For some years after their conquest of Spain the Moors held it as a dependency of the prov ince of North Africa; but it was afterward (717) governed by emirs appointed by the ca liphs of Damascus. The policy of the Spanish emirs was to extend the Moorish dominion be yond the Pyrenees into Gaul, and the 40 years of their rule was marked by much bloodshed and anarchy, consequent on their disregard of internal affairs. About the year 756 Abd er Rhaman I, the last caliph of the dynasty of the Ommiades, having been driven from Damascus, where he was replaced by the Abassides, suc ceeded in overthrowing the government of the latter in Spain and established the independent caliphate of Cordova, which under Abd er Rha man III and his son Hakkem II, who died in 976, reached its zenith of power and prosperity. After the deposition of Hescham III the cali phate rapidly declined, for when that event took place the various governors of provinces de clared themselves independent and assumed the title of kings. Thus Arabian princes reigned at Saragossa, Toledo, Valencia and Seville, where not only the language but also the manners of the Moors at that time prevailed almost univer sally. Still the free exercise of their religion was allowed to the Christians, and also the re tention of their language, laws and magistrates.
Meantime the Visigoths, who had succeeded in maintaining their independence in the moun tains of Asturia and Galicia, founded under Pelayo in 718 the kingdom of Oviedo. The sec ond successor of Pelayo, Alfonso I the Catho lic, conquered Galicia, with a part of Leon and Castile, and assumed the title of king of the Asturias. The remainder of Leon was con quered by Alfonso III, whose son, Ordofio II, transferred his residence to the city of Leon, and called his dominion the kingdom of Leon (914). The kingdom of Navarre came into existence in the 9th century. It formed a part of the Spanish territory of Charlemagne, ob tained by conquest from the Arabs, and extend ing south of the Pyrenees as far as the Ebro. Near the sources of the Ebro and Pisuarga arose even earlier the kingdom of Castile. At first a small republic, consisting of only a few towns, it appears afterward as a country with a considerably enlarged territory, and somewhat later its princes assumed the title of king. In 1037, after the death of the last king of Leon, Ferdinand I of Castile united that kingdom with his own and Castile was henceforth the most powerful Spanish state. Aragon, Galicia, Portugal, Murcia and other states owed their origin to the prevailing custom of dividing a kingdom among the sons of a deceased mon arch. Though frequently at war with each other the Christian princes generally united against their common foe, the Moors, who were daily becoming less able to cope with them. About the end of the 11th century Mohammed of Cor dova and Seville applied for assistance' against Alfonso VI of Leon and Castile to the Almorav ides, the founders of the empire of Morocco. In compliance with the request of Mohammed the Almoravides entered Spain and gained some successes over Alfonso; hut they then turned upon Mohammed himself, obliging him to yield them a portion of his territory, and the Almo ravide sovereign was ultimately acknowledged sole monarch of Mohammedan Spain. The Al moravides, however, were overpowered in their turn by another Mohammedan tribe, the Almo hades, about the middle of the 12th century. Meanwhile the Christian kings were making still further encroachments on the territory in possession of the Mohammedans, and after the great victory they obtained over the Almohades on the plains of Tolosa, in the Sierra Morena, in 1212, there remained to the Arabians only the kingdoms of Cordova and Granada, and even these were soon afterward obliged to rec ognize the supremacy of Castile. The two most important Christian states of Spain were Ara gon and Castile, and they ultimately absorbed all the others. Aragon, which had been wrested from the Moors by Sancho III and left as an independent kingdom to his son Ramiio, fell by inheritance in 1131 to the counts of Catalonia and was afterward greatly enlarged under suc cessive kings. Jayme I wrested from the Mos lems the island of Majorca in 1229, and the whole of the kingdom of Valencia in 1239. Pedro III married Constance of Sicily, and not withstanding the opposition of the Pope took possession of that island after the massacre of Sicilian Vespers (see SICILIAN VESPERS) in 1282. Jayme II effected the conquest of Sar dinia in 1326, and Alfonso V united Naples with his kingdom. Meanwhile the internal affairs of the kingdom had been thrown into confusion through civil dissension resulting from the heavy imposts laid upon the people; but a rem edy was found in increasing the power of the Cortes. Aragon was the first Christian state in which the third estate obtained a legal position. The Cortes, consisting of representatives of the nobility, of the clergy and of the towns, re ceived more extensive privileges, and the king could not act in important matters without their consent. On the extinction of the Catalonian line of princes, Ferdinand, infante of Castile, was elected king by the Cortes in 1412, and his descendants ruled over Aragon until, through the marriage of Ferdinand V of Aragon with Isabella of Castile, Christian Spain was consoli dated into one kingdom. Ferdinand I, second son of Sancho, was the first king of Castile in 1033, and as already mentioned joined the king dom of Leon to the crown of Castile. He waged successful war with the Moors, took sev eral towns and exacted tribute from the Mo hammedan king of Toledo. It is to this reign that the greater number of the exploits of the famous Rodriguez Diaz de Bivar, known under the name of Cid, belongs; and according to Viardot the establishment of the Cortes dates from the same reign. Under Alfonso VI Cas tile acquired an accession of importance through the annexation to it of the crowns of Leon (which had become again disunited), Galicia and Navarre, and above all through the con quest of Toledo and its territory, out of which was formed New Castile. Notwithstanding the success of its arms the country suffered much. Oppressed by taxes and desolated by war it was far from being in a prosperous condition. Un
