In Arabian Spain, which inherited many of the diabolical arts of Asia, poisoning was a most popular mode of revenge. Deadly substances were conveyed or administered to the victim by methods against which no precautions could avail,—in robes of honor, in golden caskets, in suits of armor, in perfumed gloves, in flowers, in delicious sweetmeats. They were often enclosed under the jewels of rings for use in sudden emergency. The barbarous practice of using poisoned weapons long prevailed. The mountaineers of Granada during the Conquest dipped their arrow-heads in aconite and hellebore, and the wounds which they inflicted generally ended in torture the life of the stricken enemy.
The people of the different cities of Andalusia had each their peculiarities, few of which elicited complimentary notices from strangers. The inhabitants of Cordova were famous for their lawlessness and their hypocrisy, their pomp and their epicureanism; in those of Seville voluptuousness, indolence, and frivolity were predominant traits; those of Granada were proverbial for vindictiveness and turbulence; those of Xeres for politeness and elegance of manners. National degeneracy early indicated the approaching and inevitable dissolution of the empire. The posterity of the conquerors, who in three years had marched from Gibraltar to the centre of France, became in the course of a few generations cowardly, effeminate, corrupt. The geographer Ibn-Haukal, who visited Spain in the tenth century, described the people of the Peninsula as feeble in body and light and vacillating in character. Ibn-Said, who wrote in the eleventh, expresses surprise that the Castilians had not long before expelled them from the land. Even in an age of decadence, however, the influence of former traditions was not easily obliterated. Despite revolution, conflagration, and African barbarity, Cordova in the twelfth century was still the intellectual centre of Spain. The difference between the two great cities of Andalusia was from the beginning indicated by the fact that when a scholar died his books were sent to Cordova to be sold; but the instruments of a musician were always disposed of to the best advantage at Seville.
With the Spanish Moors a plurality of names was considered an indication of social importance, an opinion which has been transmitted to the Spaniards. The beard, also, from remote antiquity regarded as a sign of dignity and wisdom among Orientals and often reaching to the girdle, was, according to universal custom among learned Moslems of the Peninsula, restricted in length to a palm. Only the faquis and the doctors of the law wore long hair. No one except slaves was shaven. To seize a person by the beard was an unpardonable outrage, and even to touch a woman’s hair was an insult which might have cost the offender his life at the hands of the mob. The khalifs and all personages of rank dyed their beards red with henna to distinguish themselves from the Christians and the Jews, who were never permitted to use it.
No characteristic of the Arabs of Spain was more marked than their passionate love of jewels and perfumes. According to their belief and traditions every precious stone had its peculiar virtue. The emerald banished evil spirits; the ruby possessed the property of magnifying objects; the turquoise afforded immunity from misfortune. The cat’s-eye was supposed to render the wearer invisible. Mohammed had declared that the carnelian conferred happiness upon its possessor. The sapphire banished melancholy. The diamond was beneficial in insanity; the opal cured sore eyes; the red-bezoar was a safeguard against poison. The talismanic qualities presumed to be inherent in many gems were partly attributed to the astral influence supposed to affect inanimate objects as well as living organisms, and partly ascribed to the Divine Essence believed to pervade all matter. To be efficacious, it was indispensable that the cutting or engraving of a stone should be done while certain constellations were in the ascendant. The Moorish lapidaries were experts in their art. With the aid of the bow, copper wheels, and emery, they produced work little inferior to that of the most skilful diamond-cutter of to-day. Even in the seal, an indispensable mark of consequence with the Moslem, the shape had ordinarily an important significance. Those of the khalifs were usually round or polygonal; those of diplomatists square; those of financiers oval.
Love of flowers was a veritable passion among the Spanish Moslems. As they were the greatest botanists in the world, so no other nation approached them in the perfection of their floriculture and the ardor with which they pursued it. The profusion and variety of blossoms of every description were marvellous and enchanting; each had a meaning, by whose aid tender sentiments could be conveyed without the instrumentality of speech; they were associated with every public ceremony and with the most prosaic occurrences of domestic life; they dispensed their fragrance from the priceless vase of the palace; they covered the cottage of the laborer; they formed the daily decoration of the luxuriant tresses of the princess and the peasant; their garlands were the common playthings of the infant; on the marble column which marked the sepulchre of a virgin was sculptured a single rose.
