HISTORY OF ALMERIA
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ALMERIA BECOMES AN IMPORTANT CITY
In 955 AD Abderrahman III established the City of Almeria into a Medina.
A wall was built around the city to protect the mainly Islamic population against the frequent invasions from North Africa.
At the same time the populations of nearby Pechina, which was the previous centre of the region, moved to Almeria.
The wall had six gates, with a Mezquita Mayor in the centre, and the Alcazaba.
Pechina was then called Bayyana, and is the site of the ancient settlement of Urci.
Almeria was called Al Mariya Bayyan – the port of Pechina, which was home to the Caliphate navy.
Thus the Cora (Province) of Elvira was governed from Almeria, and extended into Murcia, Jaen, Albacete, Alicante and Cordoba.
“Cuando Almeria era Almeria, Granada era su alqueria”
"When Almeria was Almeria, Granada was its farmhouse"
In 1009, with the collapse of the Omeya Caliphate in Cordoba, Almeria became independent under various governors.
Science, poetry and literature flourished.
In 1091 the City was taken over by the new influx of more extreme Muslim sect, the Almoravides, but despite this the culture continued.
Under the governor Jayran extra fortifications were built to protect the city against pirate invasions which was affecting other coastal towns.
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CHRISTIAN ATTACK ON ALMERIA
The middle of the 12th Century Almeria was a large industrial city with 800 silk looms, and iron and copper smelting factories.
By 1130 the Almoravides rule in the city declined and by 1145 they had been kicked out of the city. Seeing a weakened military presence a Genovese navy attacked the town in 1146 without success, but on 17th October 1147 Alfonso VII of Castille and Leon attacked the city by land and sea, aided by 63 Genovese galleys and 163 smaller ships.
The town was effectively destroyed.
The factories and houses were destroyed, many inhabitants killed, and many taken into captivity to work in the silk factories in Cataluña and Genoa.
Many of the intellectuals were expelled.
Although Almeria would return to Muslim control within the next 100 years the full splendor of Almeria was never to return.
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THE BLACK DEATH IN ALMERIA
By the middle of the 14th century Almeria had come under the control of the Nazari rule in Granada, and it had regained some of its original splendor and wealth.
As a gateway to the Mediterranean it became more prosperous and stable.
In 1309 it was attacked by James II of Aragon, but in the spring of 1348 it suffered a worse attack which lasted until the winter of 1349.
The bubonic plague. It had arrived by sea on ships from Mallorca and North Africa.
Many of the population fled the city, but a local doctor and philosopher Ibn Jatima stayed to treat the sick.
He established that isolating people slowed the spread of the decease.
In his book “Logro del objectivo propuesto en la aclaracion de la enfirmedad de la peste”
he proposed that the decease was transmitted by micro organisms, something confirmed 5 centuries later by Louis Pasteur.
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