We know little about “Islamic Spain.” The Arabic documents are late (written 400 to 700 years after the so-called “Islamic invasion” in 711 A.D.). They are also unreliable because Islamic history is not concerned with facts, but with the imagined triumphs of the faith. Then, there are the Visigoths, who ruled Spain and parts of North Africa in the early eighth century.

They were mostly Arian Christians, that is, heretics who rejected the Trinity and believed Jesus to be a special kind of human being, but not the Son of God. Much of Iberian history at this time is the ongoing struggle between Trinitarian (Catholic) and anti-Trinitarian Christianities, with the Byzantines (the Eastern Roman Empire) playing the dominant role.

We have a few reliable Latin historical sources that mention Gothic, Berber and Syrian-Arab anti-Trinitarian Christians fighting Trinitarians around 711 A.D. But these sources do not mention “Islam,” “Moslems” or the Koran. All we can say is that around the year 711 A.D., there is Christian infighting (between Trinitarians and anti-Trinitarians) in Southern Spain. When the dust settles, victory belongs to the anti-Trinitarian faction, while the Trinitarians flee north — some into France.

One such the ruler of Cordoba, Abd-al-Rahman I (red-haired and blue-eyed – hardly “Arab” traits) knew nothing of Mohammad, let alone the Koran, but did profess typical anti-Trinitarian Christianity. How is this to be explained by the Al-Andalus fairy tale?