History of the Moorish Empire in Europe, Vol. 1 (of 3)

A striking parallel exists between the successive events that compose respectively the political history of the rival kingdoms of Christian and Moorish Spain. In the circumstances of physical environment, in national traditions, in manners, language, and religious belief, no two races could be more dissimilar. Yet, in many respects, the accounts of the disturbances following the accession of the Kings of the Asturias and the Emirs of Cordova are counterparts of each other. Both monarchies were, in theory, elective. The independent spirit of the Arab and the untamed ferocity of the Goth were equally opposed to the subordination necessarily implied by the adoption of the law of hereditary descent. As the ruler grew more powerful, he naturally became more anxious to transmit to his descendants the authority which had been gained by his valor or confirmed by his prudence. To secure to his family this coveted advantage, he was accustomed to solicit, in his lifetime, the public acknowledgment of his son as heir apparent, who had, not infrequently, been associated with him in the conduct of the administration. A council composed of the principal officers, prelates, and nobles of the realm was convoked, and required to show its devotion to king or emir by swearing allegiance to the prince whom paternal affection, and sometimes distinguished merit, had designated as the future sovereign. This assent, prompted by interest and the certainty of royal favor, was seldom refused, and, strengthened by custom until it became a part of the constitution, was, after a few generations, regarded as a mere ceremonial,—the formal assertion of a right whose legality had been tacitly established by considerations of public policy, if not by ancient prescription. But such was the effect of a regulation in governments which preserved the forms of election but repudiated its untrammelled exercise, that the choice of the monarch, as soon as he ascended the throne, generally found himself embroiled with his less fortunate brethren, each of whom believed that he had been defrauded of his birthright. That the mere consent of the council was not deemed conclusive is proven by the fact that possession of the palace was deemed prima facie evidence of title, a principle recognized equally at Oviedo and Cordova. With insubordination came civil war and the lamentable consequences of internecine conflict. The savage instincts of the Gothic princes caused them to blind their unfortunate rivals and immure them for life in the foul and reeking cells of subterranean dungeons. The vengeance of the Moor, however, was usually satisfied with short imprisonment, and, if the culprit expressed contrition, he was often restored to favor and his crime condoned. The student of ancient Spanish history cannot fail to be deeply impressed with the different methods of dealing with treason in the north and south of the Peninsula, regions arrayed against each other in continual hostility,—exhibiting marked resemblances when they were least to be expected, and, in disposing of offences aimed at the throne and life of the monarch, displaying, on the one hand, an indulgence dictated by a magnanimity that seemed almost suicidal; on the other, a severity characterized by atrocities that could only proceed from the grossest barbarism.

The long and illustrious reign of Alfonso III., worthily named The Great, which occupies so much space in the early annals of the Reconquest, affords a conspicuous example of the vicissitudes and trials that attended the adventurous lives of the princes of the Asturian monarchy. Associated with his father Ordoño for four years preceding his advent to the throne, he was far from being a novice when summoned to assume the grave responsibilities of sovereignty. The four brothers of the King, jealous of the paternal preference, and disputing the legality of a custom that arbitrarily excluded from the succession even those most eligible under the provisions of the ancient Visigothic constitution, united their forces in a formidable attempt to subvert the authority of Alfonso. The enterprise resulted disastrously; the barbarous severity of the laws was demonstrated without the mitigation that might have been expected from the influence of fraternal sympathy, and the unhappy princes were deprived of their eye-sight and imprisoned for life in the castle of Oviedo. Three of them speedily sank under the hardships of confinement; but the fourth, Veremundo, succeeded, by some fortunate circumstance, in escaping, and was eventually raised by his adherents to the government of Astorga. In this strong city, occasionally assisted by the arms of the Moors, he successfully defied the attacks of the King of the Asturias for more than seven years. The address and courage necessarily implied by this determined resistance are in themselves sufficiently remarkable; but the fact that the hero who directed operations which thwarted the designs and repulsed the forces of an entire kingdom for this extended period was totally blind may well awaken surprise and admiration.

The eminent abilities of Alfonso III. were displayed on many a hotly contested field and in many a critical emergency during his long career. His arms were carried farther into the country of the enemy than the bravest of his predecessors had ventured to penetrate. Coimbra, Oporto, Zamora, Toro, Simancas, and numerous other cities of less importance were added to the dominions of the Christian monarchy by the efforts of his valor or the terror of his name. The sound of his trumpets had awakened the affrighted peasantry whose fields occupied the fertile slopes of the Sierra Morena. His banners had been repeatedly seen from the battlements of Merida. His squadrons had menaced the suburbs of the Moslem capital. He enforced with unabated rigor the ruthless policy of extermination inaugurated by the first monarch of his name. The captives taken in his numerous expeditions were, for the most part, distributed among the estates of the ecclesiastical order and the royal demesnes, to be employed in the construction of churches, monasteries, castles, and palaces. With each advance of the line marking the boundary of the two kingdoms to the southward, new fortresses were erected, the most famous of which was that which stood upon the site of modern Burgos, a city whose fortunes have ever been so closely identified with those of the Castilian monarchy. The province of Navarre, heretofore considered as an insignificant principality, whose allegiance to the Asturian Crown was conceded rather by the indifference of its inhabitants than based upon the acknowledgment of any well-defined obligation, was, by the marriage of Alfonso III. to Ximena, daughter of the count, enabled to claim, for the first time in history, the position of an independent kingdom. For thirty-one years Alfonso maintained an incessant contest with the Emirs of Cordova. He saw the dominions of the descendants of those terrified fugitives who had taken shelter in the wilds of the Pyrenees extended far beyond the Douro and the Tagus to the shores of the distant Guadiana. He witnessed the thorough consolidation of the temporal and ecclesiastical powers, a union portending so much to the future renown and dishonor of Spain. The shrine of Santiago had already been enriched by the devotion of the pious and the fears of the wicked; the rude hamlet had begun to assume the appearance of a city; the homely chapel had been replaced by a stately cathedral; and a constant stream of weeping and hysterical pilgrims attested the growth of a spirit of fanaticism whose effects were to be, erelong, conspicuously exhibited in those romantic deeds of daring which abound in the annals of the Reconquest. At the close of his reign, three-fourths of the Peninsula—a territory that, with the exception of a corner of the mountain wilderness, had once paid tribute to the followers of Mohammed—was in the possession of the champions of Christendom or their allies.

