Chronicle of the Conquest of Granada Part 40

The jealous doubts of Ferdinand were quickened by the letters of his spies. He saw in the hunting campaigns and royal progresses of the ex-king a mode of keeping up a military spirit and a concerted intelligence among the Moors of the Alpuxarras that might prepare them for future rebellion. By degrees the very residence of Boabdil within the kingdom became incompatible with Ferdinand's ideas of security. He gave his agents, therefore, secret instructions to work upon the mind of the deposed monarch, and induce him, like El Zagal, to relinquish his Spanish estates for valuable considerations and retire to Africa.

Boabdil, however, was not to be persuaded: to the urgent suggestions of these perfidious counsellors he replied that he had given up a kingdom to live in peace, and had no idea of going to a foreign land to encounter new troubles and to be under the control of alarabes.*

* Letter of Hernando de Zafra to the sovereigns, Dec. 9, 1493.

Ferdinand persisted in his endeavors, and found means more effectual of operating on the mind of Boabdil and gradually disposing him to enter into negotiations. It would appear that Aben Comixa was secretly active in this matter in the interests of the Spanish monarch, and was with him at Barcelona as the vizier and agent of Boabdil. The latter, however, finding that his residence in the Alpuxarras was a cause of suspicion and uneasiness to Ferdinand, determined to go himself to Barcelona, have a conference with the sovereigns, and conduct all his negotiations with them in person. Zafra, the secretary of Ferdinand, who was ever on the alert, wrote a letter from Granada apprising the king of Boabdil's intention, and that he was making preparations for the journey. He received a letter in reply, charging him by subtle management to prevent, or at least delay, the coming of Boabdil to court.* The crafty monarch trusted to effect through Aben Comixa as vizier and agent of Boabdil an arrangement which it might be impossible to obtain from Boabdil himself. The politic plan was carried into effect. Boabdil was detained at Andarax by the management of Zafra. In the mean time a scandalous bargain was made on the 17th March, 1493, between Ferdinand and Aben Comixa, in which the latter, as vizier and agent of Boabdil, though without any license or authority from him, made a sale of his territory and the patrimonial property of the princesses for eighty thousand ducats of gold, and engaged that he should depart for Africa, taking care, at the same time, to make conditions highly advantageous for himself.**

* Letter of the sovereigns to Hernando de Zafra from Barcelona, Feb., 1493.

* *Alcantara, Hist. Granad., iv. c. 18.

This bargain being hastily concluded, Yusef Aben Comixa loaded the treasure upon mules and departed for the Alpuxarras. Here, spreading the money before Boabdil, "Senior," said he, "I have observed that as long as you live here you are exposed to constant peril. The Moors are rash and irritable; they may make some sudden insurrection, elevate your standard as a pretext, and thus overwhelm you and your friends with utter ruin. I have observed also that you pine away with grief, being continually reminded in this country that you were once its sovereign, but never more must hope to reign. I have put an end to these evils.

Your territory is sold--behold the price of it! With this gold you may buy far greater possessions in Africa, where you may live in honor and security."

When Boabdil heard these words he burst into a sudden transport of rage, and, drawing his scimetar, would have sacrificed the officious Yusef on the spot had not the attendants interfered and hurried the vizier from his presence.*

* Marmol, Rebel. 1. 1, c. 22.

The rage of Boabdil gradually subsided: he saw that he had been duped and betrayed, but he knew the spirit of Ferdinand too well to hope that he would retract the bargain, however illegitimately effected.

He contented himself, therefore, with obtaining certain advantageous modifications, and then prepared to bid a final adieu to his late kingdom and his native land.

It took some months to make the necessary arrangements, or, rather, his departure was delayed by a severe domestic affliction. Morayma, his gentle and affectionate wife, worn out by agitations and alarms, was gradually sinking into the grave, a prey to devouring melancholy. Her death took place toward the end of August. Hernando de Zafra apprised King Ferdinand of the event as one propitious to his purposes, removing an obstacle to the embarkation, which was now fixed for the month of September. Zafra was instructed to accompany the exiles until he saw them landed on the African coast.

The embarkation, however, did not take place until some time in the month of October. A caracca had been prepared at the port of Adra for Boabdil and his immediate family and friends. Another caracca and two galliots received a number of faithful adherents, amounting, it is said, to eleven hundred and thirty, who followed their prince into exile.

