Chapter XIV: Reign of Hischem II (3)

The return of the army to Cordova was signalized by a military demonstration that rivalled the pomp of a Roman triumph. In the rear of the troops, chained together by fifties, thousands of Christian captives, laden with the spoils and trophies of victory, trudged painfully along. Some carried the sacrilegious plunder of many a venerated shrine. Others supported upon their shoulders the ponderous gates of the city of Santiago. Others, again, sank under the weight of the bells of the cathedral, into whose molten mass, as yet unformed, pious devotees of either sex had cast their treasure and their jewels; whose clangor had solemnized the installation of many a prelate and the sepulture of many a saint; had aroused the enthusiasm and the devotion of pilgrims of every clime; had, until this fatal hour, been heard in a land believed to be exempt from the outrages of the infidel, but were now destined to be exhibited in his greatest temple as tokens of the supremacy attained by the most implacable foe of Christianity. In the addition to the Great Mosque, then building under the direction of Al-Mansur, these souvenirs of the most memorable campaign undertaken by the arms of the Western Khalifate were deposited, amidst the frenzied acclamations of the people. The gates were used to form a portion of the ceiling, and from them, sustained by chains of bronze, the great bells were hung inverted, to be utilized as lamps during the ceremonies of the numerous festivals prescribed by the Moslem ritual.

The career of the Mauritanian rebel Zira-Ibn-Atia, whom the prodigality of the Sultana Aurora had enabled to assert his independence, under pretext of liberating the Khalif, was not of long duration. The first army sent over by Al-Mansur to chastise his insolence met with disaster. The second, commanded by his own son, Abd-al-Melik-al-Modhaffer, vanquished the forces of Zira after a desperate struggle. The latter, with the loss of his possessions, was also stripped of his power, and died soon after of wounds received in battle.

Early in the spring of the year 1002 the indefatigable Al-Mansur again invaded the territory of the Christians. This time his hostility was directed against the shrine of St. Emilian, the patron saint of Castile, whose church was in the village of Canales. The town, the chapel, and the convents, with all their paraphernalia of priestly imposture and superstition, were destroyed. But the renowned commander, whose prowess had so long sustained the reputation of the Moslem arms, had fought his last campaign. A painful malady, whose cause was unknown, and whose symptoms baffled the skill of the best physicians of Cordova, had some months before attacked him. The exposure and excitement of this expedition increased its violence. The illustrious sufferer became so weak that he was forced to travel in a litter. It was evident from his emaciated form and incessant agony that he was fast approaching his end. At Medina-Celi the army halted. Its general could proceed no farther. A universal feeling of sorrow arose as the sad tidings of the condition of the dying chieftain spread throughout the camp.

The memory of the turbulent populace of the capital, and the consciousness that it had required all the energy of his determined character to triumph over his domestic enemies, embittered the last moments of Al-Mansur. He dreaded the inauguration of anarchy and the resultant partition of the khalifate. He was only too well acquainted with the instability of the vast and magnificent fabric of greatness which his genius had reared. With a view to preserve as long as possible for his sons the power he was unable to legally transmit, he directed Abd-al-Melik to hasten at once to Cordova and assume command of the garrison. To his second son, Abd-al-Rahman, he transferred his authority over the army. Many wise injunctions were imparted by their dying parent to these two young officers, whose military character had been formed under his own eye during many eventful campaigns. The elder, who was not an unworthy descendant of so great a sire, profited largely by his opportunities. The younger, unequal to the task of government, was destined to realize the worst expectations his acquaintances had formed of his erratic and licentious nature.