The youth of the new Emir, Al-Mondhir, had, like that of his ancestors, been passed amidst military exercises or in warlike enterprises. No prince had yet ascended the throne under more auspicious circumstances, nor, at the same time, better qualified to restore the tarnished lustre of the Moslem name. His discretion and sagacity bore a just proportion to the impulsive courage that distinguished him among a nation of heroes. The energy of his character may be inferred from his response to the Toledans, who, immediately after his accession, sent him the customary tribute, which he at once returned with the following message, “Keep your money for the expenses of war, for, if God so wills, I shall soon attack you.”

The absence of Al-Mondhir, as has been already related, gave the redoubtable rebel Ibn-Hafsun an opportunity to greatly increase his following, and to secure, by threats and delusive promises, many important fortresses in Andalusia. The resolute prince, thoroughly cognizant of the dangerous character of his adversary, did not suffer him to long enjoy the advantages which the domestic misfortune of others rather than his own abilities had enabled him to obtain. Leaving Cordova quietly at the head of a body of veteran troops, he suddenly laid siege to the strong post of Archidona, commanded by an ally of Ibn-Hafsun, and, like him, a renegade. The boldness of this chieftain, who, while defaming the religion he had renounced, declared his willingness to be executed in case of capture, led Al-Mondhir to tempt the cupidity of the citizens by an enormous bribe; the apostate was surrendered, and, in accordance with the terms of his defiance, underwent a death ignominious in the eyes of all Mussulmans,—crucifixion between the bodies of two of the most unclean of animals. Terrified by this example of severity, Archidona opened its gates. The cavalry of the Emir then swept the country of provisions; some towns were plundered; a score of insurgents selected for prominence in their party were executed; and the entire army of Al-Mondhir, flushed with success and animated by the hope of booty and vengeance, invested the formidable stronghold of Bobastro.

While he entertained little fear that his castle could be taken, the cunning Ibn-Hafsun determined to provide if possible against such a contingency, and relieve his followers from the disastrous consequences of a blockade. With every appearance of sincerity, he professed a desire to conclude a permanent peace. Al-Mondhir, with all his experience, was not proof against the humble protestations of regret and assurances of future loyalty proffered by the rebel chieftain. A treaty was drawn up virtually at the dictation of the latter. At his request, a hundred mules, guarded by an escort of a hundred and sixty horsemen, were furnished to convey his family and property to Cordova. His apparent submission having removed all suspicions of his good faith, he escaped without difficulty in the dead of night; and having returned to Bobastro, which the army of the Emir had quitted, he collected a few soldiers, massacred the escort, and by daybreak was once more under shelter of the towers of the fortress. The rage of Al-Mondhir, aroused to the highest pitch by this exhibition of duplicity, impelled him to take a solemn oath that he would never cease his efforts until the perfidious rebel should have paid the extreme penalty of his treason. The blockade was renewed, but with diminished vigor, as the discipline of the troops was not only lax, but they were disheartened at the prospect of a protracted siege, the opinion prevailing among them that Bobastro was impregnable. Aware of the increasing discontent, a conspiracy was formed against Al-Mondhir by his brother Abdallah and the eunuchs of the palace; the court physician was prevailed upon to use a poisoned lancet to bleed his royal patient for some trifling indisposition; and the gallant prince, whose career bade fair to be one of the most illustrious of his dynasty, died in excruciating torture after a reign of a little less than two years. He left no sons, and the criminal design of Abdallah, which had been pushed rapidly to its execution for this very reason, having been accomplished, that prince, informed of the death of Al-Mondhir before it was known to his friends, appeared suddenly in camp, asserted his claim to the throne, and received the reluctant homage of the officers of the army.

The soldiers, who respected the abilities and stood in awe of the ferocious spirit of Ibn-Hafsun, displayed no grief at the death of their sovereign. With every manifestation of joy, they turned their backs upon the rebel stronghold, and, without preserving the semblance of military order, began a straggling march towards their homes. Each village which this armed rabble traversed was the scene of hundreds of desertions, and of the plunder of the already grievously oppressed inhabitants. The disorderly retreat had not escaped the notice of Ibn-Hafsun, and he was already close in the rear of the retiring column when a messenger arrived from the usurper imploring his forbearance, and declaring that he entertained no hostile intentions towards him. The rebel leader had the courtesy to respect this petition; and Abdallah, guarding his brother’s corpse lashed carelessly upon a camel, was permitted to reach Cordova without molestation. So complete was the disorganization of the army, that of a force numbering several thousand men scarcely twoscore troopers remained to escort the new monarch to the gates of the capital.

The crown that had been polluted by treason and fratricide seemed destined now to become the instrument of universal misfortune. The political condition of the Peninsula was already extremely complicated. Society was everywhere threatened with dissolution. The Arabs, proud of their lineage, and appropriating to their race the credit of conquests largely achieved by their allies and proselytes, constituted an aristocracy whose pretensions were both unwarrantable and offensive. Far from recognizing the new converts to Islam as brothers,—as recommended by the Koran,—they treated them as inferiors, and frequently loaded them with indignities which they would have hesitated to inflict upon their own slaves. The lapse of generations, the most eminent services, the greatest talents, the performance of acts of valor that evoked the plaudits of their enemies, could not, in the eyes of these haughty descendants of idolaters and banditti, atone for the reproach of ancient infidelity. But it was only in their antagonism to recent converts and their children that the Arabs were united. Between the Syrian and the Bedouin of the Hedjaz still existed an irreconcilable enmity. The hereditary feud of Maadite and Yemenite preserved all its original bitterness and intensity, although, on account of the incessant clashing of other interests, its manifestations were not so pronounced as they had been in the earlier years of the emirate. The confiscation of the estates of Gothic fugitives and the fortunes of the Conquest had given the Arabs an opportunity to acquire extensive estates and to amass immense riches. The deeply-rooted antipathy of the Bedouin to confinement had caused the aristocracy of the Peninsula to establish itself in the vicinity of large cities, such as Jaen, Cordova, Seville, and Malaga, where, surrounded by an army of retainers and slaves, they enjoyed the pleasures and independence of a pastoral life, for which they had inherited a predilection from their ancestors, the nobles of Central and Western Arabia.

