Avela of the Romans was a garrison town, the walls of which were partly thrown down by the Western Goths upon their arrival in the peninsula. Previously, San Segundo, one of the disciples of the Apostles who had visited Bética (Andalusia), preached the True Word in Avila, and was created its first bishop—in the first century. During the terrible persecution of the Christians under the reign of Trajanus, one San Vicente and his two sisters, Sabina and Cristeta, escaped from Portugal and came to Avila, hoping to be hospitably received. All in vain;[{304}] their heads were smashed between stones, and their bodies left to rot in the streets. An immense serpent emerged from the city walls and kept guard over the three saintly corpses. The first to approach was a Jew, drawn hither by curiosity; he was immediately enveloped by the reptile's body. On the point of being strangled, he pronounced the word, "Jesus"—and the serpent released him. So grateful was the Jew at being delivered from death that he turned Christian and erected a church in honour of San Vicente, Sabina, and Cristeta, and had them buried within its walls.
This church subsisted throughout the dark ages of the Moorish invasion until at last Fernando I. removed the saintly remains to Leon in the eleventh century. The church was then destroyed, and, it is believed, the present cathedral was built on the same spot.
The Moors, calling the city Abila, used it as one of the fortresses defending Toledo on the north against the continual Christian raids; with varying success they held it until the end of the eleventh century, when it finally fell into the hands of the Christians, and was repopulated a short time before[{305}] Salamanca toward the end of the same century.
During the centuries of Moorish dominion the see had fallen into the completest oblivion, no mention being made of any bishops of Avila; the ecclesiastical dignity was reëstablished immediately after the final conquest of the region to the north of the Sierra of Guaderrama, and though documents are lacking as to who was the first prelate de modernis, it is generally believed to have been one Jeronimo, toward the end of the eleventh century.
The city grew rapidly in strength; settlers came from the north—from Castile and Leon—and from the east, from Aragon; they travelled to their new home in bullock-carts containing household furniture, agricultural and war implements, wives, and children.
In the subsequent history of Spain Avila played an important part, and many a stirring event took place within its walls. It was besieged by the Aragonese Alfonso el Batallador, whose army advanced to the attack behind its prisoners, sons of Avila. Brothers, fathers, and relatives were thus obliged to fire upon their own kin if they[{306}] wished to save their city. The same king, it is said, killed his hostages by having their heads cut off and boiled in oil, as though severed heads were capable of feeling the delightful sensation of seething oil!
Of all the traditions as numerous here as elsewhere, the prettiest and most improbable is doubtless that of Nalvillos, a typical chevalier of romance, who fell desperately in love with a beautiful Moorish princess and wedded her. She pined, however, for a lover whom in her youth she had promised to wed, and though her husband erected palaces and bought slaves for her, she escaped with her sweetheart. Nalvillos followed the couple to where they lay retired in a castle, and it was surrounded by him and his trusty followers. The hero himself, disguised as a seller of curative herbs, entered the apartment where his wife was waiting for her lover's return, and made himself known. The former's return, however, cut matters short, and Nalvillos was obliged to hide himself. The Moorish girl was true to her love, and told her sweetheart where the Christian was hiding; brought out of his retreat, he was on the point of being killed when he asked permission to blow a last blast on his bugle[{307}]—a wish that was readily conceded by the magnanimous lover. The result? The princess and her sweetheart were burnt to death by the flames ignited by Nalvillos's soldiers. The Christian warrior was, of course, able to escape.
In 1455 the effigy of Henry IV. was dethroned in Avila by the prelates of Toledo and other cities, and by an assembly of noblemen who felt that feudalism was dying out, and were anxious to strike a last blow at the weak king whom they considered was their enemy.
The effigy was placed on a throne; the Archbishop of Toledo harangued the multitude which, silent and scowling, was kept away from the throne by a goodly number of obedient mercenary soldiers. Then the prelate tore off the mock crown, another of the conspirators the sceptre, another the royal garments, and so on, each accompanying his act by an ignominious curse. At last the effigy was torn from the throne and trampled under the feet of the soldiers. Alfonso, a boy of eleven, stepped on the dais and was proclaimed king. His hand was kissed by the humble (!) prelates and noblemen, who swore allegiance, an oath they had not the[{308}] slightest intention of keeping, and did not keep, either.
Philip III.'s decree expelling Moors from Spain, was, as in the case of Plasencia, the coup de grace given to the city's importance; half the population was obliged to leave, and Avila never recovered her lost importance and influence. To-day, with only about ten thousand inhabitants, thrown in the background by Madrid, it manages to keep alive and nothing more.