A Short History of the Moors

PBS: Monday 6 November at 7.25pm

For almost eight centuries after their conquest of the Iberian peninsula, its North African invaders ruled over Granada. It would become Moorish Spain’s last outpost, finally surren- dered to Catholic monarchs Ferdinand and Isabella in 1492.

This great Islamic civilisation would leave an impressive architectural legacy. Granada’s spec- tacular palace and fortress complex, the Alhambra, once a self-contained city, remains one of Spain’s key tourist attractions. In its time ornately decorated, defaced, altered, rebuilt, neglected, rediscovered and studied, it tells its own eventful story.

This programme explores the Moors’ extensive contribution to the history of the region, and the dynasties that built an empire during the long era between the defeat of the Visigothsand the subsequent dark days of the Spanish Inquisition.