But the several factions into which the Arabs were divided bore no comparison in numbers, power, or opulence to those composing the remainder of the population. It was but a small proportion of the Christians who, in consequence of the invasion of Tarik, had sought the unfettered exercise of political and religious liberty amidst the wilds of the Asturias. The sacred traditions of ancestry, the ties of birth, the associations of childhood, the fear of penury, the hope of wealth and distinction, retained the large majority in their homes, where many continued to enjoy the consideration derived from exalted rank and great possessions. Some paid gladly the reasonable tribute that promised a greater degree of security than they had ever known under the kings and chieftains of Gothic lineage. These were called Ahl-al-Dhimmah, The Tributaries. The members of another class, the Ajem, boldly refused to recognize the authority of the conqueror, and maintained a nominal independence in the mountains where they had their haunts, but, destitute of effective organization, they scarcely rose to the dignity of banditti. The alluring inducements of pecuniary interest and political advantage had formed another caste or faction, more numerous and more important in its influence on the fortunes of the Peninsula than all the others combined,—the Muwallads, a comprehensive term denoting persons whose derivation, while nominally Arab, was yet tainted with some foreign impurity, and which, corrupted into mulatto, has been incorporated into many of the languages of Europe. This designation was popularly applied to the descendants of renegades or apostates, called Mosalimah, an appellation corresponding to the Moriscoes, or New Christians, converted after the capture of Granada by the zealous Ximenes and his coadjutors through the potent arguments of the rack and fagot. Still another caste was the Muraddin, former converts, who, having renounced the faith of Islam, had rendered themselves amenable to death, the penalty prescribed by Mohammed for the unpardonable crime of apostasy. These were outlaws and highwaymen, who, in defiance of the feeble police maintained by the government, openly levied contributions upon travellers within sight of the minarets of Cordova. Add to these disorganizing elements of society the half-savage Berbers,—for the most part idolaters in religion and assassins in war,—and the difficulties that confronted the ablest princes of the Ommeyades may well be conceived. The Jews, whose mercantile pursuits made them on all occasions advocates for peace and frequently useful mediators, were robbed and oppressed in turn by every faction into whose hands they were unfortunate enough to fall. No region in the world of equal area contained such a mixed and turbulent population as the Spanish Peninsula before the Reconquest. The emirs, actuated by a principle familiar to all despotic sovereigns threatened with a curtailment of their power, bestowed their favor in turn upon the Arabs and the Muwallads, according as one or the other seemed about to obtain a pre-eminence dangerous to the safety of the state. But this policy reacted in an unexpected manner, and aggravated the evils it was intended to obviate. The victorious party never failed to abuse its advantage with brutal severity. The faction for the time being under the frown of the Court, lost all respect for, and renounced its allegiance to, a government that refused it the protection of the laws. The result was a bitter conflict in which Arab and Muwallad were arrayed against the Emir and against each other at the same time. The death of Al-Mondhir was the signal for increased disorder, which the feeble and hypocritical Abdallah was incompetent to suppress. The Arab nobles had long hoped to revive, in another land, that period of unrestricted license whose traditions survived in the exciting poems of the robbers and shepherds of the Desert. The famous Ibn-Hafsun, whose name was the terror of every hamlet, and who, as the head of the rebels of Bobastro and the natural ally of every party of malcontents, was more powerful than the Emir himself, now began to entertain hopes of being actually invested with the royal dignity which he in substance already enjoyed.

The situation of Abdallah was perilous in the extreme. The loyalty for the House of Ommeyah, which had been for generations the marked characteristic of the Arab of Syrian descent and the Koreishite alike, was greatly impaired. The treasury was empty. The taxes due from the walis were, for the most part, withheld. The tribute of the Christians, instigated by the Muwallads whom they considered their champions, was, except in Cordova and its immediate environs, suspended. The royal convoys were intercepted and plundered on the highways. The fidelity of the populace of the capital, suspected of secretly holding communication with the enemy, was distrusted. A spirit of bravado had even prompted Ibn-Hafsun to pass several days within its gates, which he had entered unchallenged in the disguise of a beggar. The prejudices of Abdallah inclined him to an alliance with the renegades. His early years had been passed in intimate friendship with the officers of the guard, who had since become distinguished leaders of that party. The achievements of Ibn-Hafsun had rather awakened his admiration than provoked his resentment. Conscious of his helplessness, and desirous of conciliating the most powerful chief of the opposition, he went so far as to tender him the government of Regio, conditional upon his return to his allegiance. The crafty rebel, to whom an oath was an unmeaning ceremony and who desired a respite to enable him to reorganize his army, acquiesced without hesitation, and even consented to send his son and several of his officers as hostages to the court of the Emir. The latter treated these pledges of the uncertain fidelity of a perfidious vassal with all the distinction usually reserved for the emissaries of royalty. They were magnificently entertained, lodged in palaces, and presented with costly gifts. Unrestrained of their liberty, they had no trouble in escaping when, a few months later, they received a secret message to repair to Bobastro. All security for his loyal behavior being lost by their departure, Ibn-Hafsun resumed his depredations with greater audacity than ever. His aid was soon afterwards solicited by the renegades of a district which had hitherto rather avoided than courted his alliance,—the city and province of Elvira.

