AHC/WI: Iberia remains Muslim

What are the best possible ways for Iberia to remain a Muslim-majority region until the present day? How will a Muslim Iberia affect European history?
 
Best way would be that Muslims can keep Iberia or leastly most of the area politically unified. Disunification and wars between taifas made possible for Christians conquer area back.
 
If the Christian/Muslim line stabilizes along the Pyrenees rather than stabilizing initially south of the mountains. Absent even small Christian kingdoms south of the Pyrenees, a reconquista becomes more of an effort logistically. Also, if the line is along the mountains you'll get more Christians converting to Islam.
 
A Muslim Iberia (Al-Andalus) is an obvious contender for control over the Atlantic and America. In the race to be the first to get a large presence in the New World, given the large differences between Al-Aandalus and the rest of Western Europe, and depending on the state of the Emirate itself throughout the High Middle Ages and into the Renaissance, they'll either be the first power in the New World, maybe even so much as discovering America a century early, or the last, catching up to its neighbours in Christendom.

Even with the Pyrenees as a border, it could be awfully hard to stand up to a full-blown Crusade if one gathers enough interest ("Hey, guys, it's the Pope here, why not try to avoid killing each other for a while and go chase after those heathens holding the mouth of the Mediterranean?"). A combination of a sturdy army and good diplomacy could save its skin, but what amount of cash would that leave for a navy designed to expand a colonial empire?
 
To understand how to keep Al-Andalus alive you need to understand why it didn't succeed. The biggest problem as Lalli pointed our was disunity. Al-Andalus throughout its various incarnations (Emirate of Cordoba, Caliphate of Cordoba, Taifas, Almoravids and Almohads) was never a truly united state.
During the Umayyad era, the Emir/Caliph only ever had complete control of Cordoba and it's surrounding areas. Almost everywhere else in Al-Andalus formed some kind of semi-independence, whether that be in Zaragoza, Toledo or Sevilla, the Caliph's struggled to contain their own territories let alone the northern Christian states. This was due to the Spanish Umayyad's having a bit of a bastard system, a combination of tribal and imperial systems with the benefits of neither.

This meant that in theory, they could place loyalist dynasties/tribes in outside territories for levies whilst keeping a personal army in the capital, somewhat similar to the later Ottomans. However this didn't work out, as the families who were given governing duties almost never actually had loyalty to the Caliph, due to Muladis and Berbers having no kinship to the foreign Umayyad dynasty, and Arab dynasties almost always being self - serving. All the while, private armies of the Caliph would also be a problem, as they are expemsive and due to the trend that Islamic powers were generally untrusting of natives, had to hire foreign mercanries. Thus there was never a stable state, militarily. The Caliph could either choose to accept this status quo of de facto feudalism (in which none of the fiefs were truly loyal) or actively spend what could be years quelling dissent. It took exceptionally good leaders such as Abd-Ar-Rahman III and Al-Mansur to actually control the whole realm AND wage war against Leon, Navarre etc. Most of the border fighting were left to basically independent raiding parties, which is why the term "moors" rather than any sort of actual state is often used for the battles between Christians and Muslims in Iberia at this time.

If you want the Caliphate/Emirate to survive, you need a complete overhaul of the system, and that's not just an exceptionally good Caliph, that means something that literally changes the political landscape of all Al-Andalus, such as a grand - scale war that involves all Iberian powers (hint hint at my own TL ;)). From there you can reform the system in the same way Henry VIII reformed England's own Bastard feudalism, it probably also requires the Christian states to be weak and divided whilst this great change occurs.

And that's just for the Caliphate/Emirate. The Taifas are almost impossible to survive on their own as they were, they were weak and divided militarily, and existed in the generation after Al-Mansur had forced the Christians to ally against Al-Andalus for their own safety and whilst Sancho the Great pretty much united Christian Iberia into a cohesive reconquista force. Unless some kind of ultimate king amongst men manages to unite all the Taifas whilst Christian Iberia has a meltdown, it's just ASB for the Taifas to survive as they were.

The Almoravids and Almohads had their own set of problems. As North African powers, they viewed Al-Andalus as an afterthought, a colony of sorts. Something of a cash cow and a buffer zone, as well as a place to spread their own variations of Islam. For this reason, Andalusian Muslims were willing to ally with Christians against the North Africans who they saw as an even bigger threat and more foreign. This was due to their southern Amazigh origin and their religious zealot nature that alienated Iberian Muslims. Have either of them view Al-Andalus as and more integrated part of the territory and that will go along way. Perhaps some great Sultan can turn Ceuta or Tangiers into the Constantinople of the West, solving the problem of manpower being in the Maghreb whilst literally everything else was in Iberia. Their army system was much more competent than the Caliphate of Cordoba, but they alienated those who should have been their greatest supporters. It's probably actually easier to see the North African Empires survive than the Caliphate/Emirate on their own merit, however they existed in an era of Crusaders and the reconquista, making the context they existed in much harder to survive, even in the best case scenario.

