Читать книгу Moorish Remains in Spain - Albert Frederick Calvert - Страница 7

CORDOVA

THE MOSQUE—PRINCIPAL NAVE OF THE MIHRAB.

CORDOVA

THE MOSQUE—ENTRANCE TO THE MIHRAB.

CORDOVA

GATES OF PARDON

VIEW OF THE CITY AND BRIDGE SOUTH OF THE GUADALQUIVIR

GENERAL VIEW OF THE INTERIOR OF THE MOSQUE.

CORDOVA

FAÇADE AND GATE OF THE ALMANZOR.

CORDOVA

VIEW OF INTERIOR OF THE MOSQUE 961-967.

CORDOVA

I.

THE MOSQUE.

PLAN IN THE TIME OF THE ARABS 786-796, 961-967, 988-1001, 1523-1593.

A—Gate of Pardon. B—Bell Tower. C—Orange Court. D—Principal Entrance. E—Mosque of the time 786-796.

F—Tribunal where the Mufti prays. G—Portion of the time 961-967. H—Hall where the Koran is kept. I—Sanctuary. K—Portion added in 988-1001.

CORDOVA

II.

THE MOSQUE—PLAN IN ITS PRESENT STATE.

786-796, 961-967, 988-1001, 1523-1593.

L—Principal Chapel. M—Choir. N—First Christian Church. O—Chapels. P—The Cardinal’s Chapel.

North Africa triumphed, their Berber brethren, who had been relegated to the least congenial districts of Estremadura, roused themselves to measures of retaliation, and carried their standards to the gates of Toledo and Cordova. In alarm, the Arab Governor of Andalusia sent for his compatriots of Ceuta to aid him, and he expiated his folly with his life. The African contingent routed the Berbers, murdered the Arab Governor, and set up their own chief in his place, until Abd-er-Rahman arrived from Damascus to unite all factions, for a while, under the standard of the Sultan of Cordova.

Abd-er-Rahman, which signifies “Servant of the Merciful God,” was a member of the deposed family of the Omeyyads, which had given fourteen khalifs to the throne of Damascus. The usurping khalif, Es-Deffah, “The Butcher,” who founded the dynasty of the Abbasides, practically exterminated the Omeyyad family, but Abd-er-Rahman eluded his vigilance, and, after abandoning a project to make himself the Governor of North Africa, he determined to carry his princely pretensions to the newly-founded Spanish dominions. In Andalusia, the advent of the Omeyyads was hailed with enthusiasm. The army of the Governor deserted to the standard of the young pretender; Archidona and Seville were induced to throw open their gates to him by a piece of questionable strategy; he defeated the troops that opposed his march upon Cordova, and before the end of the year 756, or some fifteen months after setting foot in the country, all the Arab part of Spain had acknowledged the dynasty of the Omeyyads, which for three centuries was to endure in Cordova. Brave, unscrupulous, and instant in action, Abd-er-Rahman had recourse to every wile of diplomacy, of severity, and of valour to maintain his supremacy in Spain. He defeated and utterly annihilated an invading army sent against him by the Abbaside khalif, Mansur, and sent a sackful of the heads of his generals as a present to their master; he won over the people of Toledo by false promises, and crucified their leaders; he had the Yemenite chief assassinated while receiving him as an honoured guest; he crushed a revolt of the Berbers in the North, and of the Yemenites in the South; he saw the forces of Charlemagne waste away in the bloody fastnesses of the Pyrenees. By treachery and the sword, by false oaths and murder, he triumphed over every rival and enemy until all insurrection had been crushed by his relentless might, and the Khalif Mansur was fain to exclaim: “Thank God, there is a sea between that man and me.” In an eloquent tribute to his “daring, wisdom, and prudence,” his old-time enemy thus extolled the genius of the conqueror: “To enter the paths of destruction, throw himself into a distant land, hard to approach and well defended, there to profit by the jealousies of the rival parties to make them turn their arms against one another instead of against himself, to win the homage and obedience of his subjects, and having overcome every difficulty, to rule supreme lord of all! Of a truth, no man before him has done this!”

But the tyrant of Spain was to pay a great and terrible price for his triumphs. He had established himself in a kingdom in which he was to stand alone. Long before his death he found himself forsaken by his kinsmen, deserted by his friends, abhorred by his enemies; on all sides detested and avoided, he immured himself in the fastnesses of his palace, or went abroad surrounded by a strong guard of hired mercenaries. His son and successor, Hisham, practised during the eight years of his reign an exemplary piety, and so encouraged and cherished the theological students and preceptors of Cordova, that they rebelled against the light-hearted, pleasure-loving Hakam, who succeeded him, and incited the people to open rebellion.

