Текст книги "Literary History of the Arabs "

Автор книги: Reynolds Nicholson

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During his long reign of thirty-two years ‘Abdu ’l-Raḥmán was busily employed in defending and consolidating the empire which more than once seemed to be on the point of slipping from his grasp. The task before him was arduous in the extreme. On the one hand, he was confronted by the unruly Arab aristocracy, jealous of their independence and regarding the monarch as their common foe. Between him and them no permanent compromise was possible, and since they could only be kept in check by an armed force stronger than themselves, he was compelled to rely on mercenaries, for the most part Berbers imported from Africa. Thus, by a fatal necessity the Moslem Empire in the West gradually assumed that despotic and Prætorian character which we have learned to associate with the ‘Abbásid Government in the period of its decline, and the results were in the end hardly less disastrous. The monarchy had also to reckon with the fanaticism of its Christian subjects and with a formidable Spanish national party eager to throw off the foreign yoke. Extraordinary energy and tact were needed to maintain authority over these explosive elements, and if the dynasty founded by ‘Abdu ’l-Raḥmán not only survived for two centuries and a half but gave to Spain a more splendid era of prosperity and culture than she had ever enjoyed, the credit is mainly due to the bold adventurer from whom even his enemies could not withhold a tribute of admiration. One day, it is said, the Caliph Manṣúr asked his courtiers, "Who is the Falcon of Quraysh?" They replied, "O Prince of the Faithful, that title belongs to you who have vanquished mighty kings and have put an end to civil war." "No," said the Caliph, "it is not I." "Mu‘áwiya, then, or ‘Abdu ’l-Malik?" "No," said Manṣúr, "the Falcon of Quraysh is ‘Abdu ’l-Raḥmán b. Mu‘áwiya, he who traversed alone the deserts of Asia and Africa, and without an army to aid him sought his fortune in an unknown country beyond the sea. With no weapons except judgment and resolution he subdued his enemies, crushed the rebels, secured his frontiers, and founded a great empire. Such a feat was never achieved by any one before."759

Of the Moslems in Spain the Arabs formed only a small minority, and they, moreover, showed all the indifference towards religion and contempt for the laws of Islam which might be expected from men imbued with Bedouin traditions whose forbears had been devotedly attached to the world-loving Umayyads of Damascus. It was otherwise with the Spanish converts, the so-called 'Renegades' Islam in Spain. or Muwalladún(Affiliati) living as clients under protection of the Arab nobility, and with the Berbers. These races took their adopted religion very seriously, in accordance with the fervid and sombre temperament which has always distinguished them. Hence among the mass of Spanish Moslems a rigorous orthodoxy prevailed. The Berber, Yaḥyá b. Yaḥyá (õ 849 a.d.), is a typical figure. At the age of twenty-eight years he travelled to the Yaḥyá b. Yaḥyá. East and studied under Málik. b. Anas, who dictated to him his celebrated work known as the Muwaṭṭa’. Yaḥyá was one day at Málik's lecture with a number of fellow-students, when some one said, "Here comes the elephant!" All of them ran out to see the animal, but Yaḥyá did not stir. "Why," said Málik, "do you not go out and look at it? Such animals are not to be seen in Spain." To this Yaḥyá replied, "I left my country for the purpose of seeing you and obtaining knowledge under your guidance. I did not come here to see the elephant." Málik was so pleased with this answer that he called him the most intelligent ( ‘áqil) of the people of Spain. On his return to Spain Yaḥyá exerted himself to spread the doctrines of his master, and though he obstinately refused, on religious grounds, to accept any public office, his influence and reputation were such that, as Ibn Ḥazm says, no Cadi was ever appointed till Yaḥyá had given his opinion and designated the person whom he preferred.760 Thus the Málikite system, based on close adherence to tradition, became the law of the land. "The Spaniards," it is observed by a learned writer of the tenth century, "recognise only the Koran and the Muwaṭṭa’; if they find a follower of Abú Ḥanífa or Sháfi‘í, they banish him from Spain, and if they meet with a Mu‘tazilite or a Shí‘ite or any one of that sort, they often put him to death."761 Arrogant, intensely bigoted, and ambitious of power, the Muḥammadan clergy were not disposed to play a subordinate rôle in the State. In Hishám (788-796 a.d.), the successor of ‘Abdu ’l-Raḥmán, they had a prince after their own heart, whose piety and devotion to their interests left nothing to be desired. Ḥakam (796-822 a.d.) was less complaisant. He honoured and respected the clergy, but at the same time he let them see that he would not permit them to interfere in political affairs. The malcontents, headed by the fiery Yaḥyá b. Yaḥyá, replied with menaces and insults, and called on the populace of Cordova—especially the 'Renegades' in the southern quarter ( rabaḍ) of the city—to rise against the tyrant and his insolent soldiery. One day in Ramaḍán, 198 a.h. (May, 814 a.d.), Ḥakam suddenly found himself cut off from the garrison and besieged in his palace by an infuriated mob, but he did not lose courage, and, thanks to his coolness and skilful strategy, he came safely out of the The Revolt of the Suburb. peril in which he stood. The revolutionary suburb was burned to the ground and those of its inhabitants who escaped massacre, some 60,000 souls, were driven into exile. The real culprits went unpunished. Ḥakam could not afford further to exasperate the divines, who on their part began to perceive that they might obtain from the prince by favour what they had failed to wring from him by force. Being mostly Arabs or Berbers, they had a strong claim to his consideration. Their power was soon restored, and in the reign of ‘Abdu ’l-Raḥmán II (822-852 a.d.) Yaḥyá himself, the ringleader of the mutiny, directed ecclesiastical policy and dispensed judicial patronage as he pleased.

