Emirate of Córdoba

The Emirate of Córdoba (Arabic: إمارة قرطبة, Imārah Qurṭuba) was an independent emirate in the Iberian Peninsula between 756 and 929 with Córdoba as its capital.

After the Umayyad conquest of Hispania in 711–718, the Iberian Peninsula was established as a province under the Umayyad Caliphate. The rulers of this province established their capital in Córdoba and received from the Caliph of Damascus the title of wali or emir.

In 756, Abd al-Rahman I, a prince of the deposed Umayyad royal family, refused to recognize the authority of the Abbasid Caliphate and became an independent emir of Córdoba. He had been on the run for six years after the Umayyads had lost the position of caliph in Damascus in 750 to the Abbasids. Intent on regaining a position of power, he defeated the existing Islamic rulers of the area who had defied Umayyad rule and united various local fiefdoms into an emirate. However, this first unification of al-Andalus under Abd al-Rahman still took more than twenty-five years to complete (Toledo, Zaragoza, Pamplona, Barcelona).