His instructions ended, the strength of Al-Mansur gave way, and he received with calm resignation the inexorable summons of the Angel of Death. For years he had entertained a presentiment that he should end his days at the head of his army, perhaps in the heat of battle. It was not only his hope, but he made it the subject of his daily petitions, that Allah would vouchsafe to him the glorious privilege of dying in war against the infidel, thereby to merit the recompense of martyrdom. In expectation of a favorable answer to his prayers, the arrangements for his burial were always ready. His shroud was invariably included among the effects of his camp equipage. It was of linen made from flax grown on his paternal estate at Torrox and woven by the hands of his own daughters. His conscience told him that the material thus produced and prepared was not tainted with the bloody reminiscences that popular report insinuated too often attached to his other possessions. The provident statesman, whose aspirations were not confined to matters terrestrial, and carrying into his relations with Allah the same prudence which had distinguished his earthly career, neglected no precaution to insure his salvation. A well-known text of the Koran declares that he who appears before the Almighty with the dust of the Holy War upon his feet shall be exempt from the tortures of eternal fire. To secure this advantage on the Day of Judgment, Al-Mansur carried with him in all his campaigns a silver casket of elegant design, into which, every evening when the army halted, his attendants carefully collected the dust which had accumulated upon his garments during the day. Enveloped in the shroud prepared for so many years, and sprinkled with this holy dust, the body of the great Moslem general was laid at rest in the city of Medina-Celi.

The character of Mohammed-Ibn-Amir-Al-Mansur has already been partially delineated in these pages. In it both good and evil were unsparingly mingled. Beyond measure shrewd, politic, audacious, and resolute, he was an adept in instigating others to the commission of discreditable acts by which he profited, while his instruments alone endured the odium attaching to them. By the irresistible force of intellect he had risen from obscurity to the enjoyment of imperial power. No act of wanton cruelty ever polluted his administration. Yet such was his firmness and the fear in which he was held that no sedition during his ascendency disturbed the peace of the khalifate. His conduct on all occasions where his personal interests were not immediately concerned was, for the most part, guided by the principles of equity. His own son was sacrificed to the maintenance of public order. The deeds of violence and tyranny for which he was so grossly abused were the results of political necessity,--measures suggested by the pressing exigencies of the occasion, and dictated by the instinct of self-preservation. Born in a comparatively humble rank of life, his matrimonial alliances were sought by princes. The daughters of Bermudo, King of the Asturias, and Sancho, King of Navarre, were inmates of his harem. Despite his talents as a statesman and his long series of military triumphs, his popularity was superficial, and his position was maintained with difficulty. He was everywhere designated by the significant and opprobrious nickname of “The Fox.” His old literary associates envied and maligned him. The courtiers were jealous of his rapidly acquired fame, and sedulously depreciated his abilities. The eunuchs justly attributed to his agency the impairment of their political fortunes, and held him in detestation as the relentless enemy of their caste. The aristocracy sneered at his pretensions and privately denounced him as an insolent parvenu. The fanatical populace repeated his alleged atheistic speeches with pious horror, a feeling which even his ostentatious charity and apparently strict observance of the duties of a faithful Mussulman could not counteract. Inconsistent with the encouragement of literature, as the narrow policy which delivered the scientific works of the library of Al-Hakem to the tender mercies of ignorant bigots would seem to indicate, Al-Mansur was, nevertheless, a munificent patron of letters. His house was so frequented by men of genius and literary proclivities that it was compared to an academy. He often visited the University, listened to the lectures of the teachers, and rewarded the proficiency of the students. By his express orders the recitations were not suspended either at his entrance or his departure. Many of the most accomplished scholars of the East and West continued under his auspices, as they had done under those of Al-Hakem, to adorn the court, and to delight with their learning the critical and fastidious society of Cordova. A special fund, appropriated from the public treasury, was assigned for the support of these distinguished guests of the State. Famous grammarians, poets, and historians, who found this a lucrative field for the exercise of their talents, took up their residence in the capital. The reputations of the physicians and surgeons of Andalusia, now greater than ever, had long since spread to the remotest borders of Europe. Whenever Al-Mansur undertook an expedition, there followed in his train a number of bards and chroniclers, who could without delay record his achievements, and celebrate in the most stirring and pathetic strains of which the poesy of the Desert was capable the valor, the generosity, the piety, of the renowned champion of the Moslem faith. Forty-one of the most accomplished literary men of the empire accompanied the army for this purpose during the Catalonian campaign.

