The dynasty of Abd al-Rahman, the Umayyad prince who successfully dodged Abbasid assassins until he took control of Spain, was still going on. He and his immediate heirs called themselves Emirs, rather than Caliphs. But by 912, when great-great-great-grandson Abd al-Rahman III took power in Cordoba, it seemed time to elevate their title.
Abd al-Rahman III was the son and grandson of Christian women; his grandmother was a Basque princess. Enough Visigothic women had been married into the line that he was born with blue eyes and red hair. Trying to look more Arabic, he would dye his beard black. They say that in addition to his family’s Arabic-language tradition, he learned the Mozarabic blend of Arabic and Latin that was becoming the vernacular.
When 21 year old Abd al-Rahman succeeded as Emir of Cordoba, the kingdom was threatened on all sides. There was an active rebellion by a Muslim noble of native Iberian descent, the new emirate of the Fatimid Imam to the south, and to the north, the beginning of the long Christian push to reconquer the peninsula.
Like other rulers of his time, he chose to create a slave army that was at his personal command. His army was mainly made up of Slavs bought from traders on ships. Using this army, he battled the internal rebellions. Because the rebel leader held a Roman-built castle, the process took from 913 to 928, with many battles, sieges, and beheadings.
In 929, Abd al-Rahman was close enough to subduing the entire al-Andalus region that he chose to elevate his title. In a letter circulated among his cities, he proclaimed that he should be called the Commander of the Faithful, like his ancestors in Damascus. As Caliph, he built a new palace, with a new city around it, north of Cordoba. The city was sacked in 1010, but it has been excavated and is now a UNESCO Heritage Site.
With a new navy, allied with the Berbers, he captured Tangiers and the coastal towns of Melilla and Ceuta, which are still part of Spain today. But Abd al-Rahman was not able to defeat the newly established Fatimids in Tunisia, so soon there were two Caliphs in the west, since al-Mahdi and his son were called Caliph, in addition to Imam.
In the north, Caliph Abd al-Rahman fought against the Christian mountain kingdoms. He invaded Navarre and sacked Pamplona, tearing down its cathedral. Barcelona, Pamplona, and the kingdom of Leon all paid homage to him in Cordoba. But the Reconquista continued, and it gained a patron, St. Pelagius. Pelagius was a Christian slave boy in Cordoba, who was the object of amorous advances by the Caliph. When he refused to cooperate, he was killed. The story seems unlikely, but there it is. His feast day is June 26.