Search

Since mid-nineteenth century, many Arabists and historians have referred to al-Andalus as a “Muslim Spain”. In the last decades, several scholars have criticized this histor iographic tradition, which th ey see as a Hispanization of al-Andalus resulting from late-nineteenth-century nationalism. Although partly accu rate, this criticism has oversh adowed the fact that the su ccess of the phrase “Muslim Spain” was not so much due to a Hispanization as to a de-Arabization of al-Andalus. Prior to the nineteenth cen- tury, Hispanizing al-Andalus was already a common historiographical practice: referring to the influence of the Iberian climate was enough to turn Arabs into Spaniards. The novelty of the last half of the nineteenth century was the triumph of racialism: national humors, until then attributed to geographical conditions, came to be understood as a product of biological inheritance. Thus, in order to continue Hispanizing al-Andalus, it was necessary to “demonstrate” (with the help of “scientific” anti-Semitism) that its inhabitants were not of “Arabian race”. And so “Arab Spain” became “Muslim Spain”.