IX. this period so friendly, that the Arabs sometimes mar- CHAP. ried Christian wives; and we have an instance of this sort, in which, the father dying, the mother edu- INTROcated her son in Christianity, and then sent him to or THE the Arab academies to be taught Arabian literature.02 ARABIAN This was in the middle of the ninth century. At this period the Arabian caliph of Cordova ruled over all Spain, from the Mediterranean to the Ebro. The mountainous sea coast of Gallicia and ASTURIA, and part of Leon, to the Duero, was under the Christian king, Alphonso III., not unjustly, in many respects, termed the Great. The count of NAVARRE was now assuming the name of royalty in his important frontier. A little kingdom was gradually forming in ARRAGON, upon the fragments that were occasionally snatched from the Mahometans; while CATALONIA was governed by its independent counts; and BISCAY by lords who would own no master. These Christian states formed the marches of Spain towards France and the Pyrenees; but could then make only bickering hostilities with the Mussulman sovereign of all the rest of this noble peninsula.03 64 DUCTION OF Muhamad I., a contemporary of Alfred the Great, cultivated poetry himself; loved and honored the learned, and protected the arts. But it was his great grandson, Abderahman III., who reigned at the same time with our Athelstan, that raised the power and celebrity of the Arabian government in Spain to their highest degree of greatness, and peculiarly fostered SCIENCES. 62 This was Aurelius, with whom Eulogius was well acquainted; ho perished in 852. pp. 244. 246. 254. He states, that the Musselmen treated the Spanish Christians, when they appeared in public, with derision, and called them fools and madmen; that the boys daily scoffed them, and that some threw stones at them as they passed. p. 218. 63 Marle's note to Condé, 1. p. 325. M. Condé, p.357. BOOK and spread the taste and pursuit of science and lite ENGLAND. VI. rature among his subjects. Invited into Morocco, he LITERARY became also the master of Western Africa, under the HISTORYOF name of Protector, and was one of the richest sovereigns of Europe in his day." He maintained armies at the same time in Gallicia, Catalonia and Africa. He built vessels and fleets, and naval arsenals for their supply. Attached to architecture, he erected his celebrated Palace of Azhara," and the splendid mosque in its vicinity.67 He drew men of learning to his court, and excited the same taste in the rich and great who frequented it."9 68 Abderhaman died in 961; but his son, Al Hakem II., continued his improvements. He sent agents 65 M. Condé, p. 460. 66 This was three leagues below Cordova, in a beautiful valley. The arched roofs of the palace, were sustained by 4300 columns of various marbles, carefully worked. All the pavements were composed of marbles of many colors, tastefully contrasted. The walls were made and ornamented in the same manner. The ceilings were painted with gold and azure. In the large saloons, fountains of water played in basins of alabaster of variegated shapes; and in the caliph's saloon was a fountain of jasper, in which a golden swan was seen rising, which had been made at Constantinople, with a pearl of great price suspended over its head, the gift of the Grecian emperor. Beautiful gardens; an elegant pavilion, with a rivulet of quicksilver to reflect the playful sunbeams as it glided; elegant baths, and carpets and drapery of silk and gold, representing cottage scenery and animals; increased the attractions of this costly edifice. Marle's Condé, 1. p. 419-421. 67 The mosque was not so vast as that of Cordova, but inuch richer. Ib. 421. He also constructed an aqueduct at Ecija; and the splendid mosque at Segovia; a sanctuary at Tarragona; and several fountains, hospitals and public baths, in other cities. At Cordova he added a spacious court to its grand mosque, with several magnificent fountains, pouring their streams among the palm and orange trees, which formed a refreshing shade within its verdant and flowery extent. Ib. 462. 68 He invited from Diarbekir, Ismael ben Casin, who was much distinguished in the East, and made him preceptor to the Prince Al Hakem, whose palace then became much resorted to by the friends of art, Ib. 463. 69 Thus his favorite, Ahmed ben Said, opened his house to all who cultivated letters in Spain, especially to poets. The cadi, Aben Zarb, invited men of science to his society; and the vizier Iza, in the same way patronized the students of physical knowledge, as others favored those who attached themselves to medicine. These were the founders of the schools, from which in the next century Averroes arose. Ib. 463. 70 IX. DUCTION OF THE SCIENCES. into Africa, Egypt, Syria and Persia, to purchase the CHAP. best books of all kinds. He rewarded those who made donations of MSS. to his royal library. He INTROwrote himself to the authors of reputation in his time for a copy of their works, and liberally remunerated ARABIAN them, while he had copies made of the valuable volumes which the possessors would not part with." He promoted the most intellectual to posts of honor and municipal duties, and even to a seat in his state council." The royal taste for letters spread thro all classes. Most of the chief towns formed several academies, for the improvement of their inhabitants;72 and Spain, during his reign, which lasted till 976, exhibited an emulous cultivation of letters, which had not appeared in Europe since the decline of the Augustan age. Females imbibed the spirit, and added the elegances of their taste and feelings to the other riches of the Arabian literature.73 7o Marle's Condé, Hist. v. 1, p. 472, 3. Casiri remarks, that Al Hakem first established a royal library, and founded several academies. The catalogue of his library filled 44 volumes. He got men of all kinds of knowlege about him, and directed some to general historiography, some to natural history, others to the Spanish animals, and some to write the history of literature. Casiri. Bib. v. 2. p. 202. " Marle's Condé, p. 485. So he made Ahmed ben Abdelmelic, of Seville, who had written a Treatise on government, and on the policy of princes, the chief cadi of Cordova. To Ahmed ben Said, who had composed an history of Spain, he gave a handsome house at Azhara: and to the popular poet El Arramedi, a superb mansion near the Alcazar, ib. He rewarded largely Aben Perag, of Jaen, for his applauded collection of poems, called The Gardens.' ib. 488. 