So yes, there's a few ways to make Al-Andalus survive, most involve fixing the problems that doomed them OTL.
 
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Al Ándalus

Al Ándalus to endure over time without threats of Christian highlanders of Asturias form the nucleus of the reconquest or being threatened for the Franks...

The border must be in Aquitaine, with an conquest of Septimanie by Al Ándalus being permanent, allowing that the conversion and assimilation process has time to make its effects felt in their Gallo-Roman populations as well as in the Visigoth nobility.


For that you should avoid the Berber rebellion or at least mitigate their effects and / or the Frankish kingdom this not unified of fight in conflicts of Royal succession... not undertake the offensive against the Iberian Muslims.

If a Berber leader not were killed to the bishop of Urgell Nambaudus and will not became a rebel, from his masters in Cordova. Abdul Rahman in turn not sent an expedition to crush his revolt, and launch an attack Against Uthman's ally Odo of Aquitaine.

In turn, would be, with Odo continue being an Umayyad vassals... Both forces will launch an attack against Odo main enemy...

Their permanent and undisputed possession of the richest and Romanized regions of Gaul, all Septimania, Provence; with the collaboration and the political support of its inhabitants, Goths, Gallic-Roman and Jewish, elapsed enough time to be initiated and completed a process of an gradual but inevitable acculturation.

During which time the Gallo-Roman culture, could will adopt the traits of Islamic culture, culminating probably in the total acculturation of at least a great part of the inhabitants of the Languedoc on a few generations, as happened in Hispania.

Based on what happened in Otl, in regions that were conquered and remained in power of Islam; it is proven generally that the teaching of religion or exchange of cultural features ranging from a more stronger culture circumstantially to "another weaker'' culture, it's seems that just as this process happened with Islam in Hispania and much of the regions that are Islamic in Otl, this could occur in Aquitaine under a permanent Islamic rule without too many Conflicts.

(However, was observed that most transculturation were very conflicting, especially for members of culture 'receiving', that were less able to adapt or more resistant to the new sociocultural context.)

Most of the inhabitants and rulers of the regions in Muslim power in Aquitaine,in OTL, despite their religious differences between them and with respect to the Arabs, actively collaborated with the Caliphate forces at the time they taken their cities and later in his defense when the cities were attacked by the Franks.

The expansion despite their defeat in Otl, in the Battle of Tours (October 732), also called the Battle of Poitiers (ma'arakat Balat ash-Shuhada -Battle of the Palace of Martyrs, in Arabic) continuous, but to the East: the Muslims take Arles in 735 and in 737 take hold of Avignon, reaching in their raids the city of Lyon; would not be until 759 (Otl), when Narbonne was taken by the king of the Franks Pepin's son Charles, who would fall the last stronghold held by the caliphate in the region.


An Emirate extending to Bordeaux region in directly and indirectly controlled through their vassals, from the Provençal Alps in the east to the Loire River in the North could be the Al Andalus natural boundary and the maximum limit of their direct political influence.

It's likely that future Muslim expansion, if any, will be in charge of the Armies and traders Andalusians (from Al Andalus), a probably hegemonic power in southwestern Europe, and perhaps being an active participant in the Gallia feudal Policy.


In this situation the Highlanders of Asturias and the Basque people remain isolated and perhaps when/if they decide to descend to the plains and attack the Caliphate of Al Ándalus do as happened in other cases in other mountainous regions of the world, as Muslims.
 

Whilst an Al-Andalus that doesn't have to worry about outside powers would definitely aid it, I don't think it would solve it's own internal problems which were the true issue causing it's decay. Including all of Iberia and Septimania within the Emirate of Cordoba would only even further overextend and expose the flawed system of governing that didn't work. If the Emirate of Cordoba could barely control Toledo and Sevilla, how can it control lands beyond the Pyrenees?
Even butterflying away Asturias successor states doesn't remove threat to Al-Andalus. Ethnic tensions and resentment combined with a system that relies too heavily on the loyalty of its fiefs (who were only appointed out of convenience rather than being a reward or due to meritocratic skill) means that rebellions were common, too common for Al-Andalus to ever truly succeed. Threats like Umar ibn Hafsun were internal, and the outlaw managed to outwit not one but two of Cordoba's Emirs, and literally took the best Caliph Al-Andalus ever had a whole decade to defeat the Mozarab/Crypto-Christian threat. In fact Abd-Ar-Rahman spent much more time waging war on internal rebels than either Leon or Pamplona.
So while removing most of its external threats would help, it doesn't stop the internal collapse bound to occur.
 
A different Emirate in a different Iberian Peninsule...


