[428] See some striking remarks on the adventures of Mohammed, in Prof. Smyth’s genial Lectures on Modern History, Vol. I. pp. 66, 67, 8vo, London, 1840.
[429] They were so called from their African abode, Mauritania, where they naturally inherited the name of the ancient Mauri.
[430] See Huet, “Origine des Romans,” (ed. 1693, p. 24,) but especially Warton, in his first Dissertation, for the Oriental and Arabic origin of romantic fiction. The notes to the octavo edition, by Price, add much to the value of the discussions on these questions. Warton’s Eng. Poetry, 1824, 8vo, Vol. I.; Massieu (Hist. de la Poésie Françoise, 1739, p. 82) and Quadrio (Storia d’ Ogni Poesia, 1749, Tom. IV. pp. 299, 300) follow Huet, but do it with little skill.
[431] The opinion of Father Andres is boldly stated by him in the following words: “Quest’ uso degli Spagnuoli di verseggiare nella lingua, nella misura, e nella rima degli Arabi, può dirsi con fondamento la prima origine della moderna poesia.” (Storia d’ Ogni Lett., Lib. I. c. 11, § 161; also pp. 163-272, ed. 1808, 4to.) The same theory will be found yet more strongly expressed by Ginguené (Hist. Litt. d’Italie, 1811, Tom. I. pp. 187-285); by Sismondi (Litt. du Midi, 1813, Tom. I. pp. 38-116; and Hist. des Français, 8vo, Tom. IV., 1824, pp. 482-494); and in the Hist. Litt. de la France (4to, 1814, Tom. XIII. pp. 42, 43). But these last authors have added little to the authority of Andres’s opinion, the very last being, I think, Ginguené.
[432] Andres, Storia, Tom. I. p. 273. Ginguené, Tom. I. pp. 248-250, who says: “C’est à cette époque (1085) que remontent peut-être les premiers essais poétiques de l’Espagne, et que remontent sûrement les premiers chants de nos Troubadours.”
[433] Fragment d’un Poème en Vers Romans sur Boèce, publié par M. Raynouard, etc., Paris, 8vo, 1817. Also in his Poésies des Troubadours, Tom. II. Consult, further, Grammaire de la Langue Romane, in the same work, Tom. I.
[434] I refer to “Observations sur la Langue et la Littérature Provençales, par A. W. Schlegel,” Paris, 1818, 8vo, not published. See, especially, pp. 73, etc., in which he shows how completely anti-Arabic are the whole tone and spirit of the early Provençal, and still more those of the early Spanish poetry. And see, also, Diez, Poesie der Troubadours, 8vo, 1826, pp. 19, etc.; an excellent book.
[435] Conde, Historia de la Dominacion de los Arabes en España, Madrid, 1820-21, 4to, Tom. I. and II., but especially Tom. I. pp. 158-226, 425-489, 524-547.
[436] Sylvester II. (Gerbert) was Pope from 999 to 1003, and was the first head France gave to the Church. I am aware that the Benedictines (Hist. Litt. de la France, Tom. VI. p. 560) intimate that he did not pass, in Spain, beyond Córdova, and I am aware, too, that Andres (Tom. I. pp. 175-178) is unwilling to allow him to have studied at any schools in Seville and Córdova except Christian schools. But there is no pretence that the Christians had important schools in Andalusia at that time, though the Arabs certainly had; and the authorities on which Andres relies assume that Gerbert studied with the Moors, and prove more, therefore, than he wishes to be proved. Like many other men skilled in the sciences during the Middle Ages, Gerbert was considered a necromancer. A good account of his works is in the Hist. Litt. de la France, Tom. VI. pp. 559-614.
[437] The condition of the Christians under the Moorish governments of Spain may be learned, sufficiently for our purpose, from many passages in Conde, e. g. Tom. I. pp. 39, 82, etc. But after all, perhaps, the reluctant admissions of Florez, Risco, etc., in the course of the forty-five volumes of the “España Sagrada,” are quite as good a proof of the tolerance exercised by the Moors, as the more direct statements taken from the Arabian writers. See, for Toledo, Florez, Tom. V. pp. 323-329; for Complutum or Alcalá de Henares, Tom. VII. p. 187; for Seville, Tom. IX. p. 234; for Córdova and its martyrs, Tom. X. pp. 245-471; for Saragossa, Risco, Tom. XXX. p. 203, and Tom. XXXI. pp. 112-117; for Leon, Tom. XXXIV. p. 132; and so on. Indeed, there is something in the accounts of a great majority of the churches, whose history these learned men have given in so cumbrous a manner, that shows the Moors to have practised a toleration which, mutatis mutandis, they would have been grateful to have found among the Christians in the time of Philip III.