Al-Andalus

Al-ʾAndalus (Arabic ???????) is the Arabic name given to the southern parts of the Iberian Peninsula by its Muslim conquerors; it refers to both the Emirate (ca 750-929) and Caliphate of Córdoba (929-1031) and its taifa successor kingdoms specifically, and in general to territories under Muslim rule (711-1492). As Iberia was slowly regained by Christians fighting from northern enclaves, in the long process known as the Reconquista, the name "al-Andalus" came to refer the Muslim-dominated lands of the former Roman Hispania Baetica, Hispania Lusitania and Hispania Tarraconensis, within an ever-southward-moving frontier. See also Andalusia and Andalusia (disambiguation)

Etymology of "al-Andalus"

The etymology of the word "al-Andalus" is uncertain. The word is popularly thought to be derived from the Vandals, the Germanic tribe who settled in southern Iberia and Northern Africa. However, scholars are by no means in agreement. The notion of it originating with the Vandals, who supposedly devastated southern Spain so severely in a mere twenty-two years of tenure (407-429) as to leave their name forever imprinted on it, gained in popularity over time and survives - but it is a theory put forth without much basis, bolstered perhaps by homophony. Three possible etymologies have been advanced in recent times. The first, the Vandal link, is largely disregarded now, and the question of the origin of the Arabic name, given to the entire peninsula, is still open to debate.

Related Topics:
Etymology - Vandal - Germanic - Vandals - Southern Spain - 407 - 429 - Homophony - Arabic

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Vandalícia

Reinhardt Dozy (1820-1883), Dutch author of the famous History of the Muslims of Spain (4 vols., Turner, Madrid, 1984), advanced the theory according to which the name of Al-Andalus is an Arabic rendition of Vandalicia or Vandalucía, on the assumption that the Roman province of Hispania Baetica (southern Spain) could have acquired and retained this name-association, not in Iberia itself, but among the Arabs of the Maghreb.

Related Topics:
Reinhardt Dozy - 1820 - 1883 - Dutch - Roman province - Hispania Baetica - Maghreb

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Atlántida

The Spanish philologist Joaquín Vallvé Bermejo, in his The Territorial Divisions of Muslim Spain (CSIC, Madrid, 1986), is of the opinion that Al-Andalus, as in Jazirat al-Andalus, translates pure and simply as "Atlantis" or "island of the Atlantic":

Related Topics:
Philologist - Atlantis

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:Arabic texts offering the first mentions of the island of al-Andalus and the sea of al-Andalus become extraordinarily clear if we substitute this expressions with "Atlántida" or "Atlantic". The same can be said with reference to Hercules and the Amazons whose island, according to Arabic commentaries of these Greek and Latin legends, was located in jauf al-Andalus — that is, to the north or interior of the Atlantic Ocean.

Related Topics:
Hercules - Amazons - Greek - Latin - Atlantic Ocean

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Landahlauts

An etymology was advanced recently by H. Halm in "Al-Andalus und Gothica Sors", in Welt des Orients, vol. 66, 1989, pp 252-263, and drawn upon by Marianne Barrucand/Achim Bednorz in Arquitectura Islámica en Andalucía, Köln, Taschen, 1992, pp 12-13. Halm dismisses any links with the Vandals, an association he finds without foundation, and offers instead an interesting explanation. According to him the name "Al-Andalus" is simply an Arabic rendition of the Visigothic name given to the Roman province of Baetica. The Visigoths, following the custom of their Germanic predecessors, parcelled out the conquered territories by drawing lots, and the allotments to anyone, with their corresponding land, was called "Sortes Gothicae". Contemporary texts, still written in Latin, refer to the Gothic kingdom as a whole as "Gothica sors" (singular). It is reasonable to suppose then that the corresponding Gothic designation "Landahlauts" (allotted, inherited, drawn land), in its phonetic form — "landalos" — became easily and spontaneously, to Arabic ears, "Al-Andalus".

Related Topics:
Arquitectura Islámica en Andalucía - Visigothic - Gothic - Gothic - Phonetic

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• Lôt (Gothic hlauts): allotment, inheritance; cf. Old High German hlôz, modern German Los, which passed into French as lot and Castilian as lote; whence "lottery," "loterie," "lotería," etc.