A crowd of his former subjects witnessed his embarkation. As the sails were unfurled and swelled to the breeze, and the vessel bearing Boabdil parted from the land, the spectators would fain have given him a farewell cheering; but the humbled state of their once proud sovereign forced itself upon their minds, and the ominous surname of his youth rose involuntarily to their tongues: "Farewell, Boabdil! Allah preserve thee, 'El Zogoybi!'" burst spontaneously from their lips. The unlucky appellation sank into the heart of the expatriated monarch, and tears dimmed his eyes as the snowy summits of the mountains of Granada gradually faded from his view.

He was received with welcome at the court of his relative, Muley Ahmed, caliph of Fez, the same who had treated El Zagal with such cruelty in his exile. For thirty-four years he resided in this court, treated with great consideration, and built a palace or alcazar at Fez, in which, it is said, he endeavored to emulate the beauties and delights of the Alhambra.

The last we find recorded of him is in the year 1536, when he followed the caliph to the field to repel the invasion of two brothers of the famous line of the Xerifes, who at the head of Berber troops had taken the city of Morocco and threatened Fez. The armies came in sight of each other on the banks of the Guadal Hawit, or river of slaves, at the ford of Balcuba. The river was deep, the banks were high and broken, and the ford could only be pa.s.sed in single file; for three days the armies remained firing at each other across the stream, neither venturing to attempt the dangerous ford. At length the caliph divided his army into three battalions: the command of the first he gave to his brother-in-law and to Aliatar, son of the old alcayde of Loxa; another division he commanded himself; and the third, composed of his best marksmen, he put under the command of his son, the prince of Fez, and Boabdil, now a gray-haired veteran. The last mentioned column took the lead, dashed boldly across the ford, scrambled up the opposite bank, and attempted to keep the enemy employed until the other battalions should have time to cross. The rebel army, however, attacked them with such fury that the son of the king of Fez and several of the bravest alcaydes were slain upon the spot; mult.i.tudes were driven back into the river, which was already crowded with pa.s.sing troops. A dreadful confusion took place; the horse trampled upon the foot; the enemy pressed on them with fearful slaughter; those who escaped the sword perished by the stream; the river was choked by the dead bodies of men and horses and by the scattered baggage of the army. In this scene of horrible carnage fell Boabdil, truly called El Zogoybi, or the Unlucky--an instance, says the ancient chronicler, of the scornful caprice of fortune, dying in defence of the kingdom of another after wanting spirit to die in defence of his own.*

* Marmol, Descrip. de Africa, p. 1, 1. 2, c. 40; idem, Hist. Reb. de los Moros, lib. 1, c. 21.

The aspersion of the chronicler is more caustic than correct. Boabdil never showed a want of courage in the defence of Granada, but he wanted firmness and decision: he was beset from the first by perplexities, and ultimately by the artifices of Ferdinand and the treachery of those in whom he most confided.*

* In revising this account of the ultimate fortunes of Boabdil the author has availed himself of facts recently brought out in Alcantara's History of Granada, which throw strong lights on certain parts of the subject hitherto covered with obscurity.

ZORAYA, THE STAR OF THE MORNING.

Notwithstanding the deadly rivalship of this youthful sultana with Ayxa la Horra, the virtuous mother of Boabdil, and the disasters to which her ambitious intrigues gave rise, the placable spirit of Boabdil bore her no lasting enmity. After the death of his father he treated her with respect and kindness, and evinced a brotherly feeling toward her sons Cad and Nazar. In the capitulations for the surrender of Granada he took care of her interests, and the possessions which he obtained for her were in his neighborhood in the valleys of the Alpuxarras. Zoraya, however, under the influence of Queen Isabella, returned to the Christian faith, the religion of her infancy, and resumed her Spanish name of Isabella. Her two sons, Cad and Nazar, were baptized under the names of Don Fernando and Don Juan de Granada, and were permitted to take the t.i.tles of infantas or princes. They intermarried with n.o.ble Spanish families, and the dukes of Granada, resident in Valladolid, are descendants of Don Juan (once Nazar), and preserve to the present day the blazon of their royal ancestor, Muley Abul Ha.s.san, and his motto, Le Galib ile Ala, G.o.d alone is conqueror.

