Rio Salado 1340: The Last Moroccan Army in Spain

Rio Salado 1340: The Last Moroccan Army in Spain In October 1340 the Marinid sultan Abu al-Hasan, "the Black Sultan", laid siege to Tarifa with the largest army to cross from Morocco since the Almohads. On 30 October, beside a little river called the Salado, Alfonso XI of Castile and Afonso IV of Portugal broke it in three hours. No great army from Morocco would ever cross into Spain again. This is the story of the Marinids, from desert herders to masters of Fez, and of the battle that closed the Strait of Gibraltar. CHAPTERS 0:00 Tarifa, October 1340 1:06 A tribe that lived in tents 1:52 From raiders to masters of Fez 3:02 Marrakech 1269: the end of the Almohads 3:39 Granada calls Morocco 4:05 Écija 1275 4:52 Tarifa and Guzmán el Bueno 5:44 The eight-year siege of Tlemcen 6:19 Abu al-Hasan, the Black Sultan 6:58 Gibraltar 1333, Tlemcen 1337 7:41 Alfonso XI of Castile 8:18 The call to holy war 8:52 The battle of Getares, April 1340 9:29 The sultan's mistake 10:00 The siege of Tarifa 10:31 Portugal joins the war 11:22 The armies meet 11:54 The night gamble 12:21 30 October 1340 12:44 The battle of Río Salado 14:39 The sultan’s camp 15:05 The booty and the Strait 15:37 Algeciras, Chaucer and the Black Death 16:20 The Black Sultan's last years 17:22 Chellah and the madrasas of Fez 17:49 Ibn Khaldun's cycle of dynasties 18:33 Granada alone SOURCES AND FURTHER READING Ibn Khaldun, Kitab al-ʿIbar (history of the Berbers and the Marinids) Ibn Abi Zarʿ, Rawd al-Qirtas Crónica de Alfonso XI; Gran Crónica de Alfonso XI Joseph F. O’Callaghan, The Gibraltar Crusade: Castile and the Battle for the Strait (2011) Maya Shatzmiller, The Berbers and the Islamic State: the Marinid Experience (2000) Amira K. Bennison, The Almoravid and Almohad Empires (2016) Numbers in medieval chronicles are often exaggerated; the figures in this video follow modern estimates. The battlefield map is a reconstruction: the exact positions are uncertain. IMAGE CREDITS (via Wikimedia Commons) Alfredo Roque Gameiro, Batalha do Salado (Quadros da História de Portugal, 1917): public domain La batalla del Salado (1340), anonymous painting, 17th century: public domain Banner of Abu al-Hasan, Fez, 1339-40 (Toledo Cathedral): public domain Salvador Martínez Cubells, Guzmán el Bueno (1884): public domain Libro de la Coronación de los Reyes de Castilla (14th century): public domain José María Rodríguez de Losada, Alfonso XI (c. 1892-94): public domain Eugénie Servières, Inês de Castro at the feet of Afonso IV (detail): public domain Aliprando Caprioli, Cardinal Gil de Albornoz (engraving, 1596-1600): CC0 George Vivian, the Padrão do Salado, Guimarães (1839): public domain The Knight, Ellesmere Chaucer (c. 1400): public domain Quran in Maghribi script, 14th century, David Collection, Copenhagen: photo by Richard Mortel, CC BY 2.0 Mansourah mosque, Tlemcen: photo by Riad Salih, CC BY 4.0 Al-Attarine madrasa, Fez: photo by Alina Chan, public domain Bou Inania madrasa, Fez: photo by Pierre André, CC BY-SA 4.0 Chellah, Rabat: photo by Bertrand Soubeyrand, CC BY-SA 4.0 Stork nest at Chellah: photo by L. Mahin, CC BY-SA 3.0 Marinid tombs, Fez: photo by Radosław Botev (attribution licence) Fes el-Jdid gate: photo by Bernard Gagnon, CC BY-SA 3.0 Statue of Guzmán el Bueno, Tarifa: photo by falconaumanni, CC BY-SA 4.0 Morocco seen from Tarifa: photo by Konstantin, CC BY-SA 3.0 The Rock of Gibraltar: photo by ADTeasdale, CC BY 2.0 Statue of Ibn Khaldun, Tunis: photo by AksilTigre, CC BY-SA 4.0 Francisco de Paula Van Halen, Las Navas de Tolosa (1864); Cantigas de Santa María miniatures (13th century); Kasbah mosque of Marrakech (early 20th-century photo): public domain Photos were cropped, colour-graded and animated for this video (changes made). Licence texts: CC BY 2.0 creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0 · CC BY 4.0 creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0 · CC BY-SA 3.0 creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0 · CC BY-SA 4.0 creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0 Video footage: Pexels. Maps and battle diagrams: made for this channel; terrain from Natural Earth (public domain); medieval borders are approximate. Music: "The Road to Mordor" by Ezra Lipp (YouTube Audio Library); original score made with VSCO 2 Community Edition samples (CC0). Narration voice: Kokoro TTS (Apache 2.0). Previously on Qalam & Saif: Las Navas de Tolosa 1212. #history #morocco #marinids #alandalus #riosalado #islamichistory #reconquista