Hispania was divided into several Roman provinces, fully integrated into the Roman Empire.
It was an important economic and administrative region for the Roman Empire during the 2nd Century.

When Postumus broke away from Rome and formed the Gallic Empire in 260, Hispania declared its recognition of Postumus as Emperor.
Motivating factors being:
– threat of Germanic invasions at a time when the Roman Empire lacked military stability
– being closer to the new Gallic Empire geographically
– Loyalty to Postumus who had demonstrated military effectiveness in the past
However, in 269 after Postumus’s assassination Hispania re-aligned itself with the Roman Empire.

Christianity rose in Hispania as the Roman Empire embraced the religion in the 4th Century.

The Visigoths sacked Rome in 410, led by Alaric I.
They then entered Hispania between 415 and 418 and settled in the area.
The Visigothic Kingdom was formally established in 418 and their authority over Hispania grew.
Hispania was conciliated under the Visigoths under King Euric (466 – 484).

The Visigoths lost most of their Gaulic territories to the Franks in 507 and shifted their main leadership bases into Hispania.
King Reccared converted to Catholicism in 589 and religious unity was brought to the realm.

Muslim Umayyad forces invaded in 711, led by Tariq ibn Ziyad and the last Visigothic king, Roderic, was defeated at the at battle of Guadalete.
Th Umayyad’s established the first Muslim governorship in Iberia, with Abd al-Aziz ibn Musa appointed as governor and Seville acting as the administrative centre.
The Iberian Peninsula (modern day Spain and Portugal) was ruled from Damascus as a province of the Umayyad Caliphate.
Many Christians retreated to the Cantabrian Mountains after the Muslim conquest and The Kingdom of Asturias was formed in modern day León.

The Umayyad dynasty fell in the East in 750 and ‘Abd al-Rahman I, the last surviving Umayyad Prince fled to the Iberian Peninsula and established the Independent Emirate of Córdoba in 756.
Córdoba grew into a major political and cultural capital under ‘Abd’s rule.
Small Christian counties formed along the Pyrenees at the north of the peninsula in the late 800s.
In 910, the Asturian Kingdom became León and it’s centre shifted southwards towards the Islamic centre of the Iberian Peninsula.

In 929, ‘Abd al-Rahman III proclaimed himself Caliph and Córdoba became a Caliphate. The Caliphate of Córdoba became one of Europe’s most advanced societies, it was a global centre for science, philosophy, art and architecture. The Great Mosque of Córdoba was a symbol of the area’s cultural greatness.

Between 1000 – 1035 Sancho III of Navarre creates a Christian dominion with control/influence over Navarre, Aragon, Castile and parts of León. Although, following his death in 1035, the land fragmented, the kingdoms strengthened.
In 1031 the Córdoba Caliphate collapsed after many civil wars and fragmented into many independent Tifa kingdoms.
Christian kingdoms in the north all began to gain power. Castile, Leon, Navarre, Aregon and Barcelona.
The Tifa kingdoms were culturally lively with scholars, poets and architects hailed as important. Yet they competed with one another and felt increased pressure from the Christian kingdoms to the north, some of the kingdoms paying tribute to Christian monarchs in order to maintain autonomy.
Christian advances intensified and taifas called for help from the Almoravids a Berber Muslim, North African dynasty.
The Almoravids entered Iberia in the late 11th century and defeated Christian forces. They absorbed many taifa kingdoms and re-established centralised Muslim rule in the region.
The Almohads who were another Berber kingdom replaced the Almoravids in controlling the Iberia in the 12th century. They pulled the region under a more fundamentalist Islam rule and forced Christians and Jews to choose between death, conversion or emigration. Many Christians fled to the northern Christian regions, whilst Jewish communities fled to Provence, Sicily and North Africa

In 1212, Christian forces from Castile, Aragon, Navarre and Portugal defeated the Almohads at the Battle of Las Navas de Tolosa, weakening Almohad authority in Iberia.
Castile and Leon were united in 1230 under Ferdinand III of Castile.
As Almohad declined, Christian kingdoms advanced southwards.
– Castile captured Córdoba in 1236 and Seville in 1248
– Aragon incorporated the Valencia and Balearic Islands
By the late 13th century, Granada stood alone as the last independent Muslim kingdom in Iberia.