In the general distribution of lands made under the direction of the emirs who acknowledged the Khalif of Damascus, the beautiful plain subsequently known as the Vega of Granada was assigned to the natives of Syria. With true Bedouin reserve and love of freedom, the adventurers who had won this earthly paradise by their valor disposed their habitations as far from the crowded haunts of men as the extent and situation of their estates would permit. The increase of their flocks, and the produce of the soil tilled by multitudes of industrious slaves, soon raised their descendants to the height of opulence. In the course of events, through confiscations for treason, the casualties of war, and the effects of disease, many Arab families became extinct, and their real property, by purchase or extortion, became vested in a comparatively small number of great proprietors, whose possessions embraced all the most valuable estates in the province. These lords formed a caste that, for arrogance and exclusiveness, had no equal in the Peninsula. The national pride of the Syrian noble was immensely flattered by the sovereign pre-eminence of his countrymen, the princes of the House of Ommeyah. In his inordinate vanity he fancied that the future of that dynasty depended on his individual exertions, as he habituated himself to believe that its establishment was solely due to the genius and efforts of his ancestors. And yet with all his professed attachment to the crown, his loyalty had been more than once justly suspected. There, as elsewhere, the interests of the court had been repeatedly sacrificed to gratify the malice of faction,—for the inappeasable feud between Yemenite and Maadite was nowhere maintained with greater virulence than in the province of Elvira. In his intercourse with his equals the Arab of the Vega—like all his brethren exposed for a time to the refinements of civilization—was a model of chivalrous politeness and graceful courtesy. But his demeanor was far different when his affairs demanded any association with the inhabitants of the city, who, in his eyes, labored under the double reproach of being traders and renegades. No opportunity was lost to humiliate these peaceful citizens; although in practice devout Moslems, they were constantly taunted with their apostasy; and for their denunciation the inexhaustible vocabulary of the Arab was ransacked for opprobrious epithets, one of which, “filii canum,” has descended to our time as the very epitome of insult.

The high spirit of the inhabitants of Elvira chafed under the gross and unprovoked abuse which they were constantly compelled to undergo. They also were vain of their ancestry and proud of their souvenirs. In the early days of the Visigothic empire, the ancient Illiberis had been an oasis in the dismal waste of Paganism that included the entire Peninsula. It had been the seat of the first Spanish bishopric. There had been held, in the first quarter of the fourth century, a famous Council, many of whose canons are still recognized as valid by the Roman Catholic Church. Among them was one requiring the celibacy of the priesthood, a regulation subsequently adopted and enforced by Gregory VII. There, too, was contrived a scheme of discipline which, originally aimed at the rich and prosperous Hebrews, became the model of that awful engine of persecution, the Inquisition, whose tortures, improved by ecclesiastical deviltry, filled the world with terror after the lapse of more than a thousand years. The city, although inferior in natural advantages to its growing neighbor, Granada, was nevertheless of considerable political and commercial importance. The generous piety of the Gothic nobles had enriched its see with large endowments, and its churches in elegance and splendor could compare with any of the kingdom.

But the contagious example of the prevalent apostasy, a condition which dispensed with tribute and at the same time appealed strongly to the ambition of the unscrupulous and the selfish passions of the multitude, made itself felt before long even in this citadel of Christianity. The corruption of the prelates, headed by the bishop, Samuel, whose profligacy attained for him a notoriety proportionate to the dignity of the office he disgraced, drove the indignant Christians by hundreds into the fold of Islam. Those who remained faithful to the traditions of the Church were so persecuted that no resource was left to them but to join their brethren, many of whom had sacrificed their convictions from more ignoble motives than that of self-preservation. This wholesale desertion was greatly facilitated by the connivance of the inferior clergy, as well as by the open violence of the bishop and his coadjutors, who, corrupted by the Moslems, exerted themselves with far greater energy and success in obtaining proselytes to the religion of Mohammed than they had ever done in promoting the cause of Christ. In the end, the excesses of this unworthy prelate became so insufferable that he was removed from his see and divested of his sacred authority; whereupon he at once repaired to Cordova, and, having publicly renounced his faith, was rewarded with the lucrative employment of persecutor, an infamous office whose duties he discharged with all the malignant assiduity of the renegade. Long before the accession of Abdallah, the resentment of the Muwallads of Elvira, inflamed to the highest pitch, had broken out against their churlish neighbors, the Arab nobles, in acts of open hostility. The sympathies of the Jews of Granada seem to have been with the latter, who, on various occasions, were saved from destruction by the friendly walls of that city. Superior in numbers and equal in bravery to their adversaries, the result of every engagement was favorable to the renegades. As neither party was accustomed to give quarter, the struggle soon assumed the character of a war of extermination. In the year 889 a number of Syrian chieftains, who were visiting the capital of the province under the protection of a truce, were treacherously massacred in the streets, a catastrophe that gave the Muwallads, already sufficiently powerful, a momentary but uncontested ascendency. The Arabs, whose numbers had been depleted by many consecutive years of warfare, forgot, for the moment, their hereditary enmities, which no disaster, however serious, could entirely reconcile, in the engrossing passion of vengeance. They chose for their leader Sauwar, a venerable warrior whose declining age had been embittered by the bloody sacrifice of his only son to the fury of the renegades. His misfortunes had erased from his bosom every feeling of compassion, every suggestion of humanity. A brutal ferocity that regarded the slightest concession to the weakness of an enemy as a crime was the prominent characteristic of the sheik whom the Arabs now selected to restore their fallen fortunes. The first exploit of this savage warrior was the capture of Monte Sacro, a stronghold north of Granada which had been the scene of the greatest victory of the Muwallads and the occasion of the death of his beloved son. Notwithstanding its strength, the castle was carried at the first attack, and the garrison, six thousand in number, massacred to a man. Encouraged by his success and infuriated by the taste of blood, the desperate Sauwar sated to the full his thirst for retribution. The terror of his arms caused many towns to surrender without a blow. But submission conferred no indulgence, and the work went relentlessly on. No Muwallad who was so unfortunate as to fall into the hands of the Arabs escaped. A mere suspicion of Spanish or Gothic descent was deemed sufficient evidence of identity, and brought certain and speedy death. Even those conditions of helplessness which most readily appeal to the compassion of mankind were not considered in this indiscriminate proscription, and many distinguished families whose names were identified with some of the most conspicuous events of Roman and Visigothic annals were swept at one blow from the face of the earth.

This reign of terror, which threatened the extermination of their race, induced the renegades to appeal for assistance to Djad, the Arab governor of the province, whose authority they had disputed after refusing the customary tribute. Satisfied of their sincerity, he marched at the head of a considerable force against the formidable partisan. The result was a decisive victory for the Arabs; the bodies of seven thousand dead strewed the field of battle, and the governor remained a prisoner in the camp of the enemy.