The social life of the Moors of Spain and Sicily presents us with a picture at once lively, sensual, intellectual,—where the highest physical enjoyment, divested of every feature of coarseness, was varied by the constant exhibition of wit and learning. To a considerable extent,—yet far less than at the present day in Mohammedan lands,—it was, as a necessary result of their domestic regulations, bounded by the walls of the harem. A feverish activity, such as pervades the atmosphere of our modern cities and which shows no abatement after sunset, was unknown to the Moslem residents of Cordova and Palermo. The streets of those great capitals, almost impassable by day, were at night deserted save by the guardians of the peace. In the court-yards of private mansions, on the other hand, all was mirth and gayety. Lamps of colored glass were suspended from the balconies. The air was laden with the grateful odors of countless blossoms. From the terrace which crowned every Moorish dwelling could be traced the silvery Guadalquivir, as it wound its tortuous way through endless olive and pomegranate plantations, and the glimmering rows of lights belonging to the suburban villas which extended to the distant slopes of the Sierra Morena. From the deep shadows of the palm- and orange-trees came the harmonious strains of lute and mandolin mingled with the gentle murmur of the fountains. In one gallery of the arcade women of exquisite grace and beauty executed the voluptuous dances which had charmed the people of Tyre and Carthage fifteen centuries before; in another, the professional story-teller recounted tales of wonder with their fascinating accessories of astrologers, genii, magicians, fairies, and enchanters. During the holy festival of Ramadhan, when the Moslem indemnified himself at night for the abstinence and privations of the day, Andalusian life in the gay capital of the khalifate was seen to its highest advantage. The city was illuminated. The mosques were never closed. The baths were crowded. In the seclusion of domestic privacy there were feasting, dissipation, often unseemly orgies, until dawn. Buffoons and jugglers entertained with indelicate jests and antics the groups of hilarious loungers in the parks and on the corners. Itinerant minstrels, progenitors of the troubadour, chanted in monotonous accents romantic ballads of love and chivalry. Gilded litters, guarded by eunuchs with drawn scimetars, traversed the streets. On the Guadalquivir, lighted by the brilliant radiance of the moon and perfumed with the odors of a thousand gardens, floated innumerable boats hung with many-colored lanterns and garlanded with flowers. Among the graver part of the population, the gratification of the senses was discarded for the more profitable diversions of the intellect,—for philosophical experiments, learned discussions, literary contests. In the library, the scholar collated the historians of Greece and Egypt. In the caravansary, the man of leisure played chess and backgammon or watched the swaying movements of the half-nude dancing-girls. On all sides resounded the clapping of hands,—the Oriental call for servants,—still heard to-day in every public place in Southern Spain. The women donned their richest apparel. Their forms were enveloped in chemises of the finest linen; their trousers, which reached to the knee, were blue, green, yellow, or scarlet; their tunic, of two colors, was richly embroidered with gold. Leggings in many folds imparted to their lower limbs a singularly clumsy and awkward appearance. Their feet were enclosed in slippers. An ample garment which could be used for both a cloak and a veil effectually concealed the identity of the owner in the moving crowds. To a comb placed at the back of the head was attached a scarf of elegant material and gauzy texture, the prototype of the Spanish mantilla. The material of the costume common to every class was ordinarily of silk. For ornaments, the rich displayed a profusion of dazzling gems; the poor were forced to be content with jingling coins and amulets. All, without exception, like the Moslem females of to-day, heightened the lustre of their eyes with antimony and stained their finger-tips with henna. Their nomenclature was suggestive of the romantic character which invested their beautiful country. Such names as Saida, “Happy;” Sobeiha, “Aurora;” Safia, “Pure;” Romman, “Pomegranate;” Lonilion, “Pearl;” Zahrâ, “Flower,” were common among the Saracens of Spain.
