Reconquista in Iberia

[Ebusitanus]

I wonder how this game is going to touch the very peculiar aspect of the Muslim-Christian war in the Iberian Peninsula were the battle was a purely religious one (and sometimes not even that) as North and South of the Alandalus border the very same people lived but with just a diferent religion.
I hope this game does not commit the very common mistake of equaling Muslim with Moor (North African) when the 90% of Muslim Spain´s population was indeed nothing but the very same Hispano-Roman population that had converted to Islam after 711 (Muladies).

La Reconquista, the first big Spanish Civil war, brother against brother.

 

[Mettermrck]

I'll confess this has always been a 'gray' area for me, the Reconquista. After Charles Martel and Charlemagne, I know very little beyond El Cid and then even less until Granada in 1492.

When could you say the Reconquista truly began, and how did it start (the first conversion, battle, etc.)?

 

[unmerged(19211)]

but charlton heston was real cool in the movie...

 

[Ebusitanus]

Check this thread out: http://forum.paradoxplaza.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&threadid=101389

 

[Ebusitanus]

How will the Reconquista be portrayed in this new game? I would like to offer my assitance in any matter if needed so that we can get an acurate portrayal of this Iberian conflict and not some Hollywood flavoured version of Morrocans against Christians.

 

[Mettermrck]

Thanks, Eb, for the link. That's precisely the history I was looking for. I had some questions on the Christian kingdoms, particularly up in Leon, Aragon, etc. Did the Muslims control all of Iberia at one point?

What I mean is, did the Christian kingdoms form as splinters from the Muslim territory, or were they the remnants of the last uncontrolled territory in Iberia?

 

[Amadís de Gaula]

No, even in 720, there were some places in Spains not ruled my muslims. You can ask Txini about the place the Reconquista started...

"or were they the remnants of the last uncontrolled territory in Iberia?" this is it.

 

[Txini]

Originally posted by Amadís de Gaula
No, even in 720, there were some places in Spains not ruled my muslims. You can ask Txini about the place the Reconquista started...

"or were they the remnants of the last uncontrolled territory in Iberia?" this is it.

8th September 722, Pelayo King of the Asturs and Visigoths and his loyal men were prepared in Covadonga to defeat the infidel who tried to make them depose weapons, they tried diplomatically using one of the traitors as diplomatic, and after that the battle started a tiny Christian army whose weapons were the few things they were able to find in their cave, fought a bigger enemy army and defeated it indicating the start of the Reconquista, after that Pelayo and his succesors will fight the muslims and reaffirm his rule over their lands durin the next 770 years.

 

[Amadís de Gaula]

A good recent book about La Reconquista is "La cruzada del Sur" (The Crusade of the South) from J. A. Cebrian.

A big success in Spain but I suppose not traslated to many countries.

 

[Mettermrck]

Thanks, Txini, precisely what I wanted to know. So from that small kernel the whole eight centuries of warfare stemmed...fascinating. So how did Charlemagne fit into things? Was he merely an intrusive invader? As I recall, he ran into troubles at Saragossa, correct? (Trying to recall his high-school freshman European History class).

 

[Txini]

Originally posted by Mettermrck
Thanks, Txini, precisely what I wanted to know. So from that small kernel the whole eight centuries of warfare stemmed...fascinating. So how did Charlemagne fit into things? Was he merely an intrusive invader? As I recall, he ran into troubles at Saragossa, correct? (Trying to recall his high-school freshman European History class).

Charlemagne was no more than an intruder and was defeated by basques, when he was going back to actual France, in fact the lands he conquered achieved total indepence or decided not to follow French orders in no much time.

 

[Ebusitanus]

Despite much mythic past about the heroic battle of Covadonga we could easily say today that this epsiode, if it ever happened in reality, was nothing but a big overblown partisan ambush by some mountaineers to a rack tag Muslim raiding party.
Sure did the later bigger Christian Kingdoms need, much like ancient Rome, of some mythic and glorious past from where everything started, and this how Covadonga came to be. Much like when it was claimed that at the battle of Clavijo the very Saint James came to aid the Christian host on his white horse slaughtering muslims by the sackful.

Charlemagne os course took everything south of the Pirinees as "fair game" for expansion. There just was nothing there in the first place to claim ownership over Iberia who could have felt insulted by the Frank raid south.
Out of Charlemagne´s forays into Muslim Iberia we can thank him for creating, what he saw initially as just a "buffer area", in the "Marca Hispanica" what was to evolve in the years later into Katalonia and ultimately into the Kingdom of Aragon. It is true though that he got an ugly beating while moving back north froman expedition he took against the Muslim overlord of Zaragoza, when his rearguard was ambushed by some savage Basque mountaineer folks who slew Roldan, one of Charles´best men at Roncesvalles.

