In the south and east along the Mediterranean, there were Indigenous tribes known as Iberians who developed a substantial civilization. They had a non Indo-European language and traded with ancient Greeks, Phoenicians, and later, with Rome, all of which influenced their civilization. Greeks, Phoenicians, and Jews had trading colonies in southern Spain.
The rest of Spain was populated by Celts and various other Indo-European speaking people as well as some non Indo-Europeans. For a while, the Celts and Iberians merged into a Celtiberian culture.
Around 2500 BC, IE steppe people arrived in larger numbers in Iberia. Phoenicians from Carthage tried to dominate Iberia in their battle with Rome for control of the Mediterranean region. When Rome won and Iberia became part of their empire, Roman soldiers and people settled in Spain and Latin became the language, mixed in some places with pre Roman people.
Germanic tribes that invaded Rome also invaded Spain. In the early centuries AD, the Visigoths were the Royal rulers. They were defeated by Arabic Muslims from the Middle East in the 700s AD. The Visigoth nobility moved into the far northwest and began an 800 year Reconquest. During Muslim rule, intermarriages and religious conversions between Christians, Jews, and Muslims were common.
Then a North African Muslim group replaced the Arabic Caliphate in Spain. Finally, in 1492, the Visigoth Christian descendants conquered the last remaining Muslim areas and ordered all Muslims and Jews to convert or be expelled.
So the Spanish people are a mix of several backgrounds. Contrary to popular beliefs, they are not all dark complected Mediterranean in appearance. In the Middle Ages, the "ideal woman" in Spain was fair-skinned, light-haired, and blue-eyed. Catherine of Aragon, who married England's Henry VIII, was the daughter of Ferdinand and Isobel of Spain. In movies, she is usually depicted as having black hair, dark brown eyes, and olive skin. In reality, her portraits show a woman with light, almost blond hair with a slight reddish cast, blue eyes, and very fair skin.
People in the Americas of Spanish descent are often mixed, Spanish and Native American, or Spanish, African, and Native American.
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