This volume gathers together extracts from texts in Latin, Hispanic vernaculars, and French, concerning the relations of the Christians and Moors in Spain in the first four hundred years of their co-existence in the Peninsula. An effort has been made to illustrate aspects other than the exclusively military.
Colin Smith was one of Britain's leading authorities on medieval Spanish literature, and the compiler of the best and most widely used Spanish-English/ English-Spanish dictionary, the Collins dictionary. His unusually wide range of interests included archaeology and entomology, and led him to joint authorship of The Place-Names of Roman Britain (1979).
Christopher Colin Smith, Hispano-medievalist, lexicographer: born Brighton, Sussex 27 September 1927; Assistant Lecturer, Department of Spanish, Leeds University 1953- 56, Lecturer 1956-64, Senior Lecturer 1964-68, Sub-Dean of Arts 1963-66; University Lecturer in Spanish, Cambridge University 1968-75, Professor of Spanish 1975-90; Fellow, St Catharine's College, Cambridge 1968-97; Hispanic Editor, Modern Language Review 1974-81, General Editor 1976-81; married 1954 Ruth Barnes (three daughters, and one son deceased); died Cambridge 16 February 1997.