But while the insurrectionists besieged the palace, the Sultan’s soldiers set fire to a suburb of the city; and when the people retired terror stricken to the rescue of their homes and families, they found themselves between the palace garrison and the loyal incendiaries. The revolt ended in a massacre, but the dynasty was saved, and the palace was preserved to become the nucleus of the gorgeous city which Hakam’s son, Abd-er-Rahman II., was to fashion after the style of Harun-er-Rashid at Baghdad. Under this æsthetic monarch, Cordova became one of the most beautiful cities in the world. Its palaces and gardens, its mosques and bridges were the wonder of Europe; its courtiers made a profession of culture; its arbiter of fashion again asserted himself as the first man in the empire.

In such a city, and at such an epoch, it was natural, even inevitable, that Christianity should assert itself as a protest against the fashion of the age. But so tolerant was the Mohammedan rule in religious matters, that the too exalted spirit of the Cordovan Christians was hard put to it to find some excuse for its manifestation of discontent. While the sultan and his nobles found their pleasure in music, poetry, and other æsthetic if less commendable indulgences, the prejudices of the devout were always respected. Prosecution for religious convictions was unheard of, and the only way that the Christians could achieve martyrdom for their faith was by blaspheming the creed of their Moslem rulers. These early fanatics, whose religious rites and beliefs had been treated with respect by the Mohammedans, and who knew that by Moslem law he who blasphemes the Prophet Mohammed or his religion must die, voluntarily transgressed the law for the purpose of achieving their object. In spite of warnings, of protests, and of earnest counsel, these suicidal devotees cursed the name of the Prophet, and expiated their wilful fanaticism with death. With the exception of this period of religious mania, which was bewailed by the general body of Christians, and regarded with unfeigned sorrow by the Mohammedan judges, the tolerance of the Moors to the Christians was as unvarying as it was remarkable.

After the execution, in the year 859, of Eulogius, a fanatical priest, and the leader of these misguided martyrs, who was fruitlessly entreated by his judges to retract his maledictions against the Prophet and be restored to freedom, the mad movement flickered and died out. But the devotion displayed by the Cordovan Christians had made its effects felt in widespread rebellion in the provinces, and a series of incapable sovereigns had reduced the throne to the state of an island surrounded by a rivulet of foreign soldiers, in a country bristling with faction jealousies and discontent. Spain had fallen a prey to anarchy, and the end of Mohammedan rule appeared imminent. Petty kings and governors had thrown off their allegiance; Berbers, Arabs, Mohammedan Spaniards and Christians had each asserted their absolute independence; and the sultan at Cordova was “suffering all the ills of beleaguerment.” The last vestige of the power of the Omeyyads was falling away when Abd-er-Rahman III. came to the throne to reconquer Spain, and bring the rebel nobles to their knees. The new sultan was a lad of twenty-one, but he knew his countrymen, and he realised that after a century of lawlessness and wasting strife, the people were ripe for a strong and effectual government. The Cordovans were won by his handsome presence and gallant bearing. The boldness of his programme brought him adherents, and the weariness of internecine warfare, which had devastated the country, prepared the rebellious provinces for his coming. Seville opened her gates to receive him, the Prince of Algarve rendered tribute, the resistance of the Christians of Regio was overcome, and Murcia volunteered its allegiance. Toledo alone, that implacable revolutionist, rejected all Abd-er-Rahman’s overtures, and confidently awaited the issue of the siege. But the haughty Toledans had not reckoned upon the metal of which the new despot was made. Abd-er-Rahman had no stomach for the suicidal tactics of scaling impregnable precipices, but he was possessed of infinite patience. He calmly set himself to build a town on the mountain over against Toledo, and to wait until famine should compel the inhabitants to capitulate. With the fall of Toledo, the whole of Mohammedan Spain was once more restored to the sultans of Cordova. The power, once regained, was never relaxed in the lifetime of Abd-er-Rahman. The Christians of Galicia might push southward as far as the great Sierra, Ordono II. of Leon might bring his marauding hosts to within a few leagues of Cordova, and cause Abd-er-Rahman to exert all his personal and military influence to beat back the obstinate Northerners, but the stability of the throne was never again imperilled. During his fifty years of strenuous sovereignty, the great Abd-er-Rahman saved Spain from African invasion and Christian aggression; he established an absolute power in Cordova that brought ambassadors from every European monarch to his court; and he made the prosperity of Andalusia the envy of the civilised world. This wonderful transformation was effected by a man whom the Moorish historians describe as “the mildest and most enlightened sovereign that ever ruled a country. His meekness, his generosity, and his love of justice became proverbial. None of his ancestors ever surpassed him in courage in the field, and zeal for religion; he was fond of science, and the patron of the learned, with whom he loved to converse.”

