Caliphate of Córdoba

The separation between the temporal power, held by Almanzor, and the spiritual, in the hands of Hisham as Caliph, increased the importance of military force, a symbol – along with the new majesty of the chamberlain's court, rival of that of the caliph himself – of the power of Almanzor, and an instrument to guarantee the payment of taxes.[19]

Almanzor successfully continued the military reforms begun by Al-Hakam[20] and his predecessors,[21] covering many aspects.[22] On one hand, he increased the professionalization of the regular army,[21] necessary both to guarantee his military power in the capital and to ensure the availability of forces for his numerous campaigns, one of the sources of his political legitimacy.[22] This policy de-emphasized levies and other non-professional troops, which he replaced with taxes used to support the professional troops—often saqalibas [21] or Maghrebis—which freed the natives of al-Andalus from military service.[23][22][24] Recruitment of saqalibas and Berbers was not new, but Almanzor expanded it.[21][25][26] On the other hand, he created new units, unlike the regular army of the Caliphate, that were faithful primarily to himself[25] and served to control the capital.[22] Emir Abd al-Rahman I had already used Berbers and saqalibas for a permanent army of forty thousand to end the conflicts that hitherto had plagued the emirate.[27] At the time of Emir Muhammad I, the army reached thirty-five to forty thousand combatants, half of them Syrian military contingents.[28] This massive hiring of mercenaries and slaves meant that, according to Christian chroniclers, "ordinarily the Saracen armies amount to 30, 40, 50, or 60,000 men, even when in serious occasions they reach 100, 160, 300 and even 600,000 fighters." [29] In fact, it has been argued that, in Almanzor's time, the Cordovan armies could muster six hundred thousand laborers and two hundred thousand horses "drawn from all provinces of the empire."[30]

Almanzor's troops, as represented in the Cantigas de Santa Maria. The chamberlain carried out wide-ranging military reforms.

In order to eliminate a possible threat to his power and to improve military efficiency, Almanzor abolished the system of tribal units[31][32][33] that had been in decline due to lack of Arabs and institution of pseudo-feudalism on the frontiers,[34] in which the different tribes each had their own commander and that had caused continuous clashes, and replaced it with mixed units[35] without clear loyalty under orders from Administration officials.[36] The nucleus of the new army, however, was formed increasingly by Maghrebi Berber forces.[24][26][34] The ethnic rivalries among Arabs, Berbers and Slavs within the Andalusian army were skillfully used by Almanzor to maintain his own power[26]—for example, by ordering that every unit of the army consist of diverse ethnic groups so that they would not unite against him;[37] and thus preventing the emergence of possible rivals.[38] However, once their centralizing figure disappeared, these units were one of the main causes of the 11th-century civil war called the Fitna of al-Andalus.[38] Berber forces were also joined by contingents of well-paid Christian mercenaries,[39] who formed the bulk of Almanzor's personal guard and participated in his campaigns in Christian territories.[40] Almanzor's completion of this reform, begun by his predecessors, fundamentally divided the population into two unequal groups: a large mass of civilian taxpayers and a small professional military caste, generally from outside the peninsula.[41]

The increase in military forces and their partial professionalization led to an increase in financial expenses to sustain them.[21] This represented an additional incentive to carry out campaigns, which produced loot and land with which to pay the troops.[40] These lands, when handed over to the soldiers as payment, were thereafter subject to tribute and ceased to operate under a system of border colonization.[42][43] The Caliphal army was funded by the taxpaying farmers in exchange for military exemptions, and consisted of local recruits as well as foreign mercenaries – Berber militias, Slav and Black slaves, mercenary Christian companies and jihadi volunteers.[44] At that time al-Andalus was known as Dar Jihad, or "country of jihad", and attracted many volunteers, and though these were relatively few compared to the total army, their zeal in combat more than compensated for this.[45]

