On January 22, 1883 the New York Times lamented: It is a mockery of science and human skill that a ship so well-appointed and furnished with all the modern appliances, that the Cimbria should be run down and sunk, with nearly all on board.” Before the Titanic, there was the Cimbria, and the victims of the Cimbria disaster deserve to be remembered.
The Reconquista, or Christian reconquest of Iberia, took nearly 800 years. The fighting did not come without great attempts by Muslim powers across the strait trying to reestablish their presence in mainland Europe. The last gasp of that effort came in the 1330s, when the powerful Marinid sultanate of what is modern Morocco invaded in an attempt to reverse Christian gains and secure the perilous position of the Sultanate of Granada.