Excursions in the mountains of Ronda and Granada, with characteristic sketches of the inhabitants of southern Spain, vol. 1/2

by C. Rochfort‏ Scott

On a nearer approach, however, Granada has an imposing appearance. Its elevated citadels, hanging gardens, and wooded hills, form a fine background to the shining city; and the splendid Sierra Nevada, which is now again seen on the right, makes the picture almost perfect.

The descent is very gradual towards Gavia el Grande, which stands on the edge of the plain—the road from thence to Granada being on a perfect level. The luxuriance of the vegetation exceeds any thing I ever beheld. The wheat, though not yet ready for the sickle, was upwards of seven feet high, and the crops of flax, clover, &c. were gigantic in proportion.

The whole plain, as we rode along, appeared to be one vast cultivated field; and the want of water we had complained of, in looking down upon the vega, was readily accounted for on observing the innumerable irrigating channels into which the Genil and its various affluents are directed, and in the distribution of which, the most rigid frugality is perceptible. The plain is all watered “by the foot,” as practised in the East.

The city of Granada is situated at the eastern extremity of the celebrated vega, where the golden Darro and the crystal Genil—long pent in amongst the tortuous ravines of the Sierra Nevada—first pour their fertilizing streams of melted snow upon the verdant plain.

The greater part of the city stands within the fork of the two rivers, sheltered to the southward and eastward by the Cerro de Santa Elena—a rugged hill, crowned by the lofty towers of the Alhambra—and connected by several bridges with the other portion of the city, which extends along the right bank of the Darro. This quarter, or Barrio, still retains its ancient Moorish appellation, Albaycin, and is screened to the north by a steep ridge, once crowned by another formidable castle, but of which the ruined foundations alone remain to attest its strength and magnitude.

Granada, whilst thus sheltered on three sides from the piercing blasts that in winter sweep over the snowy summits of the Sierra Nevada, is yet sufficiently elevated to command an extensive view over the fertile vega, stretching far away to the west, and to receive the refreshing breezes wafted from its perfumed orange groves. The climate, consequently, is at all seasons delightful, and the shade of its ever-verdant groves, and freshness of its inexhaustible springs, might well be regretted by the sensual Moslems, driven from it to seek a shelter on the parched shores of Africa.

The coins, monuments, inscriptions, and statues which have been discovered here, leave no doubt that the Roman city of Illiberris stood upon or near the site of the present city; though some antiquaries have imagined they discovered in the name of the Sierra Elvira that of the ancient city.

The word Elvira, however, is merely a corruption of the Arabic words Al Beyrah—the unprofitable—which is quite the character of the droughty arid mountain in question; and as not a vestige of a town is to be met with in its vicinity, it may fairly be concluded that so unlikely a site was never selected for one.

Pliny calls the city “Iliberi, which is also Liberini;” the latter name being apparently formed from that which it bore previously to the arrival of the Romans in the country, namely, Liberia, a city founded, according to the Spanish chronologists, 2000 years before the Christian era. By the Goths the name was changed to Eliberi, as proved by numerous coins of that people, yet extant. The last of these bears the date A.D., 636, from which it may be inferred that the place had fallen to decay prior to the irruption of the Saracens; particularly as little notice is taken of it in the early annals of the Moors of Spain, under its new name of Granada.

Florez conjectures—and I think not unreasonably—that the name Granada may be derived from the Arabic words Garb, west; and nata, the name of a mountain overlooking the city of Damascus, from whence came the band of Arabs that conquered Eliberi. Thus, we may suppose, that on first discovering it from the Sierra of Alhama, they designated it, from a resemblance to the bright city and its splendid vale in their native land, the western Nata.