Pelagius of Asturias

Pelagius was a Visigothic nobleman born around 685, at a time when his people still ruled Iberia. That world collapsed in 711 when Islamic forces swept the peninsula. In 718, somewhere in the northern mountains, Pelagius founded the Kingdom of Asturias — a Christian enclave that refused to vanish. That act is now counted as the beginning of the Reconquista, the slow, centuries-long campaign to reclaim Iberian land. He established the Asturian monarchy and ruled until his death in 737, leaving behind a kingdom small in territory but vast in consequence.