Mudéjar architecture: another example of "Convivencia"

  
La Alhambra, Granada, 800s           Mudéjar architecture in Zaragoza, 1300s

Visigothic Spain: Compare Hermenegild and Recarred’s conversion to Catholicism. What were their motivations? What was the outcome? Why was it different for each?

The Arian Visigothic king Leovigild had two sons, Hermenegild and Reccared who converted to Catholicism under different circumstances and with opposing end results. Hermenegild’s conversion in 582, which was motivated by his marriage to a Frankish princess who was also Catholic, resulted in his martyrdom in 585 and his wife fleeing to North Africa, while Reccared’s conversion in 587, which was formalized by the Third council of Toledo in 589, led to a unified peninsula where Arianism was crushed. This left me curious to find out more about the power struggle between Arian and Catholic supporters in Visigothic Spain. Why was Reccared’s conversion to Catholicism more successful than his brother’s and how did it become a driving force in the conversion of Visigothic nobles from Arianism to Catholicism and in the creation of a new unified Catholic kingdom? What had happened in the five years between Hermenegild and Reccared’s conversions, which significantly altered the outcome for each of Leovigild’s sons? Did Leovigild’s own death in 586, account for the differences in each of his sons’ future? I went back to the readings to try and find some answers to these questions.

Carr links Hermenegild’s tragedy with his hand in planning a revolt in Southern Spain in 584 against his father, which included an appeal for aid from the Catholic Byzantine Empire, which had established itself in southern Spain in 552 during the internal wars between two Arian Visigothic kings, Agila and Athanagild. Pope Gregory I’s account of Hermenegild’s death attributes it to his refusal to convert back to Arianism to appease his father, however, it may have been linked to the Visigoth’s attempt to expel the Byzantines from Spain, which did not occur until 620.

After Leovigild’s death in 586, Reccared, who had been helping his father rule the kingdom, became heir to the kingdom with the support of the Visigothic nobles. By the time Reccared converted to Catholicism one year later, several Arian nobles and bishops were also following in his footsteps. It seems that Hermenegild would have been more successful had he waited for his Arian father to predecease him and had he not involved the Byzantines in his plans.