Spanish Arabist, philologist, historian, educator, musicologist and amateur photographer.

Julián Ribera was born on February 19, 1858 in Carcaixent (Valencia) and passed away on May 2, 1934 in Puebla Larga (Valencia). He came from a family of farmers dedicated to the cultivation of oranges; his parents were José Ribera Piera and Vicenta María Tarragó Maseres, and his siblings included Romualdo and Agueda Ribera Tarragó. He married Trinidad Talens Talens.

Julián attended school in his hometown and earned his high school diploma at the Escuelas Pías in Valencia, eventually graduating from the Universidad de Valencia with a degree in civil and canon law. Later, in 1885, he earned his PhD in liberal arts with a dissertation titled "La historia de Valencia y los diccionarios biográficos árabes". In Madrid, he began working with Francisco Codera on the "Bibliotheca arábico-hispana" in 1892.

Ribera competed for and won the Arabic professorship at the Universidad de Zaragoza in 1887, where he founded and directed "Revista de Aragón". His published works include "La enseñanza entre los musulmanes españoles" (1893), "Bibliófilos y bibliotecas en la España musulmana" (1896) and "Orígenes del Justicia de Aragón" (1897).

A trip to Marrakesh in 1894 gave him the idea of creating a centre for Arabists, which was proposed in 1902 but never materialised. The Arabic professorship was eliminated in 1903, forcing Ribera to switch to the professorship of History of the Jewish and Muslim civilisations. He moved to Madrid in 1904, accepting the professroship in Arabic-Spanish literature at the Universidad Central de Madrid, and made anonymous contributions to the magazine "Cultura Española".

Ribera published "La superstición pedagógica" in 1910; that same year that same year the Centro de Estudios Históricos (CEH) was created, in which the Escuela Libre de Arabistas was integrated, a group to which he belonged. He became a full member of the Real Academia Española de la Lengua in 1912, with the acceptance speech "El Cancionero de Abencuzmán", and in 1915 he was admitted to the Real Academia de Historia. In 1913 he was named a board member of the Junta de Enseñanza de Marruecos.

In 1920, having heard that Manuel de Falla planned to visit the Alpujarra region, Ribera wrote to him about the Muslim melodies he knew. He maintained his

his professorship until retiring in 1927.

In 1928, Miguel Asín Palacios and some of his other disciples presented him with a compilation of his writings, "Disertaciones y opúsculos". He belonged to several institutions, including the International Committee of Historical Sciences, Academia de Bellas Artes de San Luis de Zaragoza, Academia de Ciencias, Bellas Letras y Nobles Artes de Córdoba, Academia Gallega, Junta de Historia y Numismática de Argentina, and Centro de Cultura Valenciana. As a musicologist, he was particularly interested in Andalusian vocal music and wrote works such as "La música en las Cantigas" (1922), "La música andaluza medieval en las canciones de trovadores, troveros y minnesinger" (1923-1925), "Historia de la música árabe medieval y su influencia en la española" (1927), and "La música de la jota aragonesa: ensayo histórico" (1928). He was awarded the sash of the Order of the Spanish Republic.

Julián Ribera fue fotógrafo aficionado y donó su excelente colección de negativos de vidrio a la Biblioteca Pública Municipal Julián Ribera de Carcaixent (Valencia).