The prestige acquired by Sauwar after these decisive advantages caused his alliance to be sought by many neighboring cities, among them Calatrava and Jaen. Reduced to despair, the Muwallad faction declared their willingness to renew their allegiance to the Emir. But the latter was powerless to render them any substantial assistance. The credit of the government was so low that it could scarcely pay the troops required for the defence of the capital. The personal qualities of Abdallah were not such as to enlist the sympathy or arouse the enthusiasm of the people, and thereby compensate, in some degree, for the deficiencies of the treasury. The governors of the provinces were, for all practical purposes, independent princes. Cordova was the residence of the flower of the Arab nobility, whose prejudices were all on the side of Sauwar and his followers in their efforts to exterminate the detested renegades, an enterprise which they regarded as little less meritorious than a crusade against an infidel foe. Willing but unable to exert his authority in behalf of his unfortunate subjects, the Emir decided to assume the less dangerous office of mediator. He therefore offered Sauwar the government of several cities on condition that he would acknowledge himself a vassal of the crown and cease his persecution of the renegades. This advantageous proposal was readily agreed to; the oath of allegiance was taken by both factions; hostilities were suspended, and, for the first time in many years, the province of Elvira was permitted to enjoy the blessings of public and private tranquillity.

Habituated to warfare and scenes of carnage, the active spirit of Sauwar chafed under the monotony and dullness entailed by civil drudgery and magisterial duties. The territory that Ibn-Hafsun had seized, and over which he ruled with despotic sway, extended to the borders of the province of Elvira. Unable to resist the temptation, Sauwar turned his attention to the adherents of that renowned champion of the Muwallads, and soon the valleys and hamlets of eastern Andalusia were visited with a scourge whose barbarity had no parallel since the invasion of the Vandals. The sympathy of their fellow-sectaries, the subjects of Sauwar, was enlisted in behalf of those who were sufferers in a common cause; the Muwallads of Elvira almost without exception rose in arms; and the Arabs, expelled from the city and chased in every direction, sought by a common impulse a temporary refuge in Granada.

The fortress of the Alhambra, a structure of remote and uncertain antiquity, is mentioned definitely for the first time during the civil wars of Elvira. It was known to the Arabs at least a century after the Conquest, as Ka’lat-al-Hamra, The Red Castle, and its commanding position and natural strength render it probable that it may have been the site of a citadel as early as the Carthaginian occupation. The whole of the Alhambra Hill was not enclosed, as at present, and, at the time under consideration, the fortifications were confined to the jutting point overlooking the present city and familiar to modern travellers as the Alcazaba. Abandoned by the government, and uncared for by the inhabitants, whose Jewish antecedents induced them to trust for their safety rather to their acuteness than to their courage, the venerable castle had fallen into decay. The repeated sieges which it had sustained in the incessant contests between rival factions had, in addition to the ruin produced by the effects of time and the action of the elements, greatly diminished its capacity for resistance. In their critical situation, where all depended on their individual exertions,—for no hope of reinforcements could be entertained,—the superstitious fears of the people, aided by the suggestions of a vivid imagination, found in each trivial incident a token of propitious or fatal augury. Fortunately for their cause, the favorable omens preponderated on the day when the besieging force, whose numbers amounted to twenty thousand, prepared to storm their intrenchments. With characteristic cunning the prudent Sauwar determined to counteract by stratagem the overwhelming superiority of his adversaries. Leaving the citadel, and unobserved in the confusion of battle, he suddenly appeared at the head of a picked detachment in the rear of the enemy. Completely surprised, the latter was at once thrown into confusion; the entire army took to flight, and the terrified renegades were pursued to the very gates of Elvira. The Muwallad army was completely destroyed. The entire province was in mourning. There was no household that did not lament the absence of one or more of its number, no soldier that did not deplore the loss of a comrade or a friend. In deep humiliation the remnant of the renegade host prepared to defend the capital to which but a few hours before they had expected to return in triumph. The elation of the Arabs exhibited itself in all the extravagant exultation peculiar to that impassioned race. The fame of Sauwar spread to the furthest limits of the Peninsula. His exploits were celebrated with varying partiality by the poets of both factions, whose interesting productions often compensate for the unsatisfactory accounts of the chronicler, and in their animated and graphic description of important events and distinguished personages contribute copious and invaluable information to the historian.

The disheartened members of the Muwallad faction now resolved to place themselves under the protection of Ibn-Hafsun. As yet, they had never asked his assistance, nor, what is even more remarkable, had tempted his ambition or incurred his hostility. The aspiring chieftain embraced with ardor a cause so congenial to his adventurous spirit. With a confidence born of many victories he encountered the Arabs in the field. The Muwallads were again defeated, however, and it was with difficulty that Ibn-Hafsun, badly wounded, and seeing decimated the ranks of the veterans who had been his reliance in a score of campaigns, effected his retreat and escaped to the mountains of Ronda.

The inhabitants of Elvira eventually succeeded in accomplishing by artifice what they had failed to do by arms, and Sauwar, lured with his escort into an ambuscade, was slaughtered. The brutal instinct of human nature that, foiled in its efforts against the living, finds a savage gratification in the mutilation of the dead, was exhibited in its most revolting aspect by the women of Elvira. With the cries of wild beasts they tore in pieces and devoured the corpse of their persecutor. This resort to cannibalism as a means of revenge appears to have been frequently practised in the wars of the Arabs and of those nations subjected to their domination. It is mentioned in the pre-Islamitic poems and traditions. A conspicuous instance, already referred to, occurred at the battle of Ohod. And examples are not wanting of the preservation of a custom aggravated by the rancor resulting from almost perpetual civil war under the Eastern and Western Khalifates, whose violation of the decencies of life would seem sufficient to disgust barbarians, to say nothing of nations long familiar with the amenities of society and the requirements of a comparatively advanced civilization.

The serious commotions which disturbed the peace of Elvira were no isolated instances of public disorder, but rather a type of what was afflicting the entire Peninsula. In Seville, the rebellious Arabs had by turns united with and opposed the renegades in defiance of the authority of the sovereign. The old metropolis of Bætica has, from its foundation, never relinquished its proud position as the capital of Southern Spain. Other cities have enjoyed the nominal title, but the Queen of Andalusia has always, under Carthaginian, Roman, Goth, and Arab, maintained an acknowledged and deserved pre-eminence. Its natural advantages were unsurpassed. It stood in the midst of one of the most fertile plains of Europe. The Guadalquivir brought the treasures of the East to its gates. Long the seat of the primate of the kingdom, its souvenirs gave it a peculiar sanctity in the eyes of the Christian. Its business facilities attracted a numerous and enterprising Hebrew colony. The blending of many races, the dominion of a score of dynasties, had imparted to the disposition of its inhabitants a peculiar character, an uncommon fertility of genius, a phenomenal activity of intellect. To their literary talents and stinging wit was added an inconstancy in political affiliations and religious belief that was often a subject of reproach and scandal. With a strange unanimity they had at the first suggestion of the substantial benefits of apostasy renounced the truths of the gospel. A magnificent mosque had been built to reward their subserviency, but neither the daily practice of the rites of Islam, the adoption of the Arabic language, nor the change of costume could eradicate those prominent mental characteristics which had been formed by the domestic life and time-honored traditions of twelve eventful centuries.