The Revolt of the Suburb was only an episode in the long and sanguinary struggle between the Spaniards, Moslem or Christian, on the one hand, and the monarchy of Cordova on the other—a struggle complicated by the rival Arab tribes, which sometimes patched up their own feuds in order to defend themselves against the Spanish patriots, but never in any circumstances gave their support to the detested Umayyad Government. The hero of this war of independence ‘Umar b. Ḥafṣún. was ‘Umar b. Ḥafṣún. He belonged to a noble family of West-Gothic origin which had gone over to Islam and settled in the mountainous district north-east of Malaga. Hot-blooded, quarrelsome, and ready to stab on the slightest provocation, the young man soon fell into trouble. At first he took shelter in the wild fastnesses of Ronda, where he lived as a brigand until he was captured by the police. He then crossed the sea to Africa, but in a short time returned to his old haunts and put himself at the head of a band of robbers. Here he held out for two years, when, having been obliged to surrender, he accepted the proposal of the Sultan of Cordova that he and his companions should enlist in the Imperial army. But ‘Umar was destined for greater glory than the Sultan could confer upon him. A few contemptuous words from a superior officer touched his pride to the quick, so one fine day he galloped off with all his men in the direction of Ronda. They found an almost impregnable retreat in the castle of Bobastro, which had once been a Roman fortress. From this moment, says Dozy, ‘Umar b. Ḥafṣún was no longer a brigand-chief, but leader of the whole Spanish race in the south. The lawless and petulant free-lance was transformed into a high-minded patriot, celebrated for the stern justice with which he punished the least act of violence, adored by his soldiers, and regarded by his countrymen as the champion of the national cause. During the rest of his life (884-917 a.d.) he conducted the guerilla with untiring energy and made himself a terror to the Arabs, but fortune deserted him at the last, and he died– felix opportunitate mortis—only a few years before complete ruin overtook his party. The Moslem Spaniards, whose enthusiasm had been sensibly weakened by their leader's conversion to Christianity, were the more anxious to make their peace with the Government, since they saw plainly the hopelessness of continuing the struggle.

