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INTRODUCTION.
INTROD.
ancient monarchy.[1] Under this liberal dispensation it cannot be doubted, that many preferred remaining in the pleasant regions of their ancestors, to quitting them for a life of poverty and toil. These, however, appear to have been chiefly of the lower order;[2] and the men of higher rank, or of more generous sentiments, who refused to accept a nominal and precarious independence at the hands of their oppressors, escaped from the overwhelming inundation into the neighbouring countries of France, Italy, and Britain, or retreated behind those natural fortresses of the north, the Asturian hills and the Pyrenees, whither the victorious Saracen disdained to pursue them.[3]
- ↑ The Christians, in all matters exclusively relating to themselves, were governed by their own laws, (See the Fuero Juzgo, Introd. p. 40,) administered by their own judges, subject only in capital cases to an appeal to the Moorish tribunals. Their churches and monasteries (rosæ inter spinas, says the historian) were scattered over the principal towns, Cordova retaining seven, Toledo six, &c.; and their clergy were allowed to display the costume, and celebrate the pompous ceremonial, of the Romish communion. Florez, España Sagrada, tom. x. trat. 33, cap. 7.—Morales, Corónica General de España, (Obras, Madrid, 1791–1793,) lib. 12, cap. 78.—Conde, Dominacion de los Arabes, part. 1, cap. 15, 22.
- ↑ Morales, Corónica, lib. 12, cap. 77.—Yet the names of several nobles resident among the Moors appear in the record of those times. (See Salazar de Mendoza, Monarquía de España, (Madrid, 1770,) tom. i. p. 34, note.) If we could rely on a singular fact, quoted by Zurita, we might infer that a large proportion of the Goths were content to reside among their Saracen conquerors. The intermarriages among the two nations had been so frequent, that, in 1311, the ambassador of James II., of Aragon, stated to his Holiness, Pope Clement V., that of 200,000 persons composing the population of Granada, not more than 500 were of pure Moorish descent! (Anales de la Corona de Aragon, (Zaragoza, 1610,) lib. 5, cap. 93.) As the object of the statement was to obtain certain ecclesiastical aids from the pontiff, in the prosecution of the Moorish war, it appears very suspicious, notwithstanding the emphasis laid on it by the historian.
- ↑ Bleda, Corónica de los Moros de España, (Valencia, 1618,) p. 171.—This author states, that in his time there were several families in Ireland, whose patronymics bore testimony to their descent from these Spanish exiles. That care-
