Moorish Remains In Spain

TO HIS MAJESTY KING ALFONSO XIII.

Sire,

The great interest Your Majesty has evinced in the Moorish Monuments which adorn Your Majesty’s loyal and noble country, and the gracious appreciation with which You were pleased to regard my work on The Alhambra, inspired me with the presumption to solicit the honour of Your Majesty’s August Patronage for this volume, which is humbly dedicated to Your Majesty agreeably to Your Majesty’s gracious permission, by

Your Majesty’s humble Servant,

Albert F. Calvert.

THE inception of my work on The Alhambra, to which this book is designed to be the companion and complementary volume, was due to the disappointing discovery that no such thing as an even moderately adequate souvenir of the Red Palace of Granada, “that glorious sanctuary of Spain,” was in existence. It was written at a time when I shared the very common delusion that the Alhambra was the only word in a vocabulary of relics which includes such Arabian superlatives as the Mosque at Cordova, the Gates and the Cristo de la Luz of Toledo, and the Alcazar at Seville. I had then to learn that while the Alhambra has rightly been accepted as the last word on Moorish Art in Spain, it must not be regarded as the solitary monument of the splendour and beauty with which the Arabs stamped their virile and artistic personality upon Andalus.

In the course of frequent and protracted visits to Spain I came to realise that the Moors were not a one-city nation; they did not exhaust themselves in a single, isolated effort to achieve the sublimely beautiful. Before the Alhambra was conceived in the mind of Mohammed the First of Granada, Toledo had been adorned and lost; Cordova, which for centuries had commanded the admiration of Europe, had paled and waned beside the increasing splendour of Seville; and the “gem of Andalusia” itself had been wrested from the Moor by the victorious Ferdinand III. But each in turn had been redeemed from Gothic tyranny by the art-adoring influence of the Moslem. Their dominion, their politics, and their influence is a tale of a day that is dead, but it survives in the monuments of their Art, which exist to the glory of Spain and the wonder of the world. The Arabian sense of the beautiful sealed itself upon Cordova, and made the city its own; it blended with the joyous spirit of Seville; it forced its impress upon the frowning forehead of Toledo. To see the Alhambra is not to understand the wonders of the Alcazar; the study of Moorish wizardry in Toledo does not reveal, does not even prepare one, for the bewildering cunning of the Mosque in Cordova.

In Cordova—this gay, vivacious overgrown village, which gleams serene in a setting of vineyards and orange groves—the spirit of the Moors still breathes. Rome wrested the city from Carthage; the Goths humbled it to the dust. But, under the Moors, Cordova became the centre of European civilisation, the rival of Baghdad and Damascus as a seat of learning, the Athens of the West, and second only in sanctity to the Kaaba of Mecca. Its Cathedral first came into being as a temple of Janus; it has been both a basilica and a mosque. But the magic art of the Mohammedan, which effaced the imprint of the Roman spear, has survived the torch of the Holy Inquisition, and to-day Cordova is the most exquisitely beautiful Moorish monument in Spain.

In Seville, on the spot where Roman, Visigoth, and Moslem have each in turn practised their faith, the Cathedral bells now hang above the Arabian tower of the mosque, and the spire of the temple of the faithful has become the world-famous Giralda, which dominates the city. Moorish fountains and patios are found at Malaga, and Granada, and Toledo, but one comes to “La Tierra de Maria Santisima” to see them at their loveliest, while the Alcazar is perhaps the best preserved and most superbly-decorated specimen of the Moorish citadel-palace that Europe has to show.

Menacing, majestic, and magnificent in its strength and splendid isolation, Toledo, guarded by its Moorish masonry, a rock built upon a rock, has been described by Padilla as “the crown of Spain, the light of the world, free from the time of the mighty Goths.” The light of the world has dwindled in the socket of modern progress, the Moor has left his scars upon the freedom of the Goth; but Toledo, which was old when Christianity was born, presents an epitome of the principal arts, religions, and races which have dominated the world for the last two thousand years.

In the three cities of Cordova, Seville, and Toledo, in which the hand of the Moor touched nothing that it did not beautify, I have found the supplement to the art wonders that I attempted to describe in my book upon the Alhambra; and, encouraged by the cordiality of the welcome extended to that volume in Spain and America, as well as in this country, I have followed the course which I therein adopted, of making the letterpress subservient to the illustrations. While immersed in authorities, and tempted often by the beauties of the scenes to indulge the desire to emotionalise in words, I have never permitted myself to forget that my purpose has been to present a picture rather than to chronicle the romance of Spanish-Morisco art.

For the historical data, and some of the descriptions contained in this book, I have levied tribute on a large number of authors. Don Pascual de Gayángos, the renowned translator of Al-Makkari; the Handbook and the Gatherings of Richard Ford; William Stirling-Maxwell’s Don John of Austria; The History of the Conquest of Spain, by Henry Coppeé; Washington Irving’s Conquest of Granada; Miss Charlotte Yonge’s Christians and Moors in Spain; Stanley Lane-Poole’s The Moors in Spain; the writings of Dr. R. Dozy, of Leipsic; Muhammed Hayat Khan’s Rise and Fall of the Muslim Empire in Spain; Hannah Lynch’s Toledo; Walter M. Gallichan’s Seville; The Latin-Byzantine Monuments of Cordova; Monumentos Arquitectonicos de España; Pedro de Madrazo’s Sevilla—these, and many less important writers on Spain, have been consulted.

But with this wealth of literary material to hand, I have remembered that it is my collection of illustrations, rather than on the written word, that I must depend. From the nature of Arabian art, and the characteristic minuteness of the details of which Morisco decoration is composed, lengthy descriptions of architecture, unaccompanied by illustrations, become not only tedious but positively confusing to the reader, while, on the other hand, a sufficiency of illustrations renders exhaustive descriptions superfluous. I have striven to do justice to the subject in this direction, not without hope of achieving my purpose, but with a vast consciousness of the fact that, neither by camera, nor brush, nor by the pen, can one reflect, with any fidelity, the effects obtained by the Moorish masters of the Middle Ages. In their art we find a sense of the mysterious that appeals to one like the glint of moonlight on running water; an intangible spirit of joyousness that one catches from the dancing shadows of leaves upon a sun-swept lawn; and an elusive key to its beauty, which is lost in the bewildering maze of traceries and the inextricable network of designs. The form, but not the fantasy, of these fairy-like, fascinating decorations may be reproduced, and this I have endeavoured to do.

A. F. C.

“Royston,” Hampstead, N. W.
1905.

THE conquest of Spain by the Moors, and the story comprised in the eight centuries during which they wielded sovereignty as a European power, forms a romance that is without parallel in the history of the world. Under Mohammedan rule Spain enjoyed the first and most protracted period of comparative peace and material prosperity she had ever known. She had been plundered by Carthage and Phœnicia, ground beneath the iron heel of Rome, devastated and enslaved by those Christianised but corrupt barbarians, the Visigoths. All the evils and demoralisation arising from successive waves of bloody conquest and decadent voluptuousness had been sown in the breast of Spain. The squandered might of Carthage had left the country a prey to the vigorous Roman; the degenerate Roman had been banished by the rugged, victorious Goth, who, after two centuries of security and sensual ease, was to be made subject to the warlike and enlightened Moor. Once more the land was to be overrun and the face of the country was to be scarred with fire and the sword; once more the people were to learn to serve new masters and conform to new laws. Of a truth the last state must have seemed worse than the first to the Romanised Spaniards. Carthage had brought chains, but it had also introduced artificers and a form of Government; the Roman eagles had been accompanied by Roman engineers and road-builders; the Goths erected upon the broken altars of mythology temples to the living God. But it now seemed that the whips of ancient foes were to be replaced by the scorpions of their new taskmasters; the Christianity which the East had sent them was to be uprooted by the Eastern infidels.

Such must have been the prospect before Spain, and even before the rest of Europe, when Tarik returned in 710 to Ceuta, from a marauding expedition upon the coast of Andalusia, and reported to Musa, the son of Noseyr, the Arab Governor of North Africa, that the country was ripe for conquest and well worth the hazard of the cast. Twenty years later the Moslems had overrun Spain, captured Bordeaux by assault and advanced to the conquest of Gaul. It is passing strange to reflect that these far-reaching, epoch-making events had not been undertaken as the result of a deep-laid scheme of national expansion or religious enterprise. According to tradition the foundation of the Moslem supremacy in Spain was instigated by the hatred of a single traitor, Count Julian, the Governor of Ceuta, and his treachery was inspired by the dishonour of one young girl—Julian’s daughter, Florinda.

At the beginning of the eighth century, when the Moors had extended their possessions up to the walls of Ceuta, which was held for Roderick, King of Spain, by Count Julian, the Count, in accordance with the custom among the Gothic nobility, had sent his daughter to the Court of Roderick, at Toledo, to be educated among the Queen’s gentlewomen in a manner befitting her rank and lineage. The rest is the old story of a beautiful, unprotected girl, a lascivious guardian, and a father thirsting for vengeance. So far Count Julian had defended Ceuta against the Moors with unbroken success, now he came to Toledo to relieve the king of the custody of his daughter, and repay the breach of trust which Roderick had committed by making a compact with the king’s enemies. On the eve of his departure from the capital, the king requested the Count to send him some hawks of a special variety that he desired for hunting purposes, and the vengeful noble pledged himself to supply his master with hawks, the like of which he had never seen.

But Count Julian found the Saracenic hawks less keen for the hunting he had in view than he expected. That old bird of prey, Musa, listened to the alluring tales of the richness and beauty of Spain, but doubted the good faith of his long-time enemy, who proposed that the Moors should invade this promised land in Spanish ships, lent to them for the purpose. But the love of conquest and the lust of loot, which had inspired and sustained the Arab arms in all their territorial campaigns, overcame the natural hesitancy of the Moorish Governor, and in 710 Musa despatched Tarik with a small expedition to spy out the state of the Spanish coast. So successful was the mission, and so rich the plunder they brought back, that in the following year he adventured an army of 7,000 men under Tarik for the spoliation of Andalusia. Tarik, who landed at the rock of Gibraltar—Gebal Tarik, which still bears his name—captured Carteya, and encountered the army of Roderick, who had hurried from the North of his dominions to repel the invaders, on the banks of the Guadalete.

Washington Irving, in the Conquest of Spain, has related, in his brilliantly picturesque style, the old legend of the prophecy of Roderick’s overthrow and the mystery surrounding his death. The king was proof against the solemn warnings of the old warders of the tower of Hercules,—the tower of “jasper and marble, inlaid in subtle devices, which shone in the rays of the sun,”—wherein lay the secret of Spain’s future, sealed by a magic spell, and guarded by a massive iron gate, and secured by the locks affixed to it by every successive Spanish king since the days of Hercules. Roderick came not to set a new lock upon the gate, but to burst the bolts of the centuries and reveal the mystery that his predecessors had gone down into their graves without solving. All day long his courtiers urged him vainly against his own undoing, and the custodians laboured at the rusty locks, and at evening he entered the mighty, outer hall, rushed past the bronze warder, penetrated the inner chamber, and read the inscription attached to the casket, which Hercules had deposited in the gem-encrusted tower. “In this coffer is the mystery of the Tower. The hand of none but a King can open it; but let him beware, for wonderful things will be disclosed to him, which must happen before his death.” In a moment the lid is prized open, the parchment, folded between plates of copper, is brought into the light of day, and the king has read the motto inscribed upon the border: “Behold, rash man, those who shall hurl thee from thy throne and subdue thy Kingdom.”

Beneath the motto is drawn a panorama of horsemen, fierce of countenance, armed with bows and scimitars. As the king gazes wonderingly upon the picture, the sound of warfare rushes on his ear, the chamber is filled with a cloud, and in the cloud the horsemen bend forward in their saddles and raise their arms to strike. Amazed and terrorised, Roderick and his courtiers drew back and “beheld before them a great field of battle, where Christians and Moors were engaged in deadly conflict. They heard the rush and tramp of steeds, the blast of trump and clarion, the clash of cymbal, and the stormy din of a thousand drums. There was the flash of swords and maces and battle axes, with the whistling of arrows and hurling of darts and lances. The Christian quailed before the foe. The infidels pressed upon them, and put them to utter rout; the standard of the Cross was cast down, the banner of Spain was trodden under foot, the air resounded with shouts of triumph, with yells of fury, and the groans of dying men. Amidst the flying squadrons, King Roderick beheld a crowned warrior, whose back was turned towards him, but whose armour and device were his own, and who was mounted on a white steed that resembled his own war horse, Orelia. In the confusion of the fight, the warrior was dismounted and was no longer to be seen, and Orelia galloped wildly through the field of battle without a rider.”

The vision he had witnessed in the Tower of Hercules must have recurred to Roderick when he saw the Moorish army encamped against him by the waters of the Guadalete, but he must have noted its numbers with surprise, and contemplated his own host with complacency. For Tarik, even with his Berber reinforcements, only counted 12,000 men, and nearly four score thousand slept beneath the standard of Spain. If ever prophecy was calculated to be found at fault it must have seemed to be so that day, and Tarik published his estimate of the enormity of the odds that were against him when he cried to his army of fatalists, “Men, before you is the enemy, and the sea is at your backs. By Allah, there is no escape for you, save in valour and resolution.” But valour and resolution belonged to the Spaniards as well as to the Moors; and, but for the action of the kinsmen of the dethroned King Witiza, who deserted to the side of the Saracens in the midst of the seven day battle, the Moorish conquest would have been delayed, if not even entirely abandoned. But Witiza’s adherents turned the tide of battle against Roderick, the Spaniards broke and fled, and Orelia galloped riderless through the field. Tarik, in a single encounter, had won all Spain for the infidels.

