style="font-size:15px;"> Besides other hereditary honors, I found the old count was Alferez mayor, or grand standard-bearer, in which capacity he was entitled to bear the ancient standard of Ferdinand and Isabella, on certain high and solemn occasions, and to wave it over their tombs. I was shown also the caparisons of velvet, sumptuously embroidered with gold and silver, for six horses, with which he appeared in state when a new sovereign was to be proclaimed in Granada and Seville; the count mounting one of the horses, and the other five being led by lackeys in rich liveries.
I had hoped to find among the relics and antiquities of the count’s palace, some specimens of the armor and weapons of the Moors of Granada, such as I had heard were preserved as trophies by the descendants of the Conquerors; but in this I was disappointed. I was the more curious in this particular, because an erroneous idea has been entertained by many, as to the costumes of the Moors of Spain; supposing them to be of the usual oriental type. On the contrary, we have it on the authority of their own writers, that they adopted in many respects the fashions of the Christians. The turban, especially, so identified in idea with the Moslem, was generally abandoned, except in the western provinces, where it continued in use among people of rank and wealth, and those holding places under government. A woollen cap, red or green, was commonly worn as a substitute; probably the same kind originating in Barbary, and known by the name of Tunis or Fez, which at the present day is worn throughout the east; though generally under the turban. The Jews were obliged to wear them of a yellow color.
In Murcia, Valencia, and other eastern provinces, men of the highest rank might be seen in public bareheaded. The warrior king, Aben Hud, never wore a turban, neither did his rival and competitor Al Hamar, the founder of the Alhambra. A short cloak called Taylasan similar to that seen in Spain in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, was worn by all ranks. It had a hood or cape which people of condition sometimes drew over the head; but the lower class never.
A Moslem cavalier in the thirteenth century, as described by Ibnu Said, was equipped for war very much in the Christian style. Over a complete suit of mail he wore a short scarlet tunic. His helmet was of polished steel; a shield was slung at his back; he wielded a huge spear with a broad point, sometimes a double point. His saddle was cumbrous, projecting very much in front and in rear, and he rode with a banner fluttering behind him.
In the time of Al Khattib of Granada, who wrote in the fourteenth century, the Moslems of Andalus had resumed the Oriental costumes, and were again clad and armed in Arabic fashion: with light helmet, thin but well tempered cuirass, long slender lance, commonly of reed, Arabian saddle and leathern buckler, made of double folds of the skin of the antelope. A wonderful luxury prevailed at that time in the arms and equipments of the Granadian cavaliers. Their armor was inlaid with gold and silver. Their cimeters were of the keenest Damascus blades, with sheaths richly wrought and enamelled, and belts of golden filagree studded with gems. Their daggers of Fez had jewelled hilts, and their lances were set off with gay banderoles. Their horses were caparisoned in correspondent style, with velvet and embroidery.
All this minute description, given by a contemporary, and an author of distinction, verifies those gallant pictures in the old Morisco Spanish ballads which have sometimes been deemed apocryphal, and gives a vivid idea of the brilliant appearance of the chivalry of Granada, when marshalled forth in warlike array, or when celebrating the chivalrous fetes of the Vivarrambla.
* Lest this should be deemed a mere stretch of fancy, the reader is referred to the following genealogy, derived by the historian Alcantara, from an Arabian manuscript, on parchment, in the archives of the marquis of Corvera. It is a specimen of the curious affinities between Christians and Moslems, produced by capture and intermarriages, during the Moorish wars. From Aben Hud, the Moorish king, the conqueror of the Almohades, was descended in right line Cid Yahia Abraham Alnagar, prince of Almeria, who married a daughter of King Bermejo. They had three children, commonly called the Cetimerian Princes. 1st. Yusef ben Alhamar, who for a time usurped the throne of Granada. 2d. The Prince Nasar, who married the celebrated Lindaraxa. 3d. The Princess Cetimerien, who married Don Pedro Venegas, captured by the Moors in his boyhood, a younger son of the House of Luque, of which house the old count was the present head.
THE GENERALIFE.
High above the Alhambra, on the breast of the mountain, amidst embowered gardens and stately terraces, rise the lofty towers and white walls of the Generalife; a fairy palace, full of storied recollections. Here is still to be seen the famous cypresses of enormous size which flourished in the time of the Moors, and which tradition has connected with the fabulous story of Boabdil and his sultana.
Here are preserved the portraits of many who figured in the romantic drama of the Conquest. Ferdinand and Isabella, Ponce de Leon, the gallant marquis of Cadiz, and Garcilaso de la Vega, who slew in desperate fight Tarfe the Moor, a champion of Herculean strength. Here too hangs a portrait which has long passed for that of the unfortunate Boabdil, but which is said to be that of Aben Hud, the Moorish king from whom descended the princes of Almeria. From one of these princes, who joined the standard of Ferdinand and Isabella towards the close of the Conquest, and was christianized by the name of Don Pedro de Granada Venegas, was descended the present proprietor of the palace, the marquis of Campotejar. The proprietor, however, dwells in a foreign land, and the palace has no longer a princely inhabitant.
Yet here is every thing to delight a southern voluptuary: fruits, flowers, fragrance, green arbors and myrtle hedges, delicate air and gushing waters. Here I had an opportunity of witnessing those scenes which painters are fond of depicting about southern palaces and gardens. It was the saint’s day of the count’s daughter, and she had brought up several of her youthful companions from Granada, to sport away a long summer’s day among the breezy halls and bowers of the Moorish palaces. A visit to the Generalife was the morning’s entertainment. Here some of the gay company dispersed itself in groups about the green walks, the bright fountains, the flights of Italian steps, the noble terraces and marble balustrades. Others, among whom I was one, took their seats in an open gallery or colonnade commanding a vast prospect, with the Alhambra, the city, and the Vega, far below, and the distant horizon of mountains — a dreamy world, all glimmering to the eye in summer sunshine. While thus seated, the all-pervading tinkling of the guitar and click of the castanets came stealing up from the valley of the Darro, and half way down the mountain we descried a festive party under the trees enjoying themselves in true Andalusian style, some lying on the grass, others dancing to the music.
All these sights and sounds, together with the princely seclusion of the place, the sweet quiet which prevailed around, and the delicious serenity of the weather had a witching effect upon the mind, and drew from some of the company, versed in local story, several of the popular fancies and traditions connected with this old Moorish palace; they were “such stuff as dreams are made of,” but out of them I have shaped the following legend, which I hope may have the good fortune to prove acceptable to the reader.
LEGEND OF PRINCE AHMED AL KAMEL, OR, THE PILGRIM OF LOVE.
There was once a Moorish king of Granada who had but one son, whom he named Ahmed, to which his courtiers added the surname of al Kamel, or the perfect, from the indubitable signs of superexcellence which they perceived in him in his very infancy. The astrologers countenanced them in their foresight, predicting every thing in his favor that could make a perfect prince and a prosperous sovereign. One cloud only rested upon his destiny, and even that was of a roseate hue: he would be of an amorous temperament, and run great perils
