The history of the city as an independent State is soon told. Under Ismail and his son Al Mamûn, Toledo became the most powerful Musulman State in Spain. The lesser principalities having been disposed of, a fierce struggle for supremacy was waged between Al Mamûn and the Amir of Seville. A desperate battle before the walls of Murcia decided the issue in favour of the Toledan, and gave Valencia into his hands. But, as is often the case with men of all ranks, Al Mamûn’s strength and wisdom were undone and rendered unavailing by his fatal trait of magnanimity.
Alfonso of Leon, dispossessed of his kingdom by his brother, threw himself upon the protection of the Amir of Tolaitola. The noble Muslim bestowed upon the fugitive prince a palace near his own, an oratory, and a garden “wherein to recreate himself”; and allowed him to establish a miniature Court for himself and his followers at Brihuega. Lands were assigned to him as a source of revenue, and he became the most intimate and honoured friend of the Amir. It is said that in return an oath was exacted of Alfonso that he would assist his host against all men, and never war upon him or his son. That some such pledge should have been asked for in return for such magnificent hospitality seems very probable. The Archbishop Don Rodrigo relates that one day Al Mamûn found himself with his most trusty counsellors in a wood from which a full view of the city could be obtained. The Moorish sovereign fell to discoursing upon the defences of the place and the best means of attacking it. These words were overheard by Alfonso, who chanced to be by, and who at once feigned sleep beneath a tree. Here he was presently discovered by the Moors, to their great dismay. Some among them asked leave of Al Mamûn to slay him. On this permission being indignantly refused, they dropped hot lead on the Leonese prince’s hand to see if he were really asleep. Alfonso did not stir, which would have convinced most people that he was feigning sleep. The Muslims, on the contrary, retired, satisfied that he had heard nothing and seen nothing.
Before returning to his kingdom, the Christian prince renewed his vows of loyalty and friendship to Al Mamûn, with whom personally, indeed, he never broke faith. The Moor’s son, Yahya, reaped the reward of the father’s generosity. A weak and incapable sovereign, addicted to luxury and despised for his devotion to superstitious practices, he was detested by his own subjects, who on one occasion drove him out of the city, to take refuge at Cuenca. His authority was restored only with the help of his natural foes, the Castilians. Alfonso, unmindful of his vow, forgetful of the dead Al Mamûn’s princely generosity, could not resist this opportunity of adding to his dominions the old capital of the Kings of Spain. For six years he laid waste the frontiers of the Amirate, and in the seventh year—carefully availing himself, no doubt, of the information unwittingly communicated by his old benefactor—invested Toledo itself. Famine accomplished what arms could not, Yahya asked for terms. They were onerous enough. They involved the cession of all the Moorish King’s dominions, except Valencia, the Muslims who elected to remain in Toledo being guaranteed the free exercise of their religion, their property, and liberty. They were to be subject to their own laws and tribunals and to retain their mosques. The terms, as remarks Quadrado, were, in fact, almost the same as those granted to the Christians by the Arabs three hundred and seventy years before. Only the Alcazar, the bridges, gates, and the garden called the Huerta del Rey, were reserved to Alfonso himself. The capitulation completed, Yahya and his court took the road to Valencia, and Alfonso VI. entered Toledo by the Bib-el-Mardom on Sunday, May 25, 1085.
“May God renew her past splendour, and inscribe once more the name of Toledo on the list of the cities of Islâm!” This was the devout aspiration of a Muslim chronicler, but in neither particular has it ever been fulfilled.
TOLEDO THE CAPITAL OF CASTILE
The incorporation of the haughty city of the Visigoths with the kingdom of Castile was, when the first wave of enthusiasm had subsided, regarded with coldness and misgiving by its people. The Toledans were as tenacious as ever of their peculiar customs and privileges which they had hoped to maintain intact. Even with the powerful assistance of the Cid, whom he appointed Alcalde, Alfonso found the ordering of the affairs of his new capital a difficult and dangerous task. The population included (remarks Don Jose Quadrado) “the conquered and resigned Musulman, the Israelite ever submissive and industrious, the Mozarabe ennobled by his ancient lineage and constancy in his faith, the Castilian, proud of his conquests, the foreigner rewarded for his prowess, or attracted from remote countries by signal privileges; and this multiplicity of races and diversity of creeds demanded as many separate systems of law and administrations.” The Jews, Musulmans and foreigners continued subject to their own codes and tribunals; but while the Mozarabe or native of Toledo clung to the old Fuero Juzgo or Visigothic law, inherited from his fathers, the Castilians and Leonese expected to be ruled according to the ruder, rougher code of their warrior counts and kings. Alfonso dealt with these two peoples of common race and language as with the other more widely distinct races. Each had an Alcalde of its own, subject, however, to the Alcalde Mayor named by the king. A compromise, too, was arrived at, the Castilians being subject to their own law in civil cases, and to the Mozarabe in criminal matters. On the whole, the tendency of these measures was to conciliate the Toledans. But we find evidence of jealousies between them and their conquerors or deliverers from the North for many years afterwards.