The enlargement of the Mosque, whose size was doubled by the additions of Al-Mansur, was undertaken quite as much to restore his failing credit with the ministers of religion as to accommodate the vast and increasing crowds which on Fridays assembled in the House of God. The land required for the extension was paid for at twice the valuation, already sufficiently exorbitant, estimated by the owners themselves. In the garden of an old woman, whose premises it was absolutely necessary for the architect to secure, stood a magnificent palm. At first she obstinately refused to sell her property, but after repeated solicitations she consented to exchange it for another residence in whose grounds was a tree of equal size and beauty. But even amidst the tropical vegetation of the environs of Cordova such a condition was not easily complied with. At length, in the vicinity of Medina-al-Zahrâ, an estate which possessed the desired requisite was procured at a fabulous price.

In imitation of his predecessors the khalifs, Al-Mansur performed for weeks the duties of a common laborer on the foundation and the superstructure of the Mosque. This addition, still intact, constructed of coarse materials and unsymmetrical in form, is readily distinguishable from the rest of the interior, whose sweeping horseshoe arches and exquisite decorations are models of grace and beauty. So meritorious was this work considered by the Mussulman theologians, that they declared that its accomplishment alone was sufficient to obtain for its author a seat in Paradise.

The energy of Al-Mansur was far from being consumed in military expeditions and the pursuit of glory. In the frequent intervals of peace his efforts were largely directed to improving the condition of his subjects, the highest and most noble title to distinction to which a ruler can aspire. He reformed the abuses which had crept into the administration of justice. He checked the peculations which were exhausting the treasury, by the institution of a rigid system of accounts and the severe punishment of dishonest officials. He sternly rebuked the intolerance of zealots who attempted to establish, without his sanction, a policy of persecution for opinions which they considered heretical. With his advent to power, the malignant influence of the eunuchs was no longer felt in the precincts of the court, and the uneasy genius of this pernicious class was diverted from the tortuous paths of political intrigue to the harmless and pleasing occupations of literature and art. He improved the breed of horses by the importation of the purest blood of Arabia. There was scarcely a river in Andalusia which could not boast of a bridge either built or repaired by the orders of the able and tireless minister. New highways were opened. Old ones were widened and extended. By these wise acts of public utility not only was the march of troops facilitated, but the trade of country and city was prodigiously increased, with a corresponding diminution of the price of provisions, whose abundance and cheapness materially benefited all classes of the population. The best commentary on his transcendent abilities is found in the fact that the empire which he had ruled with such glory and success perished with him. His majestic personality dominated everything. In the history of Islam no similar example of universally recognized individual superiority has ever been recorded. This extraordinary genius seemed impregnable to the temptations which usually assail the favorites of fortune. He was addicted to none of those unnatural vices whose practice defiled the characters of even the greatest of the Ommeyades. His harem was maintained rather as an accessory to his dignity than as an instrument of his pleasures. His amour with Aurora, which had provoked the sarcastic jests of the populace, had been from first to last a mere matter of policy. The passion of the Sultana he had deliberately used as the instrument of his ambition; when it had served his purpose it was as deliberately cast aside. With every opportunity for the accumulation of untold wealth, Al-Mansur acquired no more than was necessary to sustain the pomp incident to his exalted rank. Avarice had no place in his nature. His own treasure as well as that of the government he freely dispensed in charitable donations. The slightest act of extortion committed by one of his subordinates was met with chastisement that barely left the offender with life. No one who had merited his gratitude was ever forgotten in the distribution of official honors. No one whose insolence had at any time provoked his indignation went unpunished. In the accomplishment of his ambition, he persistently ignored the most obvious principles of morality. In his administration of petty offices of the inferior magistracy and of the highest employments of the state alike, he ordinarily observed the rules of the most impartial justice. After every victory gained by his arms he liberated hundreds of slaves.