In 912 a.d. ‘Abdu ’l-Raḥmán III, the Defender of the Faith ( al-Náṣir li-díní ’lláh), succeeded his grandfather, the Amír ‘Abdulláh, on the throne of Cordova. The character, genius, and enterprise of this great monarch are strikingly depicted in the following passage from the pen of an eloquent historian whose work, although it was published some fifty years ago, will always be authoritative762:—

"Amongst the Umayyad sovereigns who have ruled Spain the first place belongs incontestably to ‘Abdu ’l-Raḥmán III. What he ‘Abdu ’l-Raḥmán III (912-961 A.D). accomplished was almost miraculous. He had found the empire abandoned to anarchy and civil war, rent by factions, parcelled amongst a multitude of heterogeneous princes, exposed to incessant attacks from the Christians of the north, and on the eve of being swallowed up either by the Léonnese or the Africans. In spite of innumerable obstacles he had saved Spain both from herself and from the foreign domination. He had endowed her with new life and made her greater and stronger than she had ever been. He had given her order and prosperity at home, consideration and respect abroad. The public treasury, which he had found in a deplorable condition, was now overflowing. Of the Imperial revenues, which amounted annually to 6,245,000 pieces of gold, a third sufficed for ordinary expenses; a third was held in reserve, and ‘Abdu ’l-Raḥmán devoted the remainder to his buildings. It was calculated that in the year 951 he had in his coffers the enormous sum of 20,000,000 pieces of gold, so that a traveller not without judgment in matters of finance assures us that ‘Abdu ’l-Raḥmán and the Ḥamdánid (Náṣiru ’l-Dawla), who was then reigning over Mesopotamia, were the wealthiest princes of that epoch. The state of the country was in keeping with the prosperous condition of the treasury. Agriculture, industry, commerce, the arts and the sciences, all flourished.... Cordova, with its half-million inhabitants, its three thousand mosques, its superb palaces, its hundred and thirteen thousand houses, its three hundred bagnios, and its twenty-eight suburbs, was inferior in extent and splendour only to Baghdád, with which city the Cordovans loved to compare it.... The power of ‘Abdu ’l-Raḥmán was formidable. A magnificent fleet enabled him to dispute with the Fáṭimids the empire of the Mediterranean, and secured him in the possession of Ceuta, the key of Mauritania. A numerous and well-disciplined army, perhaps the finest in the world, gave him superiority over the Christians of the north. The proudest sovereigns solicited his alliance. The emperor of Constantinople, the kings of Germany, Italy, and France sent ambassadors to him.

"Assuredly, these were brilliant results; but what excites our astonishment and admiration when we study this glorious reign is not so much the work as the workman: it is the might of that comprehensive intelligence which nothing escaped, and which showed itself no less admirable in the minutest details than in the loftiest conceptions. This subtle and sagacious man, who centralises, who founds the unity of the nation and of the monarchy, who by means of his alliances establishes a sort of political equilibrium, who in his large tolerance calls the professors of another religion into his councils, is a modern king rather than a mediæval Caliph."763

In short, ‘Abdu ’l-Raḥmán III made the Spanish Moslems one people, and formed out of Arabs and Spaniards a united Andalusian nation, which, as we shall presently see, advanced with incredible swiftness to a height of culture that was the envy of Europe and was not exceeded by any contemporary State in the Muḥammadan East. With his death, however, the decline of the Umayyad dynasty began. His son, Ḥakam II (õ 976 a.d.), left as heir-apparent a boy eleven years old, Hishám II, who received the title of Caliph while the government was carried on by his mother Aurora and Regency of Manṣúr Ibn Abí ‘Ámir (976-1002 a.d.). the ambitious minister Muḥammad b. Abí ‘Ámir. The latter was virtually monarch of Spain, and whatever may be thought of the means by which he rose to eminence, or of his treatment of the unfortunate Caliph whose mental faculties he deliberately stunted and whom he condemned to a life of monkish seclusion, it is impossible to deny that he ruled well and nobly. He was a great statesman and a great soldier. No one could accuse him of making an idle boast when he named himself 'Al-Manṣúr' ('The Victorious'). Twice every year he was accustomed to lead his army against the Christians, and such was the panic which he inspired that in the course of more than fifty campaigns he scarcely ever lost a battle. He died in 1002 a.d. A Christian monk, recording the event in his chronicle, adds, "he was buried in Hell," but Moslem hands engraved the following lines upon the tomb of their champion:—

"His story in his relics you may trace,As tho' he stood before you face to face.Never will Time bring forth his peer again,Nor one to guard, like him, the gaps of Spain."764

His demise left the Prætorians masters of the situation. Berbers and Slaves765 divided the kingdom between them, and amidst revolution and civil war the Umayyad dynasty passed away (1031 a.d.).

