Making ‘great battles’ great: Christian and Muslim views of Las Navas de Tolosa

Abstract

The great battles of the medieval Mediterranean have defined a historical narrative of Christian–Muslim civilizational conflict. This essay challenges this focus on these so-called “great battles” and explains how this concentration on warfare developed for nationalist and political purposes. Las Navas de Tolosa became a “great battle” not simply because it was important in its own right but because of what it has become: a useful symbol for defining and unifying communities of both the “victorious” and the “defeated.”