The Spanish Reconquista came to end on this day 533 years ago...

In the year AD 711, Muslim forces of the Umayyad Caliphate invaded the Iberian Peninsula and conquered almost all of Christian Spain and Portugal. Only a tiny sliver of northern Iberia was left under Christian control and in AD 722 the Moors would attempt to extinguish it in the Battle of Covadonga. The engagement would instead, however, result in a Christian victory and would mark the very beginning of what has gone down in history as the Reconquista.

Over the next 770 years, the Spanish would slowly advance further and further south, re-taking lost territory from the Muslims one city at at time. This all would culminate on January 2, 1492, with the conquest of the Nasrid kingdom of Granada by Queen Isabella and King Ferdinand of Spain. As Wikipedia states:

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The surrender of Granada was seen as a great blow to Islam and a triumph of Christianity. Other Christian states offered their sincere congratulations to Ferdinand and Isabella, while Islamic writers reacted with despair. In Castile and Aragon, celebrations and bullfights were held. People rejoiced in the streets. For Christendom, the wresting of Granada from Islamic rule was seen as a counterbalance to the loss of Constantinople at the hands of the Ottoman Turks forty years prior.

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It must also be noted that shortly after the end of the Reconquista, Isabella and Ferdinand, flushed with pride and a renewed sense of nationalism, green lit a sea voyage to find alternate routes to Asia and named Cristoforo Colombo its leader.