Let us not forget that people tend to look into all this episode of muslims in Iberia in avery simplistic way when it was indeed so much more complex than all that "Resistance" crap.
Remember that even after Martel´s victory over the muslim host in Poitiers, the mohamedans still ocuppied much of south france for the next 50 years.
We tend to think and judge this time with modern eyes of national boundaires and countries, terms that just did not have much meaning back then.

We talk about Christian Kingdoms in the North of Iberia like some bulkwarks against Muslim domination in the early years when much of their own existance came from the fact that the Caliphate just did not care about those small mountainous areas where the weather plainly sucked. It was just not worth their time to waste there taking them out.
It was this negligence that brought some centuries later their doom in Iberia, but who would have known?
The might of the united Iberian Caliphate was such that very seldomly did they even care to fight the Christians and when set to punish their robbery and looting raids into their borders, they had no problems in marching right in and destroying their pitiful mountain castles and cities (like at Santiago) where Al-Manzor even burned down the most holy of Iberian Churches and made the captive christians take the church tower bells on their backs all the way to his capitol in Cordoba to serve as flaming candle holders for the local mosque (this afront was paid back when some 400 years later Cordoba was captured by the Castilians).

Only internal fighting in the Caliphate allowed the lurking Christian holds in the north to begin to grown slowly, one town or village at a time. These growing "Kingdoms" took some time to begin to build a own personality or even grasp the concept of "reconquering" Iberia since at the begining they had no real legitimacy on their own. This slow process of justifying some "higher national goal" followed the process of almost every nation in Europe in search for some justification for Kingdom and a strategic holy objective.

It came to the point where the heavy infightings within the Caliphate made it simply crumble and give birth to a myriad of small to tiny "Taifa Kingdoms" who much like their still small Christian norther neigbors had also only the objective to survive as much as possible and perhaps grow at the expenses of some weaker neigbor, be it Christian or Muslim.
It was during these times that the Christian Kindoms really grew swallowing one of these small Muslim Kingdom one at a time by taking part in wars amongst them as allies of one or another, constantly eating away in bigger and bigger chuncks from the spoils of war. This time also marked fights amongst the very own Christian Kingdoms as they now did not have this horrible unifying fear from a Strong powerful Muslim empire.
This slow march south of these Christian Kingdoms during the next years made them grow significantly to the point where the remaining Taifa Kingdoms realitzed that this situation was bringing them their undoing. In an effort to stop the tide, the decadent and occidentalitzed Muslim Taifa Kings called for help from their less refined and more fanatic religious brothers across the Gibraltar Strait. First did the relgious fanatic Almoravids arrive to "help" the Taifas, and they did. They stopped the Christian adavnce cold and even got some land back. But once they realitzed that Iberia was a much nicer place to live than the arrid sand dunes of their morrocan homelands, they just took simply over and ruled totally.
After a while even these fanatics became decadent and were swept away by yet another religious zeal current from North Africa. namely the Almohads. These folks did actually some serious damage to the Christian Kingdoms and defeated them in some pitched battles.
This unified the Christians again who even got a Papal sanctioned Crussade to help out.
1212 marks the last time where the Muslims in Iberia had any real power to decide their future. Two mighty massive armies met at "las Navas de Tolosa" and fought it out to the complete anihilation of the muslim force.
After this time everything was over for the muslim might in Iberia and the rest of their holdings were picked apart in the comming years by the now powerful Christian Kingdoms. Cordoba was taken so as Sevilla and Cadiz in short order.

Granada was the last surviving muslim hold in Iberia all the way till 1492. This long survival after their main demise was only due to the fact that Granada accepted the status quo and turned vassal of Castille, paying every year royal ransoms in gold to mantain a nominal appearance of independence. All this stopped in 1492 when the last Muslim King was toppled.

 

[Txini]

Originally posted by Ebusitanus
Despite much mythic past about the heroic battle of Covadonga we could easily say today that this epsiode, if it ever happened in reality, was nothing but a big overblown partisan ambush by some mountaineers to a rack tag Muslim raiding party.
Sure did the later bigger Christian Kingdoms need, much like ancient Rome, of some mythic and glorious past from where everything started, and this how Covadonga came to be. Much like when it was claimed that at the battle of Clavijo the very Saint James came to aid the Christian host on his white horse slaughtering muslims by the sackful.

Well then I shall suppose that Christian and Muslim Reporters of the time were liers as they reported Chronichles of a battle that never existed, specially funny that the losers of the battle did a report of a battle they didn't fight.