A delusive appearance of moderation is suggested by the conduct of Al-Mansur, when we reflect that he denied himself the more than regal prestige which attached to the name of Commander of the Faithful. There is no doubt, however, that he ardently coveted that distinction. The possession of the substance of power did not satisfy his lofty aspirations. He arrogated to himself the remaining titles of the Khalif, as he had already appropriated the latter’s prerogatives. He substituted his own seal for that of the injured Hischem. He boldly assumed the right to appoint his son to the office of prime minister, the very employment from which he himself derived his entire authority. The brilliancy of his achievements, the extent of his renown, the autocratic exertion of his power, had awed and dazzled his subjects, but had not secured their attachment. The masses openly applauded and secretly detested him. The various nations composing the population of Moorish Spain, while mutually hostile in many respects, were firmly united in their reverence for the inalienable rights of the crown. The religious character which invested the Khalif deepened and intensified this feeling. The sagacity of Al-Mansur did not suffer him to be deluded with the idea that he could violate with impunity the most sacred opinions and prejudices of the people. Moreover, an ancient tradition, universally believed, declared that a change of the dynasty portended the speedy destruction of the khalifate. The man who in defiance of these ideas could attempt open usurpation was a public enemy, something worse, if possible, than a traitor. For these cogent reasons, therefore, Al-Mansur did not seize the royal office, which, had he been able to assume it, might perhaps have retained the succession in his own family. As it was, he weakened the veneration entertained for the principle of legitimacy, without acquiring for his descendants any permanent advantage in return for the sacrifice. No one realized these facts so thoroughly as himself. The future of the empire engrossed his thoughts. It presented itself to his mind amidst the deliberations of the Divan, in the literary discussions of the University, in the manœuvres on the field of battle. It disturbed his slumbers. It embittered his dying moments. The mortal torture he endured from the reflection that by his agency the integrity of the khalifate had been irretrievably impaired, and that he could not transmit the inheritance of his glory, was almost as intense as any he could have experienced through remorse for crimes perpetrated in the pursuit of his unrighteous ambition.

The history of the campaigns of Al-Mansur differs materially from that of the military enterprises of his predecessors. Heretofore, in all important wars, the Christians were the aggressors. But under the minister of Hischem the Moslems always led the attack. Other rulers had negotiated treaties either prompted by victory or compelled by defeat. In twenty-five years he never made terms with the infidel. His success became habitual, and infused a just confidence into his own followers, while in a corresponding degree it disheartened the enemy. Almost for the first time in the annals of Islam the peremptory injunction of the Koran was fulfilled to the letter. The effects of one campaign were not repaired before the calamities of another were at hand. The frontier to the Christian states receded. The great cities of Zamora, Leon, Astorga, Barcelona, Pampeluna, Santiago were levelled with the dust. Cathedrals and monasteries were plundered of wealth bestowed by pious sovereigns and generations of grateful devotees. The incomes of the priesthood ceased on account of the devastation of their estates. With the ruin of the religious houses and the impoverishment of their occupants, the Christian worship declined. The prestige of the ecclesiastical order was weakened, and over an extensive region once abounding with churches and convents scarcely a reminiscence of Christianity survived. By the successive desecration of the two holiest shrines in Europe, the faith of the multitude in the boasted efficacy of relics, in the celestial intercession of saints, and even in the value of religion itself, was seriously shaken. The misfortunes of the clergy--who still, however, retained a portion of their ancient discipline--reacted on the other divisions of society, already sufficiently demoralized. The monarch and the nobles evinced a disposition to resist the insolent demands of the priesthood, and have been, in consequence, anathematized by prelates and defamed by chroniclers. The king seized without ceremony the property of his subjects. The barons plundered the royal estates, and cast lots for the serfs and the flocks which they had appropriated. In less than twenty years the Christians lost all they had gained in the previous three hundred. Even the defiles of their mountains were occupied by Moorish garrisons, and the Asturian peasant was compelled to purchase the uncertain privilege of procuring his own sustenance by the surrender of the larger share of the results of his labor. Such were the effects of the policy of Al-Mansur on the two rival nations of the Peninsula, a policy whose benefits perished with the author, but whose evils were destined to be augmented and perpetuated through a long period of national misfortune and disorder.