Without hesitation, and in defiance of the commands of Musa, who coveted the glory that his lieutenant had so unexpectedly won, Tarik proceeded to make good his mastery of the entire Peninsula. He despatched a force of seven hundred horsemen to capture Cordova; Archidona and Malaga capitulated without striking a blow; and Elvira was taken by storm. City after city surrendered to the victorious invaders, and the principles of true chivalry, which the Moors invariably observed, reconciled the vanquished Spaniards to their new conquerors. The common people welcomed the promise of a new era, while the nobles fled before the advancing armies, and abandoned the country to the enemy. With the surrender of Toledo, Tarik had added a new dominion to the crown of Damascus. Musa left Ceuta in 712 with 18,000 men to join Tarik at Toledo, taking Seville, Carmona, and Merida en route. The meeting of the Governor and his General at the capital revealed the first flash of that fire of personal jealousy and internecine conflict which kept Spain in a blaze throughout the eight centuries of the Moorish occupation.

To the intrepid warriors, who were bred to war and trained to the business of conquest, the Pyrenees represented, not a bar to further progress, but a bulwark from which they were to advance to the subjugation of Europe. The total defeat of the Saracens under the walls of Toulouse by the Duke of Aquitana in 721 turned their course westwards; and after occupying Carcasonne and Narbonne, raiding Burgundy and carrying Bordeaux by assault, they suffered a decisive defeat at the hands of the Franks, under Charles Martel, at the Battle of Tours in 733. The tide of Arabian aggression was arrested and rolled back; and although the Moors repulsed the Frankish invasion of Spain under Charlemagne, a bound had been put upon their empire-building ambitions, and they set themselves resolutely to accomplish the pacification of the kingdom they had already won. It is the boast of the Northern Spaniards, the hardy mountaineers of Galicia and Leon, of Castile and the Biscayan provinces, that they were never subject to Moslem rule. There is good warrant for their claim, and in truth the independence of the North was maintained, but the fact remains that the Moors had no desire for those bleak and unfruitful districts; and so long as the savage Basques did not disturb the security of Arabian tenure in the fertile South, they were left in the enjoyment of their dreary, frozen fastnesses, and their wind-swept, arid wastes.

The Moors had made themselves secure in the smiling country that, roughly speaking, lies South of the Sierra de Guadarrama; and here, with a genius and success that was unprecedented, they organised the Kingdom of Cordova. “It must not be supposed,” writes Mr. Stanley Lane-Poole, “that the Moors, like the barbarian hordes who preceded them, brought desolation and tyranny in their wake. On the contrary, never was Andalusia so mildly, justly, and wisely governed as by the Arab conquerors. Where they got their talent for administration it is hard to say, for they came almost direct from their Arabian deserts, and their rapid tide of victories had left them little leisure to acquire the art of managing foreign nations. Some of their Counsellors were Greeks and Spaniards, but this does not explain the problem; for these same Counsellors were unable to produce similar results elsewhere; all the administrative talent of Spain had not sufficed to make the Gothic domination tolerable to its subjects. Under the Moors, on the other hand, the people were on the whole contented—as contented as any people can be whose rulers are of a separate race and creed—and far better pleased than they had been when their sovereigns belonged to the same religion as that which they nominally professed. Religion was, indeed, the smallest difficulty which the Moors had to contend with at the outset, though it had become troublesome afterwards. The Spaniards were as much pagan as Christian; the new creed promulgated by Constantine had made little impression among the general mass of the population, who were still predominantly Roman. What they wanted was—not a creed, but the power to live their lives in peace and prosperity. This their Moorish masters gave them.”

The people were allowed to retain their own religion and their own laws and judges; and with the exception of the poll tax, which was levied only upon Christians and Jews, their imposts were no heavier than those paid by the Moors. The slaves were treated with a mildness which they had never known under the Romans or the Goths, and, moreover, they had only to make a declaration of Mohammedanism—to repeat the formula of belief, “There is no God but God, and Mohammed is His Prophet”—to gain their freedom. By the same simple process, men of position and wealth secured equal rights with their conquerers. But while the Moors thus practised the science of pacification, they were unable to conquer their own racial instincts, which found their vent in jealous blood feuds and ceaseless internal conflicts. In the field the Arabs were a united people; under stress of warfare their rivalries were forgotten; but the racial spirit of the conquerors reasserted itself when the stress of conquest gave place to “dimpling peace,” and government by murder created constant changes in the administration. The Arabs and the Berbers, though they may be regarded as one race in their domination of Spain, were two entirely distinct and fiercely hostile tribes. The Berbers of Tarik had accomplished the conquest of Spain, but the Arabs arrived in time to seize the lion’s share of the spoils of victory; and when the Berber insurrection in

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.

OF the four great cities of the Mohammedan domination in Spain, Cordova, as the seat of the Khalifate established by Abd-er-Rahman I., is rightly regarded as chief. The sun of the Moslem era shone with dazzling brilliance on Seville, and pierced the shadows of grim Toledo ere it set upon the decaying grandeur of Granada; but it had risen first on Cordova, and from “that abode of magnificence, superiority, and elegance” its glory had been reflected to the furthest corner of the civilised world. For Cordova, by reason of its climate, its situation, and its surroundings has, since the beginning of time, been one of the garden spots of Europe. The Carthaginians had aptly styled it “the Gem of the South,” and the Romans had founded a city there in 152 B.C., which they called Corduba. But Corduba had sided with Pompey against Cæsar in the struggle for the mastership of the Roman Empire, and the mighty Julius visited this act of hostility with the destruction of more than half the city, and the massacre of 28,000 of its inhabitants. When the Goths made themselves rulers of Spain in the sixth century, they selected Toledo to be their capital, and Cordova sank into political insignificance. In 711, when Tarik had defeated Roderick near the banks of the Guadalete, he despatched Mughith with 700 horse to seize Cordova. Taking advantage of a fortuitous storm of hail, which deadened the clatter of the horses’ hoofs, and assisted by the treachery of a Christian shepherd, the followers of the Prophet obtained an unopposed entry, and the city fell without a blow being struck. Forty-four years later Abd-er-Rahman I. established the dynasty of the Omeyyads of Cordova, and for three centuries the capital of Mohammedan Spain was to be, in the language of the old chronicler, Ash-Shakand, “the repository of science, the minaret of piety and devotion, unrivalled even by the splendours of Baghdad or Damascus.”

Science has long since deserted Cordova; piety is not obtrusive there; its material magnificence has passed away. To-day the once famous city is a sleepy, smiling, overgrown village; a congregation of empty squares, and silent, winding, uneven streets, which have a more thoroughly African appearance than those of any other town in Spain. Theophile Gautier has described its “interminable white-washed walls, their scanty windows guarded by heavy iron bars,” and its pebbly, straw-littered pavement, and the sensitive spirit of De Amicis was caught by a vague melancholy in the midst of its white-washed, rose-scented streets. Here, he writes, there is “a marvellous variety of design, tints, light, and perfume; here the odour of roses, there of oranges, further on of pinks; and with this perfume a whiff of fresh air, and with the air a subdued sound of women’s voices, the rustling of leaves, and the singing of birds. It is a sweet and varied harmony that, without disturbing the silence of the streets, soothes the ear like the echo of distant music.” It has, as I have observed elsewhere, a charm that fills the heart with a sad pleasure; there is a mysterious spell in its air that one cannot resist. One may idle for hours in the sunshine that floods the deserted squares, and try to reconstitute in one’s mind, that Cordova, which was described as “the military camp of Andalus, the common rendezvous of

PLATE I.
CORDOVA.

Shell-like Ornaments in the Cupola of the Mihrab.

PLATE II.

Shell-like Ornaments in the Cupola of the Mihrab.

PLATE III.
CORDOVA.

Shell-like Ornaments in the Cupola of the Mihrab.

PLATE IV.
CORDOVA.

Part of the ornamentation and keystone of one of the lower arches which gives light to the dome.

those splendid armies which, with the help of Allah, defeated at every encounter the worshippers of the Crucified.” This indolent, lotus-fed, listless Cordova was once, says El-Makkari, “the meeting place of the learned from all countries, and, owing to the power and splendour of the dynasty that ruled over it, it contained more excellencies than any other city on the face of the earth.” Another Mohammedan author, Al-hijari, Abu Mohammed, writing of the city in the twelfth century, said: “Cordova was, during the reign of the Beni-Merwan, the cupola of Islam, the convocation of scholars, the court of the sultans of the family of Omeyyah, and the residence of the most illustrious tribes of Yemen and Ma’d. Students from all parts of the world flocked thither at all times to learn the sciences of which Cordova was the most noble repository, and to derive knowledge from the mouths of the doctors and ulema who swarmed in it. Cordova is to Andalus what the head is to the body. Its river is one of the finest in the world, now gliding slowly through level lawns, or winding softly across emerald fields, sprinkled with flowers, and serving it for robes; now flowing through thickly-planted groves, where the song of birds resounds perpetually in the air, and now widening into a majestic stream to impart its waters to the numerous wheels constructed on its banks, communicating fresh vigour to the land.”

The extent of ancient Cordova has been differently stated, owing, no doubt, to the rapid increase of its population and the expansion of the buildings under the sultans of the dynasty of Merwan on the one hand, and, on the other, to the calamities and disasters by which it was afflicted under the last sovereigns of that house. Cordova is, moreover, described by Mohammedan writers as a city which never ceased augmenting in size, and increasing in importance, from the time of its subjugation by the Moors until A.D. 1009-10, when, civil war breaking out within it, the capital fell from its ancient splendour, gradually decaying, and losing its former magnificence, until its final destruction in A.D. 1236, when it passed into the hands of the Christians.

From 711 until 755, when Abd-er-Rahman arrived in Spain to seize the new Moorish possession, which had fallen to the military skill and courage of Tarik’s Berbers, the conquerors had been too fully employed in capturing cities to devote much leisure to beautifying their prizes; now, with the foundation of the Omeyyad power, Cordova was to reap the first fruits of comparative peace. But the repulsion of the Abbaside invasion, the subjugation of Toledo, and the suppression of the Berber revolt in the Northern provinces, long delayed the commencement of the great mosque which the sultan projected as “a splendid seal upon the works pleasing to the Almighty, which he had accomplished.” By the building of the mosque, Abd-er-Rahman would secure a place for himself in Paradise, and would leave to his own honoured memory a Mecca of the West to which the followers of the Prophet could go in pilgrimage.

The treasury of Abd-er-Rahman was at this time in a flourishing condition, despite the large sums spent in adding splendour to the growing khalifate, and there appeared to be no difficulty in carrying out his project. But Umeya Ibn Yezid, the favourite secretary of the sultan, who, in his capacity of Katib, was instructed to make overtures for the purchase of the church on whose site the khalif intended to build the new mosque, soon found that the negotiations were beset by serious difficulties. The Christians held firm to the conditions of capitulation granted them by the Saracen conquerors of Cordova, and were not at all inclined to sell to Abd-er-Rahman the temple upon which he had set his heart. This building is described by Pedro de Madrazo as a spacious basilica, which they shared with the followers of the Prophet, since the Mohammedans, according to the practice established amongst them by the advice of the Khalif Omar, shared the churches of the conquered cities with the Christians, and, after taking Cordova, had divided one of the principal basilicas in two parts, one of which they conceded to the Cordovans, reserving the other, which they at once turned into a mosque, for themselves. The Christians had religiously paid the tribute exacted from them that they might keep their churches, bishops, and priests, but this had not protected them from unjust exactions and plunderings at the hands of the governors and representatives of the Eastern khalifs. Knowing this, Abd-er-Rahman was anxious to acquire the desired site without violence, and, with his natural sagacity, he perceived that the religious zeal of the native Christians was much less fervent than that of his own people. Captivity and affliction had damped the old ardour of the natives of Cordova, which, in his day, was no longer the heroic colony, so anxious for martyrdom, and so prodigal of its blood, as it was at the time when the flock of Christ was guided by the great Osius under the persecutions of Diocletian and Maximilian. Neither was it the Cordova which had endured wars, hunger, and plague sooner than be contaminated with Arianism, and the khalif knew, too, that in spite of the education given to the Christian youth in the schools and colleges of the monasteries, where many young priests and secular scholars promised to be a future danger to the Mohammedans, the Church at Cordova was suffering grievous wounds from the new doctrines of Migencio and Elipando. He was, therefore, the more surprised to receive a stubborn refusal to his offer, but the estimation in which he held the vanquished people and their leaders, led him to believe that he could overcome their obstinacy by quiet persistence, and by trusting to time to undermine their scruples. His policy was justified by its eventual success.

How did Abd-er-Rahman succeed in persuading the Christians to make so great a sacrifice? How came they to be induced to abandon their principal church to the infidels? Had not these walls been witnesses of the vows they had sworn at the most solemn epochs of their lives? Perhaps it was already a matter of indifference to them to see the ground, sanctified by the blood of their martyrs, defiled! “God Almighty alone knows” must be our only comment upon this unaccountable transaction, and we leave it thus in accordance with the practice adopted by the Arab historians, when they were at a loss for an explanation.