According to modern studies, these mercenary contingents made it possible to increase the total size of the Caliphal army from thirty or fifty thousand troops in the time of Abd al-Rahman III to fifty or ninety thousand.[28][46][47] Others, like Évariste Lévi-Provençal, argue that the Cordoban armies in the field with the Almanzor were between thirty-five thousand and seventy or seventy-five thousand soldiers.[44][48] Contemporary figures are contradictory: some accounts claim that their armies numbered two hundred thousand horsemen and six hundred thousand foot soldiers, while others talk about twelve thousand horsemen, three thousand mounted Berbers and two thousand sūdān, African light infantry.[49] According to the chronicles, in the campaign that swept Astorga and León, Almanzor led twelve thousand African and five thousand Al Andalus horsemen, and forty thousand infantry.[30] It is also said that, in his last campaigns, he mobilized forty-six thousand horsemen, while another six hundred guarded the train, twenty-six thousand infantry, two hundred scouts or 'police' and one hundred and thirty drummers.[50] or that the garrison of Cordoba consisted of 10,500 horsemen and many others kept the northern border in dispersed detachments.[39] However, it is much more likely that the leader's armies, even in their most ambitious campaigns, may not have exceeded twenty thousand men.[39] It can be argued that until the eleventh century no Muslim army on campaign exceeded thirty thousand troops, while during the eighth century the trans-Pyrenean expeditions totaled ten thousand men and those carried out against Christians in the north of the peninsula were even smaller.[28]

In the time of Emir Al-Hakam I, a palatine guard of 3000 riders and 2000 infantry was created, all Slavic slaves.[51] This proportion between the two types of troops was maintained until Almanzor's reforms. The massive incorporation of North African horsemen relegated the infantry to sieges and fortress garrisons.[52] This reform led to entire tribes, particularly Berber riders, being moved to the peninsula.[53]

The main weapon of the peninsular campaigns, which required speed and surprise, was the light cavalry.[33] To try to counteract them, the Castilians created the role of "villain knights" – ennobling those free men who were willing to keep a horse to increase the mounted units – through the Fuero de Castrojeriz of 974.[33] For similar reasons, the Barcelonan count Borrell II created the figure of the homes of paratge- who obtained privileged military status by fighting against the Cordobans armed on horseback – after losing their capital in the fall of 985.[54] In contrast to the prominent role the navy had played in previous decades under Abd al-Rahman III,[55] under Almanzor it served only as a means of transporting ground troops,[56] such as between the Maghreb and the Iberian Peninsula, or Alcácer do Sal's ships in the campaign against Santiago de Compostela in 997.[56]

During this time, military industry flourished in factories around Córdoba.[45] It was said to be able to produce a thousand bows and twenty thousand arrows monthly,[45][47] and 1300 shields[45] and three thousand campaign stores annually.[45][47]

As for the fleet, its network of ports was reinforced with a new base in the Atlantic, in Alcácer do Sal, which protected the area of Coimbra, recovered in the 980s, and served as the origin of the units that participated in the campaign against Santiago.[42] On the Mediterranean shore, the naval defense was centered at the base of al-Mariya, now Almería.[57] The dockyards of the fleet had been built in Tortosa in 944.[58]

Initially the maritime defense of the Caliphate was led by Abd al-Rahman ibn Muhammad ibn Rumahis, a veteran admiral who had served Al-Hakam II and was Qadi of Elvira[59] and Pechina.[57] He repulsed raids by al-Magus (idolaters) or al-Urdumaniyun ('men of the north', vikings),[60] in the west of al-Andalus in mid-971;[61] at the end of that year, when they tried to invade Al Andalus,[62] the admiral left Almería and defeated them off the coast of Algarve.[63] In April 973, he transported the army of Ghalib from Algeciras[64] to subdue the rebellious tribes of the Maghreb and end Fatimid ambitions in that area.[65] As in 997, when the Al Andalus fleet hit the Galician coast, in 985 it had ravaged the Catalans.[66] During the Catalan campaign, Gausfred I, Count of Empurias and Roussillon, tried to gather an army to help the locals but then several flotillas of Berber pirates threatened their coasts, forcing them to stay to defend their lands.[67]

To ensure control of the military, Almanzor eliminated the main figures who could have opposed his reforms:[42] in addition to the death of Ghalib, the participation of the governor of Zaragoza in the plot of his eldest son served as a justification to replace him[68] with another, more amenable, member of the same clan, the Banu Tujib.[69][70] The admiral of the fleet,[71] who maintained a significant budget, was poisoned[72] in January 980[73] and replaced by a man faithful to Almanzor.[59][70]

As in the Army he encouraged the recruitment of Berbers faithful to him, so in the Administration he favored the saqalibas to the detriment of native officials, again with the aim of surrounding himself with personnel loyal only to him.[23]

Land transport routes were dotted with strongholds,[45] since ancient Al Andalus dignitaries sought to control communications.[74] Messengers were bought in Sudan and specially trained to handle Almanzor's messages and to transmit the official reports that his foreign ministries wrote about the annual campaigns.[74]