In 1469 Isabella I of Castile and Ferdinand II of Aragon married and united Castile and Aragon. The foundations for the modern Spanish state were laid.
Together they started the Spanish Inquisition in 1478 where Jewish and Muslim converts were targeted on suspicion of practicing their original faiths were tried, then tortured, imprisoned or executed.
The Granada War (1482 – 1492) took place between the Catholic rulers and Grenada the last Muslim stronghold. It ended in Muslim surrender.

The surrender of Grenada marked the consolidation of Spain under Catholic Monarchs, Isabella I of Castile and Ferdinand II of Aragon.
Christopher Columbus departed on his first voyage to find a westward route to Asia in 1492 he reached the Bahamas in 1492 and travelled back to the Americas three times more, insisting that he had reached Asia even until his death, despite being proven wrong by other voyagers.
In 1496, Joanna of Castile (daughter of Isabella I and Ferdinand II) married Philip the Handsome of the Habsburg dynasty.
Their son Charles ruled Spain, The Netherlands, Austria, Much of Italy, the Holy Roman Empire and the growing number of Spanish territories in the Americas.
Throughout the 1500s Spain expanded it’s global empire through the conquering and destruction of many major American civilisations.
Including the Aztecs (1521) and the Incas (1532-1533), vast amounts of gold and silver were collected on these brutal expeditions, funding further dominance in Europe under Charles I.
During and after expansion, Spain fought in wars against other European wars: The Italian wars against France (1494 – 1559), against the Dutch Republic in the Eighty Years War (1568 – 1648), against England and Protestant European states.
The Thirty Years War which ravaged Europe between 1618 and 1648 weakened Spanish power and their already straining finances waned.
By the late 1600s although it’s empire remained vast, Spain was diminished economically and militarily.

Charles II of Spain’s death in 1700 leaving no heir led to the end of the Spanish Habsburg dynasty.

Philip of Anjou (grandson of Louis XIV of France) declared himself King Philip V beginning the Bourbon dynasty.
This also sparked the War of Spanish Succession (1701 – 1714), as Austrian Habsburg Archduke Charles also lay his claim to Spain.
Supporters of each side battled through Europe until the Treat of Utrecht was signed. Philip V remained king of Spain, whilst European territories including Belgium, Milan, Naples, Sardinia, Gibraltar and Menorca were released by the Spanish.
During the 18th century the infrastructure of Spain was modernised and reformed under the Bourbons.

Napoleon invaded Spain in 1808, Charles IV and his son Ferdinand VII were forced to abdicate. Napoleon’s brother John Bonaparte was installed as king.
This kicked off the Peninsular War began in 1808 between a coalition of Spain, Portugal & Britain and the French, in the Iberian Peninsular.
The Spanish implemented guerrilla tactics (they originated in this war) and gradually weakened French forces.
Whilst war raged in Europe, Spanish colonies in the Americas began to revolt, most rebels claimed to be defending the usurped King Ferdinand VII.
Back in Europe the British defeated the French under the Duke of Wellington at the Battle of Victoria in 1813 and French control of Spain collapsed soon after.
Ferdinand VII was restored as king in 1814.
Spanish colonies in the Americans turned their interests to full autonomy and independence from Spain and by 1833 only Cuba and Puerto Rico remained under Spanish control.

After Ferdinand VII’s death in 1833, the Carlist Wars began over the deciding of his successor. Queen Isabella II or her uncle Carlos and his descendants. This caused mass political divide.
Queen Isabella was deposed in 1868.
In 1873 the First Spanish Republic was created and then dissolved a year later.
Alfonso XII (Isabella’s son) became king 1874 and the Bourbon monarchy was restored.

The Spanish-American war was fought in 1898 and ended with America taking control of Spain’s largest remaining colonies: Cuba, Puerto Rico, Guam and the Philippines.

Spain was politically unstable and economically fragile through the early 1900s and staid neutral through the first and second world wars.
In 1931 the monarchy was abolished and deep polarisation between the right and the left.
The Spanish Civil War took place between 1936 and 1939 between the Nationalists (conservatives, monarchists and fascists) with support from Hitler & Mussolini and the Republicans (socialists, communists and anarchists) backed by USSR.
The Nationalists won in 1939 and General Francisco Franco seized control.

Franco ruled Spain as an authoritarian state, banning political parties, supressing regional ideology and promoting Catholic nationalism.

Franco died in 1975 and Juan Carlos I was named king and his successor.
Under Juan’s rule Spain moved back to democracy. Joining NATO in 1982 and the EU in 1986. There was major modernisation of infrastructure.
The 2008 financial Crisis hit Spain hard and unemployment swelled.
Many regions vie for independence.