Battle of Tours 732
Recorded location from Wikidata; battle sites are often approximate.
Key facts
| Year | 732 | Wikidata P585 (point in time) |
|---|---|---|
| Era | Medieval (500–1499) | derived from year |
| Location | France | Natural Earth (modern borders) |
| Continent | Europe | Natural Earth |
| War / conflict | Umayyad invasion of Gaul | Wikidata P361 |
| Participants | Francia, Umayyad Caliphate | Wikidata P710 |
| Coordinates | 46.9876, 0.5344 | Wikidata P625 |
About the battle
The Battle of Tours, also called the Battle of Poitiers and the Battle of the Highway of the Martyrs (Arabic: معركة بلاط الشهداء, romanized: Maʿrakat Balāṭ ash-Shuhadā'), was fought on 10 October 732, and was an important battle during the Umayyad invasion of Gaul. It resulted in victory for the Frankish and Aquitanian forces, led by Charles Martel, over the invading Umayyad forces, led by Abd al-Rahman al-Ghafiqi, governor of al-Andalus. Many historians, including Edward Gibbon, have credited the Christian victory as an important factor in curtailing the spread of Islam in Western Europe.
Details of the battle, including the number of combatants and its exact location, are unclear from the surviving sources. Most sources agree that the Umayyads had a larger force and suffered heavier casualties. Notably, the Frankish troops apparently fought without heavy cavalry. The battlefield was located somewhere between the cities of Poitiers and Tours, in northern Aquitaine in western France, near the border of the Frankish realm and the then-independent Duchy of Aquitaine under Odo the Great.
Al-Ghafiqi was killed in combat, and the Umayyad army withdrew after the battle. Charles emerged strengthened and Odo weakened.
Text adapted from the Wikipedia article Battle of Tours (revision 1380614693), licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0. Changes: excerpted from the article lead section; shortened by selecting paragraphs and trimming at a sentence boundary; formatting and citations removed. No text added.
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