The 'Reconquista': a contested idea

La Reconquista

c. 718–1492. Between the eighth century and 1492 the Christian kingdoms of the north gradually took over the lands of al-Andalus.

What happened

Between the eighth century and 1492 the Christian kingdoms of the north gradually took over the lands of al-Andalus. Spanish tradition calls this the Reconquista, 'the reconquest'. The word itself is modern: medieval and early-modern writers spoke of the 'loss and restoration of Spain', and 'reconquista' first appears in José Ortiz y Sanz's history of 1796, spreading widely only from the 1840s as a nationalist and Catholic reading of the Middle Ages. Historians today disagree about whether to keep the term. Some defend it as a real medieval ideology of recovering Visigothic Spain; others argue it hides a far messier story of alliances across religious lines, Christian kings paying tribute to taifas or fighting each other, and conquest driven by land and plunder as much as faith.

Events along the way

• between 718 and 722: Pelayo at Covadonga
• 25 May 1085: Alfonso VI takes Toledo
• 17 June 1094: El Cid takes Valencia
• 16 July 1212: The Battle of Las Navas de Tolosa
• between 1236 and 1248: Valencia and Seville fall to the Christian kings
• 2 January 1492: The fall of Granada

Sources

1. La Batalla de Covadonga en México. Imaginarios en torno a la Reconquista (1889-1900) – M. del Mar Gutiérrez Domínguez — Estudios de Historia Moderna y Contemporánea de México 51 (2016), UNAM
2. De la Restauración a la Reconquista: la construcción de un mito nacional – Martín F. Ríos Saloma — En la España Medieval 28 (2005), Universidad Complutense
3. Reconquista — World History Encyclopedia
4. La reconquista. Una construcción historiográfica (siglos XVI-XIX), cap. II – Martín F. Ríos Saloma — UNAM Instituto de Investigaciones Históricas / Marcial Pons (2011)