In 961, Abd-er-Rahman III., the last great Omeyyad Sultan of Cordova, died. His son Hakam II. employed the peace which he inherited from his illustrious father in the study of books and the formation of a library, which consisted of no fewer than four hundred thousand works. But in his reign, the note of absolute despotism which had re-established the Empire of Cordova, was less evident; and when at his death, his twelve-year-old son, Hisham II., ascended the throne, the government was ripe for the delegation of kingly power to favourites and ministers. The Sultana Aurora, the Queen Mother, had already abrogated that power, and was wielding an influence that Abd-er-Rahman III. would not have tolerated for an instant, and her favourite—an undistinguished student of Cordova, named Ibn-Aby-Amir—was waiting to turn her influence and favour to his own advantage. This youth, who is known to history as Almanzor, or “Victorious by the grace of God”—a title conceded to him by virtue of his many victories over the Christians—was possessed of pluck, genius, and ambition in almost equal proportions; and by the opportunity for their indulgence which the harem influence afforded, he made himself virtual master of Andalusia.

In his capacity of professional letter-writer to the court servants, Almanzor won the patronage of the Grand Chamberlain, and his appointment to a minor office brought him into personal contact with Aurora—who fell in love with the engaging young courtier—and with the princesses, whose good graces he assiduously cultivated. His charm of manner and unfailing courtesy gained for him the countenance of many persons of rank, and his kindness and lavish generosity secured him the allegiance of his inferiors. By degrees he acquired a plurality of important and lucrative posts; he earned the gratitude of the Queen Mother by arranging the assassination of a rival claimant who opposed the accession of her son Hisham to the throne; and he volunteered to lead the sultan’s army against his insurrectionary subjects of Leon. Almanzor was without military training or experience, but he had no misgivings upon the score of his own ability, and his faith in himself was justified. His victories over the Leonese made him the idol of the army; and on the strength of his increased popularity he appointed himself Prefect of Cordova, and speedily rendered the city a model of orderliness and good government. By a politic impeachment of the Grand Chamberlain for financial irregularities, he presently succeeded his own patron in the first office in the State, and became supreme ruler of the kingdom.

Almanzor had allowed no scruple or fear to thwart him in his struggle for the proud position he had attained, and he now permitted nothing to menace the power he had so hardly won. He met intrigue with intrigue, and discouraged treachery by timely assassination. He placated hectoring, orthodox Moslems; he curtailed the influence of his formidable rival, Ghalib, the adored head of the army; he conciliated the Cordovans by making splendid additions to the mosque; he terrorised the now jealous Aurora and the palace party into quiescence; and he kept the khalif himself in subjection by the magnetism of his own masterful personality. His African campaigns extended the dominion of Spain along the Barbary coast, and his periodical invasions of Leon and Castile kept the Northern provinces in subjection, and his army contented and rich with the spoils of war. The Christians had terrible reason to hate this invincible upstart, and it is not surprising to read in the Monkish annals, the record of his death transcribed in the following terms: “In 1002 died Almanzor, and was buried in hell.” But if his death meant hell to Almanzor, as the Christians doubtless believed, it meant the recurrence of the hell of anarchy for the Kingdom of Spain.

Within half a dozen years of the great Chamberlain’s death, the country which had been held together by the might of one man, was torn to pieces by jealous and tyrannical chiefs and rebellious tribal warriors. Hisham II. was dragged from his harem seclusion, and the reins of Government were thrust into his incompetent hands. He failed, and was compelled to abdicate, and another khalif was set up in his place. For the next twenty years khalifs were enthroned and replaced in monotonous succession. Assassination followed coronation, and coronation assassination, until the princes of every party looked askance at the blood-stained throne, where monarchs and murderers played their several intimate parts. Outside the capital, anarchy and devastation was ravaging the country. Berbers and Slavs were carrying desolation into the South and East of the country, and in the North the Christians were uniting to throw off their dependence. Alfonso VI. was selling his aid to the rival chieftains in their battles amongst themselves, and storing up his subsidies against the day when he would undertake the re-conquest of Spain. The Cid had established his Castilian soldiers in Valencia, and the voluptuous, degenerate Mohammedan princes were panic-stricken by the growing disaffection and the instant danger which they were powerless to overcome.

