In Toledo the church of Santo Tomé has a brick tower of Moorish character; near it is the Moorish bridge of San Martin, and in the neighbourhood, by a stream leading to the Tagus, Moorish mills and the ruins of a villa with Moorish arches, now a farm hovel, may still be seen. The ceiling of the chapel of the church of San Juan de la Penetencia is in the Moorish style, much dilapidated (1511 a.d.). The Toledan Moors were first-rate hydraulists. One of their kings had a lake in his palace, and in the middle a kiosk, whence water descended on each side, thus enclosing him in the coolest of summer-houses. It was in Toledo that Ez-Zarkal made water-clocks for astronomical calculations, but now this city obtains its water only by the primitive machinery of donkeys, which are driven up and down by water-carriers as in Barbary itself. The citadel was once the kasbah of the Moors.
The Cathedral of Toledo is one of the most remarkable in Spain. The arches of the transept are semi-Moorish, Xamete, who wrought it in Arcos stone in 1546-50, having been a Moor. The very ancient manufactory of arms for which Toledo has a world-wide fame dates from the time[page 375] of the Goths; into this the Moors introduced their Damascene system of ornamenting and tempering, and as early as 852 this identical "fabrica" was at work under Abd er-Rahman ibn El Hákim. The Moors treasured and named their swords like children. These were the weapons which Othello, the Moor, "kept in his chamber."
At Alcazar de San Juan, in La Mancha, I found a few remnants of the Moorish town, as in the church tower, but the name is now almost the only Moorish thing about it. Hence we pass to Alarcon, a truly Moorish city, built like a miniature Toledo, on a craggy peninsula hemmed in by the river Jucar. The land approach is still guarded by Moorish towers and citadel.
In Zocodovar—which takes its name from the word sôk, "market-place"—we find a very Moorish "plaza," with its irregular windows and balconies, and in San Eugenio are some remains of an old mosque with Kufic inscriptions, as well as an arch and tomb of elaborate design. In the Calle de las Tornarías there used to be a dilapidated Moorish house with one still handsome room, but it is doubtful whether this now survives the wreck of time. It was called El Taller del Moro, because Ambron, the Moorish governor of Huesca, is said to have invited four hundred of the refractory chiefs of Toledo to dine here, and to have cut off the head of each as he arrived. There is a curious mosque in the Calle del Cristo de la Luz, the roof is supported by four low square pillars, each having a different capital, from which spring double arches like those at Córdova. The ceiling is divided into nine compartments with domes.
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Madrid has passed through such various fortunes, and has been so much re-built, that it now contains few traces of the Moors. The only relic which I saw in 1890 was a large piece of tabia, forming a substantial wall near to the new cathedral, which might have belonged to the city wall or only to a fortress. The Museum of the Capital contains a good collection of Moorish coins. In the Armoury are Moorish guns, swords, saddles, and leather shields, the last named made of two hides cemented with a mortar composed of herbs and camel-hair.
In Old Castile the footprints grow rare and faint, although the name of Valladolid—Blád Walîd, "Town of Walîd," a Moorish ameer—sufficiently proclaims its origin, but I am not aware of any Moorish remains there. In Burgos one old gate near the triumphal arch, erected by Philip II., still retains its Moorish opening, and on the opposite hill stands the castle in which was celebrated the bridal of our Edward I. with Eleanor of Castile. It was then a true Moorish kasar, but part has since been destroyed by fire. On the road from Burgos to Vittoria we pass between the mountains of Oca and the Pyrenean spurs, in which narrow defile the old Spaniards defied the advancing Moors. Moorish caverns or cisterns are still to be seen.