FATE OF ABEN COMIXA.

An ancient chronicle which has long remained in ma.n.u.script, but has been published of late years in the collection of Spanish historical doc.u.ments,* informs us of the subsequent fortunes of the perfidious Aben Comixa. Discarded and despised by Boabdil for his treachery, he repaired to the Spanish court, and obtained favor in the eyes of the devout queen Isabella by embracing the Christian religion, being baptized under her auspices with the name of Don Juan de Granada. He even carried his zeal for his newly-adopted creed so far as to become a Franciscan friar.

By degrees his affected piety grew cool and the friar's garb became irksome. Taking occasion of the sailing of some Venetian galleys from Almeria, he threw off his religious habit, embarked on board of one of them, and crossed to Africa, where he landed in the dress of a Spanish cavalier.

* Padilla, Cronica de Felipe el Hermosa, cap. 18, y 19, as cited by Alcantara.

In a private interview with Abderraman, the Moorish king of Bujia, he related his whole history, and declared that he had always been and still was at heart a true Mahometan. Such skill had he in inspiring confidence that the Moorish king took him into favor and appointed him governor of Algiers. While enjoying his new dignity a Spanish squadron of four galleys, under the celebrated count Pedro de Navarro, anch.o.r.ed in the harbor in 1509. Aben Comixa paid the squadron a visit of ceremony in his capacity of governor, gave the count repeated fetes, and in secret conversations with him laid open all the affairs of the king of Bujia, and offered, if the count should return with sufficient force, to deliver the city into his hands and aid him in conquering the whole territory. The count hastened back to Spain and made known the proposed treachery to the Cardinal Ximenes, then prime minister of Spain. In the following month of January he was sent with thirty vessels and four thousand soldiers to achieve the enterprise. The expedition of Navarro was successful. He made himself master of Bujia and seized in triumph on the royal palace, but he found there the base Aben Comixa weltering in his blood and expiring under numerous wounds. His treachery had been discovered, and the vengeance of the king of Bujia had closed his perfidious career.

DEATH OF THE MARQUES OF CADIZ.

The renowned Roderigo Ponce de Leon, marques-duke of Cadiz, was unquestionably the most distinguished among the cavaliers of Spain for his zeal, enterprise, and heroism in the great crusade of Granada. He began the war by the capture of Alhama; he was engaged in almost every inroad and siege of importance during its continuance; and was present at the surrender of the capital, the closing scene of the conquest. The renown thus acquired was sealed by his death, which happened in the forty-eighth year of his age, almost immediately at the close of his triumphs and before a leaf of his laurels had time to wither. He died at his palace in the city of Seville on the 27th day of August, 1492, but a few months after the surrender of Granada, and of an illness caused by exposures and fatigues undergone in this memorable war. That honest chronicler, Andres Bernaldez, the curate of Los Palacios, who was a contemporary of the marques, draws his portrait from actual knowledge and observation. He was universally cited (says he) as the most perfect model of chivalrous virtue of the age. He was temperate, chaste, and rigidly devout, a benignant commander, a valiant defender of his va.s.sals, a great lover of justice, and an enemy to all flatterers, liars, robbers, traitors, and poltroons.

His ambition was of a lofty kind: he sought to distinguish himself and his family by heroic and resounding deeds, and to increase the patrimony of his ancestors by the acquisition of castles, domains, va.s.sals, and other princely possessions. His recreations were all of a warlike nature; he delighted in geometry as applied to fortifications, and spent much time and treasure in erecting and repairing fortresses. He relished music, but of a military kind--the sound of clarions and sackbuts, of drums and trumpets. Like a true cavalier, he was a protector of the s.e.x on all occasions, and an injured woman never applied to him in vain for redress. His prowess was so well known, and his courtesy to the fair, that the ladies of the court, when they accompanied the queen to the wars, rejoiced to find themselves under his protection; for wherever his banner was displayed the Moors dreaded to adventure. He was a faithful and devoted friend, but a formidable enemy; for he was slow to forgive, and his vengeance was persevering and terrible.

The death of this good and well-beloved cavalier spread grief and lamentation throughout all ranks. His relations, dependants, and companions-in-arms put on mourning for his loss, and so numerous were they that half of Seville was clad in black. None, however, deplored his death more deeply and sincerely than his friend and chosen companion Don Alonso de Aguilar.