It is certain that under the reign of Abd-er-Rahman the Christians were no longer persecuted on account of their religion. They paid tribute, it is true, as a conquered people, but their faith was respected; they had their churches and monasteries, where they worshipped publicly; and it is not recorded that any of their priests were molested by the first Moorish king of the West. On the other hand, when they compared their present lot with that of the past, they must have considered themselves greatly fortunate, as they escaped the tyranny under which their fathers had suffered during the years from the cruel Alahor to the time of the covetous Toaba. It is certain that a new empire was rising in Cordova, which was very threatening to the law of Christ; but at first its menace was not revealed, and for this reason it was more to be feared. Its intentions were not published, but they were vaguely felt. Those who were wisest and most far-seeing could perceive, though still far off, the dark cloud of a bloody persecution drawing around the Church of Andalusia; but for the generality of the Christians there seemed to be no reason why the present toleration was not to continue, and it is certain that fear was not the motive that made them yield to the wishes of the khalif.

History is very reticent concerning this event; in fact, as Pedro de Madrazo admits, nothing definite has, up to the present, been discovered with regard to it. The probabilities are that the Bishop of Cordova, upon receiving the message of the Moorish king, called a council, and, after due discussion, resolved to part amicably with that which, despite the king’s moderation, would without any doubt be taken from them by force, should they persist in their refusal. In parting with their church, and transferring their place of worship, they hoped, too, to be released from the odious proximity of the infidels, whose presence under the roof of their basilica must always have been looked upon as a desecration of the sacred building. And, finally, the advantages to be gained by removing their holy relics to a more suitable sanctuary may have decided them to accept the khalif’s offer, under the condition that they should be allowed to re-build the basilica of the martyrs St. Faustus, St. Januaris, and St. Marcellus, which had been destroyed in recent years; and this being conceded to them by the khalif, the bishop authorised the transfer. The Arab ordered that the price agreed upon should be sent at once to the Christians, who were in turn to surrender their church forthwith, because Abd-er-Rahman, already advanced in years, was anxious that the edifice he was going to raise should be commenced without delay. No sooner had the Christians departed than Abd-er-Rahman left his villa in Razafa and took up his residence at the alcazar of the city, in order to superintend the projected work. The destruction of the old building was immediately proceeded with. Devoured with the desire to see the work completed, the indefatigable old man spent many hours each day on the scene, carefully examining the portions of the demolished buildings, which were to be utilised for the new mosque, and classifying them with rare skill. The whole city was filled with movement and commotion. There was not a trade amongst the people which did not receive fresh impetus from the new building. Whilst all were busy in the factories and workshop, in the woods, on the mountains, and on the roads from the hills to the city; whilst the furnaces and brick ovens were glowing; whilst the Syrian architect meditated on his plans and on those traced by the king’s own hands, and the Katib wrote to Asia and Africa inviting the co-operation of famous artists; the people, lazy and curious, swarmed around the spacious foundations, and the whole city presented a scene of animation and excitement not easy to describe.

Abd-er-Rahman, who had a presentiment that he would not live to see the mosque finished, pushed on the work with all speed, that he might at least have the satisfaction of covering the arcades which formed its naves, and of inaugurating the cult of Islam with one of those eloquent harangues, which he was in the habit of addressing to his people on the days of “Juma,” or Rest. Barely two years after the foundations were laid the square fortress of Islam rose above the groves by the river, surpassing in height the severe Alcazar of Rodrigo. A few more moons, and the interior walls, the superb colonnades of bold and unusual form,—the mosque of Cordova is probably the first edifice in which superposed arches were introduced—the graceful rows of double arches, the ample porticos, the handsome façade of eleven entrances, the rich side doors, flanked by fretted windows, and finally the incomparable roof of incorruptible wood, carved and painted, would be finished. Still a few more moons, and the “hotba,” or harangue, for the health of Abd-er-Rahman was to be read to the people from the most beautiful “nimbar,” or pulpit in the West, and repeated by two thousand believers as with one voice, drowning in the vibrating surge of an immense and thundering contempt the shamed hymns of the vanquished Nazarenes.

Not only was the mosque to be ready for the celebration of the public ceremonies on the first day of “Alchuma,” but already the sanctuary loomed at the extremity of the principal nave towards the South, covered with rich and dazzling Byzantine ornamentation, the venerated copy of the holy house of Mecca. The great aljama was not yet complete, it is true, but the diligent architects would find a way to satisfy the impatience of the sultan by covering the walls with rich hangings from Persia and Syria. A profusion of Corinthian columns in the principal naves, and of bold marble pillars from the Roman monuments, sent from the provinces as presents to the monarch from his walies, would be in their place. The columns taken from the old basilica of the Visigoths, would be found in the secondary naves, with others, as yet unchiselled. The floor was to be covered with flowers and fragrant herbs, and the sacred precincts would be inundated with light and perfume, diffused by hundreds of candelabra and thuribles. The fortunate Abd-er-Rahman would be able at least once before he died to direct the rites of the religion, for the propagation of which he had made so many sacrifices, in his capacity of “Imam” of the law.

But it was not to be. That day the news spread through the city that the angel of death was seated by the bedside of the khalif; and soon after, the body of Abd-er-Rahman, the wise, the virtuous, and the victorious, lay in one of the chambers of his alcazar, wrapped in the white garments, distinctive of his great lineage. The sad event was announced to the people by Abd-er-Rahman Ibn Tarif, the superior of the Aljama of Cordova, from the very pulpit from which the dead monarch was to have addressed his subjects, and the crowds departed from the mosque exclaiming: “May the Amir rest in the sleep of peace, Allah will smile upon him on the day of reckoning.”

The great glory of completing the mosque was reserved for Hisham, the favourite son of Abd-er-Rahman, to whom all the walies had sworn fealty as the rightful successor. This prince was at Merida when his father died, but he at once left that city for Cordova, where he made the mosque the object of his special solicitude.

Soon after his accession, Hisham consulted a famous astrologer as to his future. The learned man, who was called Abh-dhobi, at first refused to gratify the sultan’s curiosity, but upon being pressed he said: “Thy reign, O Amir, will be glorious and happy, and marked by great victories; but, unless my calculations are wrong, it will only last some eight years.” Hisham remained some time in silence upon hearing these words, but presently his face cleared, and he spoke thus to the astrologer: “Thy prediction, O Abh-dhobi, does not discourage me, for if the days given me still to live by the Almighty are passed in adoring Him, I shall say when my hour comes, ‘Thy will be done.’”

This monarch’s brief reign was rich in notable deeds. He repressed the rebellion of his two brothers Suleyman and Abdullah, carried the holy war as far as Sardinia, entered and sacked the town of Narbonne, and compelled the unhappy Christians to carry the clay of the demolished walls of their city upon their shoulders as far as Cordova, in order to build a mosque in his alcazar. Hisham made himself feared by the Franks, and he did much to establish the empire of Islam in Andalus, enlarging its capital, repairing

CORDOVA

THE MOSQUE.

PORTAL ON THE NORTH SIDE, MOORISH STYLE, BUILT UNDER HAKAM III., 988-1001.

CORDOVA

EXTERIOR VIEW OF THE MOSQUE.

CORDOVA

EXTERIOR ANGLE OF THE MOSQUE.

CORDOVA

THE EXTERIOR OF THE MOSQUE.

PLATE V.
CORDOVA.

Curvelinear triangles resulting from the intersection of the arches sustaining the dome.

Setting of the arches sustaining the dome.

PLATE VI.
CORDOVA.

Ornament running below the Cupola.

Setting of one of the lower arches which gives light to the dome.

PLATE VII.
CORDOVA.

Curvelinear triangles resulting from the intersection of the arches sustaining the dome.

Architrave of one of the Arches sustaining the Dome.

PLATE VIII.
CORDOVA.

Details de las Portados de la Maksurah.

Keystone of the arch of the Mihrab.

Keystone of the arch of the right hand side gateway.

PLATE IX.
CORDOVA.

Arches of the Portal of the Mihrab.

 

 

PLATE X.
CORDOVA.

Detail of the Framing of the Side Gate.
Detail of the Window placed over the Side Door.	Detail of the Framing of the Arch of the Mihrab.

PLATE XI.
CORDOVA.

Windows in an Alcove.

PLATE XII.
CORDOVA.

ft. in.
Height of Vase 4 6

ft. in.
Diameter 2 11

Arab Vase of Metallic Lustre.

PLATE XIII.
CORDOVA.

Details of the Arches.

PLATE XIV.

Centre Painting on a Ceiling.

PLATE XV.

Divan.

PLATE XVI.

Detail of an Arch.

its magnificent bridge, creating useful public institutions, and finally completing the grand mosque, which his father had commenced, founding and endowing in connection with it schools and colleges. Moreover, he did all this with the resources of the treasury, and with his lawful part of the spoils of conquest, without levying any extraordinary taxes.

Tradition relates that there formerly was a bridge over the Guadelquivir, erected on the site of the present structure, about 200 years before the arrival of the Moors in Spain: but, this edifice being greatly decayed, it was rebuilt by the Arabs during the Viceroyship of Assamh, A.D. 720 or 721. This noble structure is four hundred paces, or one thousand feet, in length, and its breadth is twenty-two feet eight inches within the parapets. The passage over the bridge is a straight line from one end to the other; the arches are sixteen in number, and the buttresses of the piers are much stronger and better adapted for similar purposes than the modern tri-lateral cut-waters. Nearly eleven centuries have these buttresses withstood the rapid floods of the Guadelquivir, without sustaining any material injury. Although Hisham practically rebuilt the bridge, the labour did not contribute to his personal convenience. His great love of hunting caused the malcontents among his subjects to whisper that he had repaired the bridge to facilitate the outgoings and incomings of his hunting parties. The rumour reached the king, who vowed that he would never cross the bridge again—a vow he faithfully observed.

The great Aljama was completed in the year A.D. 793. The Emir Hisham took as great a personal interest in its progress as did his father, the walies of the provinces contributed to its decoration with the spoils from ancient monuments, the artificers with their genius, victors with their booty, the city with its workmen, the mountains of Cordova and Cabra by yielding the treasures of their quarries, Africa with the trunks of its imperishable larch-pines, and Asia by inoculating the growing Arabic-Spanish art with its genius of ornament, its aspirations and its poetry.

The superb mosque was finished, the workmen rested from their labours, and Hisham was confident that he had secured a place in the garden of everlasting joys. Let us look at this new house of prayer, majestically situated at the southern boundary of the great city, close to the green banks of the wide river of Andalus, occupying an area of 460 feet from north to south, and 280 from east to west, surrounded by high, thick battlemented walls, flanked by stout buttresses of watch towers, and surmounted by a lofty minaret. It is entered by the faithful by nine rich and spacious outer gates, and by eleven interior doors, four in the east and west sides, and a principal one to the north; the eleven in the inner façade communicating with an equal number of naves in the temple. The interior arrangement of this wonderful monument is most beautiful. There is a great courtyard, or atrium, with wide gates in the north, west, and east sides, having fountains for the ablutions and the purifications, and orange and palm groves. Then comes the immense body of the house of prayer, divided into eleven principal naves, running from north to south, and crossed at right angles by twenty-one smaller naves, which run from east to west. The elegant combination of the arcades, in which the pilasters are superposed on the columns, and the arches on other arches, leaving a passage for the light between the upper and lower columniation, is quite ideal. Finally, the mysterious hidden sanctuary, within which the Koran is kept, in whose precincts Oriental art has exhausted all the riches of its fascinating resources.

The eleven great doors leading from the courtyard to the

CORDOVA

THE BRIDGE.

CORDOVA

VIEW OF THE MOSQUE AND THE BRIDGE.

CORDOVA

SECTION OF THE MOSQUE OF CORDOVA ON THE LINE OF THE PLAN L. M.

CORDOVA

SECTION OF THE MOSQUE OF CORDOVA ON THE LINE OF THE PLAN N. O.

CORDOVA

THE GATES OF PARDON.

mosque are superb double arches all in a row, sustained by beautiful marble columns, which, four by four, encircle the stout supporting pillars of stone in which they are consolidated. From the courtyard the interior of the mosque is seen through these eleven doors glittering with golden fires, and from the temple the courtyard, seen through these same doors, appears to be a glimpse of the longed-for Garden of Delights. The Mohammedan poet, Mohammed Ibn Mohammed Al-baluni, sings as follows of the holy House of Prayer, which surpasses in richness of colour, beauty of design, and boldness of ornamentation the most famous mosques of Arabia, Syria, and Africa:

The design, as completed by the Sultan Hisham I. in the years 794-95, received considerable improvements at the hands of his successors. Indeed, it can be safely said that none of the sultans of the illustrious family of Omeyyad who reigned in Cordova failed to make some estimable addition, or contributed in some way to the decoration of the sumptuous building. Hakam’s son, Abd-er-Rahman II., A.D. 822-852, ordered much “Gilt-work”—Zak-hrafah—to be made, but died before the work was completed. Mohammed, his son and successor—A.D. 852-886—continued the work undertaken by his father, and brought it to a close. Mohammed’s son, Abdallah—A.D. 886-888—is also recorded as having made improvements in the building.