der Ferdinand III, who ascended the throne in 1217, Cordova, Jaen, Alcala, Seville, Cadiz and other places were wrested from the infidels; and again tinder his successor, Alfonso X (1252-80), further conquests were made, though some losses were also sustained. To the latter prince is due the introduction of the third estate into the national assemblies, and the adoption of the vernacular for public acts. Alfonso XI (1324 50), like his predecessors, spent most of his time in warring with the Moors; he gained in 1340 the celebrated battle of Salados and made himself master of Algesiras in 1344. In 1465 Henry IV was deposed by his turbulent vassals and the crown given to Isabella, whose marriage with Ferdinand of Aragon in 1469 led to such important results. The marriage of these two sovereigns did not lead immediately to a com plete coalescence of the two kingdoms, for they retained the separate administration of their re spective dominions. But in concert with their great minister, Cardinal Ximenes, they pro ceeded harmoniously with the work of fusing all the states of Spain, which still differed in religion, customs and laws, into a political and ecclesiastical unity, at the same time seeking to strengthen the royal authority at the expense of the clergy, the aristocracy and the towns. By a severe administration of justice, and by the in stitution of the Santa Hermandad, or Holy Brotherhood— a body of about 2,000 police armed and mounted for the purpose not only of putting down the robberies and violence which everywhere abounded, but also of form ing a check on the power of the nobility— order was established throughout the country. The royal power was moreover strengthened and extended by the establishment of the In quisition (q.v.). Warfare also was carried on by Ferdinand against the Moors of Granada, which, undertaken in 1481, culminated 10 years later in the reduction of the capital of that kingdom, which surrendered to Ferdinand 25 Nov. 1491. With the fall of Granada fell the Moslem empire in Spain, after having existed nearly seven centuries and a half, and Spain, with the exception of Navarre, was now con solidated into one great kingdom. An order was issued, 30 March 1492, for the expulsion of all Jews who did not submit to he baptized, whereupon nearly the whole race, rather than sacrifice their religion to their worldly interests, left the country. In this sentence of banish ment the Moors were also included and the departure of the industrious Jews and Moors proved a fatal blow to the flourishing com merce of the country, which was further af fected by the discovery of America by Colum bus in 1492, this being the means of withdraw ing much of the activity of the nation from the improvement of the mother-country. While Spain consummated its complete political con solidation at home by the conquest of Navarre, the conquest of Naples by Gonsalvo, and still more the occupation of large portions of North, Central and South America by Spanish generals, soon raised the new kingdom to the front rank of European powers. Ferdinand was succeeded in 1516 by his grandson, Charles I (Charles V of Germany), who permanently united Castile and Aragon. (See CHARLES V) At the begin ning of his reign serious insurrections broke Out in Valencia and Castile, where the people dt ',landed a more liberal constitution ; but they were soon quelled and resulted in the abolition of the principal rights of the towns, the restric tion of the powers of the Cortes and a stronger attachment of the clergy and nobility to the Crown. The victory of the Spaniards at Pavia 24 Feb. 1525, which made Francis I the prisoner of Charles, and the expedition against Tunis and Algiers, extended the fame of the Spanish arms throughout Europe. But these wars to gether with those carried on against the Prot estants of Germany, against the people of Ghent in the Netherlands and against Pope Clement VII in Italy, exhausted the revenues of the country. The immense wealth that flowed in from Mexico, conquered by Cortes in 1518, and from Peru and Chile, conquered by Pizarro and Almagro in 1531, was not sufficient to supply the demands of the royal treasury, and though the taxes were largely increased a heavy debt had to be contracted. With the reign of Philip II (1_55), the son of Charles, the great monaFffiyJ3i n to decline. Oppression and re ligious intolerance, war and insurrections, occa sioned the loss of the Netherlands and depopu lated the rest of the monarchy; and the con quest of Portugal, which remained united with Spain from 1581 to 1640, could not prevent its decay. England and Holland triumphed over the naval force of Spain and destroyed her commerce; and Philip died in 1598 a bankrupt. This calamitous period was nevertheless the golden age of literature and art in Spain and the Spanish language and fashions controlled the courts of Europe. Under the reign of the indolent and incapable Philip III (1598-1621) the country took still greater strides toward decay. The Duke of Lerma, his insatiable favorite, in order to augment his own fortune and that of his partisans, squandered in a most scandalous manner the public revenues; and he struck another blow at the commerce of the country by expelling, in 1609, the last remnants of the Moriscos, to the number of 600,000. Equally damaging to the interests of the coun try was the reign of Philip IV (1621-65), not withstanding some energetic measures taken by Olivarez, the able minister of that monarch. The wars which were carried on in Germany, Italy, the Netherlands and France — the war with the last-named country ending in the loss to Spain of Roussillon — helped to complete the ruin of the country and stirred up revolts in Catalonia, Andalusia and Portugal. The civil war in Catalonia lasted about 10 years and in 1640 Portugal recovered her independence. The son of Philip IV, Charles II (1665-1700), a prince weak alike in mind and body, was obliged, after disastrous wars, to cede to France many places in the Netherlands and Franche Comte. The population of Spain, which had amounted to 11,000,000 in 1688, fell off to about 8,000,000 at the beginning of the 18th century.