It has been said with truth that the history of Spain in the eleventh century bears a close resemblance to that of Italy in the fifteenth. The splendid empire of ‘Abdu ’l-Raḥmán III was broken up, and from its ruins there emerged a fortuitous conglomeration of petty states governed by successful condottieri. Of these Party Kings ( Mulúku The Party Kings (Mulúku ’l-Ṭawá’if). ’l-Ṭawá’if), as they are called by Muḥammadan writers, the most powerful were the ‘Abbádids of Seville. Although it was an age of political decay, the material prosperity of Spain had as yet suffered little diminution, whilst in point of culture the society of this time reached a level hitherto unequalled. Here, then, we may pause for a moment to review the progress of literature and science during the most fruitful period of the Moslem occupation of European soil.

Whilst in Asia, as we have seen, the Arab conquerors yielded to the spell of an ancient culture infinitely superior to Influence of Arabic culture on the Spaniards. their own, they no sooner crossed the Straits of Gibraltar than the rôles were reversed. As the invaders extended their conquests to every part of the peninsula, thousands of Christians fell into their hands, who generally continued to live under Moslem protection. They were well treated by the Government, enjoyed religious liberty, and often rose to high offices in the army or at court. Many of them became rapidly imbued with Moslem civilisation, so that as early as the middle of the ninth century we find Alvaro, Bishop of Cordova, complaining that his co-religionists read the poems and romances of the Arabs, and studied the writings of Muḥammadan theologians and philosophers, not in order to refute them but to learn how to express themselves in Arabic with correctness and elegance. "Where," he asks, "can any one meet nowadays with a layman who reads the Latin commentaries on the Holy Scriptures? Who studies the Gospels, the Prophets, the Apostles? Alas, all young Christians of conspicuous talents are acquainted only with the language and writings of the Arabs; they read and study Arabic books with the utmost zeal, spend immense sums of money in collecting them for their libraries, and proclaim everywhere that this literature is admirable. On the other hand, if you talk with them of Christian books, they reply contemptuously that these books are not worth their notice. Alas, the Christians have forgotten their own language, and amongst thousands of us scarce one is to be found who can write a tolerable Latin letter to a friend; whereas very many are capable of expressing themselves exquisitely in Arabic and of composing poems in that tongue with even greater skill than the Arabs themselves."766

However the good bishop may have exaggerated, it is evident that Muḥammadan culture had a strong attraction for the Spanish Christians, and equally, let us add, for the Jews, who made numerous contributions to poetry, philosophy, and science in their native speech as well as in the kindred Arabic idiom. The 'Renegades,' or Spanish converts to Islam, became completely Arabicised in the course of a few generations; and from this class sprang some of the chief ornaments of Spanish-Arabian literature.

Considered as a whole, the poetry of the Moslems in Europe shows the same characteristics which have already The poetry of the Spanish Arabs. been noted in the work of their Eastern contemporaries. The paralysing conventions from which the laureates of Baghdád and Aleppo could not emancipate themselves remained in full force at Cordova and Seville. Yet, just as Arabic poetry in the East was modified by the influences of Persian culture, in Spain also the gradual amalgamation of Aryans with Semites introduced new elements which have left their mark on the literature of both races. Perhaps the most interesting features of Spanish-Arabian poetry are the tenderly romantic feeling which not infrequently appears in the love-songs, a feeling that sometimes anticipates the attitude of mediæval chivalry; and in the second place an almost modern sensibility to the beauties of nature. On account of these characteristics the poems in question appeal to many European readers who do not easily enter into the spirit of the Mu‘allaqátor the odes of Mutanabbí, and if space allowed it would be a pleasant task to translate some of the charming lyric and descriptive pieces which have been collected by anthologists. The omission, however, is less grave inasmuch as Von Schack has given us a series of excellent versions in his Poesie und Kunst der Araber in Spanien und Sicilien(2nd ed., Stuttgart, 1877).

