Nasrid dynasty

Nasrid dynasty بنو نصر
Parent house	Banu Khazraj
Country	Emirate of Granada (1232–1492)
Founded	1232; 794 years ago (1232)
Founder	Muhammad I of Granada
Final ruler	Muhammad XI of Granada
Titles	Sultan
Deposition	2 January 1492; 534 years ago (1492-01-02) (Treaty of Granada)

The Nasrid dynasty (Arabic: بنو نصر banū Naṣr or بنو الأحمر banū al-Aḥmar; Spanish: Nazarí) was an Arab dynasty that ruled the Emirate of Granada from 1232 to 1492. It was the last Muslim dynasty in the Iberian Peninsula and of al-Andalus. Twenty-three sultans ruled Granada from the founding of the dynasty in 1232 by Muhammad I until 1492, when Muhammad XI surrendered all lands to Isabella I of Castile. Today, the most visible evidence of the Nasrid dynasty is the Alhambra palace complex built under their reign.

Historical background

The dynasty founded by Muhammad I of Granada held a territory that included Granada, Jaén, Almería, and Málaga. Valencia, Játiva, and Jaén were conquered by Christians during the campaigns of the Reconquista and for the most part, the Nasrids were made into tribute-paying vassals from 1243. Granada continued as a center of Islamic culture. The Nasrids later formed alliances with the Marinids of Fez, who acted as both protectors against the Reconquista and rivals seeking to dominate Granada. Conversely, the Zianids of Tlemcen became their primary political and cultural allies in countering Marinid influence.

Nasrid crafts like textile work such as ceramic overglaze used techniques from 9th century Baghdad and were applied to make lusterware, first in Málaga, Murcia, and Almería, and then by the 15th century in Manises. This style of pottery produced first under Muslim patronage, then Christian, influenced the later style of colorful and glazed Italian ceramics known as maiolica. Throughout the 14th century, the Nasrids are noted for their palace architecture like the Alhambra, which was a product of the efforts of Ismail I and Muhammad V.

In 1469, Ferdinand II of Aragon married Isabella I of Castile, resulting in the union of the Christian kingdoms of Castile and Aragon. The monarchs shared a common cause of conquering the last Muslim kingdom on the Iberian Peninsula. During the time the Christians were launching a campaign against the Emirate of Granada that would effectively end the Nasrid dynasty, the Nasrids were engaged in a civil war over the throne of Granada. When Abu l-Hasan Ali, Sultan of Granada, was ousted by his son Muhammad XI, Abu l-Hasan Ali retreated to Málaga and civil war broke out between the competing factions. Christians took full advantage of this and continued capturing Muslim strongholds. Muhammed XI was caught by Christian forces in 1483 at Lucena, Córdoba. He was freed after he swore an oath of allegiance to Ferdinand II of Aragon and Isabella I of Castile. Abu l-Hasan Ali finally abdicated in favor of his brother Muhammad XII, known as Al-Zaghal (the valiant), and a power struggle with Muhammad XI continued. Al-Zaghal prevailed in the inner struggle but was forced to surrender to the Christians. Muhammad XI surrendered Granada to Ferdinand and Isabella in 1492 and was given a lordship in the Alpujarras mountains, but instead took financial compensation from the Spanish crown to leave the Iberian Peninsula. The remaining Muslim population was given the status of mudéjar.

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  Coat of Arms of the Emirate of Granada on a wall in the Alhambra, Nasrid dynasty (1232–1492)
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  Contemporary coat of arms (upper right) of the Nasrid dynasty of Granada with garbled Arabic inscription (Wernigerode Armorial).
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  A Nasrid-era silk textile fragment, with the epigraphic inscription "glory to our lord the Sultan".
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  Painting in the ceiling of the Hall of Kings of the Alhambra, depicting the ten Sultans of Granada.