Berber immigration, encouraged by the conspicuous favor enjoyed by the African divisions of the army, as well as by the rich rewards of successful warfare, and which was fated to inflict such disasters upon the dismembered monarchy, increased beyond precedent during the administration of Al-Mansur. Entire tribes passed the Strait to share the tempting spoil of the Holy War. There was no room for these ferocious soldiers in the crowded cities. Even in the country, so thickly populated, space could hardly be found for their encampments. Their tents were pitched in the pastures and on the slopes of the sierra. Their fierce aspect appalled all who beheld them. Their costumes and their arms were strange and foreign. Ignorant of Arabic, the guttural accents of their Mauritanian dialect grated upon the ears of the polished Andalusian. In times of the greatest victories, when the people were intoxicated with success, there were discerning men who dreaded the ascendency of such dangerous allies. It was, however, the inexhaustible supply of African recruits which secured the unbroken series of triumphs that signalized the career of Al-Mansur. Their numbers were overwhelming. In a review held before an expedition into the North, six hundred thousand troops were mustered in the plain of Cordova.

The news of the death of the potent minister was received by the majority of the inhabitants of the capital with a feeling of exultation. With the multitude, his eminent services could not atone for the obscurity of his birth or the splendor of his fortune. The animosities of contending sects, the jealousies of competing tradesmen, the envy of the masses towards the powerful, the disdain of the wealthy for the poor, were forgotten in the common desire to humiliate the family of the great chieftain through whose genius the Moslem empire had enjoyed such an extraordinary measure of prosperity and fame. An insurrection broke out. The mob, surrounding the palace, demanded that the Khalif in person should assume the direction of affairs. But the latter, who now, more than ever, felt his incompetency to govern, again voluntarily renounced the rights of sovereignty. The tumult increased; the garrison was called out, and Al-Modhaffer signalized his accession as hajib by the massacre of several hundred citizens. This example of severity was not soon forgotten; the spirit of revolt was crushed, and Al-Mansur, who on his death-bed had foreseen the occurrence of a similar catastrophe, thus averted by his prophetic wisdom a rebellion, which, unchecked, must have been productive of appalling consequences. The prince, Al-Modhaffer, inherited in no small degree the military talents and capacity for civil affairs possessed by his father, whose maxims he in the main adopted. Few details exist relative to his administration, which, however, was eminently popular and successful. The expeditions he made into the Christian territory were not attended with the brilliant results which characterized the exploits of his father. Neither profit nor glory could be derived from the invasion of a desert and the chase of bands of wandering robbers. These forays, however, served the useful purpose of intimidation, and impeded the recovery of the Christian power. Relieved from the prodigality and great military expenses incurred by the aggressive policy of Al-Mansur, the inexhaustible resources of the Peninsula were permitted to develop to the utmost. Commerce, manufactures, agriculture, flourished to a degree heretofore unknown. The rule of Al-Modhaffer is regretfully alluded to by subsequent writers as coincident with the golden age of Moslem annals.

After a reign of seven years, Al-Modhaffer died, under circumstances which raised a strong suspicion of poison. By a previous arrangement, which popular rumor suggested as the motive of his death, his office was transferred to his brother, Abd-al-Rahman. The latter was the offspring of a Christian princess, the daughter of Sancho, King of Navarre. By his vices and his blasphemy he had incurred the dislike of the people and provoked the execration of the theologians. The former, in memory of his infidel grandfather, fastened upon him the diminutive “Sanchol,” an epithet of contempt. The latter recounted with indignant horror his immoderate indulgence in wine and his open ridicule of the sacred ceremonies of Islam. Aware of his unpopularity, Abd-al-Rahman nevertheless continued to outrage public sentiment, and made no attempt to gain the attachment of his subjects or to conciliate his ecclesiastical adversaries. He even had the audacity to ask of Hischem his investiture and acknowledgment as heir presumptive to the throne. The Khalif was prevailed upon, partly by sophistry, partly by threats, to comply with this extravagant and impolitic demand, and an edict was drawn up in due form and published, proclaiming the detested Sanchol heir to the titles and the authority of the illustrious dynasty of the Ommeyades.