In their extremity they sent for assistance to Africa, where Yusuf, the king of a powerful set of fanatics whom the Spaniards named Almoravides, had made himself master of the country from Algiers to Senegal. Yusuf came with

CORDOVA

ANCIENT ARAB TOWER, NOW THE CHURCH OF ST. NICHOLAS DE LA VILLA.

CORDOVA

ORANGE COURT IN THE MOSQUE, MOORISH STYLE, BUILT 957, BY SAID BEN AYOUT.

CORDOVA

EXTERIOR OF THE MOSQUE.

CORDOVA

THE MOSQUE—SECTION OF THE MIHRAB.

his Berber hosts in 1086, defeated the Christians, under Alfonso, near Badajoz, and leaving three thousand of his men to stiffen the ranks of the Andalusians in maintaining the struggle, he returned to Africa. Four years later the Spanish Mohammedans again besought Yusuf to bring his legions against their Christian despoilers, offering him liberal terms for his assistance, and stipulating only that he should retire to his own dominions as soon as the work was completed. The Almoravide king subscribed the more readily to this condition, since his priestly counsellors absolved him from his oath, and had little difficulty in convincing him that his duty lay in the pacification of the unhappy Kingdom of Andalusia. Yusuf organised a force capable of contending with both the Christians of Castile and his Moorish allies. The capitulation of Granada provided him with the means of distributing vast treasure among his avaricious followers, and promises of even greater booty inspired them to further faithful service. Tarifa, Seville, and the rest of the important cities of Andalusia, fell before the treasure-hunting Berbers; and with the surrender of Valencia, on the death of the Cid, the re-conquest of Mohammedan Spain was practically completed. Order was temporarily restored, lives and property were once more respected, and a new era of peace and prosperity appeared to have begun. But the degenerating influence of wealth and luxurious ease, which in the course of generations had sapped the manhood of Spain’s successive conquerors, played swift havoc with the untutored Berbers. At the end of a score of years, the Castilians, led by Alfonso “the Battler,” had resumed the offensive, sacking and burning the smaller towns, and carrying their swords and torches to the gates of Seville and Cordova. The Almoravides were powerless to resist their vigorous forays. The people of Andalus, recognising the powerlessness of their protectors, declared their independence, and rallied to the ranks of the score of petty chiefs who raised their standards in every city and castle in Andalusia, and who fought with, or bribed their Christian adversaries for the maintenance of their vaunted power.

At this crisis in the history of Spain, when the dominion of the enfeebled and dissolute Arab and Berber leaders was weakening before the resolute onslaughts of the rude, hard-living, and hard-fighting Christians of the North, a new force was created to turn the scale of Empire and prolong the rule of the Moslem in Europe. Before the Almoravides had been overthrown in Andalus, the Almoravides in Africa had been vanquished and dispersed by the mighty Almohades, who now regarded the annexation of Mohammedan Spain as the natural and necessary climax to the work of conquest. Andalusia had been a dependence of the Almoravide Empire; it was now to be a dependence of the Almoravides’s successors. Between 1145 and 1150 the transfer was completed; but although the Almohades had wrested the kingdom from the Almoravides, they had not subdued the Christian provinces. The new rulers, under-estimating the potentiality of this danger, left the country to be governed by viceroys—an error in statecraft, which ultimately lost Spain to the Mohammedan cause. In 1195 they sent from Morocco a huge force to check the Christian aggressive movement, and the Northern host was routed at Alarcos, near Badajoz. That success was the last notable victory that was to arrest the slow, but certain, recovery of all Spain to Catholic rule. In 1212, the Almohade army suffered a disastrous defeat at the battle of Las Navas; in 1235 they were driven out of the Peninsula; three years later, on the death of Ibn-Hud, the Moslem dominion in Spain was restricted to the Kingdom of Granada; and, although this Moorish stronghold was destined to endure for another two and a-half centuries, it existed only as a tributary to the throne of the Christian kings of Spain.

For the purposes of this book, the history of Moorish Spain closes with the expulsion of the Mohammedans from Cordova, Toledo, and Seville. That more modern, and, in some ways more wonderful, Moorish monument—the Red Palace of Granada—I have dealt with in my book on “The Alhambra,” to which this work is intended to be the companion and complement.