christian kingdoms. Toledo fell to Castile in 1085, Saragossa to Aragón in 1118, and Lisbon to Portugal in 1147, confining al-Andalus to the southern half of the peninsula.

IV

Reconquista

For over a century, however, the Christian advance was held up by invaders from North Africa: Berber tribesmen from the Sahara and the High Atlas mountains of Morocco, who had been turned into conquerors by the summons to holy war. These were the Almoravids (1086-1147) and the Almohads (1147-1228), who incorporated what remained of al-Andalus into a North African empire ruled from Marrakesh. Under the Almohads, al-Andalus produced the last great generation of Muslim and Jewish philosophers, but its people were now dependent on their North African rulers for their protection.

The shattering defeat of the Almohads by the combined armies of the Christian kingdoms at Las Navas de Tolosa in 1212 opened the way to the Christian conquest of most of the country by Portugal, Castile, and Aragón between 1230 and 1250. Only Granada then remained as an independent Muslim state under the rule of the Nasrid dynasty. But in the 15th century it too came under attack. The union of Aragón and Castile through the marriage of Ferdinand and Isabella created the kingdom of Spain in 1479. Their determination to create a Christian nation through the expulsion of all Muslims and Jews brought about the conquest of Granada in 1492, and the exile of its last ruler Abu Abdullah (Boabdil in Spanish) and his people to North Africa. Muslims who remained were obliged to convert to Christianity. Driven to rebellion, however, these Moriscos were themselves expelled in 1610.