subject: How The Moors, Jews And Christians Lived Harmonious In Their Andalucia Villas Lifestyle [print this page] A few hundred years ago visiting your ANDALUCIA VILLAS might have been a perilous thing to do. Now of course a lot has changed since the days of Muslim rule. Many kings of various regions would fight others during those turbulent years: there was no big struggle of Christians against the Muslim empire. Often it was just a case of land squabbles, a question of politics, son against father or siblings fighting siblings. Internal squabbles affected everyone: Muslim against Muslim, Christian or whoever there was to fight over one piece of land or another.
So many castles had been built and destroyed during the 700 years of Muslim occupation in Spain. There are almost 10,000 castles, of which 2,000 can be visited which are not just ruins. Most of these can be seen in the region of Castile on your way into Andalucia, although the more prestigious fortresses and some of the biggest are in Andalucia. The magnificently preserved examples at Granada and Seville are just two that you must visit.
After the reconquest ended in 1492, many Muslims found they had a limited choice of forced expulsion from their lands. Leave a county which had been there home for seven centuries. The Moors when they first arrived never bought their wives with them: the women were left behind in northern Africa. This way integration of the people on the Iberian Peninsula was so much easier: language changed and religion was a mixture of Christianity, Judaism and Islam, all surprisingly living in harmony.
Muslims that crossed over to Christianity were called Moriscos and while some lived in the cities, others moved out to the lands away from city life. Small villages grew in areas out under the mountains in hidden valleys. These villages became known as the Pueblos Blancos: white villages which are one of the many popular sites to be seen in Andalucia.
The Spanish Inquisition took place as the King of the time wanted to rid the Muslims from the land and with God, or at least his representative the Pope, it was a lot easier to do. Unfortunately, sending the Moriscos away and throwing them out of the country had a bad effect on the welfare of many of the cities. Suddenly there was no one to make many of the products that had made the country so rich in the past and schools and universities declined as there were no one around to teach in them.
The Spanish Inquisition was not interested in banishing just the Moriscos: they included the Jews and for a time many of the white villages became almost ghost towns for a hundred years or so. Though now they are the most popular visiting sites for those in their ANDALUCIA VILLAS and ideal sites for those that love to trek across the country.
by: Porsche Klinger
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