In the time of the Great Khalif, Abd-er-Rahman III., called An-nasir in order to distinguish him from the other monarchs of that name, the old minaret was pulled down by the advice of a wise architect, and a new one built on its site, whose vastness surpassed all other minarets in the world. Forty-three days were spent in sinking its foundations, which penetrated into the ground till water was struck, and three months sufficed for its construction. The superb tower is built of freestone and mortar in such a curious manner that, though it contains two staircases in its interior, each flight containing 107 steps, people can ascend to the top and go down again without seeing one another. This elaborate tower measures fifty-four cubits from its foundations to the upper part of the open dome, to which the priest, who calls to prayers, turns his back, as he perambulates the projecting balcony, whose elegant balustrade surrounds the four walls like a graceful ring. From this balcony up to the top the tower rises eighty-three cubits more, being crowned with three beautiful apples, two of gold and one of silver, each three palms and a half in diameter, from which spring two lilies of six petals, supporting a pomegranate of purest gold. It has fourteen windows in its four faces. In two of these faces there are three intervals, and in the other two, two intervals, formed between columns of white and red jasper, and over the windows there is a crowning of solid arches sustained by small columns of the same jasper. These windows break up the mass of the walls in an admirable manner. The minaret is covered, both inside and out, with beautiful tracery in relief.

Abd-er-Rahman also rebuilt the wall which enclosed the mezquita to the north, looking towards the Orange Court, and he had the entire floor of the mosque levelled.

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A VIEW IN THE GARDEN BELONGING TO THE MOSQUE.

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THE MOSQUE—LATERAL GATE.

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INTERIOR OF THE MOSQUE, OR CATHEDRAL.

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INTERIOR OF THE MOSQUE, MOORISH STYLE, BUILT 961-967, UNDER HAKAM II.

In 961 A.D., Abd-er-Rahman III., the last great Omeyyad Sultan of Cordova died, and among his papers was discovered a diary, in his own handwriting, in which he had carefully noted down the days which he had spent in happiness and without any cause of sorrow. They numbered exactly fourteen. “O, man of understanding!” says the Arabian philosopher, “wonder and observe the small portion of real happiness the world affords even in the most enviable position! The Khalif An-nasir, whose prosperity in mundane affairs, and whose widely-spread empire became proverbial, had only fourteen days of undisturbed enjoyment during a reign of fifty years, seven months, and three days. Praise be given to Him, the Lord of eternal glory and everlasting empire.”

The Sultan Hakam, as soon as he succeeded to the Khalifate, determined to enlarge the mosque, which was too small to accommodate the numbers of those who went there to perform the “azalas.” He called together the architects and geometricians, who decided that the addition should extend from the “kiblah”—the point looking towards Mecca—of the mosque to the extreme end of the atrium, thus running the entire length of the eleven naves. The addition measured ninety-five cubits from north to south, and as much from east to west as the width of the whole mosque. The passage to the alcazar, used by the khalif when he came to the “azalas,” was intersected near the “nimbar,” or pulpit, inside the “maksurrah.” In the year 354 of the Hegirah the cupola, which crowned the “mihrab,” or sanctuary, containing the Koran, in the addition to the mosque made by Hakam, was completed. In the same year the “sofeysafa,” or enamelled mosaic work, was commenced in the mosque, and, by the order of Hakam, the four incomparable columns, which formerly had served as jambs for the doors of the old “mihrab,” were set up again in the new one. It is related that while the addition was being made, a lively dispute arose as to the exact spot of the “kiblah,” and it was finally decided to erect the sanctuary at the limit of the prolongation of the eleven naves, in the centre, looking directly to the south. Between the interior southern wall and the exterior, which was strengthened with round towers, a space of some fifteen feet remained. This was divided into eleven compartments, corresponding with the eleven naves of the mosque, that in the centre being destined for the sanctuary, and the others being reserved for the priests and other purposes. In this manner the “mihrab” was placed in the exact centre of the south side, with a wing on each side, of precise resemblance. In the west wing there was a secret passage leading from the mosque to the alcazar, which extended very near the west wall of the mezquita. The doors of this passage were arranged in a most intricate fashion, doubtless for the greater security of the palace, and they gave entrance to the interior of the “maksurrah,” a sumptuous reserved space, communicating on the north, east, and west with the great naves, and on the south forming part of the interior wall of the mosque. This “maksurrah” was a privileged spot, enclosed by a sort of wooden grating, elegantly worked on both faces, and surmounted by turrets, the object of which was to cut off all communication with the sultan. This screen, measuring twenty-two cubits to its summit, gives its name to that part of the edifice which it occupies. Its ornamentation, as well as that of the new part of the central nave, extending from the old to the new “mihrab,” is magnificent in the highest degree. The plan of the “maksurrah,” properly speaking, was a large rectangle, divided into three parts, almost square, from which rose three Byzantine domes of rare beauty.

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THE MOSQUE.

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THE MOSQUE—INTERIOR VIEW.

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INTERIOR VIEW OF THE MOSQUE.

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THE MOSQUE—GENERAL VIEW OF THE INTERIOR.

That in the centre served as a vestibule to the sanctuary, and was the most remarkable for its proportions, its outlines, and its decorations. This part of the mosque has been preserved in its principal features to the present day. The edifice has lasted nine centuries, and there is no indication that it will not endure for nine centuries more.

Over the festooned arches, which intersect each other, rise seven light and graceful horse-shoe arches, which disappear into the south wall, thus closing the picture and terminating the lower body of the sumptuous vestibule. Above these double arches runs an impost, beautifully worked and very graceful, embracing and crowning the four façades, and dividing the cupola into two zones—an upper and a lower. On this impost rest beautiful columns in pairs, oversetting great bold semi-circular arches, arranged with such art that they seem to imitate the curves of the interlaced garlands of a choir of beautiful odalisques, as the arches do not go from each column to the corresponding one of the next couple, but leave the intervening pair open. In this way, as there are two pairs of columns supporting the impost in each façade, eight principal arches are formed in the space in two great quadrilaterals placed opposite each other, their springing stones crossing and forming eight points of a star. There is an octagonal ring in the centre with eight graceful pendants, as an embellishment to the capitals of the eight pairs of columns. A horseshoe arch from point to point, to which a tablet of alabaster is fitted, leaves an uncertain prospect of the vault of heaven, which shines upon the cupola and the profusion of rich mosaic work with which it is adorned.

Between the elegant arches, which appear rather to hang from the cupola than to support it, the marvellous façade of the “mihrab” appears in the background, which glistens in the rays of the setting sun like a piece of brocade loaded with jewels, and which must have been dazzling as a fairy palace when, in the month of Ramadhan, the fourteen hundred and fifty-four lights of the great lamp shone under this enamelled “half-orange.” This façade, in spite of its marvellous richness, does not show the smallest confusion in its ornamentation, each line is traced with the idea of giving greater beauty to the arch which forms the entrance to the sanctuary. It is composed of the arch with its spacious architrave and its smooth jambs with small columns, together with its “arraba” surrounded by Grecian frets, and a light series of arches without vacuums, upon which rest the imposts which divide the upper and lower bodies of the dome. But such is the profusion and splendour of the ornamentation of each of these parts that it is impossible to describe them. The keystones, the architrave, the circle drawn in squares, the panels, the trefoil arches and the tympana are incomparable, and the combination of Grecian frets with Persian and Byzantine ornaments and geometrical figures is as beautiful as it is bewildering. These last, moreover, do not preponderate as was the case later in the degenerate Mussulman ornamentation proper. Here the Grecian frets are the most important, being combined in a thousand different ways, the stems and leaves tracing the most graceful curves, and all uniting to form an elegant border, of the most capricious tracery. The whole of this ornamentation is of marble, delicately carved, now smooth and white, now covered with minute mosaic of various colours, and loaded with crystal and gold. The inscriptions seen here are also in gold, on a ground of crimson, or ultra-marine, alternating with the shining “sofeysafa.”

“Sofeysafa” is an obscure word, which Don Pascual de Gayangos believes to be a transposition of the Arabic

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THE CENTRAL NAVE OF THE MOSQUE—961-967.

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THE MOSQUE—CHIEF ENTRANCE.

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INTERIOR VIEW OF THE CATHEDRAL.

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INTERIOR OF THE MOSQUE—LATERAL NAVE.

INTERIOR OF THE MOSQUE—EAST SIDE.

PLATE XVII.
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PLATE XVIII.
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Detail of one of the niches of the Cupola.

Mosaic keystones of the great arch of the Mihrab.

Details of the Mihrab.

PLATE XIX.
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Cufic inscription, over the arch of the Mihrab.

PLATE XX.
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Pieces of Wood used in the ancient covering of the Mosque.

Details of the Interior of the Mosque.

word Foseyfasa,[A] signifying enamel work of exceptional brilliancy, laid down by Greek workmen whom Abd-er-Rahman had brought to Cordova for the task.

Two columns are built into the jamb of the entrance arch to the sanctuary—one of black marble, the other of jasper, with lavishly carved capitals. If his blind enthusiasm did not deceive El-Makkari, the four columns were of green jasper and lapis-lazuli, two of each. An impost rests upon them as a cornice, and from this the arch springs; and on the impost an inscription in golden characters upon a crimson ground is written, which has the following meaning:

“In the name of God, clement and merciful, let us give praise to Him, who directed us to this, for we could not have directed ourselves if we had not been directed by God, for which purpose the deputies of our Lord came with the truth. The priest Al-mostaner Billah Abdallah Al-Hakam, Prince of the Faithful—may God be faithful to him—ordered the president and prefect of his court, Giafar ben Abd-er-Rahman—may God be pleased with him—to add these two columns, since he laid the foundations in the holy fear of God, and with His good pleasure. This work was concluded in the month of Dhilhagia of the year 354 of the Hegirah.”

From this inscription it would seem that two of the columns supporting the arch of “sofeysafa” were placed there by order of Hakam II., and that the others belonged to the old “mihrab,” which had been demolished in order to lengthen the mosque; but no one is capable of saying to-day whether the black marble columns, or the jasper, were those added by the order of the magnificent khalif; and whether the inestimable gift which was deemed worthy of being commemorated in letters of gold was of lapis-lazuli or not. “God alone knows!”

The sanctuary is a small heptagonal space, with a pavement of white marble, a socle formed by seven great slabs of the same, and a dome, also of marble, shaped like a shell and made of a single piece, edged with an elegant moulding. The seven sides of the heptagon are decorated with exquisite trefoiled arches, supported by marble columns, with gilt capitals of delicate workmanship; the columns resting on a cornice, below whose modules runs a fascia, or fillet, of gilded characters carved in the marble of the slabs, which form the socle, or sub-basement.

Within this sanctuary was kept the famous “nimbar” of Hakam II., which was a sort of pulpit, according to the Arab historian, unequalled in the world, either for its materials or its workmanship. It was of ivory and precious woods—ebony, red and yellow sandal, Indian aloe, &c.—and the cost of it was 35,705 dineros and three adirmames. It had ten steps, and was said to consist of 37,000 pieces of wood joined by gold and silver nails, and incrusted with precious stones. It took nine years to build, eight artificers working at it each day. This pulpit, which must have been of mosaic of wood, jewels and metals of price, was reserved for the khalif, and in it was deposited also the chief object of veneration of all the Mohammedans of Andalusia, a copy of the Koran, supposed to have been written by Othman, and still stained with his blood. This copy was kept in a box of golden tissue studded with pearls and rubies, and covered with a case of richest crimson silk, and was placed on a desk or lectern, of aloe wood with golden nails. Its weight was so extraordinary, that two men could scarcely

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THE MOSQUE—DETAIL OF THE GATE.

THE MOSQUE—FAÇADE OF THE ALMANZOR.

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VIEW IN THE MOSQUE—961-967.

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THE MOSQUE—A GATE ON ONE OF THE LATERAL SIDES.

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THE MOSQUE—SIDE OF THE CAPTIVE’S COLUMN.

carry it. It was placed in the pulpit in order that the Imam might read in it during the “azala;” and when the ceremony was concluded, it was carried to another place, where it remained, carefully guarded, with the gold and silver vases destined for the great celebration of Ramadhan.

The chronicler, Ambrosio de Morales, says that the “nimbar” was a sort of chariot on four wheels, and that it had but seven steps. It was to be seen in the cathedral of Cordova as late as the middle of the sixteenth century, when it was dismembered, and its materials employed in the construction of a Christian altar.

The place, which from the slight indications of Edrisi appears to have served as treasure-room, was a sort of chapel, which is situated to-day not far from the site of the ancient “mihrab,” to the north of the present “maksurrah.” In this way it can easily be supposed that the noblest apartment of the mosque was completely closed to the people on the north and south sides; and, being occupied by the principal personages of the court, it would have been difficult for any irreverence to have been shown to the Imam or to the venerated “Mushaf”—Koran. The two “maksurrahs” remained, the one facing the other, both occupying exactly the same space; that is, at least, from east to west, supposing that they cut the three centre naves of the eleven which are in the mosque. Both these “maksurrahs,” or screens, have disappeared; and at the present time we cannot form the slightest idea as to their design. Almost the only thing which has remained intact of that time is the sumptuous space of the three chapels occupied by the “maksurrah” of Hakam; and of the spaces occupied by the old “maksurrahs,” only two disfigured chapels exist—that of the chief nave, and that of the next nave to the east. The latter is divided into two parts by a platform some feet above the floor of the mosque. In the upper portion the “Alicama” or preliminary for the prayer was made; and in the lower part, which still has the form of an underground chapel, the treasure was kept. The centre chapel, the present Chapel of Villaviciosa, was reserved for the khalif when he did not act as Imam; and in the west chapel, which exists no longer, was the seat of the Cadi of the Aljama. No trace of the original interior decoration of these chapels remains at the present day, and externally, only the arches facing the “mihrab,” and which are similar to those of the façade of the vestibule, are left.

