page_title: Al-Andalus
section_title: Food and agriculture
hierarchical_section_title: Al-Andalus / Culture / Food and agriculture
caption_attribution_description: English: Author: Bless_sins Source: Watson, Andrew. Agricultural innovation in the early Islamic world, New York: Cambridge University Press, 1983. Made from a blank world map with free license.
context_page_description: Al-Andalus was the name of the Iberian Peninsula, given by the Moors during the Middle Ages. At its greatest geographical extent, its territory occupied most of the peninsula and a part of present-day southern France, Septimania, and for nearly a century extended its control from Fraxinet over the Alpine passes which connect Italy to Western Europe. The name more specifically describes the different Arab or Berber states that controlled these territories at various times between 711 and 1492, though the boundaries changed constantly as the Christian Reconquista progressed, eventually shrinking to the south and finally to the vassalage of the Emirate of Granada.
  Following the Umayyad conquest of Hispania, al-Andalus, then at its greatest extent, was divided into five administrative units, corresponding roughly to modern Andalusia; Portugal and Galicia; Castile and León; Navarre, Aragon, and Catalonia; and the Languedoc-Roussillon area of Occitanie.
context_section_description: A variety of foodstuffs, spices and crops were introduced to Spain and Sicily during Arab rule, via the commercial networks of the Islamic world. These include sugarcane, rice, cotton, alfalfa, oranges, lemons, apricots, spinach, eggplants, carrots, saffron and bananas. The Arabs also continued extensive cultivation and production of olive oil (the Spanish words for 'oil' and 'olive' -- aceite and aceituna, respectively—are derived from the Arabic al-zait, meaning 'olive juice'), and pomegranates (the heraldic symbol of Granada) from classical Greco-Roman times. 
  Arabic influence still lingers on in Spanish cuisine through these fruits, vegetables, spices and cooking and agricultural techniques. One of the largest palm groves in the world, called the Palmeral of Elche, was established by the Arabs between the 7th-10th centuries to facilitate fruit (including pomegranate and date crops) and vegetable growth underneath the cool shade of palm trees and irrigation channels, and is cited by UNESCO as an example of the transfer of agricultural practices from one continent (North Africa) to another (Iberian Peninsula of Europe).
  The period of Arab rule also involved the extension of Roman irrigation channels as well as the introduction of novel irrigation techniques from the Persianate world, such as the acequia (deriving from the classical Arabic as-sāqiya) – subterranean channels used to transport water from highland aquifers to lowland fields in arid environments –first originating in either the Arabian Peninsula or the Persian Empire (referred to as qanat or karez in the Middle East). These structures are still found in Andalusia province, particularly in Granada.
caption: Diffusion of bananas from India to the Iberian peninsula during Islamic rule.
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