<Tr> <Td> <Ul> <Li> </Li> <Li> </Li> <Li> </Li> </Ul> </Td> </Tr> <Ul> <Li> </Li> <Li> </Li> <Li> </Li> </Ul> <P> The Expulsion of the Moriscos (Spanish: Expulsión de los moriscos, Catalan: Expulsió dels moriscos) was decreed by King Philip III of Spain on April 9, 1609 . The Moriscos were descendants of Spain's Muslim population that had converted to Christianity by coercion or by Royal Decree in the early 16th century . Fighting wars in the Americas, and feeling threatened by the Turks raiding along the Spanish coast, it seems the expulsions were a reaction to a perceived internal problem of the stretched Spanish Empire . Between 1609 through 1614, the Crown systematically expelled Moriscos through a number of decrees affecting Spain's various kingdoms, meeting varying levels of success . </P> <P> Although initial estimates of the number expelled such as those of Henri Lapeyre range between 275,000 and 300,000 Moriscos (or 4% of the total Spanish population), the extent and actual success of the expulsion order in purging Spain of its Moriscos has been increasingly challenged by modern historians, starting with the seminal studies carried out by François Martinez (1999) and Trevor J. Dadson (2007). Dadson estimates that, out of a total Morisco population of 500,000, a figure accepted by many, around 40% avoided expulsion altogether and tens of thousands of those expelled managed to return . The only place where the expulsion was truly successful was the eastern region of Valencia, where Muslims represented the bulk of the peasantry and ethnic tension with the Christian, Catalan - speaking middle class was high . As a result, this region implemented the expulsion most severely and successfully, leading to the economic collapse and depopulation of much of its territory and aggravated by the bubonic plague which hit Valencia only a few years later . </P>

Who did the spanish crown expel in 1609