The Muslims of the Iberian Peninsula, who ruled Spain between 711 and 1492 C.E., are commonly known as the Moors. They called their land Andalus which in the early period of their history also included Portugal and southern France and in the last period only the Kingdom of Granada. The word Andalusia is derived from the Arabic word Al-Andalus which has several meanings. One of them is ‘to become green after a long summer or drought,’ and the history of the Iberian Peninsula over the ages attests to this phase when Muslims ruled Spain.
During the Middle Ages, Moor was a common term to refer to the Muslims of Islamic Iberian Peninsula and North Africa, who were of Arab and Berber descent. They inhabited the Iberian Peninsula after the Arab conquests of the Rashidun and Umayyad Caliphates. The conquests influenced southern migration of the indigenous Moors to modern-day Mauritania, Western Sahara and other West African countries as far south as the Senegal River.[citation needed]
At the beginning of the eighth century, Moorish soldiers crossed over from Morocco into Spain, Portugal, France, and Italy where their swift victories became legendary. To the early Christians of Europe there was no question about the ethnicity of the Moors, and numerous sources support the view that the Moors were dark-skinned people. For example, Morien is the legend of a heroic Moorish knight supposed to have lived during the days of King Arthur. He is described as "all black: his head, his body, and his hands were all black." In the French epic Song of Roland, the Moors are described as "blacker than ink".
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