Spanish, also known as the Castilian language, was created during the reign of the King of Castile and Leon, Alfonso X. It is quite possible that the monarch himself, nicknamed the Wise, personally had a hand in its creation. He was an extraordinary personality. He was fascinated by science. He compiled astronomical tables later called "gigolo". Seriously engaged in literature. He wrote several masterpieces with his own hand and introduced the entire royal court to literary activity.
In Toledo, the ancient capital of Iberia, Alfonso organized the so-called "school of translators". He gathered there scholars of different nationalities and religions: Latins, Jews, Muslims. I set a task for them: to translate legislative acts and liturgical books from the previous state language - Latin into the new state language of his kingdom. And scientific works from the languages in which they are written. When creating a new language, mainly the local folk dialect was used, as well as the Galician-Portuguese language, which was known in those places as the language of poetry.
Initially, the sphere of influence of the Castilian language was limited to the Castile-Leone Kingdom, which occupied a small territory in the north of the Iberian Peninsula. Other Catholic kingdoms of the peninsula had their own languages: Galician-Portuguese, Aragonese, Catalan and others. Basques spoke their ancient language. In most of the Iberian Peninsula, the country of Al-Andalus, the Moors ruled. The Mozarabian language predominated here.
Mosarabian, too, was of Latin origin. However, its writing was based on the Arabic alphabet and was strongly influenced by Arabic vocabulary and grammar.
It is curious that after the conquest of the Iberian Peninsula by the Moors, more precisely by the Berbers from North Africa, the population continued to remain Christian for a long time. True, services in churches are conducted according to the Mosarabian rite in the Mosarabian language. In principle, the ceremony was similar to the Catholic one, but there were many "oriental" elements in it.
At some point, the nobility and some of the commoners convert to Islam. Some churches are being converted into mosques. At first, the clergy use the same Mosarabian language in mosques. And only later do they switch to Arabic proper.
But back to the Castilian language. He expanded his influence during the Reconquista - the conquest of land from the Moors, displacing the Mozarabian and at the same time enriching his vocabulary at the expense of it. In the year when the last stronghold of the Moors, the Emirate of Granada, fell, Antonio de Nebria published the first textbook of the Spanish language "Grammar". Previously, only Latin textbooks were published in Europe.
In the same year, the expedition of Christopher Columbus discovered America. And the Spanish language began its triumphant march on another continent.
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