Valencia Valenciana Spain

The Roman position in Iberia has become so tenuous that three magistri utriusque militiae (masters of both services) have been sent to the peninsula between 441 and 446.

Abd al-Aziz takes Valencia in 714 and, breaking the terms of surrender, pillages the city; he turns the churches into mosques, leaving only one to the Christians.

Al-Hakam pardons Abdallah but forces him to stay in Valencia.

The region of Valencia submits peacefully to Abd ar-Rahman in 915.

The city of Valencia, called Balansiyya when Islamic culture settled in the region, has prospered from the tenth century, due to a booming trade in paper, silk, leather, ceramics, glass and silver-work.

After the death of Almanzor in 1002 and the ensuing unrest, Muslim Al-Andalus has disintegrated into numerous small states known as taifas, one of which is the Taifa of Valencia, in and around the town, which experiences a rebirth of sorts.

The town has grown, and during the reign of Abd al-Aziz (1021-1016) a new city wall will be built, remains of which are preserved throughout the Old City (Ciutat Vella) today.

Solomon ben Judah ibn Gabirol, a Jewish poet and philosopher who lives in Muslim Spain, produces an enormous body of secular and religious poems (over four hundred of which survive), including his celebrated philosophical poem “Keter Malkhut” (“The Kingly Crown”).

Gabirol combines Neoplatonism with traditional Jewish philosophy in his chief philosophic work, a metaphysical discussion entitled “Mekor Hayyim.” He attempts, in his ethical treatise “The Improvement of the Moral Qualities,” to separate ethics from a purely religious framework.

Little is known of Gabirol's life.

His parents died while he was a child.

At seventeen he became the friend and protégé of Jekuthiel Hassan.

Upon the assassination of the latter as the result of a political conspiracy, Gabirol composed an elegy of more than two hundred verses.

The death of Hai Gaon also called forth a similar poem.

When barely twenty, Gabirol wrote Anaḳ, a versified Hebrew grammar, alphabetical and acrostic, consisting of four hundred verses divided into ten parts.

Of this grammar, ninety-five lines have been preserved by Solomon Parḥon.

In these Gabirol reproaches his townsmen with their neglect of the Hebrew language.

Gabirol is one of the first teachers of Neoplatonism in Europe.

His role has been compared to that of Philo, who had served as the intermediary between Hellenic philosophy and the Oriental world; a thousand years later, Gabirol Occidentalizes Greco-Arabic philosophy and restores it to Europe.

Fons Vitæ ("Fountain of Life"), a philosophical dialogue between master and disciple, derives its name from the fact that it considers matter and form as the basis of existence and the source of life in every created thing.

It is translated from the Arabic into Latin in the year 1150.

There are no extant Arabic texts, but the Latin text has been translated into Hebrew.

(The manuscript in France’s Bibliothèque Mazarine is entitled "De Materia Universali.")

Gabirol's residence in Zaragoza had been embittered by strife.

He thought of leaving Spain, but remained and wandered about.

He had gained another friend and patron in the person of Samuel ibn Naghrela, whose praises he sang.

Later an estrangement arose between them, and Naghrela became for a time the butt of Gabirol's bitterest irony.

All testimonies agree that Gabirol was comparatively young at the time of his death, which followed years of wandering.

The year of his death is probably 1058 or 1059.

Ferdinand, embarking on what will be his final military campaign, invades the taifa of Valencia in 1065 and gets as far as the vicinity of the city itself.

After besieging the city, Ferdinand finds the city's defenses to be extremely resilient and determines that it will be impossible to take them by an assault.

The king therefore decides to call for a general retreat from the city.

The Muslim defenders of Valencia exit the city and begin to harass the retreat of the Leonese forces.

At Paterna, approximately five kilometers from Valencia on the left bank of the Turia, the Leonese troops set an ambush for the pursuing forces.

Catching the Valencian attackers completely by surprise, they are wiped out almost to a man.

It is said that Abd al-Malik only escaped due to the speed of his horse.

Ferdinand falls ill in November and returns to his kingdom.

King Ferdinand had once again resumed the siege of Valencia after the battle of Paterna, When Abd al-Malik had been attacked by Ferdinand in 1061, the emir had sued for support from his father-in-law, Al-Mamun, but the latter takes advantage of the situation to annex Valencia with the approval of the Christian king.

El Cid gradually comes to have more influence on Valencia, ruled by al-Qadir, who becomes his tributary.

In October 1092, an uprising occurs in Valencia, inspired by the city's chief judge Ibn Jahhaf and the Almoravids, that results in the death of al-Qadir.

El Cid and his private army immediately invest the city to thwart its annexation by the Almoravids, who elect not to attack.

The Moorish emirate of Badajoz falls to the Almoravids in 1094, leaving the Moorish emirate of Valencia the only polity in southern Iberia not under the control of the Almoravids, whose restoration of a centralized Moorish power effectively blocks the further progress of the Christian “reconquista.”