subject: The history of the Balearics [print this page] things to do in spain things to do in spain
The people continued to live in their villages around the, and the innocence of the Romans on building seems to have been small. You can see that, at some sites, the conquerors merely reinforced the prehistoric wals, though they did found the towns of Palmaria (Palma) and Polenta (near present-day Alcudia). By contrast, the Spanish mainland was one of Rome's most important provinces. In the fifth century, as the Empire crumbled, tribes called 'barbarians' by the Romans poured into Spain. Goths were followed by Vandals, in their turn pursued by Visigoths, who established themselves more permanently. The Vandals crossed to North Africa and there became a seapower to be reckoned with. They occupied the Balearics until defeated by a Byzantine expedition sent from Constantinople in 534.
Ignited in the Arabian peninsula by the teachings of the Prophet Muhammad, the faith of Islam spread like wildfire, with its armies reaching the Atlantic coast of Morocco by the year 683. Muslim converts in North Africa included the warlike, nomadic Berbers, or, as they became known, the Moors. They were determined to carry their new religion into Europe, and in 711 a predominantly Moorish army under the Arab general Tarik landed near the peninsula known from then on as the Rock of Tarik (Gibel Tarik or Gibraltar). Within just seven years almost all of Spain was in Moorish hands.
The great Muslim world, from Baghdad to the Pyrenees, soon broke into fragments, and the Spanish part became an independent caliphate, with its capital at Cordoba. Under tolerant rulers the city rapidly became one of Europe's greatest centers of scholarship and the arts. At first the caliphs were content to accept tribute from the Balearics, without imposing Islam, but by 848 disturbances in the islands moved them to deploy their newly expanded navy to bring the region into line.
By the 11th century, the caliphate in its turn had splintered into a mosaic of fractious statelets 26 at one point. During the confusion, Muslim governors, including those on the Balearics, ruled as independent monarchs until waves of zealots came from Morocco to enforce greater unity in the face of Christian resurgence.