Lineage

The Nasrid dynasty was descended from the Arab Banu Khazraj tribe, and claimed direct male-line descent from Sa'd ibn Ubadah, the chief of the tribe and one of the companions of the Islamic prophet Muhammad.

List of Nasrid sultans of Granada

Except as noted, this list is based on Mediano (2010) with biographical details from O'Callaghan (2014).

Genealogy

See also

• Romance of Abenámar
• Taifa of Granada

Notes

References

Bibliography

• Arié, Rachel (1990). L'Espagne musulmane au Temps des Nasrides (1232–1492) (in French) (2nd ed.). De Boccard. ISBN 2-7018-0052-8.
• Boloix-Gallardo, Bárbara (2021). "Granada, Capital of al-Andalus and Core of the Nasrid Kingdom (7th–9th/13th–15th Centuries)". A Companion to Islamic Granada. Brill. p. 122. ISBN 978-90-04-42581-1.
• Bueno, Francisco (2004). Los Reyes de la Alhambra. Entre la historia y la leyenda (in Spanish). Miguel Sánchez. ISBN 84-7169-082-9.
• Cortés Peña, Antonio Luis; Vincent, Bernard (1983–1987). Historia de Granada. 4 vols (in Spanish). Editorial Don Quijote.
• Fernández Puertas, Antonio (1997). The Alhambra. Vol 1. From the Ninth Century to Yusuf I (1354). Saqi Books. ISBN 0-86356-466-6.
• Fernández Puertas, Antonio (1997). The Alhambra. Vol. 2. (1354–1391). Saqi Books. ISBN 0-86356-467-4.
• Fernández-Puertas, Antonio (April 1997). "The Three Great Sultans of al-Dawla al-Ismā'īliyya al-Naṣriyya Who Built the Fourteenth-Century Alhambra: Ismā'īl I, Yūsuf I, Muḥammad V (713–793/1314–1391)". Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society. Third Series. 7 (1): 1–25. doi:10.1017/S1356186300008294. S2CID 154717811.
• Harvey, Leonard Patrick (1992). Islamic Spain 1250 to 1500. University of Chicago Press. ISBN 0-226-31962-8.
• Latham, J.D. & Fernández-Puertas, A. (1993). "Naṣrids". In Bosworth, C. E.; van Donzel, E.; Heinrichs, W. P. & Pellat, Ch. (eds.). The Encyclopaedia of Islam, Second Edition. Volume VII: Mif–Naz. Leiden: E. J. Brill. pp. 1020–1029. ISBN 978-90-04-09419-2.
• Mediano, Fernando (2010), "The post-Almohad dynasties in al-Andalus and the Maghrib (seventh–ninth/thirteenth–fifteenth centuries)", in Fierro, Maribel (ed.), The New Cambridge History of Islam: Volume 2, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, pp. 106–143, doi:10.1017/CHOL9780521839570.006, ISBN 978-0-521-83957-0
• Miranda, Ambroxio Huici (1970). "The Iberian Peninsula and Sicily". In Holt, P.M; Lambton, Ann K.S.; Lewis, Bernard (eds.). The Cambridge History of Islam. Vol. 2A. Cambridge University Press.
• O'Callaghan, Joseph F. (2014). The last crusade in the West: Castile and the conquest of Granada. Middle Ages series (1st ed.). Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press. ISBN 978-0-8122-4587-5.
• Vidal Castro, Francisco (2018). "Ismail III". Real Academia de la Historia.
• Vidal Castro, Francisco (2018a). "Ismail IV". Real Academia de la Historia.
• Vidal Castro, Francisco (2008c). "Muhammad I". Real Academia de la Historia.
• Watt, W. Montgomery (1965). A History of Islamic Spain. Edinburgh University Press. ISBN 0-7486-0847-8.
• Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). "Nasrides, The" . Encyclopædia Britannica. Vol. 19 (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. pp. 249–250.

External links

• Media related to Banu Nasr at Wikimedia Commons