Charlemagne os course took everything south of the Pirinees as "fair game" for expansion. There just was nothing there in the first place to claim ownership over Iberia who could have felt insulted by the Frank raid south.
Out of Charlemagne´s forays into Muslim Iberia we can thank him for creating, what he saw initially as just a "buffer area", in the "Marca Hispanica" what was to evolve in the years later into Katalonia and ultimately into the Kingdom of Aragon. It is true though that he got an ugly beating while moving back north froman expedition he took against the Muslim overlord of Zaragoza, when his rearguard was ambushed by some savage Basque mountaineer folks who slew Roldan, one of Charles´best men at Roncesvalles.

Once again so Frank defeat from Basques is true, but Covadonga a myth
Also we shall thank him because freeing the only northeners that weren't able to do by itself

Let us not forget that people tend to look into all this episode of muslims in Iberia in avery simplistic way when it was indeed so much more complex than all that "Resistance" crap.
Remember that even after Martel´s victory over the muslim host in Poitiers, the mohamedans still ocuppied much of south france for the next 50 years.
We tend to think and judge this time with modern eyes of national boundaires and countries, terms that just did not have much meaning back then.

Think Martel's succes was not to drive the muslim of France but stop them to continue their attack to Europe.

We talk about Christian Kingdoms in the North of Iberia like some bulkwarks against Muslim domination in the early years when much of their own existance came from the fact that the Caliphate just did not care about those small mountainous areas where the weather plainly sucked. It was just not worth their time to waste there taking them out.
It was this negligence that brought some centuries later their doom in Iberia, but who would have known?
The might of the united Iberian Caliphate was such that very seldomly did they even care to fight the Christians and when set to punish their robbery and looting raids into their borders, they had no problems in marching right in and destroying their pitiful mountain castles and cities (like at Santiago) where Al-Manzor even burned down the most holy of Iberian Churches and made the captive christians take the church tower bells on their backs all the way to his capitol in Cordoba to serve as flaming candle holders for the local mosque (this afront was paid back when some 400 years later Cordoba was captured by the Castilians).

The Northern Kingdoms were not so little undefendable kingdoms, they had some fighting traditions which served for years and in fact they like janissars when someone fall other took his place. And Almanzor, well as Almanzor Christian Kingdoms also had great commanders as for example El Cid, not only Muslims had.

Only internal fighting in the Caliphate allowed the lurking Christian holds in the north to begin to grown slowly, one town or village at a time. These growing "Kingdoms" took some time to begin to build a own personality or even grasp the concept of "reconquering" Iberia since at the begining they had no real legitimacy on their own. This slow process of justifying some "higher national goal" followed the process of almost every nation in Europe in search for some justification for Kingdom and a strategic holy objective.

Christian Kingdoms also had their internal strifes, not only Muslims did.

It came to the point where the heavy infightings within the Caliphate made it simply crumble and give birth to a myriad of small to tiny "Taifa Kingdoms" who much like their still small Christian norther neigbors had also only the objective to survive as much as possible and perhaps grow at the expenses of some weaker neigbor, be it Christian or Muslim.
It was during these times that the Christian Kindoms really grew swallowing one of these small Muslim Kingdom one at a time by taking part in wars amongst them as allies of one or another, constantly eating away in bigger and bigger chuncks from the spoils of war. This time also marked fights amongst the very own Christian Kingdoms as they now did not have this horrible unifying fear from a Strong powerful Muslim empire.
This slow march south of these Christian Kingdoms during the next years made them grow significantly to the point where the remaining Taifa Kingdoms realitzed that this situation was bringing them their undoing. In an effort to stop the tide, the decadent and occidentalitzed Muslim Taifa Kings called for help from their less refined and more fanatic religious brothers across the Gibraltar Strait. First did the relgious fanatic Almoravids arrive to "help" the Taifas, and they did. They stopped the Christian adavnce cold and even got some land back. But once they realitzed that Iberia was a much nicer place to live than the arrid sand dunes of their morrocan homelands, they just took simply over and ruled totally.
After a while even these fanatics became decadent and were swept away by yet another religious zeal current from North Africa. namely the Almohads. These folks did actually some serious damage to the Christian Kingdoms and defeated them in some pitched battles.
This unified the Christians again who even got a Papal sanctioned Crussade to help out.
1212 marks the last time where the Muslims in Iberia had any real power to decide their future. Two mighty massive armies met at "las Navas de Tolosa" and fought it out to the complete anihilation of the muslim force.
After this time everything was over for the muslim might in Iberia and the rest of their holdings were picked apart in the comming years by the now powerful Christian Kingdoms. Cordoba was taken so as Sevilla and Cadiz in short order.

