[57] At least in Syria and Irak.
[58] One of the most remarkable men of the period; he was said to unite the fierceness of the lion with the subtlety of the fox; his eventful life would furnish ample material for ten historic romances.
[59] It would appear, from Leo Africanus, that a considerable body of Goths formed part of the army of relief.
[60] Handalusia signifies, in Arabic, the country of the West; and the Arabs applied the name not only to the modern province of Andalusia, but to the whole peninsula of Spain. The attempted derivation of the name of Andalusia from the Vandals (Vandalusia) is most improbable. Lembke travels still farther out of the way of all rational probability, by assigning the etymological paternity of the name to Andalos, whom the Arabians number among Noah’s grandchildren.
[61] 649-672.
[62] This would certainly seem to have been the true cause of Julian’s defection; the story of the seduction or violation of his daughter Florinda (surnamed la Cava, i.e., the wicked), lacks all true historic foundation. Mariana, the Jesuit historian, to whom we are chiefly indebted for this pretty tale, was too apt to draw on his lively imagination, where historical evidence failed him.
[63] The place on which the Arabs landed is marked to the present day by the name of their chief Tarif (Tarifa); on the coast they bestowed the name of the Green Island (Algesiras or Algezire).
[64] Musa had fought in Syria; he had assisted Moawiyah in the reduction of Cyprus (648), and had held the government of that island; he had subsequently been governor of Irak, and after this, governor of Egypt; Sardinia, Majorca, and Minorca, also had felt his presence.
[65] Though some historians lead Musa (in 712) into the Narbonnese Gaul, there are strong reasons to reject this as an erroneous supposition; it is more than doubtful whether the old chief ever passed the Pyrenees.
[66] The statement made by some historians, that Ætius presented this table as a gift to Torismund, after the victory of Chalons (451), seems to rest on a very slender foundation; and so, I am inclined to think, do the 365 feet of gems and massive gold so liberally bestowed upon the table by Oriental writers. Another tradition substitutes, as the gift of the Roman patrician, the famous Missorium, or great golden dish for the service of the communion table, which is stated to have weighed 500 pounds, and to have been adorned with a profusion of gems.