My proposal to eliminate the external threat and incorporate Septimania the emirate is also to create a defensive mark and isolate the Christian Montagnards .... providing the time required for at least south of the Pyrenees the emirate to stabilize and perhaps turn to Islam ... as happened in other regions.

Also I base as a precondition that the Kingdom of the Franks either a disunited kingdom or unstable and weaker than in OTL a duchy of Aquitaine, vassal, ally and trading partner of the emirate ... perhaps also united by marriage with Umayyad of Al Andalus...

Beside would be a very different TTL Emirate, controlling the Bay of Biscay, at least the part in Gaul and the Mediterranean coast to the mouth of the river Rhone and perhaps the city of Arles.

From the Bay of Biscay, traders and raiders of the emirate is very likely to attack and established autonomously or by order of the Emir, on the Biscay bay Iberian coast and Rías of Galicia.

This would alter completely the dynamics between the Christian-Muslim religions of the peninsula, in OTL ... isolating them in their mountains to the Asturian Highlanders and Vascos, non-Muslims and preventing so the Christians clans to increase their power base enough to even attempt to establish their own kingdoms.

The amount of land to distribute would increase as well as increase their tax revenues, business profits and taxes from his subjects and vassals.

This certainly is quite different to the internal situation of the Emirate... and possibly would strengthen rather than in OTL.

Allowing that despite the internal political situation of the emirate or its LAQ stability is strong enough and widespread cultural influence on the time to convert to Islam to at least part of the OTL, allogène populations that were resistant to assimilation primarily in the Iberian Peninsula and also in the Languedoc being Islamized part of the urban population.
 

Oh so I see your proposal, even if the Caliphate/emirate doesn't succeed, the lack of any major external threats plus a greater cultural integration would mean Al-Andalus could survive Decentralisation? I hadn't considered that, and I'll admit that I hadn't considered that as a possibility.

So yes, if you successfully ingrain Islam to all parts of Iberia, and remove external threats, then the collapse of the centralised state won't be the beginning of the end for Al-Andalus, and likely an equal or even more powerful Muslim successor state could take Iberia.
 

That is basically ... mainly that there were no effective external threats against the Emirate but is similar that as happened in other regions with unassimilated populations in regions geographically difficult to conquer and / or that it is impracticable an effort of conquest...
be isolated and subjected to the gradual, through generations as happened in many regions of the Islamic world ,cultural and religious Islamization.

In the case of Al Andalus governing both sides of the Pyrenees and the Cantabrian coast easily accessible by their subjects Islamized in Gascony besides with the ports in the Bay of Biscay controlled by the emirate's hard not to be installed on the coast Iberica or at least they garrisoned at last the mainly ports and from there to control their Hinterland at least nominally and punish the occasional forays of Astures mountaineers.

Given this scenario even if a Christian power recovered in part or in whole regions beyond the Pyrenees dominated and governed by the Andalusians, there maintain a strong Islamic presence in the Languedoc and the beginning of linking its proto nationalism with Islam in opposition to the Franks or Lombards conquerors...

Meanwhile in the Iberian Peninsula it will have given time perhaps to not have independent Christian nuclei that can attack the Emirate/Caliphate ... in any case would be more or less successful rebellions or attacks from tribesmen recently converted to Islam to impose their version more rigorist of Islam.
 
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Iberia

It comes down mainly to simply geography. Had the Muslims pushed to border north to the Pyrenees, I seriously doubt the Reconquista would have happened at all.
 
It comes down mainly to simply geography. Had the Muslims pushed to border north to the Pyrenees, I seriously doubt the Reconquista would have happened at all.

You have to remember if Muslims (meaning the original Umayyad Caliphate) pushes forward, perhaps winning some of the battles against the Franks, changes almost all of Islamic history. If Islamic expansion continues, this butterflies away the Berber revolts which were caused in the short term by the end of the loot economy that the Arab establishment used to keep the Berbers pre-occupied and happy. If this is an AHC surely we should be aiming for the latest and most challenging time period for Al-Andalus to be saved?

A super power Al-Andalus can be formed as late as the late 10th century, whilst a less impressive but existin/thriving Al-Andalus can exist with a POD as late as the 13th century with the Almohads. Hell if you get creative with it, you can have Mongols win the battle of Ain Jalut, have the Ilkhanate convert to Islam soon after, pretty much reck the Maghreb and the last of the Almohads and attempt to retake Al-Andalus from there.

Obviously, this would be difficult as the Mongols Cavalry tactics become a bit stale when facing the part of the world with the most castles, but that's not to say this Maghrebi Khanate can't change a few tactics, vassalise the remaining Taifas like Granada etc, and have an alive Al-Andalus. Obviously this is a creative scenario relying on the best of situations occurring multiple times, but again, AHC, meant to be challenging.
 
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