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In 711, Arabs and Berbers had converted to Islam, a religion founded in the 7th century by prophet Muhammad and which by the 8th dominated all the north of Africa. A raiding party led by Tariq ibn-Ziyad was sent to intervene in a civil war in the Visigothic kingdoms in Iberia. Crossing the Strait of Gibraltar, it won a decisive victory in the summer of 711 when the Visigoth king Roderic was defeated and killed on July 19th at the Battle of Guadalete. Tariq's commander, Musa bin Nusair quickly crossed with substantial reinforcements, and by 718 the Muslims dominated most of the peninsula. The advance into Europe was stopped by the Franks under Charles Martel at the battle of Poitiers (France) in 732.

Mistreatment of the Moorish population in Morocco led to an uprising and the loss of all North African possessions except for the enclaves of Ceuta and Melilla in 1921. Abd el-Krim, Annual. In order to avoid accountability, the king Alfonso XIII decided to support the dictatorship of general Miguel Primo de Rivera.

Spanish rule in Morocco ended in 1956. Though militarily victorious in the 1957-1958 Moroccan invasion of Spanish West Africa, Spain gradually relinquished its remaining African colonies. Spanish Guinea was granted independence as Equatorial Guinea in 1968, while the Moroccan enclave of Ifni had been ceded to Morocco in 1969.

In 1898 Spain lost the Spanish-American War. Cuba gained its independence, and Spain lost its remaining New World colonies—Guam, the Philippines, and Puerto Rico—to the United States. Spain's colonial possessions were reduced to Spanish Morocco, Western Sahara and Equatorial Guinea.

As recently as the mid-20th-century, much of Spain (especially outside of the major cities) remained quite distinct from the rest of Europe. In 1954, V.S. Pritchett could still write of small Spanish towns, "The inn, if there is one, will not be a hotel, nor even a fonda — the Arab word — but perhaps a posada: a place one can ride into with a mule or a donkey, where one can stable an animal and lie down oneself on a sack of straw, the other side of the stall." [Pritchett, 1954 p. 46-47] However, especially since the 1975 death of Francisco Franco, Spain has become increasingly European; Pritchett's rustic posada would be unimaginable today.

The expulsion of the Muslims was reputedly started by the first King of Asturias, named Pelayo (718-737), who started his fight against the Moors in the mountains of Covadonga (722). Later, his sons and descendants continued with his work until all of the Muslims were expelled. Meanwhile, in the east of the peninsula the Frankish emperors established the Marca Hispanica across the Pyrenees in part of what today is Catalonia, reconquering Girona in 785 and Barcelona in 801. It was a buffer zone against Islam.

After the fall of the Roman Empire, Germanic tribes invaded the former empire, several turned sedentary and created successor-kingdoms to the Romans in various parts of Europe. Iberia was taken over by the Visigoths after 410.In the Iberian peninsula, as elsewhere, the Empire fell not with a bang but with a whimper. Rather than there being any convenient date for the "fall of the Roman Empire" there was a progressive "de-Romanization" of the Western Roman Empire in Hispania and a weakening of central authority, throughout the 3rd, 4th and 5th centuries. At the same time, there was a process of "Romanization" of the Germanic and Hunnic tribes settled on both sides of the limes (the fortified frontier of the Empire along the Rhine and Danube rivers). The Visigoths, for example, were converted to Arian Christianity around 360, even before they were pushed into imperial territory by the expansion of the Huns. In the winter of 406, taking advantage of the frozen Rhine, the (Germanic) Vandals and Sueves, and the (Asiatic) Alans invaded the empire in force. Three years later they crossed the Pyrenees into Iberia and divided the Western parts, roughly corresponding to modern Portugal and western Spain as far as Madrid, between them. The Visigoths meanwhile, having sacked Rome two years earlier, arrived in the region in 412 founding the Visigothic kingdom of Toulouse (in the south of modern France) and gradually expanded their influence into the Iberian peninsula at the expense of the Vandals and Alans, who moved on into North Africa without leaving much permanent mark on Hispanic culture. The Visigothic kingdom shifted its capital to Toledo and reached a high point during the reign of Leovigild, treated in some detail at its own entry.

The dry weather of Spain resulted in the importance of water fountains in Spanish urban design. In addition, ceramics figure prominently in architecture throughout Spain, especially in the tile roofs and the use of decorative tiles known as azulejos.

Terrorism is a problem of present-day Spain, since ETA (Basque Homeland and Freedom) is trying to achieve Basque independence through violent means, including bombings and murders. Although Basque Autonomous government does not condone any kind of violence, the different approaches to the problem are a source of tension between Central and Basque governments. Besides ETA violence, the conflict in the Basque Country is also shaped by the non-acceptance on the part of the spanish state of the right of basque people to choose freely their political status. Recently, 2 political parties - which in previous elections had received the support of around 15% of the popular vote- have been banned due to their negative to condemn publicly ETA violence in the terms that the main spanish political parties wanted.

Spanish cuisine is made of very different kinds of dishes due to the differences in geography, culture and climate. It is heavily influenced by the variety of seafood available from the waters that surround the country. As Spain has had a history with many different cultural influences, the richness and variety of its cuisine is overwhelming, but all these ingredients have made up a unique cuisine with thousands of recipes and flavours. Much influence on Spanish cuisine has come from the Jewish and Moorish traditions. The Moors were a strong influence in Spain for many centuries and their food is still eaten in Spain today.

The most important minority group in the country are the Gitanos. Other indigenous minorities are Mercheros (or Quinquis) and Vaqueiros de alzada.- The latter, meaning "Mountain cow-breeders" dwell in mountain ranges in the Principality of Asturias and have kept historically apart from the valley dwellers. Foreign minorities include South Americans from countries like Argentina, Ecuador or Colombia; black Africans; Arabs and Berbers mainly from Morocco and other countries of North Africa; and Asians from China, Japan, Korea, and Vietnam.

With the approval of the Spanish Constitution of 1978 and the arrival of democracy, the old historic nationalities — Basque Country, Catalonia, Galicia and Andalusia— were given far-reaching autonomy, which was then soon extended to all Spanish regions, resulting in one of the most decentralized territorial organizations in Western Europe.