January 25, 750 C.E. The fate of the Umayyad Dynasty was sealed on the banks of the Great Zāb as the victorious Abbasids chased survivors of the hitherto invincible rulers of Damascus, exterminating them to a man but for one notable exception.
ʿAbdel-Raḥmān I (ad-Dāẖil, or Ṣaqr Qurayš) managed to escape the massacre. He ended up in the Iberian Peninsula in 755 C.E., where he proceeded to conquer a kingdom for himself and his descendants, thereby duplicating—and surpassing—the exploits of the Barcids all the way back in the 3rd century B.C.E.
Whatever their shortcomings, the Umayyads were Syrians, loved Syria, and promoted its welfare. They ruled an immense empire and were constantly combating foreign foes while suppressing "domestic" rebellions in Ḥiǧāz, Iraq, H̱urāsān, and elsewhere. They constructed the Great Mosque of Damascus and the beautiful Dome of the Rock in Jerusalem, among other architectural marvels. Syria has never forgotten its caliphate and has unsurprisingly cherished the distant Spanish branch of its beloved rulers and, by extension, the entire Eldorado that was Andalusia. The Arab conquerors of Spain would have their names bestowed on Syrian schools and Damascene quarters; even the national Tobacco Company would market brands named after Alhambra and Granada.
Reality is, however, less romantic. Whatever was the origin of those “Arab Conquistadors,” it was a matter of time before they would acquire the identity of their adopted land. It took me less than eight years from my arrival to the USA in 1985 to become a US citizen in word as well as in deed, whereas my kids are literally Native Americans. One could, of course, argue that the situation was dramatically different in the Dark Ages, as the concept of “nation” was nonexistent, but I would nevertheless maintain that the accumulation of years and miles is bound to have the ultimate say on creating a new identity, all the more so in an age when the means of communication were precarious and travel was downright dangerous. Conclusion? The “Arabs” of Spain were as Spaniards as anyone else, if not in the first generation, then certainly in the numerous generations that spanned hundreds of years since the original conquest; alas, neither East nor West seems to have seriously entertained what should be as elementary as ABC.
So what should we call those 8th-century newcomers to Spain? Were they Syrians? The answer would most certainly be no, though to be sure some of them were. They were not Arabs either, for quite a few of them, including Ṭāriq ibn Zīād, were Berbers from North Africa. They were not “Saracens,” since many came from “al-Maġrib.” Closer to reality would be that they were Muslims, but one should keep in mind that when Catholicism reclaimed Spain, its adherents evicted (or exterminated)—in addition to Iberian Muslims—not only the Jews but also the Moriscos (that is, the Spanish Muslims who converted to Christianity in the vain hope of earning toleration). Very well, let’s call them—by default—the way Catholic Spain did: the Moors, a term loosely—and contemptuously—employed to describe “others” who looked darker, adopted (or were suspected to adopt) a different faith, and whose ancestors came from “somewhere else in the Southeast.”
History as taught in modern Syrian schools maintains that the Arabs presence in Andalusia lasted almost eight centuries, starting when Ṭāriq crossed Gibraltar in 711 C.E. and ending with the fall of Granada in 1492. While there is some truth in this narrative, it is so imprecise as to be misleading.
For Andalusia, for all practical purposes, did not fall towards the end of the 15th century, but rather in the middle of the 13th. Abu al-Baqāʿ ar-Randī, whose beautiful ode poignantly mourned the fall of his beloved Utopia, died in 1285, more than 200 years before the fall of Granada. The protracted conflict that pitted Europeans versus Moors began shortly after Ṭāriq brought the Visigothic Kingdom to an end and his successors raided Southern Gaul before they were repulsed at Poitiers by Charles Martel. Charlemagne, the first Holy Roman Emperor, continued the struggle, and it seems neither he nor the Abbasid Hārūn ar-Rašīd had scruples about joining efforts against their common Umayyad enemy in Spain, their religious differences notwithstanding.
For more than two centuries, the Moorish presence in Spain was not just secure but prosperous and bountiful. The Umayyad Caliphate rivaled its Abbasid and Fatimid counterparts in wealth and prestige, while the European North languished in the Dark Ages throughout the 9th and 10th centuries. The end of the beginning was when the Córdoba Umayyads followed their Damascene ancestors into oblivion early in the 11th century to be replaced by the “Mulūk aṭ-Ṭawāʾf,” petty principalities warring among themselves and often enlisting the aid of their “Spanish” enemies against each other. To be sure, the Moorish cities hosted a brilliant civilization despite their political decline, bound sooner or later to translate into economic decline even were we to exclude outside predators.
Toledo fell in 1085, never to be recovered. The Andalusian Moors reacted by calling on their North African brethren, who mounted a credible counterattack, first under the Almoravids (who defeated Alfonso VI) and secondly under the Almohads (followers of Ibn Tumart). The struggle lasted about 150 years before the Moors were decisively defeated in 1212 at the Battle of Las Navas de Tolosa. One great city after another fell to the Reconquista: Córdoba in 1236, Seville in 1248, etc. By 1252 only the Kingdom of Granada remained, protected by its mountainous terrain and a heavy tribute paid by its king to his Castilian overlord. Granada went so far as to help Castile conquer Seville along with other Moorish strongholds.
Granada was thus capable of enjoying a long Indian summer during which Moorish culture and architecture flowered as seldom before. Refugees from the Spanish Reconquista flocked into the tiny kingdom that thrived on the trade of the Western Mediterranean, at least till the geographic discoveries of the 15th century started to bypass that sea altogether. Insulated from reality in their gardens and palaces, the hedonistic Naṣrid rulers seemed to have forgotten that Andalusia was virtually no more. To them, ar-Randī was a distant memory, if they remembered him at all.
Old habits die hard. Muhammad XII “Boabdil,” the last king of Granada, was incapable of comprehending—let alone facing—the imminent danger that the united Kingdoms of Aragon and Castile represented. The Naṣrids continued the Moorish tradition of internecine fighting inaugurated in the eleventh century by “Mulūk aṭ-Ṭawāʾf,” including a Faustian deal every now and then, with their covetous Northern neighbors. Granada finally succumbed to the inevitable and surrendered to the triumphant Crusaders on January 2nd, 1492. The curtain descended on this tragedy with the immortal words of Boabdil’s mother, reproaching him for weeping like a woman for a lost kingdom he could not defend as a man.
Post-mortem analysis is easy. Perhaps Andalusia was bound to fall in a fanatical age when victors offered no quarter. It also is true that the “Spaniards” quarreled among each other just as Muslims did and were no less ready to call on outside help when push came to shove. The fall of Constantinople—first to the Crusaders in 1204 and secondly to the Ottomans in 1453—clearly illustrates the universality of this phenomenon, namely seeking the help of your natural enemies for the sake of temporary gains at the expense of your kinsfolk.
Corrupted from within and devoured from without, Andalusia imploded by the middle of the 13th century, and its surviving remnant finally crumbled in 1492. Let’s keep beloved Syria in our thoughts.
