The Arabs/Moors ruled the greater part of the Iberian Peninsula for three centuries, during which time they exerted a strong cultural and linguistic influence over the territory (the Arabic language was dominant even among Jews and Christians).
Al-Andalus: Moorish Spain and the stages of the Reconquista, map, 2003, creator: Ernst Klett Verlag, in: Hans Ulrich Rudolf / Vadim Oswalt: Taschenatlas Weltgeschichte: Europa und die Welt, 5th ed., Gotha 2008, p. 69. With the generous permission of Klett Verlag, http://www.klett.de.