72 M. Condé, p. 484-491. 73 Ib. 492, 3; and see before, note 52. their daughters significant names, like our Sobeiha, the dawn. Redhiya, mild and pleasing. Nocima, gracious. Zahra, a flower. Saida, happy. Amina, faithful. Selima, peaceful. BOOK VI. HISTORYOF ENGLAND. In several of the great towns, Jews and Christians lived intermingled with the Arabs. This was pecuLITERARY liarly the case in Toledo, which so often maintained itself and the Mussulman leaders whom it upheld, against the sovereign caliph." And this intermixture of Spanish Christians, studying Arabic and Arabian learning, with the Mussulman population, established an easy channel for the transfusion of Arabian science into the European mind. By degrees, many persons from other countries were attracted, by the reputation of the Spanish Mohamedans, to visit them in order to acquire their knowlege. One of the first of these intellectual Columbuses who ventured to explore what riches they possessed, and who imparted to Europe the treasures he obtained, was Gerbert, Sylvester who became the Pope Sylvester II. The rumor of the sciences of the Saracens having reached his ear, he went into Spain to cultivate them.75 Returning to France, he established schools there, taught what he had exhibited, became preceptor to the princes of II. 74 See repeated instances of these in Marle's translation of Condé's History, vol. 1. p. 154. 205. 220. 257. 274, &c. 'The great number of Christians at Toledo were always ready to favor any insurrection against the authority of the Musselmen.' p. 280. 75 In his letters we see his Spanish connexions and Arabian acquisitions. He writes to Lupito of Barcelona for the books on astrologia, translated by him. 3 Bib. Mag. p. 700. He mentions the book on arithmetic, by Joseph the Spaniard, and the wise. p. 698. He says, on another occasion, that he had derived great advantage from the study of philosophy, and was going to the princes of Spain. p. 706. He states that he had begun a sphere, with an horizon and a representation of the heavens. p. 731. In one important letter he seems to me to allude to the Arabian numerical arithmetic: How should I strive to explain the reasons of the numbers of the abacus-The philosopher must not think that these things without letters are contrary to some art or to themselves; for what will he say esse digitos, articulos, minuta, who disdains to be auditor majorum-What, when the same number is now simple, now composite; now a digit (or unit), and now is made an articulus (or ten)?' p. 735. This exactly suits our present numerals, in which 1 is at one time an unit, and at another constitutes a ten, as all the other units, 2, 3, &c. do with the addition of a cipher, o. CHAP. DUCTION France and Germany, distinguished himself for an active and independent mind," and is said to have recalled into his native country, arithmetic, music, INTROand geometry, which had become unknown." Her- OF THE mannus Contractus, who died 1054, was another of ARABIAN these ardent minds: He learnt Arabic, translated into Latin several volumes both of Arabians and Greeks, and wrote on astronomy and the quadrature of the circle.78 SCIENCES. Constantine Afer had the courage to go farther. ConstanWith an ardor for knowlege that has no parallel but tine Afer. in Pythagoras, he visited the Saracens in Asia, and passed there thirty-nine years in studying their astronomy, their medical and mathematical knowlege. He came thence to Italy, and entered the monastery at Mount Cassino in 1086, where he translated into Latin several works of the Arabian physicians." The 76 Baronius is compelled to admit Gerbert among the popes, but he does it with visible reluctance. He says that no one had been promoted to the papal seat, who had so proscribed it by his writings. Ile gives us a specimen of what he calls the horrenda blasphemia of Gerbert. It may surprise the reader to find that this was Gerbert's assertion, that the Pope was the Antichrist-the man of sin mentioned in the Thessalonians-a remarkable opinion for the year 990. The harsh censures of Baronius were, in the same century, balanced by the zealous defence of Bzovius, a Franciscan, in his Sylvester II, Romæ, 1629. 77 Malmsbury, 1. 2. p. 65. says,' he was the first who seized the abacus from the Saracens, and gave it rules which are scarcely yet understood by the toiling abacists. His two treatises on Geometry, &c. are published by Pez, in his Thesaur. Anecdot.; and his letter on the Sphere, is in Mabillon Anecdot. His treatise de Abaco, or on Arithmetic, is yet in MS. in Ottobonia Bibliotheca. Murat. Ant. p. 981. A collection of his letters is in Mag. Bib. Pat. vol. 3.-Du Chesne, in his Hist. Franc. vol. 2. has 55 additional letters.-The pretty tale of his magical chamber, Malmsbury mentions rather seriously, p. 66. 78 Trithemius Catal. Illust. Vir. p. 132; and see Fabricius Med. Lat. p. 708. In his book on the Astrolabe, he confesses, that whatever he had of astronomy, he had wholly borrowed it from the Arabs. Murat. Ant. Ital. p. 934. His treatise de Astrolabio is in the Bodleian library, Digby, No 1775; and another, No 1652. 79 Fab. Bib. Græc. t. 13. p. 124. Trithemius de Script. p. 257.-Some MSS. of his works are in the Harl. Lib. as his Loci Comm. Med. N° 1676; his Viat. N° 3407; his Tract. Var. No 3140; also in Bib. Bodl. Laud, |