Malaqa
The Muslim conquest began on July 19, 711 when Tariq Ibn-Ziyad's Arab and Berber troops defeated King Rodrigo's Visigothic army on the banks of the Guadalete (river in southern Spain). The historian Francisco Guillén Robles describes in his book History of Malaga and its province that, after the triumph, the Muslims went to the Malaga regions:
"The territory of our current province after the expeditions of Zaide ben Kesadi and Abdalazis was definitively in the hands of the Muslims: initially, the armies of Tariq and Muza, made up of Berbers, slaves, Jews and Visigoths traitors (...) burned several villages and murdered some of their inhabitants. "
Guillén Robles reflects in his work that Malaga received the name Rayya and was inhabited by Yemenite Arabs, Berbers, Jews, Goths and Hispano-Romans. The city was under Muslim rule for more than 700 years and during that time it underwent a great transformation. Various civil and religious constructions were erected and it was at this stage that the Alcazaba and the Gibralfaro Castle were built.
The medina (the urban nucleus) was surrounded by a wall that had a series of gates, as can be seen in the previous infographic. However, the population increased and it had to expand outside the walls, so that suburbs (walled neighborhoods) emerged in the north of the city and in the western part, on the other side of the Guadalmedina river. The publication Malaga in the transit from the Nasrid medina to the Christian city (2018) details the urban structure of the time:
"All the neighborhoods had common services and sufficient basic equipment for their autonomy: mosques, baths, ovens, inns, wells, etc. One of the most important elements of the neighborhoods was the mosques, which largely made up the interior fabric of The medina. In the city of Malaga there were at least 53 mosques , among which the Aljama or Greater Mosque is worth noting, which, apparently, was structured in five naves and had 113 free-standing columns, and occupied the site where today stands it finds the Church of the Sagrario and the area of the Cathedral. Likewise, another mosque considered Aljama was located in the area of the Puerta de Granada, in the current Plaza de la Merced ".