The same prejudices and national antagonism existed between the Muwallad and the Arab parties at Seville as at Elvira with the notable exception that their mutual dislike had not yet been embittered by deeds of blood. But the dangerous proximity of lawless Arab nobles occupying the fertile district of the Axarafe that skirted the Guadalquivir had early suggested to the renegades the propriety of making thorough preparations for defence. An organization had accordingly been formed, whose members were liable to a summons for active service, and which, in its regulations and military duties, bore a considerable resemblance to the militia of modern times.

The acknowledged chiefs of the Sevillian aristocracy were the sheiks of the two powerful tribes of the Beni-Khaldun and the Beni-Hadjadj. Their estates comprised the most valuable and productive lands in the vicinity of the Andalusian capital. In some respects the Arab prejudice against the promotion of trade and the employment of the mechanical arts had been relaxed, and the proud descendants of the Bedouins of Yemen did not consider it inconsistent with their dignity to add to their resources by the freighting of ships, the buying and selling of merchandise, and the fabrication of weapons and armor. The wealth derived from these profitable occupations, added to the income of their vast plantations, enabled them to maintain a state that eclipsed even the regal splendor of the court of Cordova. Faithful to the pastoral traditions of their race, these princely nobles passed the greater portion of their time at their country-seats; but they also maintained palatial establishments in the city, whither they resorted on Fridays to attend the services of the mosque and to dazzle the eyes and provoke the envy and indignation of the populace by the magnificence of their attire and the insolence of their manners.

It is proverbial that the ordinary tendency of opulence and prosperity is rather to allay than to stimulate the passions of ambition and independence. A notable exception to this principle existed in the case of the Arab aristocracy of Seville. The wealthiest and most epicurean in its tastes of any in the kingdom, it was at the same time the most narrow, belligerent, and exclusive. The persistent evils of the Desert—the love of warfare, the Bedouin repugnance to royal power, which seemed to imply undue superiority on the one hand and an appearance of servitude on the other—outweighed all considerations of security, all the advantages of peace. This propensity to disturbance was largely confined to those who resided in the country, where a marked contraction of intellect and a tenacity of prejudice have always been the well-known characteristics of those who pass their lives amidst scenes unaffected by the collision of interests, the bustle, the enterprise, the ever-changing panorama, of metropolitan life. The Arabs of Seville regarded the impatience of their brethren of the Axarafe with a disapproval which not even tribal attachment and ancestral pride could overcome. But their numbers were small and their influence inappreciable when compared with the great power of the rural noble whose multitudes of slaves and vassals imparted to his seat the appearance of the capital of a principality.

Despite all their pretensions, the blood of many of these lords had been contaminated by an impure commerce with the infidel. The family-tree of the Beni-Khaldun showed numerous crosses which had greatly deteriorated the pure stock of the nobility of Hadramaut. The Beni-Hadjadj traced their pedigree in the maternal line from the royal family of the Visigoths. The admixture of Christian blood had, however, no visible effect in softening their manners, and they were at heart as lawless as the most savage Bedouin who still adored the idols of the Age of Ignorance, and regularly plundered the caravans between Medina and Mecca.

The head of the Arab faction at Seville was Koraib, sheik of the Beni-Khaldun. In talent for political intrigue, in unblushing effrontery, in bigoted devotion to what he considered the honor of the tribe, he stood without a rival. For many years he had nursed in secret a dream of independence, to be realized by violence and rapine. Personal ambition does not seem to have had any part in his plan of universal disorder. An unreasoning hatred of royalty and a mad aspiration to restore the freedom of pre-Islamic times appear to have been the only motives that actuated this dangerous agitator, whose intellect was too much obscured by rancor and prejudice to perceive that the only safeguard of his own possessions lay in the preservation of a strong and arbitrary government.

Repulsed by his countrymen in the city, Koraib turned his attention to the inhabitants of the suburbs. His influence was so extensive and his cause so popular in the Axarafe that it was not long before he found himself in a condition to take the offensive. Many influential Arab and Berber sheiks promised their co-operation. The rich spoils of the province of Seville were offered to the Berbers of Merida, and to the outlaws who swarmed in the fastnesses of the Sierra Morena. The signal given, these merciless savages poured down upon the fields and habitations of the defenceless peasantry. With amazement and terror the industrious farmer saw the accumulations of a lifetime swept away in a moment, his home given to the torch, his sons butchered in cold blood, his wife and daughters dragged into slavery. At the first appearance of the enemy, the governor had summoned all the neighboring chieftains to join him with their retainers. Among these was Koraib, who, in consequence of a previous understanding with the Berbers, deserted at a favorable opportunity. In the first encounter the rebels obtained a complete victory, and, having plundered the country at will, they returned to Merida, leaving the environs of Seville in the condition of a conquered province which had undergone all the injury that barbarian ruthlessness could inflict.

Information of this successful enterprise was soon conveyed to the lair of every brigand and outlaw in the Peninsula. While long since aware of the weakness of the emirate and the military incapacity of its sovereign, the banditti had nevertheless hesitated to approach the neighborhood of large towns like Seville, and their depredations had been confined to isolated hamlets and the highways connecting the provincial capitals with the seaboard. Now, however, a wider field was opened to their indulgence of their predatory instincts. From every quarter of the compass armed desperadoes and criminals, accustomed from childhood to deeds of cruelty and rapine, made their way singly, and in companies, to the province of Seville. The entire country was laid under contribution. The peasantry abandoned their possessions and fled with their families to the metropolis. The powerful chieftains of Lusitania and Estramadura, who had thrown off the yoke of the emirate but had for years been content to govern their principalities in peaceful independence, now hastened to secure a share of the plunder. The renegade, Ibn-Merwan, whose exploits under a preceding reign have already been recounted, descended upon the plains of Andalusia at the head of the fierce warriors of Badajoz.