When everything had been completed internally to the satisfaction of Hakam, it occurred to him that the fountains in the Court of Ablutions did not harmonise with the grandeur of the mosque; he therefore commanded that they should be replaced by four splendid founts, or troughs, each cut out of a single piece of marble—two for the women in the eastern part, and two for the men in the west. It was his wish that these basins should be of magnificent proportions, and made from the same quarry. The work took much time, engaged many people, and necessitated the expenditure of a great deal of money; but it was happily executed, and the troughs were brought to their destination by a sloping way, specially constructed for the purpose, on great carts, each drawn by seventy stout oxen. The water, which was brought by the aqueducts of Abd-er-Rahman II., and was stored in a great reservoir covered with marble, flowed night and day; and after supplying the wants of the mosque, was carried off by three conduits to feed as many fountains for public use in the north, east, and west of the city.

The great Vizier, Almanzor, considerably enlarged the mosque; many Christians, loaded with chains, being employed amongst the workmen. The eastern wall was thrown

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MOSQUE, NORTH SIDE—EXTERIOR OF THE CHAPEL OF ST. PEDRO.

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GENERAL VIEW OF THE INTERIOR OF THE CHAPEL OF THE MASURA AND ST. FERDINAND.

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DETAIL OF THE CHAPEL OF MASURA.

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THE MOSQUE—ELEVATION OF THE GATE OF THE SANCTUARY OF THE KORAN.

down, and the foundations of a new wall were laid one hundred and eighty feet from the old one, throughout the entire length from north to south. In the covered part of the building eight great naves were added, all of equal size, and having the same number of arches as those already existing; so that the thirty-three minor naves, which cut the principal naves at right angles, were lengthened one hundred and eighty feet, running from east to west. The new part formed thirty-five transverse naves, where there had formerly been only thirty-three, because the wing, with the residences which fell to the east of the “mihrab” which was not lengthened, occupied the space of the two extra naves. The prolongation of the minor naves was not carried out with the slavish and monotonous uniformity of modern days. The Arab architects did not understand symmetry as we do to-day, and they satisfied themselves with producing unity by means of variety, without seeking a forced correspondence of similar parts. In the part added by Almanzor it was considered useless to give the same dimensions to the buttresses of the north wall as the primitive wall possessed, and consequently a space of six feet in length was gained from the principal naves at the north side. But as this extra width could not be given to the first of the lesser naves, as the height of the columns would not allow of it, the architect doubtless thought that instead of dividing up this small excess equally among the thirty-three arches in the length from north to south, it would be preferable and more effective to preserve the first three or four naves in line, adding a nave in the space gained by the diminution in the bulk of the buttresses, and by enlarging the succeeding naves wherever it seemed most convenient. As a result of this, the first transverse nave of the lengthened part, on account of the great narrowness of its intercolumniation, was not able to preserve the full span of its arches. It was necessary, therefore, to bring the latter nearer together and to break their curve, in order to keep the desired height, and thus probably for the first time, Pedro de Madrazo considers, was seen in the edifices of Arab Spain, the pointed arch which was destined to totally change the physiognomy of monumental art in the Middle Ages.

The arch, broken in this manner at the culminating point of its curve, presently adopted in this small nave all the varieties of decoration to which it was susceptible. Here in effect, in this small space of barely seven feet wide and one hundred and eighty-five long, architecture exhausted at one time, and at the first attempt, all the shapes of arches, which were to be employed in the four following centuries; a circumstance which was quite fortuitous. It was not the intention to dissimulate the enlargement of which we are speaking; on the contrary, it was decided to signalise it in an unmistakable manner, for which purpose a row of stout pillars was raised, where the old east wall stood, and where at present is the dividing line between the eleventh and twelfth greater naves, the pillars of which were suitably united to each other by great arches, springing from beautiful columns in pairs, built into the pillars. The old classical art would never have confided such wide spaces to supports so delicate as are these columns, which in couples send the bold festooned arches, which serve as an opening to the edifice of Almanzor, across to the opposite pair. But the architects of the time of Abd-er-Rahman I. and of Hakam II. had already successfully attempted a similar feat in the grand arcade of the inner façade, which looks on the Court, and in the strengthening arcade which divides the primitive mosque from its prolongation to the south, so there was no reason to fear its repetition. To-day we pass, with a certain respect,

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THE MOSQUE—GATE OF THE SANCTUARY OF THE KORAN.

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THE MOSQUE—MOSAIC DECORATION OF THE SANCTUARY, 965-1001.

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THE MOSQUE—RIGHT-HAND SIDE GATE WITHIN THE PRECINCTS OF THE “MAKSURRAH.”

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THE MOSQUE—SECTION OF THE CUPOLA OF THE MIHRAB.

under these bold arches of eight metres elevation, and six, seven, and even eight metres in width, when we consider that they rest on columns of some three metres high, including their capitals; and only the stoutness of the pillars into which these graceful pairs are built assures us that they will not fall to the ground, wearied with such a supernatural effort.

For the greater solidity of the wide edifice, added by Almanzor, a line of great pillars and arches, which marked the southern limit of the original mosque, was lengthened as far as the eastern wall, crossing at right angles the strengthening arcade already mentioned stretching from north to south; so that the actual Aljama was divided into four unequal parts, separated from each other, probably, by wooden screens and partitions. The part added by Hakam II., at whose extremities rose the old and the new “maksurrah,” was called “The Noble Apartment,” and was reserved for the nobility and the personages of the Court, the portion close to the “mihrab” being occupied by the ulema, alkatibes, almocries, and other ministers of the temple, and the Imam. The three remaining parts were for the people, and most likely the sexes were divided, for it is certain, from the assurances of an historian cited by Ahmed El-Makkari, that there were two doors inside the naves leading to the women’s part.

The art of the decorations of Almanzor’s prolongation is not particularly attractive, the arches seem to be copied from those of the old door, and the only circumstance worthy of mention is that all the capitals of the columns are equal, and of the same form, in contrast with the great variety and richness of the capitals in the primitive mosque, and in the additions of Hakam II. The delicate and uniform construction of the mighty “hagib” may be mentioned as a purely archæological item, and also that the names of the artificers who made them are frequently to be seen in the foundations and shafts of the columns: e.g., Mondair, Mostauz, Motobarack, Fayr, Masud, Tasvir, Nassar, Kabir, Amin, Jalem-al-Amery, Hachchi, Tsamil, Bekr, Casim.

With the part added by Almanzor, the mosque is said to have formed a great rectangular quadrilateral 742 feet long from north to south, and 472 feet wide from east to west, enclosed by four great battlemented walls, fortified with square watch-towers, varying in height. The south wall, which reached a formidable height on account of the declivity of the ground, was adorned with nineteen towers, including those flanking it at both angles, which were more spacious and common to the two walls of east and west. The western wall had fourteen towers, and the north five, including the majestic minaret over the principal door; and, finally, the eastern wall was fortified by ten towers, all corresponding to the part which had to bear the pressure of the naves, and the wall of the Court at that side had no towers at all. The greater number of these towers remain, and the wide old walls also exist.

There were twelve outer gates to the mosque, ten leading into the edifice, and twenty-one interior doors, without counting those of the dependencies to the temple and that of the khalif’s private passage, nineteen in the façade of the courtyard, and two which led to the women’s part of the building. All the outer doors were for the most part rectangular, formed by arched lintels set into ornamented horseshoe arches, their keystones were either white, or of alternate colours, the white being richly decorated with stucco ornaments in relief, and the coloured with beautiful mosaic of red and yellow brick, cut into tiny pieces. The horseshoe arch is set in a beautiful frame,

PLATE XXI.

White marble pilaster of principal nave.

Ornaments and arches in the Mihrab.

keystones of chapel of the

Capitals rough-hewn.

Finished capital specimen of Arabian sculpture.

PLATE XXII.
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Details of Moorish Work.

PLATE XXIII.

Details, Villaviciosa Chapel and Mihrab.

PLATE XXIV.

Details of Moorish Work.

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THE MOSQUE—DOME OF THE SANCTUARY.

 

 

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THE MOSQUE.

ROOF OF THE CHAPEL OF THE MASURA AND ST. FERDINAND.

 

 

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VILLAVICIOSA CHAPEL.

 

 

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THE MOSQUE—DETAIL OF THE HALL OF CHOCOLATE.

 

 

richly ornamented as are the tympana between the arch and the lintel, the facias and the little windows of perforated alabaster, which, now enclosed in arches resting on little marble pillars and grouped in graceful pairs, flank the door. Some of these have projecting cornices forming a parapet with small dentalated towers, which give the sacred building the appearance of a fortress, and recall the warlike origin of the Mohammedan religion. All the outer gates have inscriptions, with invocations and verses taken from the Koran.

Hakam II. had an apartment constructed in the western part of the temple, which was to serve for the distribution of alms, and here any poor wanderer, who happened to be in the city without protection or means of subsistence, could obtain the wherewithal to continue his journey. For this purpose the khalif endowed the establishment in a splendid manner. It was not exactly a hostel, as its space was too limited; and, besides, Hakam had already established other places of lodging for poor travellers outside the mosque, one of these being quite near this “Dar-as-asdaca,” or “Alms Chamber.” Poor students, too, were looked after, and received a daily meal, and even small sums of money. The wise men received annual pensions from the treasury, according to their merit and personal circumstances.

The Alms Chamber was, properly speaking, only intended for the distribution of alms to the poor. Its beautiful door, to-day blocked up, can still be seen, both inside and out, in the wall of the mosque, and, according to El-Makkari, it was the most beautiful of the western side. It is no longer possible to form an exact idea of the aspect of the chamber as it was when Hakam II. completed its decoration. He covered it with gilded and painted stucco work, which turned its walls into beautiful filigree, and to-day this apartment is half forgotten, after having served as a vestibule to the first Christian cathedral of Cordova. No one would think that this place, beyond St. Michael’s postern, and separated from the body of the building by a wretched partition and a door of pine-wood, is the ancient “Dar-as-asdaca.” For many years it was used as a Chapter Hall, and the archives of the extinct music-school, with its choir books, were kept here.

The actual dimensions of the mosque varied at different periods, and are difficult to establish. One authority says, that in length from north to south the mosque measured six hundred and forty-two feet, in width four hundred and sixty-two feet. Mr. Waring, in his Notes of an Architect in Spain, describes the mosque as an oblong of three hundred and ninety-four feet by three hundred and sixty feet. The famous Orange Court is in length two hundred and twenty feet, and, being within the boundary walls of the mosque, it is probably included in the former measurement.

It is also impossible to fix, with any degree of certainty, the number of columns contained in the mosque during the time of Mohammedan supremacy. Ambrosio de Morales, and the Infante Don Juan Manuel, both of whom described the mosque before the columns were reduced in number by the alterations to which the building has been subjected, estimate the figures at one thousand and twelve, but it is only too certain that when the mosque was converted into a Christian church very many were removed to make room for altars and chapels.

No less than one hundred columns were comprised within the “maksurrah,” which was further provided with three doors of exquisite workmanship, one of which was

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ENTRANCE TO THE VESTIBULE OF THE MIHRAB.

 

 

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MIHRAB OR SANCTUARY OF THE MOSQUE.

 

 

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THE MOSQUE—ARCH AND FRONT OF THE ABD-ER-RAHMAN AND MIHRAB CHAPELS.

 

 

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ENTRANCE TO THE CHAPEL OF THE MIHRAB.

 

 

covered with plates of pure gold, as were the walls of the “mihrab.” The floor of the “maksurrah,” it is said, was paved with silver, and the pavements adjacent to it were covered with “sofeysafa.”

The ceiling of the mosque was formerly covered with oval cartouches, bearing appropriate monitory inscriptions and pious sentences—such as, “Be not one of the negligent,” “Felicity,” “Blessing,” “There is no God but God, to whom all beings address themselves in their need”—thus inciting the minds of the faithful to contemplation and prayer. Some few of the cartouches are still remaining; but the inscriptions were, for the most part, carefully effaced when the mosque was transformed into a Christian temple. Those in the “mihrab,” and in the angles near the tower, may yet be seen.

The number of brazen chandeliers of different sizes in the mosque is computed at upwards of two hundred, and the number of cups attached, and containing oil, at upwards of seven thousand. Some of the oil-reservoirs for the great lamps were Christian bells, deprived of their clappers; inverted, and suspended from the roof. It is known that in the many expeditions against the Christian, bells were frequently removed from the churches and brought to Cordova. Sometimes the metal of the bells was recast into forms more in accordance with the Moorish style of ornament.

The following rites had to be observed in the service of the mosque: The ornaments were to consist only of brass, silver or glass lamps, which were lighted at night when the doors were opened for prayer. Some striking design was painted on the west wall, in order that the faithful should look in that direction. There was only one pulpit, which was on wheels, as the sermon was preached from any spot the Talvi wished.

The courts of the mosque were paved with porcelain tiles, over which pure water could flow. Those who did not wash themselves at home were obliged to do so in the Court of Ablutions before entering the sacred precincts. All shoes had to be left at the door of the mosque, and no buildings, such as inns and hostelries, and disreputable houses, were allowed in the neighbourhood. No Jews were allowed to pass before it. Women were not permitted to enter some mosques, because they were not circumcised, the sultana alone having an oratory, where she prayed for all women.

