From the Arab word “Al-Gharb” is derived the current Portuguese word Algarve . In 750, the Abássida dynasty (of Baghdad ) de-throned the Omiadas (of Damascus ). The Omíada dynasty (Ben Umaia) had continuity in the Iberian Peninsula , with its conquest by Abd Ar-Rahman Ben Umaia who, in 756, established the Caliphate of Córdoba.

1091 saw the fall of the Omíada dynasty and the “1st Kingdoms of the Taifas” were established in Andalucia and from Silves and Faro, in the current territory of the Algarve .

The Governors of these kingdoms were the poets Al-Mu´tamid and Ibn’Amar. The Almorávidas (Al-Murabitun), from the Western Sahara, unified the Al-Andaluz and established their capital in Seville .

In 1143 Portugal was founded. In 1144 the second Kingdoms of the Taifas were established: the government of the Muridines (Sufi philosophers) and of the Mystic Ibn Caci in Silves. In 1147, the Berber dynasty Almóada (Al-Muahadin) reunified the Al-Andaluz. In 1189, the King of Portugal, D. Sancho I, backed by his crusaders, conquered Lagos (Az-Zauia) and Silves (Chelb) for the first time. In 1190, the Almóada Yacub Al-Mansur (Almançor) conquered the Gharb Al-Andaluz, returning the Algarvian localities to the power of the Portuguese. The Almóada power ended in 1230 with the establishment of the 3rd Kingdom of the Taifas.

In 1241, Lagos and Silves were definitively conquered by the Christians, commanded by D. Paio Peres Correia, Master of the Order of Santiago . In 1249, in the reign of D. Afonso III of Portugal , the Algarve was totally conquered by the Portuguese.

Since then, and until the proclamation of the Republic in 1910, the Portuguese monarchs took the title of “King of Portugal and of the Algarves”.

The contribution of the Arab culture in the Iberian Peninsula was marked by its architecture, agriculture and irrigation techniques, arts of fishing and naval construction, literature, mathematics and geography, as well as the manner and physiognomy of the people and in more than 600 words in the Portuguese language.

This region of the Algarve had a new resurgence in the first half of the XV century with the establishment of the bases, by the Infante D. Henrique, of the maritime and commercial exploration of the Western African coast and the Atlantic Islands . The nautical knowledge obtained by the maritime expansion and exploration of the Western African coast became known by the term “Escola de Sagres” ( School of Sagres ).

To organize the Atlantic commerce, the Casa de Guiné e da Mina in Lagos was established, where the first slave market was also established. Following the death of the Infante in 1460, the Casa de Guiné e da Mina was transferred to Lisbon .

A factor marking the economic history of the Algarve was, from the end of the XIX century, the advantage of the abundance of fish in its coastal waters, for the establishment of a new industry, brought by Italians and French, and of canned fish. The products from the sea, as well as cork, dried fruits and citrines, were the basis of the productions of the Algarve , until, from the sixties, following the opening of the Airport of Faro , and until today, tourism and associated activities became one of the principal activities of the region.

“A paradise”, wrote the first tourist in 1801, the English Robert Southey (who was imprisoned in Lagos as a vagabond) about the Algarve .
(António Morais)