Jews and Muslims were forced to convert to Catholicism and the latter were eventually expelled from Castile and Aragon. That same year, Christopher Columbus arrived in the New World on behalf of the Catholic Monarchs, whose dynastic union of the Crown of Castile and the Crown of Aragon is usually considered the emergent Spain as a unified country. Over the next seven centuries, an intermittent southward expansion of these kingdoms-metahistorically framed as a reconquest, or Reconquista-culminated with the Christian seizure of the last Muslim polity in the peninsula, the Nasrid Kingdom of Granada in 1492. Several Christian kingdoms emerged in Northern Iberia, chief among them León, Castile, Aragón, Portugal, and Navarre. During this period, Al-Andalus became a major economic and intellectual centre, with the city of Córdoba being among the largest and richest in Europe. In the early eighth century, the Visigothic Kingdom was invaded by the Umayyad Caliphate, ushering in over 700 years of Muslim rule in Southern Iberia. Eventually, the Visigothic Kingdom emerged as the dominant power in the peninsula by the fifth century. During this period, the peninsula was ruled by the likes of the Suevi, Alans, Vandals and Visigoths, while part of the Mediterranean Coast belonged to the Byzantine Empire. Hispania remained under Roman rule until the collapse of the Western Roman Empire in the fifth century, which ushered in Germanic tribal confederations from Northern and Central Europe. Hispania was also the birthplace of Roman emperors such as Trajan or Hadrian. The Romans left a long-lasting legacy that included their language, religion, laws and political and social institutions. The Romans had driven the Carthaginians out of the Iberian peninsula by 206 BCE, and divided it into two administrative provinces, Hispania Ulterior and Hispania Citerior. From the year 218 BCE, the Roman colonization of Hispania began and, with the exception of the Atlantic cornice, they quickly controlled the territory of present-day Spain. Later, foreign Mediterranean peoples such as the Phoenicians and ancient Greeks developed coastal trading colonies, and the Carthaginians briefly controlled part of the Spanish Mediterranean coastline. The first cultures and peoples that developed in current Spanish territory were Pre-Roman peoples such as the ancient Iberians, Celts, Celtiberians, Vascones, and Turdetani. Spain's capital and largest city is Madrid other major urban areas include Barcelona, Valencia, Seville, Zaragoza, Málaga, Murcia, Palma de Mallorca, Las Palmas de Gran Canaria and Bilbao.Īnatomically modern humans first arrived in the Iberian Peninsula around 42,000 years ago. With a population exceeding 47.4 million, Spain is the sixth-most populous country in Europe, and the fourth-most populous country in the European Union. With an area of 505,990 km 2 (195,360 sq mi), Spain is the largest country in Southern Europe, the second-largest country in Western Europe and the European Union, and the fourth-largest country by area on the European continent. The country's mainland is bordered to the south by Gibraltar to the south and east by the Mediterranean Sea to the north by France, Andorra and the Bay of Biscay and to the west by Portugal and the Atlantic Ocean. The largest part of Spain is situated on the Iberian Peninsula its territory also includes the Canary Islands in the Atlantic Ocean, the Balearic Islands in the Mediterranean Sea, the autonomous cities of Ceuta and Melilla, as well as several minor overseas territories also scattered along the Moroccan coast of the Alboran Sea. Spain (Spanish: España, ( listen)) or the Kingdom of Spain ( Reino de España), is a country in Southwestern Europe with parts of territory in the Atlantic Ocean and across the Mediterranean Sea.
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