At midnight a mezzin mounted the minaret, and cried out: “God is great, to pray is better than to sleep”; at two o’clock in the morning he said the same; at four o’clock he placed a lantern at the end of a rod and said, “Day is breaking, let us praise God”; at the fourth prayer he hoisted a white flag, which was lowered at one o’clock, saying, “God is great.” Friday was their feast day, and a blue banner was hoisted at dawn, and left floating till half-past ten. The fifth prayer was at four o’clock in the afternoon, in winter at three; when the evening star appeared, the sixth prayer was called out; and at nine o’clock the last prayer of the day was said. Sand glasses were employed to mark the passage of the hours.

The state of Cordova died with Almanzor; and the races, who alternately took possession of the throne, did not leave the least trace in the mosque. Finally, St. Ferdinand, King of Castile and Toledo, completely routed the Moors, and the mezquita was purified and dedicated to Our Lady of the Assumption. The following is an extract from the archives of the cathedral: “Let it be known that I, Ferdinand, by the grace of God, King of Castile, with the consent and approval of Dona Berenguele, my Mother, and

CORDOVA

VIEW OF THE INTERIOR OF THE MIHRAB CHAPEL.

 

 

CORDOVA

THE MOSQUE—DETAILS OF THE INTERIOR OF THE CHAPEL OF THE MIHRAB.

 

 

CORDOVA

THE MOSQUE—MARBLE SOCLE IN THE MIHRAB.

 

 

CORDOVA

BASEMENT PANEL OF THE FAÇADE OF THE MIHRAB.

 

 

of Dona Juana, the Queen my wife, and of my children, Alfonso, Frederico, and Ferdinand, make a deed of gift to God of the Cathedral Church of Santa Maria of Cordova, and to you, Master Lope, my beloved chosen Bishop of the same, from now on, and to your successors, and the Chapter of Canons, &c. November 12th, 1238.” This pious monarch founded a chapel dedicated to St. Clement, which was erected against the south wall, embracing the space occupied by three naves from east to west, and by four transverse naves from north to south. This space was shut in with walls, leaving the two Arab arches inside intact, the altar dedicated to the saint being placed against the east wall. Many nobles followed the king’s example, and founded chapels, amongst them being that of St. Inez, erected by Piedro Diaz de Haro, in 1250, in the tenth principal nave, counting from the west wall, also against the south wall, and only occupying two transverse naves. St. Ferdinand endowed the cathedral so richly that on his death its benefices were very considerable. He was succeeded by his son, Alfonso X., who showed the same religious spirit as his father, giving large grants to the funds of the cathedral; and, in the year 1258, erecting the grand chapel, conceding many privileges to the work and the fabric. The donations made by other Christians up to this time had been of a very modest nature; and, as the Jews of Cordova were expending great sums on the erection of a synagogue, it seems as though the Christians were shamed into greater generosity to the cathedral, for at the same time the famous commander, Domingo Muñoz, erected the chapel of St. Bartholomew, and the chapter and the king decided to turn the mosque into a real Christian cathedral in developing Western architecture. The commander made his chapel in the angle formed by the inner south wall and the west side of the vestibule, or “maksurrah,” of Hakam II., taking the area of two principal and two transverse naves. As this chapel could not be lighted from outside on account of the west wing of the “mihrab,” and the khalif’s secret passage being behind, it was illuminated with light from the temple, a pointed door and four windows being made in the north wall.

The chapter set about their work with more splendour. They selected the three first transverse naves of the noble apartment, beginning at the re-inforcing wall, which marks the prolongation of Hakam, giving to the single nave that they opened a length of one hundred feet from the inner door of the Alms Chamber to the central apartment of the three enclosed in the old “maksurrah.” They made the Alms Chamber into a vestibule, leaving the re-inforcing wall as it was without touching the bold ultra-semi-circular arches resting on pairs of columns; they pulled down the cadi’s apartment in order to make way for the transept, and also the three transverse naves it had occupied. The three columns in front of the Arab pillars, which stood in the length from east to west, were pulled down too, and three handsomer pillars were erected in their place, fortified at right angles by walls in the manner of buttresses, which intercepted the entire width of one transverse nave. Great pointed arches sprang from pillar to pillar, corresponding with the horse-shoe arches in front; a light and graceful dome stretched from one side to the other, divided into four compartments by three great arches, of which that nearest to the sanctuary rested on high columns, and the other two on well-carved brackets, with open-work borders suspended at a regular height above the spaces. Finally, they took the central apartment of the ancient “maksurrah,” where we presume the khalif sat, and erected there the Grand Chapel.

CORDOVA

THE MOSQUE—FRONT OF THE TRASTAMARA CHAPEL.

 

 

CORDOVA

GENERAL VIEW OF THE CHAPEL OF VILLAVICIOSA.

 

 

CORDOVA

NORTH ANGLE OF THE CHAPEL OF VILLAVICIOSA.

 

 

CORDOVA

VILLAVICIOSA CHAPEL.

 

 

This chapel was built at the king’s expense, for which the grateful chapter resolved to celebrate the anniversary of his death, a practice which has been faithfully observed to the present day.

The arrangement of this space was perfectly adapted for the purpose of a Grand Chapel; the other room adjoining to the east being converted into a sacristy. It was doubtless in the same condition as when finished by the architects of Hakam II. At the north side it had a horse-shoe arch corresponding with the re-inforcing wall of the same khalif, and on the east side it had a great arched window and two little doors at the sides, which communicated with the tribune of the “Alicama,” at the south side, giving a splendid example of the rich Byzantine style of the time of Hakam, and forming a combination of segment arches crossing in space and forming crosses of undulating ribbons in the intercolumniations, the whole being similar to the decoration displayed in front of the vestibule of the “mihrab.” We do not know how the west side was decorated, where this space was united with the apartment of the cadi, which had been pulled down. In order to convert this into a Grand Chapel it was not necessary to disfigure it completely; it was sufficient to fill up the great northern arch, which in the time of the khalifs was closed by the first “maksurrah,” and also to block up the great window at the east, communicating with the tribune of the “Alicama;” to leave the two little side doors open for communication with the sacristy, and to enlarge the sanctuary as much as necessary, to shut it in at the south side with glass windows, and to place the customary chancel at its opening. Perhaps no more than this was done; but who is capable to-day of saying how much respect the king’s architects had for Arab-Byzantine work?

In the year 1260 Don Gonzalo Yanez, first gentleman of Aguilar, founded the Chapel of St. John the Baptist. Five years later the Bishop Fernando de Mesa built the Chapel of Santiago, in the south-east corner, near the Chapel of St. Clement. This chapel was wide and commodious, and the Arab arches in its area were not disturbed. In 1263 King Alfonso X. had the ancient aqueducts repaired, and in 1275 Prince Ferdinand gave an order for four Moors, who should be free from taxation, to be kept at work in the building operations of the cathedral. Two of these were to be carpenters, and two masons. This privilege was confirmed several times in succeeding years, and a charter exists, dated Cordova, 25th October, 1282, which orders that all the Moors living in the city, whether they were artificers or not, shall work for two days of the year in the cathedral. It was thought that these workmen would understand the repairing of Moorish work better than Christians, but the task was also meant as a humiliation. As time went on, these workmen, more or less, lost the traditions of their faith and their architecture, so that they were really of little service in preserving the original character of the edifice.

In 1278 the first statue of St. Raphael the Archangel was placed on the top of the minaret. At that time Cordova was visited by the plague, which worked terrible destruction amongst the inhabitants. It is related that St. Raphael appeared to Friar Simon de Sousa, of the Convent of Our Lady of Mercy, and told him that God was moved with compassion, and that He would take away the visitation if a statue of St. Raphael himself were placed on the tower of the Cathedral, and if his Feast were celebrated properly every year. This was done, and the plague immediately ceased. A new chapel to St. Bartholomew was erected in 1280 by Martin Muñoz, nephew of the famous commander Domingo Muñoz; and after this, the Chapel of St. Paul,

CORDOVA

THE MOSQUE—CHAPEL OF VILLAVICIOSA.

 

 

CORDOVA

ARAB TRIBUNE, TO-DAY THE CHAPEL OF VILLAVICIOSA, LEFT SIDE.

 

 

CORDOVA

ANCIENT INSCRIPTION OF THE TIME OF KHALIFATE, FOUND IN AN EXCAVATION.

 

 

CORDOVA

THE MOSQUE. DETAIL OF THE TRASTAMARA CHAPEL.

THE MOSQUE. CHAPEL OF TRASTAMARA, SOUTH SIDE.

 

 

which belonged to the family of the Godois. Then followed the foundation of the Chapel of St. Nicholas, by a pious Archdeacon; and of the Chapels of St. Benedict, St. Vincent, and St. Giles, and that of Our Lady of the Snow.

It was not thought wise to make any great efforts to introduce the art of the West into a city which could not as yet be considered sure of not falling again into the hands of the infidels. In the year 1369 Don Enrique, the Fraticide, came to the throne of Castile. He desired to carry out the wishes of his father, and to give him a place of sepulchre worthy of his high renown. For this purpose he ordered a Royal Chapel to be erected in the cathedral at the back of the Grand Chapel in the Arab Tribune, which served as a sacristy. He decided to bury here his grandfather, Don Fernando X., whose body had been laid under the grand chapel by order of his Queen, Constanza. This fabric must have taken some considerable time, for the stucco, wood and tile work are really wonderful. Mohammedan art had undergone a complete transformation; the grandiose Arab-Byzantine style had been succeeded by the effeminate Moorish school, first practised by the Almoravides, and after by the Almohades; and the Moorish architects and decorators of Cordova could not remain uninfluenced by the taste which had become general through the artificers who had renovated the Alcazar at Seville, and who had embellished the Alhambra at Granada. Nothing was more unlike the architecture of the days of Hakam II. than that employed now in the construction of the Royal Chapel. Two parts are noticed—an upper and a lower. The Moorish architect who directed the work had windows with ornamented arches in the new style opened in the east and west sides, which were longer than the others. He ordered, too, that Saracen art, emancipated from the Byzantine traditions, should be stamped on the ornamentation of the four walls, and on the cupola that crowned them. These arches were given festoons with lobules, which boldly, though corruptly, hid the true object of the curves. They were also set in square compartments, forming many edges beautifully worked with hammer and chisel. The framings were crowned with beautiful little cornices of small interlaced and open-worked arches, and above them ran round all the four sides a wide facia of little pine-shaped domes, which imitated stalactites of crystallised gold, having a most surprising effect, and of a sort until then unknown in the most famous mosque of the West.

In the east and west walls, which were the longest of the rectangle, the arches with lobules, which could not be opened, were in relief; and resting on the light cornice were two tablets with lions. There were four of these lions—two on the western and two on the eastern facia, equi-distant from one another; and from each lion to that which faced him sprang a great arch, whose facing projected some feet over the lower zone, and from each lion to that by his side sprang another great arch, which did not project beyond the facing of the lower wall. These four upper arches, each one with twenty-one trefoil lobules, formed a perfect square, their four supports being at an equal distance, thanks to the ingenious method of cutting the longer sides, putting the lions perpendicularly over the great lower arches. Once this difficulty was overcome it was doubtless an easy matter to raise the cupola, which was to crown the fabric. The ancient dome must have been similar to that which has been discovered in the Chapel of Villaviciosa, but it must have seemed poor in the eyes of King Henry II., so accustomed to seeing the Moorish cupolas with stalactites; so they placed a cornice on the arches described above, and on this

CORDOVA

THE MOSQUE. INTERIOR OF THE MIHRAB.

THE MOSQUE. ARAB ARCADE ABOVE THE FIRST MIHRAB.

 

 

CORDOVA

THE MOSQUE. DETAILS, ARCHES OF THE MIHRAB.

THE MOSQUE. DETAIL OF THE MIHRAB.

 

 

CORDOVA

THE MOSQUE. EXTERIOR OF THE CHAPEL OF THE MIHRAB.

THE MOSQUE. GATE OF THE SULTAN.

 

 

CORDOVA

PRINCIPAL ENTRANCE TO THE MOSQUE.

DETAIL NEAR THE MIHRAB.

 

 

rested the segments of the circle, which form the elegant and strange African cupola.

The following distribution is seen in the lower portion: Towards the middle of the east side there is an arch formed of little domes with stalactites, slightly pointed, sufficiently deep, enclosed in a sort of framing of gilded stucco, forming beautifully interlaced branches. The square compartment finishes at the lower end in a wide facia, which runs on both sides on a high socle of minute and beautiful tiling, and between the complicated ornaments in relief circles are formed, enclosing the arms of Castile and Leon. To the right side, on this same facia, is an ornamental arch of eleven lobules enclosed in another framing, entirely covered with tracery in relief, sustained by two very slight columns, built into the wall. Joined to this is another arch, much lower, with seven lobules, also ornamented, and sustained by columns of the same style as those just described, bearing a shield with the same arms. The left side has the same ornamentation, with the difference that both the arches have seven lobules, because the wall has more frontage on this side: and another difference was that in the north-east corner it had an ornamentation of minute open-work instead of a shield. The wall opposite had the same distribution with a deep central arch and small arches at the side, with little columns in the Gothic style, which show already that the style is no longer purely Moorish, but a sort of base mixture of the decorative art of the East and the West. Perhaps we may consider this the true concession of the Moorish artificers to the art preferred by the Court, and as their final abandonment of the pure style, which had been traditional with them.

In 1521 the Bishop Don Alonso Manrique obtained permission from the Emperor Charles V. to erect the Gothic cathedral, which is in existence to-day. Three years later, when he visited the buildings, the Emperor repented having given his permission. Indeed the Christian work appears cold and pallid by the side of that of the Arabs.