No measure could have been devised by his most bitter enemy so fatal to the aspirations of its promoter as this concession wrung from a reluctant and persecuted sovereign. It was alike an insult to religion and to loyalty. It attacked the sacred character of the Successor of the Prophet, while attempting to abrogate the prerogatives which, in the eye of the devoted subject, were inseparable from the condition of sovereignty. Sanchol further increased the prevailing discontent by compelling the soldiers to discard the helmet for the turban, an innovation which, appropriating a distinctive portion of the attire of theologians, was generally regarded as a flagrant act of sacrilege.

Careless of public opinion, and confident of the stability of his power, Sanchol began to entertain aspirations to military distinction. He led an expedition into the Asturias, the results of which were not flattering to his vanity. The mountain defiles, filled with snow, impeded his progress, and the scarcity of provisions, which he had neglected to provide in sufficient quantities, finally compelled him to retreat. In the mean time Cordova was in revolt. A band of conspirators headed by Mohammed, a great-grandson of Abd-al-Rahman III., surprised the citadel. The unfortunate Hischem, the puppet of every faction, was compelled to abdicate. The religious fanatics and the populace hailed the change of government with extravagant expressions of joy, a feeling by no means shared by the wealthy and intelligent, who anticipated with undisguised concern the destructive tyranny of a succession of military adventurers.

The first act of Mohammed was the seizure of Zahira. The stronghold of the Amirides was entered and sacked by an infuriated rabble. For four days the beautiful palace founded by Al-Mansur was at the mercy of the revolutionists and outlaws of the capital. The long rows of villas, which, embosomed in shady groves of palm- and orange-trees, stretched away to the Guadalquivir, were visited with the same destruction. Everything portable, even to the woodwork, was removed. No estimate could be made of the plunder secured by the mob, who ransacked every apartment; but the soldiers of Mohammed delivered to their master two million one hundred thousand pieces of silver and a million five hundred thousand pieces of gold. The torch was then applied and the entire suburb was reduced to ashes. The stones were gradually appropriated for the construction of other buildings, and in a few years the memory as well as the ruins of the seat of the Amirides had completely vanished.

When the intelligence of these events was transmitted to Sanchol at Toledo, he set out at once with his army for Cordova. The march had scarcely begun before he experienced the full extent of his unpopularity, which heretofore he had refused to believe. His force was diminished daily by desertions. Many of the soldiers who remained refused to obey their officers. At a short distance from the capital, the Berbers, on whom he placed his main reliance, left the camp at midnight, and morning found the commander with a slender retinue, whose number did not equal that of his ordinary body-guard. Notwithstanding these ominous indications, the infatuation of Sanchol, who fancied that the people of Cordova would, by the mere effect of his presence, be induced to return to their allegiance, urged him on to his ruin. He was seized by the troops of Mohammed, beheaded, his body clothed in rags and nailed to a stake, and then placed with the head--which was impaled on a pike--in one of the most public quarters of the city. With the death of Sanchol, the rule of the Amirides, who, in a subordinate capacity, had for a generation exercised despotic power, and whose policy was destined to visit upon their countrymen a long series of misfortunes, terminated forever.

The pernicious effects of the practical usurpation of Al-Mansur now became apparent. The ambition of every aspiring partisan was encouraged by the example of that gifted leader whose extraordinary talents had raised him to such a height of affluence and renown.