The provincial governors, as incompetent as their master, were unable or unwilling to repress the prevalent anarchy. That apparently hopeless task was finally performed by Ibn-Ghalib, a Muwallad of Ecija, whose abilities and courage in a few months restored comparative order throughout Andalusia.

The prestige thus attained by one of the despised race that the malevolent prejudice of party had devoted to extermination was especially odious to the Arab aristocracy. The contest which was raging between the rival castes for self-preservation on the one hand, and absolute supremacy on the other, now became more sanguinary and irreconcilable. The cities were filled with tumult. The Emir was openly insulted. The influence of the Arab faction in the Divan prevailed in the end, and Ibn-Ghalib was sacrificed by an act of treachery to the hatred of his enemies through his zeal for his master’s interests.

The news of his death provoked an insurrection at Seville. The sympathies of the people had been with him in his quarrel with the Arab nobles. Many causes contributed to his popularity. He was a renegade, and his political interests were identified with those of a majority of the citizens. Large numbers of the natives of the province had served under his banner. He had swept brigandage from the highways. In consequence of his vigorous measures trade had revived, and public confidence had, to a certain degree, been restored. Not only his partisans, but even those who from policy had hitherto remained neutral, now clamored for the heads of his murderers. The city was in the hands of an infuriated mob. The governor was besieged in his palace. It required all the resources of the government to suppress the outbreak, which, for a time, threatened the most serious results. A terrible retribution was exacted of all taken in arms, or suspected of having accorded to the insurrection aid or sympathy. The leaders of the Muwallad faction, the most prominent merchants of the city, were decapitated or crucified. Many of the unfortunates who had escaped the blind fury of the pursuit were deliberately massacred. Their houses were abandoned to the avarice, their harems to the lust, of the brutal soldiery. It required all the influence of leading members of the successful party, little given to the exercise of clemency, to check the indiscriminate slaughter of their unhappy neighbors. The cessation of hostilities was, however, only temporary. Mutual acts of violence renewed the deadly struggle between contending factions. The province was at length abandoned to the Arabs by the weakness of the court. History shrinks from the task of recording the outrages and the tortures of barbarians inaccessible to pity and unrestrained by any law of God or man. Suffice it to say the Muwallads of Seville were annihilated. The memories of a catastrophe which produced a profound impression on the politics of the Peninsula are still discernible in the traditions and minstrelsy of the South of Spain.

The Arab faction was now triumphant. The balance of power had been destroyed. The Christians of Cordova, persuaded that the end of the Moslem domination was at hand, made overtures to Ibn-Hafsun, whose former affiliations and present influence seemed to point to him as their deliverer, an advantage which he was not slow to recognize.

The consciousness of great talents; the uniform success which had attended his operations; the virtual control of the most opulent provinces of the Peninsula; and the boundless, almost servile, devotion of his followers, now prompted Ibn-Hafsun to aspire to the rights as well as the actual possession of absolute power. With this end in view, he sent an embassy, laden with costly presents, to the Abbaside Viceroy of Africa, offering to become the vassal of the Eastern Khalifate in return for the commission of Emir of Spain. The application was forwarded to Bagdad, and Ibn-Hafsun was encouraged to expect the speedy fulfilment of his hopes.

This ominous design had not been conducted so secretly as to escape the knowledge of the court. Abdallah perceived at a glance the imminent peril that menaced his throne. There was little doubt that the consideration acquired by the vassal of the Abbasides would at once invest with dignity and authority the renegade chieftain, whose pretensions grounded upon force were still deficient in the indispensable requisite of legality. The jurisdiction of the emirate was not recognized beyond the actual confines of the capital. The palace was infested with traitors. An active and fanatical sect was distributed throughout the city conveying secret information to the enemy, and impatiently expecting the moment when they might exact retribution at once for the humiliation of conquest and the wrongs of persecution. In his extremity the Emir endeavored, but in vain, to conciliate his foe. Foiled in this attempt, he resolved to risk an appeal to arms. His decision was heard by the Divan with unconcealed dismay, but their remonstrances were unheeded. In the abject nature of Abdallah, degraded by superstition and haunted by the memory of atrocious crimes, an heroic sentiment, born of despair, had at last arisen. When intelligence of his determination to substitute for the pusillanimous policy he had hitherto employed the hazardous experiment of the sword was conveyed to Ibn-Hafsun, his surprise was provoked to the point of incredulity. But when he was told that the advance guard of the hostile troops was in motion, and that the royal pavilion had been pitched in the plain of Secunda to await the arrival of the sovereign, he no longer doubted the truth of a report which seemed to be a certain presage of victory. The insurgent army mustered thirty thousand strong. It was composed of veterans who knew no home but the camp, no pleasure but the excitement of battle, no law but the command of their general. The royal force, on the other hand, numbered scarce fourteen thousand men. One-third of these were the guards of the Emir; the remainder was composed of raw recruits whose courage and fidelity could not be depended upon in the hour of trial.

The two armies met near Aguilar. Whatever hesitation the inexperienced soldiers of the emirate may have previously manifested, none flinched in the presence of the enemy. Their courage was nerved to desperation when they remembered that defeat meant death, for Ibn-Hafsun never gave quarter. The efforts of the combatants were encouraged by the exhortations of the imams and the prelates, who fearlessly exposed their unprotected persons in the thickest of the fight. The rebel lines were broken by the furious charge of Abdallah’s troops. Once in confusion, they could not be rallied, and, dispersed in every direction, they fell by thousands under the weapons of their pursuers. Their leader, having narrowly escaped capture, with difficulty succeeded in reaching his mountain stronghold.

