Where Did Spanish Come From?
Spanish has a deeper history than that with the decline of the Roman Empire in the first half of the first millennium AD, Roman control of Hispania weakened, and invading Germanic tribes filled the vacuum of power. This ultimately resulted in the establishment of the Visigothic Kingdom in the 5th Century. The Visigoths continued Christian traditions which had been established during the later part of the Roman Empire but left only small marks on Spain’s culture and language. In 711 AD, coming from northern Africa, the Umayyad Caliphate started the conquest of the Iberian Peninsula. Within a few years, Muslims controlled almost the entirety of Portugal and Spain. However, the length of Muslim control differed greatly across Spain and ranged from less than 30 years in Galicia in the north to almost 781 years around Granada in the South.During this time, the Arabic language mixed with the vernacular Latin spoken in Spain especially in the south.Spanish was derrived from latin in the Iberian Peninsula and had many versions but the primarily spoken one and the one that modern spanish comes from is the Castillian Spanish. Castillian Spanish was formed at the height of the Reconquista which was the reconquest of spain from muslim rule. The almost 800-year-long effort to reconquer Spain from Muslim rule is known as the Reconquista. Varying Christian Kingdoms expanded their territories from the north of Spain southwards. Finally, in 1491, Granada, the last holdout of Muslim rule in Spain, surrendered to the Castilian-Aragonese forces, concluding the Reconquista.