Mohammed was no sooner fairly seated upon the throne, when the populace again began to murmur. The excitement of revolution, once enjoyed, was too pleasant to be abandoned for the severe restraints of law and social order. And in reality only too much cause existed for popular dissatisfaction. The new sovereign was cruel, rapacious, dissolute. He took the heads of rebellious vassals sent him by his generals, had them cleansed, and the skulls--in which flowers had been planted--arranged in fantastic designs in the garden of his palace. His drunken and licentious orgies were the reproach of the court. He alienated the theologians, who soon discovered that they had made a bad exchange for even the dissipated and impious Sanchol. He persecuted the Berbers, who had inherited the vices and the unpopularity of the eunuchs, but who for a quarter of a century had been the support of the monarchy. To avoid the possible restoration of Hischem, he publicly announced his death, substituted for his corpse that of a Christian killed for the occasion, and who bore a striking likeness to the Khalif, and celebrated his obsequies with all the magnificence due to departed royalty. The performance of the rites of Mussulman burial over the body of an infidel was, in the eyes of every true believer, a deed of unparalleled infamy. The unpopularity of Mohammed increased daily. A sedition broke out headed by Hischem, a grandson of Abd-al-Rahman III., who boldly demanded the crown of his kinsman. The usurper pretended to accede, and secretly despatched emissaries to incite the Berbers to plunder the capital. The scheme was successful; at the first appearance of these detested foreigners in the market-place, the tradesmen arose in a body and, aided by the royal body-guard, drove the Africans from the city. The pretender was taken in the confusion attending the skirmish and immediately executed.

His place was filled by Suleyman, another prince of the Ommeyade line. Negotiations were entered into with the Count of Castile, who, in consideration of the surrender of certain territory, agreed to furnish a large contingent of men and horses. As soon as their organization was effected, the Berbers marched on the capital. A battle was fought on the plain of Cantich, but the disorderly rabble of Cordova were unable to resist the fierce onset of the African cavalry, and ten thousand of the partisans of Mohammed fell by the sword or perished in the Guadalquivir. Mohammed then liberated Hischem, whose supposed corpse he had buried, resigned his dignity, and proclaimed the son of Al-Hakem sovereign of Spain. But the ruse had no effect. The Cordovans admitted the Berbers, and Suleyman occupied the palace of the khalifs.

Henceforth the story of the Peninsula is one of anarchy and ruin. Every province, every hamlet, was a prey to the hatred of contending parties intensified by the daily infliction of mutual outrages. Christian mercenaries, paid with the plunder of the enemy, served in the armies of both factions. The peasantry were robbed and butchered without mercy. Cordova was repeatedly sacked by the Catalan auxiliaries, by the Berbers, by ruthless mobs of its own citizens. It endured all the privations of a protracted siege, all the unspeakable horrors of famine and pestilence. While the capital was invested by the Berbers, the suburb of Medina-al-Zahrâ was taken by these savage warriors. Every being within its limits was slaughtered. The favorite seat of the khalifs, on whose construction for forty years the wealth of the empire had been lavished by Abd-al-Rahman and Al-Hakem, was utterly destroyed. The treasury was empty, and Wadhih, the governor of Cordova under Hischem,--who had again been made khalif,--was forced to sell the greater portion remaining of the library of Al-Hakem to obtain money to pay his troops. At length the Berbers took the city by assault. The inhabitants dearly expiated the predilection for revolt which they had so frequently manifested. The butchery was frightful. Families conspicuous for wealth were reduced in a few hours to abject poverty. The gutters ran with blood. Heaps of unburied corpses encumbered the streets. The famous scholars who had been attracted to Spain from every country in the world perished almost to a man. No considerations of mercy, policy, or religion restrained the brutal instincts of the victors. Women and children were cut down or trampled to death. Crowds of trembling suppliants, who had sought refuge in the mosques, were massacred. The sanctity of the harems was violated with every attendant circumstance of lust and cruelty. Palaces erected by the ambition of a proud and opulent nobility were burned to ashes. With the accession of Suleyman, an edict confiscating the property of the citizens whom the public misfortunes had least affected, and banishing the owners, was promulgated, and the ferocious Africans, who had dealt such a fatal blow to the civilization of Europe, and in a few months had overturned a fabric which the intelligence and energy of a line of great princes had hardly been able to complete in two hundred years, appropriated the seraglios, and installed themselves in the few remaining mansions whose luxurious appointments and magnificent gardens had long been the boast of the Moslem capital.

