Old Court Life in Spain, vol. 1/2

In no boastful spirit I gratefully acknowledge the flattering success of _Old Court Life in France_, written twenty years ago. It is precisely owing to the favour with which the...

How great is Spain! How mighty! From the rugged mountains of the Asturias, their base washed by stormy waves, and the giddy heights of the Pyrenean precipices--an eternal barrie...

How strange to think of Cordoba before the Moors, who so imbued it with the spirit of Moslem life! Those famous Caliphs of the rival houses of Mirvan and Ummaija, and the great...

The court life shifts from the green Sierras of Cordoba to the old city of Toledo. Again we are in the corn-bearing plains, the outlines of the domes, pinnacles, and turrets of...

Julian’s first object is, without exciting suspicion, to remove his daughter from Toledo. Full of the project of revenge, he crosses the Straits and repairs to the Court. Wherev...

“Of great woe,” is the answer. “Already the rock of Calpe has fallen. The noble Teodomir is wounded. The Gothic troops, O King, fly before the Moslem. Whether they come from hea...

All night a light burned in the tent of Don Roderich. If he slept, his slumbers were troubled. Now the pale form of Florinda rises before him with sad eyes, then the hideous vis...

Again we are at Cordoba! Under the protection of its river-girt walls the flying Goths draw breath. From Cordoba the king has started his great army, spreading like waves over t...

At this time a Mussulman Emir, named Alabor, ruled in Cordoba under the Sultan Suleiman of Damascus. Alabor, who was a hard and zealous follower of Mahomet, looked with suspicio...

Meanwhile the great Emir Mousa is moved by fierce jealousy of the success of Tháryk of the one-eye. Not only had he overrun the mountains of the Moon and conquered Granada, but...

The Alcazar at Seville (each Spanish city has its Alcazar) still stands in the centre of the city. Not the decorated palace we see it now, rebuilt by the Toledan Zalubi for Prin...

At Cordoba we come upon the full splendour of the Moors, a whole world of chivalry, _jonglerie_, magic, and song, from the old East, their home. What noble devotion to their rac...

Abdurraman, first Sultan of Cordoba, was a kindly hearted man, with none of the traditional cruelty of the Arab, eloquent in speech, and of a quick perception--quite the Caliph...

Kerim-El-Nozier, the Governor of Gijon in Galicia, is a Berber, infinitely less cultured than the Moors, and the distance from the capital at Cordoba has made him almost indepen...

The Plaza of Gijon swarms with a motley crowd. The news of some great event to take place has spread abroad and brought down peasants from the distant mountain-tops, clad in pri...

To those who have not visited the north of Spain, the grandeur of the dark chain of the Asturian mountains rising sheer out of the plains of Leon and Lugo can hardly be imagined...

The city of Leon is a very ancient place, old even in the days of the Romans. Around it circles the line of walls spared by Witica when he levelled the defences throughout Spain.

Bernardo hastily passed the court with swift, straight strides, his form in shadow defined against the light. A heavy peal of thunder sounded overhead as he turned to the right,...

As Bernardo knelt upon the steps of the darkened altar, on which the outline of a saint with a dim glory seemed to bless him with outstretched arms, something in the ardent aubu...

An immense plain spreads around, verdant with pastures, gardens and _huertas_ full of fruit-trees and clumps of planes and oaks, while across it, flung like a silver ribbon, flo...

In front of the many valleys opening out from under the dark range of the Pyrenees, they met--the Gaul and the Spaniard. The Emperor Charlemagne with good cause curses the fickl...

And now Bernardo is home again in the red-walled streets of Leon. Others long for life, he has sought for death; but the dark angel has not answered to his call.

Castile formed no part of the new kingdom of Leon and was governed by its own lord. And here we come on a noticeable history of how the lion was added to the castle on the arms...

At a great festival given by Don Garcia, Doña Ava sat at the board. The jewels that decked her coif and neck but increased the paleness of her eyes. No love-dimple dented her fa...

Burgos was reached without further incident, and in a few days the marriage of the Conde and the Infanta was solemnised with great pomp in the church of Sant’ Agueda on the hill...

Time passed and a new element made itself felt in the struggle between the Christians and the Moors. The powerful tribe of the Berbers had fastened like leeches on the Gothic la...

Don Fernando el Magno is king. He has transferred the Christian capital to Burgos on succeeding to the states of Leon, Castile, and Galicia by the death of his brother-in-law, B...

I wonder if Burgos looked then as it does now?--a well-washed, trim little city, Dutch in its neatness, tinted, upon the principle of Joseph’s coat of many colours, pink, blue,...

It was the hottest hour of the day, when the citizens took their _siesta_; the sun poured down in splendour on the white walls, absorbing the shade; the river was dried up.

It was in this manner. The king girded on him his sword Tizona, to become famous to all time, and gave him a kiss, but no blow; the queen gave him a horse, perhaps Babieca; and...

After this there was a great change. The good king Fernando fell ill with the malady of which he died. For three days he lay on his bed lamenting in pain; on the fourth, at the...

Don Sancho was young. He was arrogant. He had already crowned himself king of the three kingdoms, and believed he was invincible. As the Cid entered his tent and delivered Doña...

When the Cid returned to Burgos, men and women went forth to look at him, others were on the roofs and at the windows weeping, so great was the sorrow at the manner of his retur...

First he betook himself to the court of the Count of Barcelona, but not agreeing with him, passed into the service of the Sheikh Móstadri, the most powerful of the Moslem prince...

After the death of Alfonso el Valiente, which followed close upon that of the Cid, our Old Court Life brings us to the reign of Fernando el Santo, third of that name--1217--brot...

Oh! the beautiful south it is at Seville! Nothing can shut it out! With its glamour of all strange things in nature, story, and song; Moslem and Christian knights and lovely sul...