THE WESTERN CALIFATE.
Within three years after their first appearance in Spain the Moors had
subjected nearly the entire territory, save only a restricted region
in the north and west. For about fifty years thereafter they were
governed by emirs sent from the califate of Damascus, and the last of
some twenty emirs was one Yusef, an Abbasside. To understand the Arab
terms which we are now compelled to use in relating this portion of
Spain’s history, we must transport ourselves once again to the Orient,
and glance at the line of califs, or caliphs, successors to Mahomet, or
Mohammed, which had carried on his conquests for many years.
The Prophet left no direct heirs, and this led to continual wrangling
among the various tribes; even the succession of Abu–bekr, father of
Mohammed’s favourite wife Ayeshah, did not settle anything, for at
his death the question was reopened. Not right, but might, however,
prevailed with the Arabs, and about the year 661 the first calif of the
Ommiades seated himself at Damascus. One of this line was in power when
Spain was invaded, but about the middle of the eighth century three
brothers came forward to dispute his rights. The calif was killed, and
eighty Ommiades of influence, invited to a feast at Damascus, were
murdered in cold blood. Thus arose the line of Abbassides, so called
from alleged descent from Abbas, uncle of Mohammed. Like most of the
Arab rulers, the Abbassides signalled their rise to power by deeds of
blood, their first effort being toward the entire obliteration of the
house of Ommiades. But two of this noble house escaped: one fled to
Arabia, where his descendants ruled a while; and the other to Africa,
where, among the devoted adherents of his line, the Bedouins and the
Berbers, he passed several years under their protection.
It happened that most of the Moslem chiefs in Spain were also allied
to the house of Ommiades, and when they learned that the young Syrian
Abderrahman was wandering in Africa a fugitive, with a price upon his
head, they earnestly entreated him to come over and become their
ruler. Yusef, the last emir of the Abbassides, was routed in battle
and sent away, and Spain at last made independent of Eastern influence
under a king of her own—the first of a line which governed, in the main
wisely, for nearly three hundred years.
Prince Abderrahman made the city of Cordova the seat of the Western
califate, and under him it became a centre of learning as well as
prosperity, rivalling all other cities of the peninsula. Magnificent
palaces were built, hospitals and mosques, one of the last named being
the glorious mosque of Cordova, its site four acres in extent, renowned
throughout the world for its beauty. This was begun by Abderrahman in
the year 786, and has lasted to our time, with its unrivalled mosaics,
tiles, and arabesques, and its thousand columns of porphyry and
alabaster.
Then were begun those vast irrigation works which reclaimed the desert
plains of the country and made them flourish with vegetation; the
immense aqueducts, the bridges, towers, and walls of defence. And yet
the reign of Abderrahman was by no means a peaceful one, as he had to
placate the many different sects and tribes of his own countrymen on
the one hand, and the Jews and Christians on the other. In the north
was a turbulent Christian population, ever at war; in the south, a
Mohammedan population always quarrelling over the division of spoils,
and particularly of the conquered territory.
Toward the last of his reign there appeared in the north a mightier
than he—no less than the magnificent Charlemagne, Emperor of the
French, who, about the year 778, having been invited thither by a
disaffected Arab captain, crossed the Pyrenees and captured several
towns. He did not stay long, however, for a rising of the Saxons
called him back, after he had taken Saragossa and razed the walls of
Pampeluna. Perhaps his brief campaign in Spain might never have been
chronicled had it not been for his disastrous rout in the Pyrenean
Pass of Roncesvalles, and the death of that hero of early song, the
gallant Roland, a semi–mythical figure in history. It was for a
long time believed that they were infidel Saracens who attacked and
destroyed Charlemagne’s rear guard in the Pass of Roncesvalles; but
later investigations show them to have been Basques, descendants of
the primitive Iberians, who resented this invasion of their territory,
even by a grandson of the great Charles Martel, who had beaten back the
Moslems in 732 and 737.
Abderrahman died in 788, and was succeeded by Hicham I, and he by
others of the line, whose moral tone may be indicated by the remark of
one Mohammed, eldest of forty–five brothers, who, when congratulated by
a favourite upon his elevation, exclaimed: “What an absurd idea to say
this world would be beautiful if there were no death! If there were no
death, should _I_ be reigning? Death is a good thing; my predecessor
is dead; that is why I reign.” Another calif before him, who refused
to treat Christian and Mussulman alike in the eyes of the law, invited
seven hundred citizens of Toledo to a banquet, admitting each one
separately within the doorway of his castle, when he was seized and
taken to the parapet, where his head was lopped off and thrown into
the fosse. But this was only a playful manifestation of power, which
caused the calif to be regarded as eccentric, rather than cruel or
bloodthirsty.
