June–December 1491
Forces Engaged
Castillian: Unknown. Commander: King Ferdinand.
Moorish: Unknown. Commander: King Muhammed XI (Abu Abdullah, Boabdil).
Importance
Ferdinand’s successful siege brought to an end Moorish control over Spain, ending a conflict that had lasted almost 700 years.
Historical Setting
The Iberian Peninsula has long been the site of conflict as well as a source of warriors. Iberian mercenaries composed the bulk of the Carthaginian army, and, after Rome defeated Carthage and occupied the peninsula in the wake of the Second Punic War (late third century b.c.), it drew on the population there as well. Roman culture dominated what came to be called Spain until the fourth century a.d., when the Romans were defeated by the invading Vandals, who moved on through to North Africa. Then the Visigoths took over after their long wanderings from Scandinavia through Europe. Those barbarian invasions infused even more warrior blood into the population. Over time, however, even warrior societies begin to soften and the Visigoths fell prey to the power of Islam in the early eighth century.
Moslem forces spreading their religion moved westward from Arabia in the late seventh century, conquering everything from Syria to Morocco. In 711, Moslem troops crossed the Straits of Gibraltar into Spain and soon conquered the peninsula. They would have used that as merely a base for further expansion but for a major defeat in 732 at Tours, at the hands of Frankish forces under the command of Charles Martel, forebear of Charlemagne. That battle determined that the Pyrenees would mark the border between western Islam and Christian Europe, but the two religions could never leave each other alone. The Moslems settled into Spain: troops originating in Arabia settled into the fertile eastern regions of modern Andalusia and Aragon, Syrian forces occupied the southern region of Granada, North African Berbers were granted lands in the central hill country, and mercenaries grabbed whatever land was left.
In the far northern provinces along the Bay of Biscay, a few Christian fortress holdouts remained independent. Over time, the two sides entered into a tenuous peace. After the caliphate that had been established at Cordova in the eighth century collapsed in the tenth, there was enough dissension between the Moslem provinces that no unified effort was launched at the Christians. Except for the occasional holy war declared by fundamentalists like the Almohads or Almoravids in North Africa, the Moslems, or Moors as they were called in Spain, became less warlike. The fervor aroused by the Christian Crusades, starting at the end of the eleventh century, created the opposite effect among the Christians. Indeed, some of the motivation for the Catholic Church’s call for a war against the Moslems in the Holy Land grew from successes scored by Christian forces in Spain.
The Christians took the offensive under leaders such as Rodrigo de Vivar, known to history by his nickname El Cid (from the Arabic Al Sayyid, meaning chieftain), and King Alphonso VIII of Castile. These men, for their own gain or for their faith, began picking off the Moorish provinces one by one, until in the late 1400s only the southern province of Granada remained in Moslem hands. The city of Granada was the capital of the province of the same name, and it was targeted for conquest by Ferdinand II, king of the recently united Christian provinces of Aragon, Castille, and Leon. He and his wife Isabella of Castille formed a formidable team, and together they were determined that they would unify Spain into a completely Catholic country, this movement taking the name of Reconquista, the reconquest. In the summer of 1491, Ferdinand and Isabella’s army marched up to Granada, home of the famous Alhambra Palace, to begin the siege of the final Moslem stronghold.
On the other side, the Moslems were led by King Muhammad XI, born Abu Abdullah, but better known to the Spanish as Boabdil. His father, Abu Hassan, had submitted to the demand from Ferdinand to pay an annual tribute to maintain peace, but in 1478 reneged on the pledge. Occupied with a war against Portugal, Ferdinand was unable to turn his attention to this matter until 1481. Thus, Abu Hassan had had 3 years to recruit troops and allies in North Africa and he was ready for war. He struck the first blow, attacking and pillaging the town of Zahara at the end of December. Ferdinand’s main commander, the marquis of Cadiz, responded by capturing the fortress at Alhama, near the city of Granada. He held the city against Abu Hassan’s recapture attempt, and the Moors retreated to Granada. There Abu Hassan was deposed by his son Boabdil, and he retired with some supporters to Malaga.