The Caliphate ruled by Almanzor was a rich and powerful state. According to Colmeiro, it is estimated that in a pre-industrial society, for every million inhabitants, ten thousand soldiers could be mustered. Even assuming the chronicles exaggerated tenfold the real numbers – these speak of eight hundred thousand soldiers – the caliphate could have had eight million inhabitants.[30] Those who use more bullish criteria estimate between seven[75] and ten[76] million, but the population was probably much fewer.[75][30] Traditionally speaking, around the year 1000, the caliphate occupied four hundred thousand square kilometers and was populated by three million souls.[77] By comparison, the Iberian Christian states comprised one hundred and sixty thousand square kilometers and half a million people.[78] By the 10th century, 75% of the population under the Umayyads had converted to Islam, a number reaching 80% two centuries later.[79] By comparison, at the time of the Muslim invasion, Spain had about four million inhabitants, although there is no shortage of historians who would raise that estimate to seven or eight million.[79]

His realm also had large cities like Córdoba, which surpassed one hundred thousand inhabitants; Toledo, Almería and Granada, which were around thirty thousand; and Zaragoza, Valencia and Málaga, all above fifteen thousand.[75] This contrasted sharply with the Christian north of the peninsula, which lacked large urban centers.[80]

Hisham II of Córdoba Dinar

The economy of the caliphate was diverse and successful, with trade predominating. Muslim trade routes connected al-Andalus with the outside world via the Mediterranean. Industries revitalized during the caliphate included textiles, ceramics, glassware, metalwork, and agriculture. The Arabs introduced crops such as rice, watermelon, banana, eggplant and hard wheat. Fields were irrigated with water wheels. Some of the most prominent merchants of the caliphate were Jews. Jewish merchants had extensive networks of trade that stretched the length of the Mediterranean Sea. Since there was no international banking system at the time, payments relied on a high level of trust, and this level of trust could only be cemented through personal or family bonds, such as marriage. Jews from al-Andalus, Cairo, and the Levant all intermarried across borders. Therefore, Jewish merchants in the caliphate had counterparts abroad that were willing to do business with them.[101]

Exterior of the Great Mosque

The caliphate had an ethnically, culturally, and religiously diverse society. A minority of ethnic Muslims of Arab descent occupied the priestly and ruling positions, another Muslim minority were primarily soldiers and muladi converts were found throughout society. Jews comprised about ten percent of the population: little more numerous than the Arabs and about equal in numbers to the Berbers. They were primarily involved in business and intellectual occupations. The Christian minority (Mozarabs) professed by and large the Visigothic rite. The Mozarabs were in a lower strata of society, heavily taxed with few civil rights and culturally influenced by the Muslims. Ethnic Arabs occupied the top of the social hierarchy; Muslims had a higher social standing than Jews, who had a higher social standing than Christians. Christians and Jews were considered dhimmis, required to pay jizya (a protection tax).[102]

Half of the population in Córdoba is reported to have been Muslim by the 10th century, with an increase to 70 percent by the 11th century. That was due less to local conversion than to Muslim immigration from the rest of the Iberian Peninsula and North Africa. Christians saw their status decline from their rule under the Visigoths, meanwhile the status of Jews improved during the Caliphate. While Jews were persecuted under the Visigoths, Jewish communities benefited from Umayyad rule by obtaining more freedom, affluence and a higher social standing.[101]

According to Thomas Glick, "Despite the withdrawal of substantial numbers during the drought and famine of the 750s, fresh Berber migration from North Africa was a constant feature of Andalusi history, increasing in tempo in the tenth century. Hispano-Romans who converted to Islam, numbering six or seven millions, comprised the majority of the population and also occupied the lowest rungs on the social ladder."[103][104] It is also estimated that the capital city held around 450,000 people, making it the second largest city in Europe at the time.[105]

• History of Islam
• History of Gibraltar
• History of Algeria
• History of Portugal
• History of Morocco
• History of Spain
• List of Sunni Muslim dynasties
• Martyrs of Córdoba
• Timeline of Septimania
• Umayyad conquest of Hispania

• Ambrosio, B.; Hernandez, C.; Noveletto, A.; Dugoujon, J. M.; Rodriguez, J. N.; Cuesta, P.; Fortes-Lima, C.; Caderon, R. (2010). "Searching the peopling of the Iberian Peninsula from the perspective of two Andalusian subpopulations: a study based on Y-chromosome haplogroups J and E". Collegium Antropologicum 34 (4): 1215–1228.
• Fletcher, Richard (2001). Moorish Spain (Hardcover ed.). Orion. ISBN 1-84212-605-9.
• Guichard, P. (1976). Al-Andalus: Estructura antropológica de una sociedad islámica en Occidente. Barcelona: Barral Editores. ISBN 8421120166