Alfonso’s honour had not gone unstained in regard to his taking the city of his old friend and benefactor, and the Moors must have been sanguine indeed if they looked forward to a scrupulous fulfilment of the pledges given them by the conqueror while he was outside the walls. The clause that entitled the Muslims to the free and exclusive use of their mosques was particularly obnoxious to the rabid ecclesiastics and crusaders who accompanied the king. With increasing irritation they compared the noble proportions of the Mohammedan mezquita with those of the humble provisional Catholic Cathedral of Santa Maria de Alficem. While Alfonso was absent in Leon, he left the city in charge of his queen, Constancia, a Frenchwoman, and of her countryman, Bernard, now bishop, and formerly a monk of Cluny. This prelate took advantage of his sovereign’s absence to burst one night into the coveted mosque with an armed party, and having “purified” it, suspended bells in the minarets, which announced at dawn the celebration of the Christian rite. When word was brought to the King of this infamous violation of the treaty, he set out for Toledo, announcing his intention of burning the bishop alive. Moved either by that magnanimity which in the person of Al Mamûn had contributed to their downfall, or, as Spanish writers say, by a far-seeing prudence, the Moors went out in a body to meet the monarch, and besought him to forgive the highly placed thieves. Alfonso, with a show of reluctance, acquiesced in their prayer, and the Christians were most undeservedly confirmed in the possession of a church they had no hand in creating. The Alfaqui, or headman of the Muslims, was munificently rewarded for his generosity, his statue being placed in the Capilla Mayor of the new cathedral, which was solemnly consecrated in 1087. No nation has shown a very nice sense of honesty in respect of church property, yet it needs no subtle intelligence to perceive that a church is as much the property of the particular sect for whose special use it was designed by members of that sect, as any private house is of its private owner.
The sturdy Toledans were attached, not only to their laws and customs, but (which was of more importance in those days) to their own Gothic or Mozarabic ritual. This differs in what are considered important particulars from the Roman. The host is divided into nine parts, representing the Incarnation, Epiphany, Circumcision, Passion, Death, Resurrection, Ascension, and Eternal Kingdom of Christ. Of these fragments, seven are arranged to form a cross. Because it is not Roman, English writers are fond of extolling the beauty and simplicity of this liturgy. It was a stumbling-block to Queen Constance and the zealous French bishop, who were anxious to reduce all things in Spain to Catholic uniformity. The King ordered the question to be decided by ordeal of single combat. The Mozarabic champion remained the victor. The bishop then demanded the ordeal of fire. The two missals were accordingly thrown into a great blazing pile, and the local favourite, having probably been saturated with some incombustible preparation, remained unconsumed. Another version has it that neither book was injured by the flames. Alfonso, after his fashion, clinched the controversy by ordering the Mozarabic ritual to be confined to the two parish churches allotted to the Christians by their Moorish rulers, whilst everywhere else Mass was to be celebrated according to the Roman office.
Alfonso VI. had to fight hard to keep possession of Toledo. The Almoravide invasion had burst like a tidal wave over Southern Spain. Everywhere the Musulmans were recovering their spirits and their strength. The Castilian king fled, wounded, from the bloody field of Zalaca, with only five hundred followers, leaving behind him twenty thousand slain. Toledo could have had no pleasant associations for its latest conqueror. Here died three of his six wives—Constancia of Burgundy, Isabel of France, and Zayda of Seville. At Ucles was slain his only son, while yet a mere child. “Where is your prince?” asked the unhappy father of the warriors escaped from the rout. “Where is the light of my eyes and the staff of my age?” All were silent. “He is dead and you live!” bitterly exclaimed the king. “Yes,” replied Alvar Fañez sternly, “we live to save the throne, the country, and the lands acquired with our blood and sweat.” But the Alcazar re-echoed to the mournful plaint, “Sancho! Sancho, my son!” till Alfonso VI. passed away in July 1109. The stones of which the church altars were built had miraculously distilled tears in token of his approaching death. Before a year had passed the Vega was blackened by the advancing hordes of Islam. The Castle of Azeca, the monastery of San Servando, fell into their hands; but the City of the Goths, thanks to the leadership of Archbishop Bernard and of Alvar Fañez, hurled back the hosts of Ali and was held fast for Spain.
The accession of Alfonso VII. el Batallador brought brighter days to his capital, but it was assailed during the twelfth century with a succession of calamities that might have broken down the patience of Job. The year 1113 was marked by an earthquake and disastrous overflowing of the Tagus; 1116, by a fire on a large scale; in 1117, the price of wheat rose, to fourteen soldos the bushel; in 1168, the Tagus was again in flood; again in 1181 and 1200; between 1187 and 1200, all the grocery stores were burnt (how or why, we are not told), the Tagus was frozen over in 1191, and there was a famine the following year. Eclipses of the sun were of the commonest occurrence: we hear of them in 1114, 1162, 1177, 1191, and 1207. We can easily imagine the Mohammedan denizens shaking their heads and ascribing these phenomena, especially the last, to the change of government, and extolling the good old times of Al Mamûn when earth, river, and sun kept their places and behaved according to rule.