SEVILLE
ALCAZAR—DORMITORY OF THE KINGS.
to put modern windows in the hall over the principal façade, called the Hall of the Princes, near the Court of the Dolls; and also to spoil the ceiling of the Hall of Ambassadors with heavy beams and supports, quite ruining the beauty of this enamelled half-orange. One is curious to know who it was who first tried to repair in a measure the harm done by these so-called “restorations.” In 1833 a rational restoration of the Court of the Dolls, and of the hall near it to the north, was begun with laudible zeal by the Don Joaquin Cortes, professor of painting, and the intelligent overseer, Antonio Raso, and the official, Manuel Cortes. The real work of restoration commenced about the year 1842, thanks to the praiseworthy efforts of Don Domingo de Alcega, administrator of the royal patrimony, and to those who helped him in his difficult task, the distinguished artist, Don Joaquin Dominguez Becquer, and the master artificer, José Gutierrez y Lopez. Señor Becquer designed the Arab cornice which to-day decorates the outer part of the edifice defining the dome of the Hall of Ambassadors, which had been half destroyed in 1805, and he never ceased to devote his genius to the restoration, now in part and again general, of the most precious monument of Moorish art of the fourteenth century. During the years 1852 and 1853 the alcalde of the royal palaces completed the work of replacing some of the stucco ornaments in various apartments. Afterwards the vice-alcalde, Don Alonso Nuñez de Prado, assisted by Señor Becquer, brought a complete restoration to a successful end, which, though it may not be faultless in the eyes of a modern critic, is still worthy of praise, considering the period in which it was undertaken. In 1855 the administrator of the alcazar invited the Queen, Doña Isabella II., to interest herself in the works, with the result that he was able to cover the Court of the Dolls with glass, and to re-build the thirty-six arches of the Court of the Damsels.
There is no inscription in the alcazar which offers a real historical or literary interest to the archæologist. One does not find here the fragments of poems on the walls which in the Alhambra rest the eye and speak to the intelligence in praising the heroic deeds of warriors and the beauties of the sumptuous habitations. In the alcazar one reads the Koran with its repeated salutations and some praises of Don Pedro, in which the praises of the Mohammedan sultans have been suppressed, also the word, Islamism; but we must draw attention to the fact that the greater number of the inscriptions are the same as those employed in the alcazar of Granada, repeated a thousand times, and it would be tedious and tiresome to accompany the artistic description with the same verse, repeated a hundred times, which is to be found in the different apartments, and interrupted a hundred times also by others put in at the time of the restorations. As the persons who were charged with the work of restoring the inscriptions did not know the ancient language, they very often placed the inscriptions upside down.
On the façade, and over the principal entrance of the alcazar, around the twin windows, one reads the well-known verses: “Glory to our Lord the Sultan;” “Eternal Glory for Allah, the perpetual empire for Allah;” “Lasting happiness;” “Benediction;” “The kingdom of God, the power of God, glory to God;” “Happiness and peace, and the glory and generosity of perpetual felicity;” “In prosperous fortune this palace is the only one.” The inscription, “There is no conqueror but God,” placed above and below the wide frieze of painted porcelain, in cufic characters, in our opinion, must be the work of an artist from Granada.
SEVILLE