A new and implacable adversary, and one whose position placed her beyond the reach of the minister’s vengeance, now arose to defy his power. The Sultana Aurora—who united to her amorous susceptibilities all the obstinacy and vindictiveness of the Basques, to which race she belonged—had for many years entertained the closest relations with the favorite whose fortunes she had founded, and whose success she had so zealously promoted. Their intimacy, even during the lifetime of Al-Hakem, had been the scandal of the capital. But the lady, like many of her sex, was inconstant, and other lovers, including the kadi Ibn-al-Salim, also stood high in her favor. As soon as Al-Mansur no longer required her services to advance his interests, he had the imprudence to neglect his haughty mistress. Deeply piqued, she began to meditate revenge. Her social rank, the inviolability of her person, and her residence in the palace gave her advantages which she was not slow to improve. With all the fiery energy of her nature she represented to the Khalif the degradation of the position he had been compelled to assume, and urged him to assert his rights as a sovereign. Hischem, who had hitherto evinced no dissatisfaction with his condition, was roused from his lethargy. Under his mother’s dictation, he made a formal demand on the minister for the prerogatives which the latter had usurped. The viceroy of Africa, Ziri-Ibn-Atia, instigated by the agents of the Sultana, rose in rebellion, and proclaimed himself the supporter of the laws of the empire and the champion of its injured monarch. The ingenuity of Aurora provided her partisans with an abundant supply of money. The vaults of the palace of Medina-al-Zahrâ, where was the national treasury, contained six million pieces of gold. They were deposited in earthenware jars, sealed with wax and impressed with the royal signet. The astute princess removed a hundred of the jars, whose contents amounted to the sum of eighty thousand dinars, broke the seals, covered the gold with honey, drugs, and syrups, and, having attached to each an appropriate label, caused them to be conveyed by her slaves to a palace in the city, whence they were, without delay, transported to Africa. The rage of Al-Mansur on finding himself thus outwitted by a woman was extreme, but it availed him nothing. He could not venture to offer violence or even reproaches to the mother of his sovereign whose servant he was in name. The trend of recent events suggested that Hischem might have consented that the money be employed for the recovery of his imperial dignity. Desirous of obtaining the sanction of law in a matter of such vital importance, Al-Mansur called the great officers of state together. To them he represented that the women of the harem were plundering the treasury, and requested permission to remove the gold from the palace. This was readily granted; but when the officers exhibited their warrant, they were refused admission to the vaults, on the plea that the Khalif had not authorized the removal of the treasure. Foiled once more, the minister—whose genius, fertile in expedients and undaunted by reverses, never once despaired of success—devised a plan whose audacity would have appalled a less determined mortal. Perfectly familiar with all the approaches to the palace, he penetrated by a secret passage to the apartments of the Khalif. His unexpected appearance and menacing aspect terrified the imbecile prince, who protested that he had no desire to thwart the designs of the minister, and, without hesitation, signed an order for the removal of the gold. The politic Al-Mansur, at the same time, extorted from him an edict by which he unreservedly renounced, in favor of the hajib, all practical control of the government of the empire. This explicit and indisputable confirmation of the authority of the latter at once legalized every act which he had already committed in a public capacity. In a measure, it invested his person with the sanctity that appertained to his master, and rendered all liable to the penalty of treason whose intemperate language or whose violence should be directed against the authorized representative of absolute sovereignty.
An enterprise of surpassing difficulty and danger, and one which the bravest of the Ommeyade khalifs had never ventured to undertake, was now planned by the greatest statesman and warrior of his age. The shrine of St. James of Compostella was one of the most renowned for wealth and sanctity in Christendom. In the marvels which had attended its foundation, in the fame of its miracles, in the number and potency of its sacred relics, in the touching interest attaching to its legends, it scarcely yielded to the sacred traditions of the Eternal City. A countless multitude of pilgrims from every country where the name of the Saviour was revered had for generations deposited their oblations upon its altars. The modest chapel which had marked the site of the apostle’s grave soon after its discovery during the reign of the pious Alfonso had been replaced by a stately cathedral of marble, decorated with all the rude magnificence of which the decadent art of the age was capable. A numerous priesthood, the splendor of whose appointments and the luxury of whose lives indicated a dispensation with the vow of poverty, ministered to the wants of the pilgrims, and acknowledged, with affected gratitude and humility, the bestowal of their donations and the performance of their vows.
The reverence entertained by the Spanish Christians for the sepulchre of St. James far exceeded that with which the most fanatic Mussulman regarded the Prophet’s tomb at Medina. Already, industriously propagated by monkish imposture and popular credulity, wondrous tales were whispered of the appearance of the apostle on a milk-white steed at the head of the Christian squadrons, an infallible harbinger of victory, and a delusion of ominous import to the Saracen intruders in the Peninsula. History affords no parallel to the momentous effects produced by the adoption of this frivolous legend. The circumstances of its origin, which contemptuously violated every probability of time or place; its universal acceptance by individuals of every rank in life; its subsequent extension to the distant lands of an unknown world; the blind and unquestioning faith with which the impossible miracles of its subject were received, offer an eloquent commentary on the boundless influence of the Catholic hierarchy and the debased superstition of the age.