The funeral ceremonies were of the most solemn and sumptuous kind. The body of the marques was arrayed in a costly shirt, a doublet of brocade, a sayo or long robe of black velvet, a marlota or Moorish tunic of brocade reaching to the feet, and scarlet stockings. His sword, superbly gilt, was girded to his side, as he used to wear it when in the field.

Thus magnificently attired, the body was enclosed in a coffin which was covered with black velvet and decorated with a cross of white damask. It was then placed on a sumptuous bier in the centre of the great hall of the palace. Here the d.u.c.h.ess made great lamentation over the body of her lord, in which she was joined by her train of damsels and attendants, as well as by the pages and esquires and innumerable va.s.sals.

In the close of the evening, just before the Ave Maria, the funeral train issued from the palace. Ten banners were borne around the bier, the particular trophies of the marques won from the Moors by his valor in individual enterprises before King Ferdinand had commenced the war of Granada. The procession was swelled by an immense train of bishops, priests, and friars of different orders, together with the civil and military authorities and all the chivalry of Seville, headed by the count of Cifuentes, at that time intendente or commander of the city. It moved slowly and solemnly through the streets, stopping occasionally and chanting litanies and responses. Two hundred and forty waxen tapers shed a light like the day about the bier. The balconies and windows were crowded with ladies, who shed tears as the funeral train pa.s.sed by, while the women of the lower cla.s.ses were loud in their lamentations, as if bewailing the loss of a father or a brother. On approaching the convent of St. Augustine the monks came forth with the cross and tapers and eight censers and conducted the body into the church, where it lay in state until all the vigils were performed by the different orders, after which it was deposited in the family tomb of the Ponces in the same church, and the ten banners were suspended over the sepulchre.*

* Cura de los Palacios, c.104.

The tomb of the valiant Roderigo Ponce de Leon, with his banners mouldering above it, remained for ages an object of veneration with all who had read or heard of his virtues and achievements. In the year 1810, however, the chapel was sacked by the French, its altars were overturned, and the sepulchres of the family of the Ponces shattered to pieces. The present d.u.c.h.ess of Benevente, the worthy descendant of this ill.u.s.trious and heroic line, has since piously collected the ashes of her ancestors, restored the altar, and repaired the chapel. The sepulchres, however, were utterly destroyed: an inscription in gold letters on the wall of the chapel to the right of the altar is all that denotes the place of sepulture of the brave Ponce de Leon.

THE LEGEND OF THE DEATH OF DON ALONSO DE AGUILAR.

To such as feel an interest in the fortune of the valiant Don Alonso de Aguilar, the chosen friend and companion-in-arms of Ponce de Leon, marques of Cadiz, and one of the most distinguished heroes of the war of Granada, a few particulars of his remarkable fate will not be unacceptable.

For several years after the conquest of Granada the country remained feverish and unquiet. The zealous efforts of the Catholic clergy to effect the conversion of the infidels, and the coercion used for that purpose by government, exasperated the stubborn Moors of the mountains.

Several missionaries were maltreated, and in the town of Dayrin two of them were seized and exhorted, with many menaces, to embrace the Moslem faith; on their resolutely refusing they were killed with staves and stones by the Moorish women and children, and their bodies burnt to ashes.*

* Cura de los Palacios, c. 165.

Upon this event a body of Christian cavaliers a.s.sembled in Andalusia to the number of eight hundred, and, without waiting for orders from the king, revenged the death of these martyrs by plundering and laying waste the Moorish towns and villages. The Moors fled to the mountains, and their cause was espoused by many of their nation who inhabited those rugged regions. The storm of rebellion began to gather and mutter its thunders in the Alpuxarras. They were echoed from the Serrania of Ronda, ever ready for rebellion, but the strongest hold of the insurgents was in the Sierra (12) Bermeja, or chain of Red Mountains, which lie near the sea, the savage rocks and precipices of which may be seen from Gibraltar.

When King Ferdinand heard of these tumults he issued a proclamation ordering all the Moors of the insurgent regions to leave them within ten days and repair to Castile; giving secret instructions, however, that those who should voluntarily embrace the Christian faith might be permitted to remain. At the same time he ordered Don Alonso de Aguilar and the counts of Urena and Cifuentes to march against the rebels.