This created two factions in the Moorish ranks, with only their fear of Christian expansion in common.
Boabdil’s forces were commanded by his father-in-law, Ibrahim Ali Atar, a 90-year-old soldier. Through 1482, he gave Ferdinand all he could handle until he was killed in battle at Sierra de Rute, after which Boabdil fell into Ferdinand’s hands. Boabdil was released on the stipulation that he would pay tribute and surrender hostages, including his own son. That resulted in a 2-year truce, but also in increased hostility against him in the Moorish community. Abu Hassan was not about to follow his son’s lead, and he continued his war with the Christians, but upon getting sick was succeeded by his brother Muhammad ibn Sa’ad, known as al-Zagal. Al-Zagal rallied the faithful and continued the conflict, to which Ferdinand replied by instituting a campaign of talas, an offensive scorched-earth policy designed to deny al-Zagal any resources. By 1485, the Christians had spit the province of Granada in two. Boabdil was sent to reacquire the capital city from his uncle al-Zagal, but instead the two joined together.
Ferdinand attacked his erstwhile ally at Loxa, and a major battle and then siege ensued. When the city finally fell after an intense bombardment, Boabdil was once again Ferdinand’s prisoner. The war continued against al-Zagal, however, while Boabdil reestablished his throne in the city of Granada. In 1489, Ferdinand was able to occupy most of the remaining Moorish strongholds and force the surrender of al-Zagal; that resulted in Boabdil requesting negotiations to determine a long-lasting settlement between Christian and Moor. For some reason, Boabdil broke off the talks in the summer of 1490 and went on the offensive, which brought about Ferdinand’s siege of the capital.
The city of Granada is built on two hills, one crowned by the Alhambra, the other by the Alcazaba fortress. Between is a small valley through which runs the Darro River, and the city is built between the heights. A wall surrounded it, as was typical of the day, reportedly surmounted by a thousand towers. Ferdinand’s troops surrounded the city, while he established his headquarters in the nearby village of Atqa.
The Battle
After a time of relatively passive siege, the two forces met in July 1491 in the wake of an exchange of insults. In the midst of a sally against the Spanish, a Moorish soldier had flung his spear toward the king’s pavilion. That night, a number of Spanish troops snuck into the city and attached a copy of the Ave Maria, a prayer, to the door of a mosque. The following day, the same Moor who had thrown the spear, named Yarfe, rode his horse in front of the Spanish lines with the Ave Maria tied to its tail. This last incident took place during a visit to the front by Queen Isabella, who was escorted to a point near the city by a large force of cavalry and heavy infantry under the command of the marquis of Cadiz, Don Rodrigo Ponce de Leon. The Moors had opened the gates and deployed troops in response, but Isabella forbade her troops to engage, as she merely wanted to view the city and not be the cause of anyone’s death. When, however, Yarfe desecrated the Ave Maria, Ferdinand acceded to the wish of one of his soldiers to engage in single combat.
The two armored knights fought on horseback and then on foot until, after an even struggle, the Spanish knight prevailed. During the combat, both armies had observed the rules of chivalry and refrained from interfering, but, once their champion was dead, the Moors attacked. Unable to maintain his queen’s wish against fighting in the face of this onslaught, the marquis committed his troops. Artillery fired from the fortress at the Spanish, but their heavy cavalry broke the assault, and the Moors began to retreat behind the city walls, leaving behind 2,000 casualties.
In the wake of this victory, the Spanish suffered a disaster. That night, a candle in Queen Isabella’s tent caught some curtains on fire, and the result was a conflagration that burned down most of the Spanish camp. The following morning, to prove to the Moors that he was not really broken, Ferdinand paraded his troops before the city walls. Boabdil responded by sending his troops out of the gates into battle. A large number of skirmishes ensued until finally the Spanish gained the upper hand and the Moors once again retreated into the city. For the next 3 months, the Moors looked down on the Christian camp as it was rebuilt into a small, permanent town that came to be called Santa Fe. They watched and starved.