Normally expansions are done that way, the Country with more power absorves the one with less, so give an idea that the little northern Christian were not so easy piece to defeat by the Great Muslim Caliphat.

Granada was the last surviving muslim hold in Iberia all the way till 1492. This long survival after their main demise was only due to the fact that Granada accepted the status quo and turned vassal of Castille, paying every year royal ransoms in gold to mantain a nominal appearance of independence. All this stopped in 1492 when the last Muslim King was toppled.

Also have to count that during this time the internal battle for Power in the Kingdoms were Great, apart from the battles in other wars outside Iberian Peninsule.

 

[Ebusitanus]

Originally posted by Txini
Well then I shall suppose that Christian and Muslim Reporters of the time were liers as they reported Chronichles of a battle that never existed, specially funny that the losers of the battle did a report of a battle they didn't fight.

I guess Txini it all depends upon what you call a "battle". I call Clavijo, Navas of Tolosa, Muret, Alarcos, battles...An ambush by stone throwing desperate men against a muslim column is not a "battle" in what I praise it. Furthermore those at Covadonga I very much doubt they were seeing themselves as the "resistance" against the muslim. Look into why the muslim column went there in the first place, they were hunting down a looting riding group, not fighting a Christian Army.

Once again so Frank defeat from Basques is true, but Covadonga a myth

I would like you to consider Charlemagne´s field army that he brought into Spain to fight the muslims at Zarragoza (a major city) something, a "tad" different then the few desperate men at Covadonga. You must have to agree that the whole Covadonga eppisode was taken out of proportion by the later Castillian Kings in order to seeks that mythic glorious past. Everyone has done it Txini.

Also we shall thank him because freeing the only northeners that weren't able to do by itself

Your refusal at seeing historic fact into the eyes wont make it less real. The Franks did create the "Hispanic Marque" that in later stages of history developed into an independent County and later into the Kingdom of Aragon. This was Charlemagne´s creation.
By the time Charlemagne was campaiging through north Spain there was no meaningful independent Iberian Christian power to oppose him or call him for help. Christians at that time were few, unorganized and hardly a menace for the Caliphate.

Think Martel's succes was not to drive the muslim of France but stop them to continue their attack to Europe.

There was not such a thing as a concept of "Europe" and Martel for sure did not strike out to "save" the west from Muslim domination but rather to stop a dangerous invasor, mcuh like he would have fought a Saxon raid or a Lombard raid. Its just with our modern eyes that we see and grasp the powerful meaning of what he did. Fact is that Martel did not go crussading down into South France to kick out the muslims but just stopped their raid. Muslim presence in Souther France survived over 50 years (50 years, thats a medieval full generation).

The Northern Kingdoms were not so little undefendable kingdoms,

These "Kingdoms" did not apear out of thin air Txini and grew bigger out of the sheer carelesness of the Caliphate not because they could smash the muslim armies. Not up until the Taifa Epoch did those "Kindoms" grow to the point of becoming respectable enemies of the muslims..and thats why they called the Almoravids in for help. The error of the Islamic empire in Iberia was to underestimate their less refined foes in the north till it was too late.

they had some fighting traditions which served for years and in fact they like janissars when someone fall other took his place.

Nobody claimed that Christian warriors were not a fearsome enemy. But in high politics and strategy the individual might of a knight or foot soldier is not that important.

And Almanzor, well as Almanzor Christian Kingdoms also had great commanders as for example El Cid, not only Muslims had.

Almanzor was the ruler of the Cordobese Caliphat, you can not even compare him to El Cid, someone who was more alike a Cortez or Pizarro, an adventurer who fought Christians as well as Muslims when the Taifa Kingdoms were there already in full force and muslim power was weak and not unified. Again, I´m not trying to say the Christian Kingdoms had no great men and warriors as they truly had, but in these matters of conquest, higher considerations have to be taken beyond the individual valor of some men.

Christian Kingdoms also had their internal strifes, not only Muslims did.

I believe I said so myself Txini. Its just a natural reaction to a threat. Christain Kingdoms began having time to fight each other as soon as the major enemy was weak and the strong enemy of their interests were actually another Christian. As soon as the Muslims united again under the Almoravids and Almohads those same Christian Kingdoms quickly joined again against the common threat. This is a very natural tendency actually.

Normally expansions are done that way, the Country with more power absorves the one with less, so give an idea that the little northern Christian were not so easy piece to defeat by the Great Muslim Caliphat.

