NASRID DYNASTY

last of the Muslim dynasties in Spain, rising to power following the defeat of the Almohads at the Battle of Las Navas de Tolosa, in 1212. They ruled Granada from 1238 to 1492. The first Nasrid ruler, Muhammad I al-Ghalib (d. 1273), a tributary vassal of the Christian king Ferdinand III of Castile and later of Alfonso X, began the construction of the Alhambra and laid the basis of Granada's prosperity by welcoming Muslim refugees from Seville, Valencia, and Murcia. The Nasrid rulers who succeeded Muhammad, weakened by dynastic and factional strife, wavered between submission to Christian Castile and dependence on their Marinid kinsmen of Fs (in modern Morocco); but the African alliance finally proved disastrous, leading to the defeat of the Nasrid ruler Yusuf I (133354) at Salado River (1340) by Alfonso XI. In 1469 Christian Spain united under the marriage of Ferdinand II of Aragon and Isabella I of Castile. Then, when the Nasrid ruler Abu al-Hasan 'Ali (146685) introduced a succession struggle at home, while externally antagonizing Castile by refusing to pay tribute, Nasrid rule was finally ended by the Christian conquest of Granada (1492).