An abundant and acceptable supply of arms, treasure, and munitions of war came into the possession of Abdallah by the capture of Aguilar. A thousand renegade Christians who preferred death to a second apostasy were beheaded. The moral effect of the victory was important and wide-spread. Ecija was taken after a short resistance. Archidona and Jaen voluntarily implored the clemency of the conqueror. The Viceroy of Africa notified the discomfited renegade at Bobastro that his pretensions to the Spanish Emirate, under the auspices of the Khalifate of Bagdad, could no longer be entertained. The friends of order of every faction—the nobles, the merchants, the proprietors of large estates, the artisans, and the peasantry—for a moment regained confidence in a cause which they had recently considered as hopelessly lost.

This flattering prospect was, however, soon clouded by fresh disasters. The reverse sustained by Ibn-Hafsun was temporary, and had not seriously affected either his popularity or power. With little effort he succeeded, in a measure, in re-establishing his authority. The lost cities were retaken through treachery or by force. The royal governors were decapitated, as an intimation to the monarch that his appointees were to be classed as rebels, the servants of a usurper. The Arab party of Granada was beaten in a great battle, and its influence forever destroyed. The reviving fortunes of Ibn-Hafsun had produced a strong reaction in his favor when his renunciation of Islamism—an act of mistaken policy which, without gaining the respect of the Christians, made him an object of aversion to every Mussulman—effected greater injury to his cause than a score of defeats could have accomplished. The last nine years of Abdallah’s life were the least turbulent of his reign. The substantial aid afforded by the Arab nobles, at last convinced of their dependence on the crown, had restored the languishing authority of the emirate.

Radical changes had been produced in the political complexion and social condition of the Peninsula by a generation of civil war. Factions had been practically exterminated. All the great leaders, save one, had been removed by age, disease, or assassination. The motive of the original sedition had long been forgotten. Religion had become the nominal incentive to hostility. The enthusiasm of the clansman aspiring to independence had been supplanted by the avarice of the brigand eager for rapine. The general character of the subjects of the emirate had undergone a complete metamorphosis. They had lost the ferocious and uncompromising spirit of their ancestors. They were no longer oppressed by the tyranny of the monarch, whose helplessness and imbecility everywhere provoked public contempt. The enmity with which the members of opposing parties regarded each other was rather apparent than real. Their military operations were languidly prosecuted. Their encounters were often bloodless. Familiarity with disorder induced many to consider it the natural condition of society. The vitality of the royal power seemed proof against all the resources of treason and violence. Thousands of lives had been sacrificed in futile attempts to overturn a government whose support rested neither upon the valor of its soldiery, the genius of its statesmen, nor the affections of its people.

The sober sense of the masses, chastened by misfortune, eventually caused them to reflect upon the advantages of submission to authority and the restoration of order. Insubordination had brought nothing but distress. The great works of the founders of the dynasty—souvenirs of former prosperity and renown—were everywhere around them. Principles of vital importance to their forefathers were but meaningless names to the present generation. These considerations first affected communities whose commercial interests were seriously involved. A number of the provincial capitals voluntarily returned to their allegiance. Gradually other towns followed their example. Even in the mountain fastnesses the spirit of returning loyalty began to assert itself. Anarchy and exhaustion effected what force was powerless to accomplish, and the close of the administration of one of the worst of Moslem princes was characterized by a degree of tranquillity unknown to those of many of his race eminently distinguished for their genius and their virtues.

During all these internal commotions, the peace existing between the courts of Oviedo and Cordova was never broken by hostilities of a serious character, a circumstance that contributed largely to the preservation of the Moslem empire. Everything seemed to indicate at least a respite from the evils that had so long afflicted the people and harassed the government, when Abdallah suddenly expired, in the sixty-ninth year of his age.

The relation of the monotonous and sanguinary events of this period is valuable, in a philosophical point of view, in determining the real causes of the decadence of the Mohammedan power in Western Europe. The chronicle of the reign of Abdallah, the Emir, is in reality the story of Ibn-Hafsun, the renegade. Yet this enterprising partisan was indebted for his fame far less to his own abilities, conspicuous as they were, than to the disputes and jealousies of his enemies. These effects of tribal prejudice made possible the organization of a troop of banditti that a single squadron of cavalry, properly directed, would have been sufficient to disperse. The spirit of insubordination became contagious; the governors of remote provinces threw off their allegiance; the sources of public revenue were obstructed; repeated disasters shook the precarious loyalty of powerful chieftains, whose barbaric traditions deluded them with the fallacious hope of independence; the fires of religious discord were kindled in every community; and the government, deprived of its subjects, seemed repeatedly on the verge of dissolution. The character of the sovereign was, in a measure, responsible for many of the most serious disasters of his reign. It possessed no qualities that could inspire the respect or elicit the approbation of either friend or foe. Abdallah was a miserable compound of hypocrite and poltroon. His title had been obtained by fratricide. The crime had been attended with circumstances which heightened its atrocity. Popular rumor attributed to him the murder of two of his sons. Without faith, he betrayed in turn both his allies and his enemies. He neglected the appeals of devoted adherents whose fidelity had long been proof against temptation. He suffered himself to be deceived by the representations of rebels whom experience had shown to be wholly devoid of truth and honor. He possessed neither the capacity of the general nor the courage which is an indispensable attribute of the common soldier. His impiety was so universally recognized that it was the favorite theme of satirical poets, and even the imams frequently omitted to mention his name in the khotba, or public prayer. Little wonder was it that, under such a ruler, the Emirate of Cordova should have reached the lowest point in its fortunes to which it was reduced before its final overthrow. The authority of the crown was everywhere disputed. The great cities,—Seville, Cadiz, Toledo, Jaen, Granada, Valencia, Saragossa,—whose power and glory had been the pride of former ages, no longer sent their rich tributes to the capital on the Guadalquivir. The slumbers of the citizens of Cordova were nightly disturbed by the shrieks of peasants dying under the weapons of banditti, and by the lurid glare of burning villages that lighted up the landscape with the brilliancy of noon-day. Traffic disappeared from the highways. The markets were empty and deserted. The prevalent insecurity had suspended the operations of agriculture, and the necessaries of life became luxuries attainable only by the rich. In many localities famine-stricken wretches fed, with ghastly satisfaction, upon the bodies of their friends and neighbors. These deplorable conditions were aggravated by the denunciations and prophecies of the ministers of religion, who, with characteristic audacity, shifted the blame for public misfortune upon those who were in reality its victims, and called down upon the heads of a sinful and pleasure-loving people the long-deferred but inexorable wrath of an avenging God.