The
Kingdom of Pamplona is the historiographic name, according to the
Royal Frankish Annals, used to denominate the political entity that took form across the western
Pyrenees and around the city of
Pamplona during the first centuries of the Iberian
Reconquista. It was thus one of the
Christian political entities that arose on northern
Iberia following the conquest of the
Visigothic Kingdom by the Islamic
Umayyad Caliphate in the early 8th century. The kingdom has its origins in the County of Pamplona, one of the
buffer states established by the
Frankish king Charlemagne in order to stop the progress of the Islamic caliphate that controlled most of the Iberian Peninsula. The city of Pamplona (
Latin:
Pompaelo), had been the main city of the indigenous
Vasconic population and was located amid the Vasconic region, in a predominantly Basque-speaking area. In the year 824
Íñigo Arista, initially with support of the
Caliphate of Córdoba and the
Muladi Banu Qasi family, founded the Kingdom of Pamplona. Starting in the 10th century the Kingdom would break its formal alliance with Córdoba and would start expanding militarily, establishing strong links with the Christian
Kingdom of Leon. A series of dynasties would follow one another, until the year 1162 when the King
Sancho IV would change his title from King of Pamplona to
King of Navarre, and thus giving form to the
Kingdom of Navarre.