Under the Spanish Arabs, women enjoyed privileges from which they were rigidly excluded in other Mohammedan countries. They appeared everywhere unveiled. As mentioned in a previous chapter, public opinion not only permitted, but openly encouraged, their participation in the national and provincial contests for the palm of literary excellence. The rare educational facilities of the khalifate were at their disposal. Many—proficient in poetry, philosophy, grammar, and rhetoric—excited universal admiration by the scope and variety of their mental accomplishments. Some even became the political advisers of great sovereigns. These circumstances, so favorable to the development and exaltation of the female character, eventually procured for the sex a consideration elsewhere denied. As Mohammedanism was the first of creeds to spontaneously recognize the right of woman to an amelioration of her social condition, so in the Peninsula the Hispano-Arab invested her personality with a dignity and an importance heretofore not conceded to her merits by members of any race or religion. From such novel doctrines were evolved those chivalrous sentiments which, imparted to Europe, effected such a salutary reformation in the intercourse and social usages of mediæval society. Mohammedan Spain presents the only instance, in ancient or modern history, of a country under whose laws and customs woman did not exist in a state of tutelage. The quality of infant or chattel has, to a greater or less extent, always seemed inseparable from her condition. Among races highest in the scale of civilization, her inferiority appeared the more striking, partly from actual legal disabilities, partly from contrast. It is true that among the Greeks, when Athens was at the summit of her renown, there were females of polished education, of extensive knowledge, gifted with talents of the highest order, able to cope in every intellectual exercise with the most distinguished scholars, philosophers, and statesmen. But these were few in number, and belonged to a class which modern prejudice has branded as infamous; the Athenian wife of the time of Pericles was little better than a slave. Charlemagne is generally conceded to have been the most enlightened Christian sovereign of his epoch. The civilization of his dominions offers a vivid contrast to the darkness which enveloped contemporaneous states and kingdoms. He professed at least a nominal respect for the precepts of Christianity. He publicly avowed himself the champion of the Holy See. To the policy inherited by his successors is largely due the subsequent increase of authority which rescued the Papacy from contempt and made the Bishop of Rome for centuries the dictator of Europe. The learning of his court, modified and in a measure directed by Arabic influence, was far from mediocre. And yet the old chronicles inform us that this great prince in the presence of his courtiers engaged with his sister in a personal encounter, whose result was doubtful until the vigorous use of his steel gauntlet, which knocked out several teeth of his amazonian adversary, gave him the advantage. If such was the treatment accorded to ladies of the highest rank in the Middle Ages, the degradation of women belonging to the remaining orders of society can scarcely be conceived. Nor were these conditions materially improved for centuries. Even so late as 1750, the laws of England permitted women to be treated with a severity almost barbarous; nor have the humiliating restrictions born of masculine superiority been in our age entirely removed. During the reign of Charles II. illiteracy was almost universal; learning in the sex was decried as pedantry or worse; it was rarely that a housewife could write her name; and even the princesses of the royal blood were unable to speak or spell grammatically. This condition, born of ecclesiastical precept derived from the customs of a remote and barbarous age and confirmed by national depravity whose tendency was to depreciate and ridicule female virtue, is an unfailing sign of moral perversity and intellectual decadence. Eight hundred years before, women of Cordova had established an enviable reputation for their proficiency in all the arts which contribute to the culture of nations; for the skill which they exhibited in every department of scientific research; for their profound acquaintance with the models of classic antiquity; for their originality in poetical composition; for the signal success they achieved in the literary congresses, wherein they were forced to compete with the assembled genius and learning of the empire. They were treated with the dignified respect and courtesy which were due to high mental attainments, as well as dictated by the regulations of chivalry which governed the conduct of every Moorish cavalier. These demonstrations of gallantry never degenerated, however, into the fulsome adulation and the worship, half mystical, half sensual, and expressed in terms of florid hyperbole, that prevailed in the social life of the Limousin and Provençal courts, whose development marked an age unique for its extravagance, its epicureanism, its licentiousness; an age of ostentatious asceticism and secret indulgence; an age when ballad-singers moralized and bishops abandoned the crosier for the lute; an age of arduous pilgrimage and romantic exploit; the age of Jongleur, Knight-errant, Crusader, and Troubadour.
In spite of the distinguished consideration they evinced for woman, the Moslems of Spain were unable to divest themselves of the prejudice regarding the fickleness of the sex, which, from immemorial antiquity, had been accepted as one of its prominent characteristics. The position she occupied in the social polity was anomalous. Her features were exposed to the public gaze; she was permitted to attend the lectures of the University; she participated in academical exhibitions. But the liberty she enjoyed was only apparent. Her steps were constantly guarded by eunuchs. Her lord was not less suspicious than his Oriental brethren, and she, if the literature of the time is to be credited, probably for fear of disappointing him, not infrequently gave abundant cause for jealousy. Nothing discloses the general sentiment of a people upon any given subject so comprehensively as its proverbs and epigrams. The estimation in which the Spanish Arabs held the feminine character is indicated by the following saying, often quoted by them, and which is as old as the Pharaohs, “Never trust in women, nor rely upon their vows, for their pleasure and displeasure depend upon their passions. They offer a false affection, while perfidy lurks within their garments. By the tale of Joseph be admonished, and guard against their stratagems.”
The question of polygamy is one which is almost universally viewed through a false medium. Its existence in the torrid climates of the East from a period of unknown antiquity would seem to demonstrate at least the practical usefulness, if not the supreme physiological necessity, of a system which has endured for so many ages. It is eminently unfair for us to condemn a practice sanctioned by Holy Writ and recognized by the patriarchs, without an accurate knowledge of the ethnological conditions under which it is perpetuated. What public opinion, custom, and long experience have found to be beneficial and have pronounced not inconsistent with morality, is very often not a question of ethics, but merely a matter of expediency. Institutions which nations inhabiting the tropics defend as necessary could not be adopted without injury by the sluggish races of the North; and of their propriety, we at a distance of eight thousand miles are incompetent, not to say prejudiced, judges. The women who rose to such distinction under the khalifate were, without exception, members of polygamous households, a circumstance which would seem to effectually contradict the prevalent idea that the system of the harem inevitably tends to intellectual debasement. The standard of morals under the Hispano-Arab domination was probably much superior to that which now obtains in the great capitals of Europe. The deplorable condition of modern society, even among the highly cultivated, where monogamy nominally exists, is disclosed by the frequency of divorce cases and the significant revelations of criminal statistics. It demonstrates that the primitive impulse which among barbarians leads to communal marriage—the original social state of man—is not only not extinct, but even generally prevails, although decorously concealed, and, however repugnant to every principle of morality, must be recognized as a powerful and retarding element of our boasted civilization.
The chivalrous courtesy born of intellectual culture and refined surroundings which distinguished the Spanish Moslems in all the phases of their social life was, as above stated, eminently conspicuous in their treatment of females. The latter were, for the most part, highly educated. Even to-day, in the harems of Constantinople, it is not unusual to see women fine musicians, excellent conversationalists, familiar with the principles of art, able to express themselves fluently in three or four languages. Such accomplishments are still sufficiently rare to confer distinction upon their possessors in London, Paris, and New York. Under the khalifs of the House of Ommeyah, the mental faculties of the sex were cultivated to a marked degree; no field of literature was closed to those who aspired to eminence. They were everywhere received with great respect. They were never insulted in public. They traversed districts in revolt without molestation. The laws protected them against the excesses of marital jealousy. If divorced, the wife was certain of maintenance. It was she who, at marriage, received the dowry. Public opinion denounced as infamous the husband who permitted his spouse to labor in order that he might profit by her earnings. In case of his death she was entitled to a share of his estate. All things considered, the legal status of woman under the khalifate appears to advantage when compared with that to which she is restricted by modern legislation. If polygamy entailed the unhappiness which foreign prejudice is accustomed to attribute to it, the practice would long since have been abolished. It is but a natural result of climatic and physiological conditions, an apparently indispensable factor in the maintenance of Oriental life.