The destruction of the church of Santiago was now the aim of Al-Mansur. The depressing influence of such a signal triumph over the adversaries of Islam, it was thought with much reason, would be incalculable. The immunity enjoyed by the Christian sanctuary of Spain was attributed by its votaries to the protection afforded by the body of the saint, far more than to the natural difficulties which an enemy must surmount to reach his shrine. Even could an invasion occur and the desecration of the cathedral be threatened, it was firmly believed that the miraculous intervention of Heaven—more marked even than that which deterred the Romans from rebuilding the temple of Jerusalem—would avert such a calamity from one of the holiest places of the Christian world. The removal of these impressions, by demonstrating the incapacity of St. James to defend his own relics, must certainly weaken the faith of the multitude in his ability to protect the lives of others. The prestige derived from the interposition of supernatural influence would be seriously impaired. The menacing spectre of the patron of Spain would no longer inspire the fanaticism of his followers to strike terror into the Saracen armies. These conclusions of Al-Mansur, while founded on reason, in the end proved fallacious. The superstitious veneration, which, confirmed by blind ignorance and credulity for centuries, now exercised its power over an entire people, was too deeply rooted to be more than temporarily affected by the most glaring sacrilege.
The campaign was carefully planned. Every precaution was taken to provide against any possibility of failure. Marching westward, the several divisions of Moslem cavalry assembled at Coria. At Oporto they were joined by the fleet, in which the infantry had already embarked. A number of Christian vassals, attended by their retainers, responded to the summons of their suzerain, and lent their reluctant aid to the injury of their faith and the destruction of their countrymen. The Douro was crossed upon a bridge constructed of ships. Roads were cut through rocky and precipitous mountains. Broad estuaries and rivers were forded. The country, which had long suffered from repeated forays, was depopulated, and could offer no resistance. When the mountains of Galicia appeared in the distance, the resolution of the Christian allies faltered. Some of the counts entered into a secret correspondence with the enemy. Their designs were betrayed, and a number of Leonese nobles underwent the extreme penalty of treason. This salutary example insured the wavering loyalty of their companions, who henceforth found it expedient to conceal their real sentiments under an appearance of obedience and alacrity.
The region now traversed by the Moslems had hitherto been safe from their inroads. This circumstance, the sacred character of the territory, and the wealth of the clergy had attracted to the vicinity of Santiago a large and busy population. Ecclesiastical establishments abounded. Along the hill-sides were countless hermitages, shrines, and chapels. Almost every valley was occupied by a monastery or a convent. The lands susceptible of cultivation were tilled by slaves or dependents of the religious houses, whose condition differed little from that of hereditary servitude. The mansions of the prelates of high rank exhibited a palatial magnificence, and were not infrequently tenanted by occupants of the softer sex, whose charms of face and figure indicated an appreciation of female beauty hardly to be expected from their pious companions.
The utter demoralization of the Christian kingdoms through domestic feuds and incessant warfare, added to the terror inspired by the name of Al-Mansur, precluded the possibility of effectual resistance. The inhabitants, taking with them their portable property and the bones of their saints and kings, fled to the mountains or to islands off the sea-coast. Santiago was completely deserted. The invaders obtained a rich booty from the shrines of innumerable chapels and monasteries. Every building in the city, including the famous cathedral, was razed to the ground. The latter was constructed of marble and granite. Its plan and decoration exhibited the corrupt taste and barbaric splendor inherited from the Visigoths, whose faults of design had been aggravated by the native rudeness of the Galician architects. In front of the high altar stood the statue of the saint, carved by the pious but unpractised hand of a Gothic sculptor, and enclosed in a shrine of massy silver. Every portion of it except the face was painted or profusely gilded. One hand clasped a Bible, the other was raised aloft in the attitude of benediction. The kisses of innumerable pilgrims had almost obliterated the coarse and grotesque features of the image. By its side were disposed the emblems of the vagrant apostle, the staff, the calabash, the scallop shells. Its head was partially enveloped with a hood identical in shape with that worn by every pilgrim and glittering with jewels.
The statue and the tomb of the apostle escaped desecration, through the policy of Al-Mansur, who feared to exasperate his allies, already shocked by the sacrilegious deeds of their infidel companions in arms. This forbearance of the Moslem general was afterwards distorted by the clergy into a stupendous miracle. The Mauritanian cavalry plundered the neighboring settlements and intercepted many parties of fugitives, including not a few ecclesiastics, whose faith in the supernatural virtues of the image and the relics of the saint vanished quickly before the gleaming lances of the Saracen cavalry.
The return of the army to Cordova was signalized by a military demonstration that rivalled the pomp of a Roman triumph. In the rear of the troops, chained together by fifties, thousands of Christian captives, laden with the spoils and trophies of victory, trudged painfully along. Some carried the sacrilegious plunder of many a venerated shrine. Others supported upon their shoulders the ponderous gates of the city of Santiago. Others, again, sank under the weight of the bells of the cathedral, into whose molten mass, as yet unformed, pious devotees of either sex had cast their treasure and their jewels; whose clangor had solemnized the installation of many a prelate and the sepulture of many a saint; had aroused the enthusiasm and the devotion of pilgrims of every clime; had, until this fatal hour, been heard in a land believed to be exempt from the outrages of the infidel, but were now destined to be exhibited in his greatest temple as tokens of the supremacy attained by the most implacable foe of Christianity. In the addition to the Great Mosque, then building under the direction of Al-Mansur, these souvenirs of the most memorable campaign undertaken by the arms of the Western Khalifate were deposited, amidst the frenzied acclamations of the people. The gates were used to form a portion of the ceiling, and from them, sustained by chains of bronze, the great bells were hung inverted, to be utilized as lamps during the ceremonies of the numerous festivals prescribed by the Moslem ritual.
The career of the Mauritanian rebel Zira-Ibn-Atia, whom the prodigality of the Sultana Aurora had enabled to assert his independence, under pretext of liberating the Khalif, was not of long duration. The first army sent over by Al-Mansur to chastise his insolence met with disaster. The second, commanded by his own son, Abd-al-Melik-al-Modhaffer, vanquished the forces of Zira after a desperate struggle. The latter, with the loss of his possessions, was also stripped of his power, and died soon after of wounds received in battle.