"One of its marvels," says Qazwíní, referring to the town of Shilb (Silves) in Portugal, "is the fact, which innumerable persons have mentioned, that the people living there, with few exceptions, are makers of verse and devoted to belles-lettres; and if you passed by a labourer standing behind his plough and asked him to recite some verses, he would at once improvise on any subject that you might demand."767 Of Folk-songs. such folk-songs the zajaland muwashshaḥwere favourite types.768 Both forms were invented in Spain, and their structure is very similar, consisting of several stanzas in which the rhymes are so arranged that the master-rhyme ending each stanza and running through the whole poem like a refrain is continually interrupted by a various succession of subordinate rhymes, as is shown in the following scheme:—

aabbbacccaddda.

Many of these songs and ballads were composed in the vulgar dialect and without regard to the rules of classical prosody. The troubadour Ibn Quzmán (õ 1160 a.d.) first raised the zajalto literary rank. Here is an example of the muwashshaḥ:—

"Come, hand the precious cup to me,And brim it high with a golden sea!Let the old wine circle from guest to guest,While the bubbles gleam like pearls on its breast,So that night is of darkness dispossessed.How it foams and twinkles in fiery glee!'Tis drawn from the Pleiads' cluster, perdie. Pass it, to music's melting sound,Here on this flowery carpet round,Where gentle dews refresh the groundAnd bathe my limbs deliciouslyIn their cool and balmy fragrancy. Alone with me in the garden greenA singing-girl enchants the scene:Her smile diffuses a radiant sheen.I cast off shame, for no spy can see,And 'Hola,' I cry, 'let us merry be!'"769

True to the traditions of their family, the Spanish Umayyads loved poetry, music, and polite literature a great deal better than the Koran. Even the Falcon of Verses by ‘Abdu ’l-Raḥmán I. Quraysh, ‘Abdu ’l-Raḥmán I, if the famous verses on the Palm-tree are really by him, concealed something of the softer graces under his grim exterior. It is said that in his gardens at Cordova there was a solitary date-palm, which had been transplanted from Syria, and that one day ‘Abdu ’l-Raḥmán, as he gazed upon it, remembered his native land and felt the bitterness of exile and exclaimed:—

"O Palm, thou art a stranger in the West,Far from thy Orient home, like me unblest.Weep! But thou canst not. Dumb, dejected tree,Thou art not made to sympathise with me.Ah, thou wouldst weep, if thou hadst tears to pour,For thy companions on Euphrates' shore;But yonder tall groves thou rememberest not,As I, in hating foes, have my old friends forgot."770

At the court of ‘Abdu ’l-Raḥmán II (822-852 a.d.) a Persian musician was prime favourite. This was Ziryáb, a Ziryáb the musician. client of the Caliph Mahdí and a pupil of the celebrated singer, Isḥáq al-Mawṣilí.771 Isḥáq, seeing in the young man a dangerous rival to himself, persuaded him to quit Baghdád and seek his fortune in Spain. ‘Abdu ’l-Raḥmán received him with open arms, gave him a magnificent house and princely salary, and bestowed upon him every mark of honour imaginable. The versatile and accomplished artist wielded a vast influence. He set the fashion in all things appertaining to taste and manners; he fixed the toilette, sanctioned the cuisine, and prescribed what dress should be worn in the different seasons of the year. The kings of Spain took him as a model, and his authority was constantly invoked and universally recognised in that country down to the last days of Moslem rule.772 Ziryáb was only one of many talented and learned men who came to Spain from the East, while the list of Spanish savants who journeyed "in quest of knowledge" ( fí ṭalabi ’l-‘ilm) to Africa and Egypt, to the Holy Cities of Arabia, to the great capitals of Syria and ‘Iráq, to Khurásán, Transoxania, and in some cases even to China, includes, as may be seen from the perusal of Maqqarí's fifth chapter, nearly all the eminent scholars and men of letters whom Moslem Spain has produced. Thus a lively exchange of ideas was continually in movement, and so little provincialism existed that famous Andalusian poets, like Ibn Hání and Ibn Zaydún, are described by admiring Eastern critics as the Buḥturís and Mutanabbís of the West.

