Lope de Vega. Jerusalen Conquistada, l. vi. f. 136.
That helm
Whose horns, amid the thickest of the fray
Eminent, had mark’d his presence.—[I. p. 3.]
Morales describes this horned helmet from a coin. “Tiene de la una parte su rostro, harto diferente de los que en las otras Monedas de estas Reyes parecen. Tiene manera de estar armado, y salenle por cima de la celada unas puntas como cuernos pequeños y derechos por ambos lados, que lo hacen estraño y espantable.” Florez has given this coin in his Medallas de Espana, from the only one which was known to be in existence, and which was then in the collection of the Infante D. Gabriel. It was struck at Egitania, the present Idana, and, like all the coins of the Visigoth kings, is of the rudest kind. The lines which Morales describes are sufficiently apparent, and if they are not intended for horns, it is impossible to guess what else they may have been meant to represent.
“These Gothic coins,” says P. D. Jeronymo Contador de Argote, “have a thousand barbarisms, as well in their letters as in other circumstances. They mingle Greek characters with Latin ones; and in what regards the relief or figure, nothing can be more dissimilar than the representation to the thing which it is intended to represent. I will relate what happened to me with one, however much D. Egidio de Albornos de Macedo may reprehend me for it in his Parecer Anathomico. Valerio Pinto de Sa, an honourable citizen of Braga, of whom, in various parts of these Memoirs, I have made well-deserved mention, and of whose friendship I have been proud ever since I have been in that city, gave me, some six or seven years ago, a gold coin of King Leovigildo, who was the first of the Gothic kings of Spain that coined money, for till then both Goths and Sueves used the Roman. I examined it leisurely, and what I clearly saw was a cross on the one side upon some steps, and some ill-shaped letters around it; and on the reverse something, I knew not what: It seemed to me like a tree, or a stake which shot out some branches: Round about were some letters, more distinct; I could not, however, ascertain what they signified. It happened about that time that I had the honour of a visit from the most illustrious Sr. D. Francisco de Almeida, then a most worthy Academician of the Royal Academy, and at present a most deserving and eminent Principal of the Holy Patriarchal Church. He saw this coin, and he also was puzzled by the side which represented what I called a tree. He asked me to lend it him, that he might examine it more at leisure. He took it away, and after some days returned it, saying, that he had examined it with a microscope, and that what I had taken for a stake was without question the portrait of King Leovigildo. I confess that I was not yet entirely satisfied: however, I showed it afterwards to divers persons, all of whom said they knew not what the said figure could be; but when I desired them to see if it could be this portrait, they all agreed that it was. This undeceived me, and by looking at the coin in every possible light, at last I came to see it also, and acknowledge the truth with the rest. And afterwards I found in the Dialogues of Antonio Agostinho, treating of these Gothic coins, that there are some of such rude workmanship, that where a face should be represented, some represent a pitcher, and others an urn.”—Memorias de Braga, t. iii. p. lix.
He bade the river bear the name of Joy.—[I. p. 3.]
Guadalete had been thus interpreted to Florez. (Espana Sagrada, t. 9. p 53.) Earlier writers had asserted (but without proof), that the Ancients called it Lethe, and the Moors added to these names their word for river. Lope de Vega alludes to this opinion: