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Muslims in Spain: al-Andalus When thinking of Islamic states, the contemporary world lists countries like Iran, Pakistan and Jordan. Yet in he history of the world, there is an almost forgotten Muslim state- al Andalus, the great empire of the Muslims from North Africa that lasted from the year 711, the date of the first Muslim invasion in Spain, to the year 1492, when the last independent Muslim power in Granada was destroyed. The history of al-Andalus is somewhat patchy. At some periods there is a great deal of information about the political events and government operations, yet in other periods there is almost no written history and only a bare outline can be pieced together. For example, one can find the entire history of the reign on al-Razi’s court (961-976) because of the survival of his court records; however the years from 1184-1210 are almost completely blank. There is one chronically, however, that has the most thorough history of al-Andalus on the market- “Muslim Spain and Portugal” by Hugh Kennedy. A professor at St. Andrews in London, Kennedy has taught generations of students about Christian and Muslim Spain and has written the authoritative history of al-Andalus. Therefore, a great deal of information f