The dismemberment of the empire now progressed with appalling rapidity. The chief’s of both factions constantly solicited the aid of the Christians for the destruction of their adversaries. For a time their entreaties were heeded, but with each application the surrender of territory, whose fortresses constituted the security of the frontier provinces of the khalifate, was required. With the increasing distress of the party whose nominal head was Hischem, the demands of the Leonese and Castilian chieftains became more exacting. At length the Count of Castile threatened that, unless all the strongholds taken and fortified by Al-Mansur were delivered to him, he would join the Berbers with the entire force at his command. The cowardice of the government of Cordova impelled it to make this disgraceful concession. A great number of fortified places won by the valor of Al-Mansur’s veterans were evacuated by the Saracen garrisons. Encouraged by the example of Sancho, the petty sovereigns of Leon and Navarre sent similar messages to Cordova. The incompetent Wadhih, who exercised the royal power in the name of the Khalif, terrified by these empty menaces, hastened to purchase temporary immunity for the capital by the sacrifice of the remaining bulwarks of the frontier. It was not long before the Christian princes, without striking a blow or giving any equivalent, recovered the territory which all the courage and obstinacy of their fathers had not been able to retain.

The occupation of Cordova by Suleyman was far from obtaining for him the submission of the remaining cities of the khalifate. The excesses committed by the Berbers, and the employment of the hated infidels of Castile, arrayed almost the entire population against him. The strongholds of the North, through the pusillanimous conduct of the imperial officials, were irretrievably lost. The governors of the eastern and western provinces proclaimed their independence. Thousands of prosperous villages were destroyed; and the plains so recently covered with luxuriant vegetation again assumed the desolate appearance they possessed during the disastrous civil wars of the emirate. So complete was this devastation, that it was said one could travel for many days northward from Cordova and not encounter a single human being.

Upon the arrival of Ali, Suleyman’s successor, at the capital, a thorough search was made for the Khalif Hischem, but without success. The corpse buried by Mohammed was exhumed, but was not identified as that of the unfortunate prince. Diligent inquiry failed to elicit any reliable intelligence concerning the missing monarch. The same uncertainty envelops the end of the last of the Ommeyades that attaches to the fate of the last of the Visigoths. Both were the degenerate heirs of a dynasty of illustrious sovereigns. One lost his crown and his life directly through the oppression he inflicted on his subjects; the other indirectly through tyranny endured from an unnatural relative and an ungrateful minister. Both perished by treason, and each disappeared in the final catastrophe which overwhelmed his kingdom. The Khalif Hischem was never seen after the Berbers sacked the capital. An idle tradition asserted that he escaped the carnage of that dreadful day and found a refuge in Asia. It is more probable, however, that he was killed in the confusion of the assault, and that his body, stripped and unrecognized, was consigned, with those of thousands of his subjects, to an unknown grave. With him ended the prosperity, the affluence, the glory of the line of the Ommeyades. Henceforth, the khalifate, broken into a multitude of independent and often hostile principalities, offered an easy prey to the enterprise of the Christians, whose costly experience had finally taught them the imperative necessity of concerted union.

END OF VOLUME I.

Transcriber’s Notes:

1. Obvious printers’, punctuation and spelling errors have been corrected silently.

2. Some hyphenated and non-hyphenated versions of the same words have been retained as in the original.

3. Where hyphenation is in doubt, it has been retained as in the original.

4. Italics are shown as _xxx_.