Tariq ibn Ziyad Lands at Gibraltar: The Moorish Conquest of Spain Begins
A single mountain of rock in North Africa swallowed an army and spat them out into Europe. Tariq ibn-Ziyad didn't just land; he burned his own ships to ensure his men had nowhere to run but forward. The Visigothic King Roderic, confident in his power, met this desperate force at the Guadalete River and lost everything, including his life. For seven centuries, the Iberian Peninsula became a bridge of science, art, and faith between worlds that thought they were enemies. We still walk through streets named for kings who never ruled it, speaking words borrowed from a language we barely speak anymore.
April 29, 711
1315 years ago
Key Figures & Places
What Else Happened on April 29
l’empereur Constantin Ier fait adopter une loi pénalisant la bâtardise.
conquête musulmane de la péninsule Ibérique par laquelle les troupes du gouverneur de Tanger Tariq ibn Ziyad prennent pied en Hispanie.
The basilica of San Paolo Fuori le Mura cracked open while Rome slept in 801, shaking the Central Apennines hard enough to rattle Spoleto too. It wasn't just st…
Byzantine Emperor Alexius I crushed the Pecheneg army at the Battle of Levounion, ending their threat to Constantinople. By annihilating the nomadic force with …
A Lithuanian cavalry charge at the Vikhra River crushed Smolensk's hopes in minutes. Prince Vasily's army, outnumbered and outmaneuvered by Algirdas's son, didn…
bataille de la rivière Vikhra (en). La principauté de Smolensk est écrasée par les Lituaniens et devient le vassal du Grand Duché.
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