As Amados de los Rios, a great Spanish antiquary and Orientalist, sings in his mournful requiem over the departed glories of the mosque: “Neither the sumptuous Christian fabric that to-day rises in the midst of those countless columns, nor all the treasures of art lavished upon it by the celebrated artists of the sixteenth century who erected it, nor that interminable series of chapels of every epoch which, resting against the walls of the mosque disfigure it; nor the clumsy angels that seem to suspend their flight to shed glory over the Divine service, nor the words of the Evangelist sounding from the seat of the Holy Spirit, can dispel or banish, in the slightest degree, the majesty of those wandering shades that in vain seek in the sanctuary the sacred volume whose leaves, according to tradition, were enamelled with the blood of the Khalif Othman, martyr to the faith. A world of souvenirs here enthrals the mind of the traveller as he gazes with a feeling of sorrow upon these profanations—works dedicated by the intolerant, yet sincere, faith of our ancestors; impelled by the desire of banishing for ever from that spot, consecrated to the law of Jesus, the spirit of Mohammed and the ghosts of his slaves that haunt it, and will for ever haunt it while it exists. For, in spite of the mutilations it has endured, and of the changes it has undergone, there is impressed upon it, by a superior ineradicable law, the seal of the art that inspired it, and the character of the people by whom it was planned and erected.”

Don Amados is not alone in his eloquent, if unavailing, protest. When Charles V. observed St. Peter’s Chapel rising out of the very centre of the mosque, he rebuked the Bishop,

CORDOVA

THE GATES OF PARDON.

THE BISHOP’S GATE.

 

 

CORDOVA

THE MOSQUE—PILASTERS AND ARABIAN BATHS.

 

 

Alonso Manriquez, who had erected the incongruous edifice, in no measured terms. “You have built here,” said the king, “what you or anyone might have built elsewhere; but you have spoilt what was unique in the world.” Alas! the monarch had forgotten, or did not choose to remember, that the reprimand came with a very bad grace from one who, for his never-completed palace at Granada, had torn down whole courts and halls of the Alhambra.

The mosque of Cordova is still to-day, by universal consent, the most beautiful Mussulman temple, and one of the most wonderful architectural monuments in the world. The susceptible Italian author, Edmondo de Amicis, has given us a vividly picturesque description of his first impression of the interior of the building. “Imagine a forest,” he says, “fancy yourself in the thickest portion of it, and that you can see nothing but the trunks of trees. So, in this mosque, on whatever side you look, the eye loses itself among the columns. It is a forest of marble, whose confines one cannot discover. You follow with your eye, one by one, the very long rows of columns that interlace at every step with numberless other rows, and you reach a semi-obscure background, in which other columns seem to be gleaming. There are nineteen aisles, which extend from north to south, traversed by thirty-three others, supported (among them all) by more than nine hundred columns of porphyry, jasper, breccia, and marbles of every colour. Each column upholds a small pilaster, and between them runs an arch, and a second one extends from pilaster to pilaster, the latter placed above the former, and both of them in the form of a horseshoe; so that in imagining the columns to be the trunks of so many trees, the arches represent the branches, and the similitude of the mosque to a forest is complete. The middle aisle, much broader than the others, ends in front of the “maksurrah,” which is the most sacred part of the temple, where the Koran was worshipped. Here, from the windows in the ceiling, falls a pale ray of light that illuminates a row of columns; there is a dark spot; farther on falls a second ray, which lights another aisle. It is impossible to express the feeling of mysterious surprise which that spectacle arouses in your soul. It is like the sudden revelation of an unknown religion, nature, and life, which bears away your imagination to the delight of that paradise, full of love and voluptuousness, where the blessed, seated under the shade of leafy palm trees and thornless rose bushes, drink from crystal vases the wine, sparkling like pearls, mixed by immortal children, and take their repose in the arms of charming black-eyed virgins! All the pictures of eternal pleasure, which the Koran promises to the faithful, present themselves to your bright mind, gleaming and vivid, at the first sight of the mosque, and cause you a sweet momentary intoxication, which leaves in your heart an indescribable sort of melancholy! A brief tumult of the mind, and a spark of fire rushes through your brain—such is the first sensation one experiences upon entering the cathedral of Cordova.”

Listen again to the musings of this same impressionable writer, as he gazes at the ceiling and walls of the principal chapel, the only part of the mosque that is quite intact. “It is,” he says, “a dazzling gleam of crystals of a thousand colours, a network of arabesques, which puzzles the mind, and a complication of bas-reliefs, gildings, ornaments, minutiæ of design and colouring, of a delicacy, grace and perfection sufficient to drive the most patient painter distracted. It is impossible to retain any of the pretentious work in the mind. You might turn a hundred times to look at it, and it would only seem to you, in thinking it over, a

CORDOVA

INSCRIPTIONS AND ARABIAN CHAPTERS.

 

 

CORDOVA

THE MOSQUE—A CUFIC INSCRIPTION IN THE PLACE APPROPRIATED TO THE PERFORMANCE OF ABLUTIONS.

 

 

CORDOVA

ARABIC INSCRIPTIONS.

 

 

CORDOVA

A CUFIC INSCRIPTION ON THE ADDITIONS MADE TO THE MOSQUE, BY ORDER OF THE KHALIF AL-HAKAM.

 

 

mingling of blue, red, green, gilded, and luminous points, or a very intricate embroidery, changing continually, with the greatest rapidity, both design and colouring. Only from the fiery and indefatigable imagination of the Arabs could such a perfect miracle of art emanate.”

But if the mere shell of this majestic edifice, this voiceless testimony to the glory of a world-power that has gone the way of all temporal empires is still eloquent in decay, and still a force to stir the imagination, what must it have been when the spirit of Moslemism filled its courts, and the temple resounded with praise and devotion? We can get some idea of the impressiveness of a Mohammedan service in the pages of Frederick Schack’s Poetry and Art of the Arabs in Spain and Sicily. The following vivid passage is a description of the mosque of Cordova on a solemn fête day: “On both sides of the pulpit wave two standards to signify that Islam has triumphed over Judaism and Christianity, and that the Koran has conquered the Old and New Testaments. The ‘Almnedian’ climb upon the gallery of the high minaret and intone the ‘salam’ or salutation to the Prophet. Then the nave of the mosque fills with believers, who, clothed in white and wearing a festive aspect, gather for the oration. In a few moments, throughout the edifice nothing is to be seen but kneeling people. By the secret way which joins the temple to the alcazar, comes the khalif, who seats himself in his elevated place. A reader of the Koran reads a Sura on the reading-desk of the Tribune. The voice of the Muezzin sounds again, inviting people to the noon-day prayers. All the faithful rise and murmur their prayers, making obeisances. A servant of the mosque opens the doors of the pulpit and seizes a sword, with which, turning towards Mecca, he admonishes all to praise Mohammed, while the Prophet’s name is being celebrated from the Tribune by the singing of the ‘mubaliges.’ After this the preacher ascends the pulpit, taking from the hand of the servant the sword, which recalls and symbolises the subjection of Spain to the power of Islam. It is the day on which ‘Djihad,’ or the holy war, is to be proclaimed, the call for all able-bodied men to descend into the battle-field against the Christians. The multitude listen with silent devotion to the discourse (woven from the head of the Koran) which begins like this:

“‘Praised be God, who has increased the glory of Islam, thanks to the sword of the champion of the Faith, and who, in his Holy Book, has promised aid and victory to the believer.

’”Allah scatters his benefits over the world.

’”If he did not impel men to dash armed against each other, the earth would be lost.

’”Allah has ordered that the people be fought against until they know there is but one God.

’”The flame of war will not be extinguished until the end of the world.

’”The Divine benediction will fall upon the mane of the war-horse until the Day of Judgment.

’”Be you armed from head to foot, or only lightly armed, rise, and take your departure.

’”O, believers! what will become of you if, when you are called to battle, you remain with your face turned toward the ground?

’”Do you prefer the life of this world to that of the future?

’”Believe me: the gates of paradise stand in the shadow of the sword.

’”He who dies in battle for the cause of God, washes with the blood he sheds all the stains of his sins.

CORDOVA

THE BRIDGE ACROSS THE GUADELQUIVIR, WITH A VIEW OF THE CATHEDRAL (MEZQUITA). THE SCENE AS IT APPEARED IN 1780.

From Antigüedades Arabes de España. Madrid, 1780, fol.

 

 

CORDOVA

VIEW OF CORDOVA CATHEDRAL (MEZQUITA), AS IT APPEARED IN 1780.

From Antigüedades Arabes de España. Madrid, 1780. fol.

 

 

CORDOVA

WALL OF THE MOSQUE.

 

 

CORDOVA

FAÇADE OF THE MIHRAB.

 

 

’”His body will not be washed like the other bodies, because in the Day of Judgment his wounds will send out a fragrance like musk.

’”When the warriors shall present themselves at the Gates of Paradise, a voice from within will ask: “What have you done during your life?”

’”And they will reply: “We have brandished the sword in the struggle for the cause of God.”

’”Then the eternal Gates will open, and the warriors will enter forty years before the others.

’”Up, then, O believers! Abandon women, children, brothers, and worldly possessions, and go forth to the holy war!

’”And thou, O God, Lord of the present and future world, fight for the armies of those who recognise thy Unity! Destroy the incredulous, idolaters, and enemies of thy holy faith! Overthrow their standards, and give them, with all they possess, as booty to the Mussulmans!’”

The preacher, when he has finished his discourse, exclaims, turning towards the congregation: “Ask of God!” and prays in silence. All the faithful, touching the ground with their foreheads, follow his example. The “mubaliges” sing: “Amen! Amen, O Lord of all beings!” Like the intense heat which precedes the tempest, the enthusiasm of the multitude (restrained, up to this time, in a marvellous silence) breaks out in loud murmurs, which, rising like the waves of the sea, and inundating the temple, finally make the echo of a thousand united voices resound through the naves, chapels, and vaults in one single shout: “There is no God but Allah!”

Abd-er-Rahman I. was old when he commenced the building of the Mosque, and experienced in every description of architecture. His passion for building was as eager as that of his predecessors of the house of Omeyyad, who had made Damascus the envy of the world; and, during the frequent periods of peace, he had turned all his thoughts to the adornment of his capital by works which he had himself superintended. One of his first undertakings was to supply Cordova with water by means of an aqueduct, which came from the distant hills, and the vestiges of which are visible to this day. The water thus brought from the mountains was conveyed to the palace, and thence carried to every quarter of the city by means of conduits, from which it flowed into basins, as well as into lakes, enormous tanks, reservoirs and fountains. The sultan then planted a most delightful garden, to which he gave the name of Munyat-Arrissafah, in remembrance of a country seat near Damascus, which his grandfather, the Khalif Hisham, had built, and where he himself had spent the earliest years of his life. Finding the spot a very charming one, he erected in the middle of it a magnificent palace; and, moreover, made it his residence in preference to the old palace, inhabited by the former governors of Andalus. Having an ardent love of horticulture, he commissioned a botanist to procure for him in the East fruits and plants that could be easily naturalised in Andalus; and, in this manner, it is said, Abd-er-Rahman introduced the peach, and the particular kind of pomegranate, called “Safari,” into Spain. It is believed that this best species of pomegranate obtained its name from having been sent to Abd-er-Rahman by his sister, then residing in the East, and was called “Safari,” or “the Traveller,” from this circumstance. Other derivations of the name are given, all plausible enough. One thing is certain, the fruit is called to this day in Spain, “Granada Zafari,” and is considered the best of its kind in point of flavour, smallness of seed, and abundance of juice.

CORDOVA

THE MOSQUE—ARCH OF ONE OF THE GATES.

 

 

CORDOVA

THE MOSQUE—LATTICE.

 

 

Abd-er-Rahman II. carried on the work of beautifying Cordova with gardens, palaces, and bridges, but it was the third sovereign of his name, the Great Khalif, Abd-er-Rahman III., who restored the Moslem supremacy in Spain, and won for himself the title of En-Nasir li-dini-llah (“The Defender of the Faith of God”), who placed the crown on Cordova’s beauty and splendour. Byzantium, perhaps, compared with it in the loveliness of her buildings, and the luxury and refinement of her life, but no other city of Europe could approach the “Bride of Andalusia.” “To her,” sang the old Arab writer, “belong all the beauty and the ornament that delight the eye and dazzle the sight. Her long line of Sultans form her crown of glory; her necklace is strung with the pearls which her poets have gathered from the ocean of language; her dress is of the canvas of learning well knit together by her men of science; and the masters of every art and industry are the hem of her garments.”

“The inhabitants of Cordova,” says Ahmed-El-Makkari, the great Arab historian, “are famous for their courteous and polished manners, their superior intelligence, their exquisite taste and magnificence in their meals, dress, and horses. There thou wouldst see doctors, shining with all sorts of learning; lords, distinguished by their virtue and generosity; warriors, renowned for their expeditions into the country of the infidels; and officers, experienced in all kinds of warfare. To Cordova came from all parts of the world students eager to cultivate poetry, to study the sciences, or to be instructed in divinity or law; so that it became the meeting-place of the eminent in all matters, the abode of the learned, and the place of resort for the studious; its interior was always filled with the eminent and the noble of all countries, its literary men and soldiers were continually vying with each other to gain renown, and its precincts never ceased to be the arena of the distinguished, the retreat of scholars, the halting place of the noble, and the repository of the true and virtuous. Cordova was to Andalus what the head is to the body, or what the breast is to the lion.”