I did not say otherwise Txini. The Caliphate had no interests into taking his control into an area that was so arid, primitive and with so few resources and that would have cost way to much manpower for it to be worth. The Romans themselves did not fancy to do much work in the Basque lands and only the gold brought them into Galicia (Gold that was gone by then). Keep in mind that these Christian Kingdoms did grow essecially because they realitzed that they could not live themselves in such a misserable land and they managed to grow meaningfully only when the Caliphate was crumbling through internal problems and not before. After that it was just too late eventhough the Almoravids and Almohads did try to reverse the fate without success.

Also have to count that during this time the internal battle for Power in the Kingdoms were Great, apart from the battles in other wars outside Iberian Peninsule.

Sure, once the Caliphate was no more, the Christian Kingdoms began to look for their interests everywhere. Problems with Portugal, problems with Navarra and the French, Aragonese expansion into south France, Problems due to the 100 year war in France, etc...But all this was when the muslims were no threat, not during the worse times.

 

[unmerged(345)]

well, fellow Iberians
out of pan-cantabric solidarity i have to say that the Roncesvalles' episody was not D-day, either.
those 'savages' D ) maybe in intelligence with the Banu qasi ambushed & stoned only the rear column of the Charlemagne's army (full of booty from pamplona and the Saragossa area)
the army, that though it looked impressive in its first crossing, was lower on morale after being baffled by locals and having raised the siege of saragossa and it was eager to get home.
of course this raid originated the chanson de Roland and all that so it got quite famous.
those 'vascones' kept on raiding expeditions and pilgrims crossing the Pyrinees well until the XIIth.

in general i do not see great contradictions between both views. the cantabric kingdoms were quite fiery but of course, they were regarded as small and poor from a cordoba's vantage point. only when they begain to repopulate the right bank of the duero these kingdoms/county became a real menace.

 

[Ebusitanus]

Originally posted by Alzate
well, fellow Iberians
out of pan-cantabric solidarity i have to say that the Roncesvalles' episody was not D-day, either.
those 'savages' D ) maybe in intelligence with the Banu qasi ambushed & stoned only the rear column of the Charlemagne's army (full of booty from pamplona and the Saragossa area)
the army, that though it looked impressive in its first crossing, was lower on morale after being baffled by locals and having raised the siege of saragossa and it was eager to get home.
of course this raid originated the chanson de Roland and all that so it got quite famous.
those 'vascones' kept on raiding expeditions and pilgrims crossing the Pyrinees well until the XIIth.

in general i do not see great contradictions between both views. the cantabric kingdoms were quite fiery but of course, they were regarded as small and poor from a cordoba's vantage point. only when they begain to repopulate the right bank of the duero these kingdoms/county became a real menace.

Quite right and I did not intend for Roncesvalles to look like Stalingrad but certainly the quality and numbers of troops involved and the chances taken where quite high compared to the Covadonga incident.

The whole issue gravitates basically around the very fact that without the inner collaspse of the Cordoba Caliphate its very uncertain if those very small Christian enclaves (I hestitate calling them really kingdoms at this point) would have grown much more beyond their rugged terrain strongholds beyond the Caliphate´s interest sphere.
Without the Taifa Kingdoms and it inner weakness to be exploited by the Christians not much would have changed so clearly.

Divide and Conquer, how so very true also in this case

 

[Ebusitanus]

Just going through the available info (not much) it does seem that the Campaign starts in 1066. This is indeed a pity regarding Iberia since at that time the Great Corbobese Caliphate (1031)had already crumbled and at this point muslim Iberia was just a big amount of little infighting "Taifa Kingdoms" waiting for the the Almoravids to show up around 1090 to press what was left from the avid Christian land grabs in that lull into a strong unified empire.
I wonder if this game will take all this in consideration.

 

[Amadís de Gaula]

Let´s hope so.

Let´s hope Almohades, Almorávides and Benimerines are not forgotten...

 

[unmerged(3440)]

1066 is not that bad. It also gives a lot of variety in Christian Spain, divided as it is in five kingdoms plus the Catalan Counties.

Edited PS: AFAIK, the game won't follow history the way EU does it, it will only provide a realistic starting point and then everything will happen 'ahistoricaly'. At least that's the way with leaders, I suppose it will be the same with the events.

 

[Ebusitanus]

I would REALLY like to see how the game will set the 1066 Islamic Iberia. I do hope and pray that in depth research has been done as to represent the reality of a VERY fractioned Islamic Iberia with a score of Taifa Kingdoms some led by Berbers, some by Arabs and others by Slavs. It would be sad to miss out the oportunity to show the Iberian Penninsula as a VERY rich gaming area in the dificult political and geo-strategic aspects of such a splintered reality amongst Christian Kingdoms and the miriad of Islamic Kingdoms.

Any clues?