During the reign of Abderrahman II the Spanish coast was ravaged by the
Norman sea–robbers, who even sailed up the river Guadalquivir as far as
Seville, and with whom the Arab navy is said to have had a great sea
fight; though this is doubtful. One hundred years later—the interim
being filled with three inconsequential rulers—another, Abderrahman
III, carried Cordova and the califate to the summit of power. He held
the government for nearly fifty years, from 912 to 961, and came to
be one of the wealthiest rulers in the then known world. The city
contained half a million inhabitants, one hundred thousand houses, and
twenty–eight suburbs, and the surplus population was urged to dwell
in a new city outside the walls, which was called Zahra, after one of
Abderrahman’s six thousand wives, and which rivalled the finest city of
the Orient in the beauty of its palaces.
Material and intellectual growth kept even pace, and Cordova was a
torch of enlightenment during that time which in Europe was known
as the “Dark Ages.” The son of Abderrahman III, who reigned fifteen
years as Hacam II, was a gifted bibliophile, if not a scholar, for
he collected, read, and annotated (it is said) a library of four
hundred thousand volumes. From distant Cairo, Bagdad, and Damascus he
drew the precious books which went to swell his great catalogue of
forty–four volumes; and among them, at one time, was the veritable
copy of the Koran stained by the blood of Othman, who was beheaded in
the year 650. The University of Cordova was known abroad, and hither
flocked scholars, poets, and Arab singers, while thousands of students
listened to eloquent teachers of theology and law. Of all the cities
of Spain, none rivals in interest golden Cordova, on the banks of the
Guadalquivir—though Seville, Granada, and Toledo press it close—either
in the list of famous Arabs or Romans, born and educated here.
Skilled in astrology and astronomy we know they were, and from Cordova,
in the latter half of the tenth century, were obtained the Arabic
numerals, which were carried to Rome by Pope Sylvester II, it is said,
soon after he had studied at the university; and where, doubtless, he
acquired those attainments in mathematics, chemistry, and philosophy
which caused it to be said of him that he was in league with the devil.
From the name Cordova, also, we get the term “cordwainer,” out of
“_cordovan_,” the celebrated leather manufactured there. Many arts and
a few sciences flourished in this noble city; and we should not forget
our indebtedness to the Spanish Arabs, who kept alight the lamp of
learning, and who have left in their architecture, if in nothing else,
a memorial of their greatness.
Under another calif, Hicham II, the Moors in Spain reached the zenith
of their prosperity; but not through any act of the calif himself,
except negatively, when he resigned all power to his _hadjib_, or
_vizier_, Abou–Amir Mohammed, who under the surname of _Almansor
Billah_—“victorious by help of God”—nearly destroyed the rising
Christians of the north. The renowned hero of more than fifty
battles, Almansor carried death and destruction to all parts of
rebellious Spain. He marched upon and captured the cities of Leon,
Barcelona, Pampeluna, Salamanca, and Zamora; but the greatest of his
achievements—that upon which he most prided himself—was the sacking
of the sacred shrine of Campostella, and the hanging of its bells of
bronze in the great mosque at Cordova, where they were used as lamps.
Campostella, or the Field of the Star, was the holy spot where,
according to early Christian legend, the body of Saint James the
apostle was found, having been brought here by his disciples. Its
discovery, after having been for centuries buried here, was owing to
the shining of a star of exceeding lustre above the sacred spot, and
hence the name applied to the church subsequently erected here, and
which became a shrine for pilgrims from all parts of Christian Spain.
As scallop shells are found here imbedded in the rock, a shell of this
sort was the pilgrim’s badge; but was not, it need hardly be said,
respected by the fierce Almansor.
Calif in all save name, Almansor ruled supreme; whenever he went to
battle—and which always ended in victory for the Moslem—he took with
him forty poets to chant his praises and sing his greatness. Yet he too
died, at last; with his departure began the decline of Moorish and the
consequent rise of Christian power. But for more than two centuries
longer the Moors were to dwell—
“Where Cordova is hidden among
The palm, the olive, and the vine;
Gem of the South, by poets sung,
And in whose mosque Almansor hung
As lamps the bells that once had rung
At Campostella’s shrine.”
[Illustration]