To-day there is nothing left in Cordova but the mosque, the bridge, and the ruins of the alcazar to mark the spot where, in the time of Abd-er-Rahman III., a city, ten miles in length, lined the banks of the Guadelquivir with mosques and gardens and marble palaces. The royal palaces of the Great Khalif included the Palace of Lovers, the Palace of Flowers, the Palace of Contentment, the Palace of the Diadem, and the palace which the Sultan named Damascus, of which the Moorish poet sang, “All palaces in the world are nothing compared to Damascus, for not only has it gardens with the most delicious fruits and sweet-smelling flowers, beautiful prospects, and limpid running waters, clouds pregnant with aromatic dew, and lofty buildings; but its night is always perfumed, for morning pours on it her gray amber, and night her black musk.” The city contained over fifty thousand palaces of the nobles, and twice that number of houses of the common people, while seven hundred mosques and nine hundred public baths had close companionship among a community who made cleanliness co-ordinate with godliness.

But perhaps the greatest monument of Moorish architecture that was ever created in Spain, the most wonderful city and palace that has ever been constructed, is to-day a name and a memory of which not a trace is in existence. That marvellous suburb of Cordova, called Ez-Zahra, “the Fairest,” which was built at the suggestion of the favourite mistress of Abd-er-Rahman III., and was

CORDOVA

THE MOSQUE—ORNAMENTAL ARCHED WINDOW.

 

 

CORDOVA

THE MOSQUE—CAPITALS OF THE ENTRANCE ARCH.

 

 

CORDOVA

DETAILS OF THE FRIEZE.

CORDOVA

PLAN.

KEYSTONE OF ORNAMENTAL ARCH.

 

 

CORDOVA

DETAIL OF THE CORNICE.

DETAIL OF THE CORNICE.

 

 

forty years in the making, has been entirely obliterated. At the foot of the “Hill of the Bridge,” at a distance of three miles from Cordova, the foundation of the city was laid in A.D. 936. A third of the royal income was expended every year in the prosecution of the work. Ten thousand labourers and three thousand beasts of burden were employed continually, and six thousand blocks of stone were cut and polished each day for building purposes. Many of its four thousand columns came from Rome, Constantinople, and Carthage; its fifteen thousand doors were coated with iron and polished brass; the walls and roof in the Hall of the Khalif were constructed of marble and gold. A marble statue of Ez-Zahra, “the Fairest,” was erected over the principal gateway.

Arabian chroniclers have exhausted their eloquence in attempting to do justice to the wonders of Medinat-Ez-Zahra, and the result is so monotonous a surfeit of superlatives that even the beauty that inspired them can scarcely reconcile us to the repetition. But the historians occasionally drop into prose in recounting the marvels of the palace, and then we learn that “the number of male servants employed by the khalif has been estimated at thirteen thousand seven hundred and fifty, to whom the daily allowance of flesh meat, exclusive of fowls and fish, was thirteen thousand pounds; the number of women of various kinds and classes, comprising the harem of the sultan or waiting upon them, is said to have amounted to six thousand three hundred and fourteen. The Slav pages and eunuchs were three thousand three hundred and fifty, to whom thirteen thousand pounds of flesh meat were distributed daily, some receiving ten pounds each, and some less, according to their rank and station, exclusive of fowls, partridges, and birds of other sorts, game, and fish. The daily allowance of bread for the fish in the pond of Ez-Zahra was twelve thousand loaves, besides six measures of black pulse, which were every day macerated in the waters.” It is small wonder that travellers from distant lands, men of all ranks and professions in life, following various religions—princes, ambassadors, merchants, pilgrims, theologians, and poets—all agreed that they had never seen in the course of their travels anything that could be compared to it.

“Indeed,” writes one Moorish chronicler, “had this palace possessed nothing more than the terrace of polished marble overhanging the matchless gardens, with the golden hall and the circular pavilion, and the works of art of every sort and description—had it nothing else to boast of but the masterly workmanship of the structure, the boldness of the design, the beauty of the proportions, the elegance of the ornaments, hangings, and decorations, whether of shining marble or glittering gold, the columns that seemed from their symmetry and smoothness as if they had been turned by lathes, the paintings that resembled the choicest landscapes, the artificial lake so solidly constructed, the cistern perpetually filled with clear and limpid water, and the amazing fountains, with figures of living beings—no imagination, however fertile, could have formed an idea of it.” So at least it struck the Moorish author, and the sight inspired him to ejaculate: “Praise be to God Most High for allowing His humble creatures to design and build such enchanting palaces as this, and who permitted them to inhabit them as a sort of recompense in this world; and in order that the faithful might be encouraged to follow the path of virtue, by the reflection that, delightful as were these pleasures, they were still far below those reserved for the true believer in the celestial Paradise!”

The effect of all this massed splendour upon the mind,

CORDOVA

CAPITAL OF ARCH.

SIDE VIEW OF THE CORNICE.

BASES.

 

 

EAST FAÇADE, WITHOUT THE PORTICO.

 

 

even of those whose position and duties made familiar with the treasures of Abd-er-Rahman’s palaces, is illustrated by one of the ambassadors of the Greek Emperor. The khalif received Constantine’s emissaries in the great hall of the palace of Ez-Zahra, which was specially arranged for the occasion. The richest carpets and rugs, and the most gorgeous silk awnings, covered the floor, and veiled the doors and arches, and in the midst of the apartment was set up the royal throne, overlaid with gold, and glittering with precious stones. On the right and left of the throne stood the khalif’s sons, beside them were the viziers, and behind them, in the order of their rank, were ranged the chamberlains, the nobles, and officers of the household. The ambassadors were awed and amazed by the magnificence of the scene, and the orator, charged with the office of delivering the speech of welcome, was literally struck dumb by the splendour of the spectacle. With wide, staring eyes and speechless lips he stood spellbound, caught in a maze of wonder. This man, who had grown accustomed to superb beauty, who had seen splendour piled upon splendour under the directing hand of his master, was paralysed by the effect it produced. His brain reeled, and, without uttering a word, he fell senseless to the ground. A second orator took the embossed scroll, and faced the august assemblage, but the witchery of the scene hypnotised his senses, and he, too, hesitated, faltered, and broke down.

The mere outward and visible aspect of this “brightest splendour of the world,” as the nun Hroswitha described it, fired the imagination of man, and deprived the practised orators of speech. But the mind of Cordova at this period of its history was as beautiful as its frame. It was the fountain-head of learning, the well-spring of art, the scientific centre of Europe. Literature became the study of every class, poetry was the common language of the people. The potters, the silk weavers, the glass blowers, the jewellers, swordmakers, and brass workers of Cordova were renowned throughout Europe—in all that appertained to art she was acknowledged to stand pre-eminent. The greatest doctors, the most skilled surgeons, had their homes in Cordova; and astronomers, geographers, chemists, philosophers, and scientists of every kind resorted thither to study and prosecute their researches.

Under Hakam II., the Royal library at Cordova became the largest and most celebrated collection of books in the world; and under Almanzor, the powerful minister who ruled Spain for the Khalif Hisham, the beauty of the Imperial city was jealously maintained. But the end of the Omeyyad dynasty was even then in sight, the sun of Cordova’s glory was already commencing to set. After the death of Almanzor

“Sultan after Sultan with his pomp
Abode his destin’d hour and went his way,”

the puppet khalifs were enthroned and deposed at the will of successive prevailing factions. Anarchy had broken out again, the mob was Sultan, and the work of pillage and plunder was begun. The overthrow of the Almanzor order was followed by the wrecking of the Almanzor palace, which was ransacked and burned to the ground. For four days the work of riot, robbery, and massacre went on unchecked. Palace after palace was reduced to ruins, gardens were devastated, the public squares ran with blood. The brutal, savage Berbers captured the beautiful city of Ez-Zahra (A.D. 1010) by treachery, and put its garrisons to the sword, while the flying inhabitants were chased into the sacred precincts of the mosque and butchered without mercy.

Ez-Zahra, “the city of the fairest,” was pillaged; its palaces and mosques were thrown down, and the walls were given to the flames. To-day its site alone remains, and its glories exist only in name.

 

 

THE beginning of the history of Seville is buried, with the date of its foundation, in oblivion. It has its place in mythology as the creation of Hercules; its origin being more reasonably credited to the Phœnicians, who colonised the mineral-yielding region of Andalusia, which is watered by the Guadalquivir, and called it Tartessii. Strabo states that they built the town of Tartessus; and some authorities favour the conclusion that Seville stands on the site of that Phœnician stronghold. In 237 B.C. Hamilcar Barca conquered Andalusia, and his son-in-law founded Carthagena, which was seized by Publius Cornelius Scipio, or Scipio Africanus, during the second Punic War. Scipio founded Italica, which was to serve as a sanatorium for his invalided soldiers, and for awhile its importance eclipsed that of the neighbouring city of Seville. Honoured by the gifts of three Roman emperors born within its walls, and adorned with the splendid edifices raised by Trajan, Adrian, and Theodosius, Italica was advanced to the first rank among the Roman cities of the Peninsula. Julius Cæsar restored the balance of power to Seville in 45 B.C., when he made it his capital, and changed its name to Julia Romula. The city was fortified and protected by walls, which have been variously described as from five to ten miles in length. To-day the remains of the great aqueduct, the two high granite columns in the Alameda de Hercules, and the beautiful fragments of capitals and statues in the Museo Arqælogico, are the only existing relics of the Roman sway in Seville, while on the opposite bank of the Guadalquivir a ruined, grass-grown amphitheatre is all that is left of the once mighty town of Italica. In 584 Leovigild repaired the walls of Italica when he was beseiging Seville, and less than two centuries later those walls were greatly injured by the Moors, who further fortified and enlarged Seville with the stones brought from Italica.

In 711 Tarik captured Cordova, and in the following year Musa, the Governor of Africa, appeared before Seville with an army of 18,000 warriors. In a few weeks the city had fallen, and for 536 years the “Pearl of Andalusia” remained in the possession of the Moors. The conquerors abandoned Italica to its fate, or, rather, they used the remains of the city as a quarry, while some of the sculpture of the deserted capital, which appealed to the Arabs by its surpassing beauty, was removed to Seville. Despite the injunctions contained in the Koran, the sculptures were not destroyed, and a statue of Venus was long preserved in one of the public baths of the city. El-Makkari, writing in the sixteenth century, and quoting from an early Moorish manuscript, records that “there was once found a marble statue of a woman with a boy, so admirably executed that both looked as if they were alive; such perfection human eyes never beheld. Indeed, some Sevillians were so much struck with its beauty as to become deeply enamoured of it.” An anonymous poet, a native of Seville, made a set of verses about it, which have been translated by Don Pascual de Gayangos as follows:

It has been said that the Sevillians pretend to regard Hercules as the builder of the city, and the Puerta de la Carne is inscribed with the following distich:

This has been paraphrased in an inscription over the Puerta de Xerex:

Hercules built me; Julius Cæsar encircled me with walls and lofty towers; a Gothic king (Roderick) lost me; a saint-like king (St. Ferdinand), assisted by Garci Perez de Vargas, regained me.

The inscription might well have included the name of the brother of Garci Perez, Diego de Vargas, surnamed “El Machuca,” or “the Pounder,” who performed prodigies of valour at the breaking of the Moorish bridge of boats across the Guadalquivir, when the destruction of that gallantly-defended means of access to the city led to the capture of Seville by the Christians in 1248. These two brothers are the heroes of Spanish ballads, and were greatly distinguished by St. Ferdinand; the grateful monarch freely acknowledging their prowess by the bestowal of houses and lands wrested from the Moors. A curious “Repartimiento,” or Domesday Book of Seville, is still extant, and many families can trace their actual possessions back to this original partition.

Musa appointed his son, Abdelasis, a brave soldier and a humane ruler, to be governor of Seville. That he was a successful general, that he married Egilona, the widow of the unfortunate King Roderick, and was murdered by the order of Suleyman, brother and heir of the Khalif of Damascus, is all that history records of him. A malignant rumour, that he was scheming to make himself sole ruler of the Berber dominion in Spain, reached Damascus. Suleyman immediately sent emissaries to Seville with secret instructions that Abdelasis should be put to death, adding as an incentive to swift compliance with his order, that whoever among them executed the deed, should be appointed his successor as Amir of Seville. The delegates were armed with friendly letters to Abdelasis, who received them cordially, and entertained them in accordance with his exalted position as an amir under the khalif. It appears, according to the tradition, that the scheme was revealed to ’Abdullah Ibn, “who was the most eminent and most conspicuous officer in the army.” ’Abdullah, however, would have no hand in the projected assassination, but, on the contrary, endeavoured to dissuade the conspirators from their purpose, saying to them: “You know the hand of Musa has conferred benefits on every one of you: if the Commander of the Faithful has been informed as you represent, he has been told a lie. Abdelasis has never raised his hand in disobedience to his master, nor dreamt of revolting against him.” Suleyman’s emissaries, however, disregarded his words, and decided on the murder. One morn they stood among the rest at the gates of the palace, waiting till the governor should go to the mosque, and, when he appeared, followed him to prayer. Scarcely had he entered the “kiblah,” and begun to read the Koran, than one of the conspirators rushed upon the governor and stabbed him. Abdelasis, leaving the “kiblah,” took refuge in the body of the mosque, whither he was followed and slain. When the news spread through the city, the inhabitants

PLATE XXV
SEVILLE

Frieze in the Hall of Ambassadors.
Mosaic of the large Court, Alcazar.	Stucco work, Hall of Ambassadors.	Mosaic of the large Court.