Results
In September, Boabdil called for negotiations and was presented with a list of demands, the Capitulations. It was extremely fair. There was to be no retribution against the inhabitants, and freedom of worship was guaranteed, as were locally elected magistrates and protection of Islamic culture. Those citizens that did not wish to remain in a Christian-ruled country were free to emigrate to North Africa, a trip for which Ferdinand’s government would pay. That settlement was reached on 25 November 1491, but not scheduled to go into effect for another 2 months. When a small group opposed to the surrender began agitating for resistance, Baobdil asked for the transfer date to be moved forward. Thus, Ferdinand received the keys to the city from Baobdil’s hand on 1 January 1492.
With the occupation of the city of Granada, the Reconquista was finished after a struggle of almost 800 years. Spain entered into a new era, both for herself and the world. Ferdinand’s previous consolidation of the kingdoms of Spain under one monarch began the process of creating a nation, and, once this was a fact after 1492, a spirit of nationalism grew in Spain. That meant, regrettably, a spirit of intolerance for things not Spanish, and the promises that Ferdinand made to Baobdil and the Moors were soon forgotten. The aggressive Catholicism for which Spain became famous began in earnest, and both Moors and Jews suffered persecution, exile, and death. It is possible that such an expulsion of non-Christians solidified Spanish culture as well as population.
Spain’s new nationalism was perfectly timed and placed. Located between the Atlantic and Mediterranean, Spain was positioned to take advantage of trade possibilities in both. Its neighbor Portugal had recently been exploring possible alternatives to overland trade with the Far East via the Arabs and Turks by exploring maritime routes around Africa. Spain’s monarchs had an almost immediate opportunity to establish an alternate route themselves with the timely appeal of Christopher Columbus for ships to discover a western pathway to the Far East. The profits potential involved in bypassing Moslem dealers was a driving consideration, but so was the religious aspect. Rumors of Far Eastern Christian realms had long been extant in Europe. If they could be recruited to cooperate with European Christians, then a pincer attack on the Middle East could conceivably crush Islam and recover the Holy Land for Christianity. A combination of expanding wealth and religion was too much for Ferdinand and Isabella to forego. A divided Spain struggling with the Moors could never have engaged in such a project; a united Spain accepted the challenge and was victorious, establishing an international empire that resulted in immense wealth and power for Spain in Europe.
That empire, although incredibly profitable for Spain, resulted in the destruction of native civilizations in the Western Hemisphere. The conquistadors, the warrior class in Spain that had carried on the struggle against Islam for centuries, found themselves with little to do in Spain after the fall of Granada. Rather than have them idle about Spain, Ferdinand commissioned many of them to take their talents to the New World, and the resulting conquest enriched both warrior and king while causing the deaths of millions, primarily via European diseases. When or if a Moslem administration in Iberia would have undertaken such a venture, had Ferdinand not been successful, is impossible to surmise. As it was, Christianity and European values entrenched themselves in the Americas. A Moslem Spain engaging in similar explorations would certainly have been just as aggressive in spreading its faith to the New World as were the Spanish Catholics. The effects of a Moslem culture in that part of the world at that time would certainly have altered the entire world significantly.
References: Castlewitz, Donald. “Siege Forces a Kingdom,” Military History 12(2), June 1995; Fernandez-Armesto, Felipe. Ferdinand and Isabella. New York: Taplinger, 1975; Fuller, J. F. C. A Military History of the Western World, vol. 1. New York: Funk & Wagnalls, 1954; Harvey, L. P. Islamic Spain, 1250 to 1500. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1990; Hillgarth, J. N. The Spanish Kingdoms, 1250–1516. Oxford, UK: Clarendon Press, 1976–1978.