The tenth century of the Christian era is a fortunate and illustrious period in Spanish history. Under ‘Abdu ’l-Raḥmán III and his successor, Ḥakam II, the nation, hitherto torn asunder by civil war, bent its united energies to the advancement of material and intellectual culture. Ḥakam was an enthusiastic bibliophile. He sent his agents in every direction to purchase manuscripts, and collected 400,000 volumes in his palace, which was The Library of Ḥakam II. thronged with librarians, copyists, and bookbinders. All these books, we are told, he had himself read, and he annotated most of them with his own hand. His munificence to scholars knew no bounds. He made a present of 1,000 dínárs to Abu ’l-Faraj of Iṣfahán, in order to secure the first copy that was published of the great 'Book of Songs' ( Kitábu ’l-Aghání), on which the author was then engaged. Besides honouring and encouraging the learned, Ḥakam took measures to spread the benefits of education amongst the poorest of his subjects. With this view he founded twenty-seven free schools in the capital and paid the teachers out of his private purse. Whilst in Christian Europe the rudiments of learning were confined to the clergy, in Spain almost every one could read and write.

"The University of Cordova was at that time one of the most celebrated in the world. In the principal Mosque, where the The University of Cordova. lectures were held, Abú Bakr b. Mu‘áwiya, the Qurayshite, discussed the Traditions relating to Muḥammad. Abú ‘Alí al-Qálí of Baghdád dictated a large and excellent miscellany which contained an immense quantity of curious information concerning the ancient Arabs, their proverbs, their language, and their poetry. This collection he afterwards published under the title of Amálí, or 'Dictations.' Grammar was taught by Ibnu ’l-Qúṭiyya, who, in the opinion of Abú ‘Ali al-Qálí, was the leading grammarian of Spain. Other sciences had representatives no less renowned. Accordingly the students attending the classes were reckoned by thousands. The majority were students of what was called fiqh, that is to say, theology and law, for that science then opened the way to the most lucrative posts."773

Among the notable savants of this epoch we may mention Ibn ‘Abdi Rabbihi (õ 940 a.d.), laureate of ‘Abdu ’l-Raḥmán III and author of a well-known anthology entitled al-‘Iqd al-Faríd; the poet Ibn Hání of Seville (õ 973 a.d.), an Ismá‘ílí convert who addressed blasphemous panegyrics to the Fáṭimid Caliph Mu‘izz;774 the historians of Spain, Abú Bakr al-Rází (õ 937 a.d.), whose family belonged to Rayy in Persia, and Ibnu ’l-Qúṭiyya (õ 977 a.d.), who, as his name indicates, was the descendant of a Gothic princess; the astronomer and mathematician Maslama b. Aḥmad of Madrid (õ 1007 a.d.); and the great surgeon Abu ’l-Qásim al-Zahráwí of Cordova, who died about the same time, and who became known to Europe by the name of Albucasis.

