Puberty

The Moors (the Umayyad  Caliphate was considered the rising superpower at the time) quickly took advantage of the situation & seized control of the kingdom, reaching the city of Tarraco in 717 and Barchinona in 720.

They would stop their advance only after their defeat by the combined Frankish & Burgundian forces of the Merovingian Prince Charles Martel  in central France (Battle of Tours) in 732 AD. While cities like Tarraco & Empúries put up a resistance and were consequently destroyed, Barchinona avoided devastation by signing a treaty of capitulation with the new regime.

Muslim Barshiluna lasted less than a century during which religious freedom & civil government was largely respected with the price being the extra taxes imposed on non-Muslims. The city’s cathedral was converted into a mosque symbolizing the city’s integration into the Umayyad Caliphate. The Christians still living in the city formed its Mossarab community.

After 80 years of Moorish rule, in 801 AD, Louis the Pious, son of Charlemagne, captures Muslim Barshiluna after a siege of several months that resulted in the placement of the city on the borders of the Carolingian Empire. The whole region of Catalonia became a buffer zone against the advance of the Muslims.