The fall of the Spanish Umayyads, which took place in the first half of the eleventh century, left Cordova a republic and a merely provincial town; and though she might still claim to be regarded as the literary metropolis of Spain, her ancient glories were overshadowed by the independent dynasties which now begin to flourish in Seville, Almeria, Badajoz, Granada, Toledo, Malaga, Valencia, and other cities. Of these rival princedoms the most formidable in arms and the most brilliant in its cultivation of the arts was, beyond question, the family of the ‘Abbádids, who reigned in Seville. The The ‘Abbádids (1023-1091 a.d.). foundations of their power were laid by the Cadi Abu ’l-Qásim Muḥammad. "He acted towards the people with such justice and moderation as drew on him the attention of every eye and the love of every heart," so that the office of chief magistrate was willingly conceded to him. In order to obtain the monarchy which he coveted, the Cadi employed an audacious ruse. The last Umayyad Caliph, Hishám II, had vanished mysteriously: it was generally supposed that, after escaping from Cordova when that city was stormed by the Berbers (1013 a.d.), he fled to Asia and died unknown; but many believed that he was still alive. Twenty years after his disappearance there suddenly arose a pretender, named Khalaf, who gave out that he was the Caliph Hishám. The likeness between them was strong enough to make the imposture plausible. At any rate, the Cadi had his own reasons for abetting it. He called on the people, who were deeply attached to the Umayyad dynasty, to rally round their legitimate sovereign. Cordova and several other States recognised the authority of this pseudo-Caliph, whom Abu ’l-Qásim used as a catspaw. His son ‘Abbád, a treacherous and bloodthirsty tyrant, but an amateur of belles-lettres, threw off the mask and reigned under the title of al-Mu‘taḍid (1042-1069 a.d.). He in turn was succeeded by his son, al-Mu‘tamid, whose strange and romantic history reminds one of a sentence frequently occurring in the Arabian Nights: "Were it graven with needle-gravers upon the eye-corners, it were a warner to whoso would be warned." He is described as "the most liberal, the most hospitable, the most munificent, and the most powerful of all the princes who ruled in Spain. His court was the halting-place of travellers, the rendezvous of poets, the point to which all hopes were directed, and the haunt of men of talent."775 Mu‘tamid himself was a poet of rare distinction. "He left," says Ibn Mu‘tamid of Seville (1069-1091 a.d.). Bassám, "some pieces of verse beautiful as the bud when it opens to disclose the flower; and had the like been composed by persons who made of poetry a profession and a merchandise, they would still have been considered charming, admirable, and singularly original."776 Numberless anecdotes are told of Mu‘tamid's luxurious life at Seville: his evening rambles along the banks of the Guadalquivir; his parties of pleasure; his adventures when he sallied forth in disguise, accompanied by his Vizier, the poet Ibn ‘Ammár, into the streets of the sleeping city; and his passion for the slave-girl I‘timád, commonly known as Rumaykiyya, whom he loved all his life with constant devotion.

Meanwhile, however, a terrible catastrophe was approaching. The causes which led up to it are related by Ibn Khallikán as follows777:—

"At that time Alphonso VI, the son of Ferdinand, the sovereign of Castile and king of the Spanish Franks, had become so powerful The Almoravides in Spain. that the petty Moslem princes were obliged to make peace with him and pay him tribute. Mu‘tamid Ibn ‘Abbád surpassed all the rest in greatness of power and extent of empire, yet he also paid tribute to Alphonso. After capturing Toledo (May 29, 1085 a.d.) the Christian monarch sent him a threatening message with the demand that he should surrender his fortresses; on which condition he might retain the open country as his own. These words provoked Mu‘tamid to such a degree that he struck the ambassador and put to death all those who accompanied him.778 Alphonso, who was marching on Cordova, no sooner received intelligence of this event than he returned to Toledo in order to provide machines for the siege of Seville. When the Shaykhs and doctors of Islam were informed of this project they assembled and said: 'Behold how the Moslem cities fall into the hands of the Franks whilst our sovereigns are engaged in warfare against each other! If things continue in this state the Franks will subdue the entire country.' They then went to the Cadi (of Cordova), ‘Abdulláh b. Muḥammad b. Adham, and conferred with him on the disasters which had befallen the Moslems and on the means by which they might be remedied. Every person had something to say, but it was finally resolved that they should write to Abú Ya‘qúb Yúsuf b. Táshifín, the king of the Mulaththamún779 and sovereign of Morocco, imploring his assistance. The Cadi then waited on Mu‘tamid, and informed him of what had passed. Mu‘tamid concurred with them on the expediency of such an application, and told the Cadi to bear the message himself to Yúsuf b. Táshifín. A conference took place at Ceuta. Yúsuf recalled from the city of Morocco the troops which he had left there, and when all were mustered he sent them across to Spain, and followed with a body of 10,000 men. Mu‘tamid, who had also assembled an army, went to meet him; and the Moslems, on hearing the news, hastened from every province for the purpose of combating the infidels. Alphonso, who was then at Toledo, took the field with 40,000 horse, exclusive of other troops which came to join him. He wrote a long and threatening letter to Yúsuf b. Táshifín, who inscribed on the back of it these words: ' What will happen thou shalt see!' and returned it. On reading the answer Alphonso was filled with apprehension, and observed that this was a man of resolution. The two armies met at Zalláqa, Battle of Zalláqa (October 23, 1086 a.d.). near Badajoz. The Moslems gained the victory, and Alphonso fled with a few others, after witnessing the complete destruction of his army. This year was adopted in Spain as the commencement of a new era, and was called the year of Zalláqa."