Chapter III

ALFONSO THE WISE.--HIS LIFE.--HIS LETTER TO PEREZ DE GUZMAN.--HIS CÁNTIGAS IN THE GALICIAN.--ORIGIN OF THAT DIALECT AND OF THE PORTUGUESE.--HIS TESORO.--HIS PROSE.--LAW CONCERNING THE CASTILIAN.--HIS CONQUISTA DE ULTRAMAR.--OLD FUEROS.--THE FUERO JUZGO.--THE SETENARIO.--THE ESPEJO.--THE FUERO REAL.--THE SIETE PARTIDAS AND THEIR MERITS.--CHARACTER OF ALFONSO.

The second known author in Castilian literature bears a name much more distinguished than the first. It is Alfonso the Tenth, who, from his great advancement in various branches of human knowledge, has been called Alfonso the Wise, or the Learned. He was the son of Ferdinand the Third, a saint in the Roman calendar, who, uniting anew the crowns of Castile and Leon, and enlarging the limits of his power by important conquests from the Moors, settled more firmly than they had before been settled the foundations of a Christian empire in the Peninsula.[36]

[36] Mariana, Hist., Lib. XII. c. 15, ad fin.

Alfonso was born in 1221, and ascended the throne in 1252. He was a poet, much connected with the Provençal Troubadours of his time,[37] and was besides so greatly skilled in geometry, astronomy, and the occult sciences then so much valued, that his reputation was early spread throughout Europe, on account of his general science. But, as Mariana quaintly says of him, “He was more fit for letters than for the government of his subjects; he studied the heavens, and watched the stars, but forgot the earth, and lost his kingdom.”[38]

[37] Diez, Poesie der Troubadours, pp. 75, 226, 227, 331-350. A
long poem on the influence of the stars was addressed to Alfonso
by Nat de Mons (Raynouard, Troub., Tom. V. p. 269); and besides
the curious poem addressed to him by Giraud Riquier of Narbonne,
in 1275, given by Diez, we know that in another poem this
distinguished Troubadour mourned the king’s death. Raynouard,
Tom. V. p. 171. Millot, Histoire des Troubadours, Paris, 1774,
12mo, Tom. III. pp. 329-374.

[38] Historia, Lib. XIII. c. 20. The less favorable side of
Alfonso’s character is given by the cynical Bayle, Art.,
_Castile_.

His character is still an interesting one. He appears to have had more political, philosophical, and elegant learning than any other man of his time; to have reasoned more wisely in matters of legislation; and to have made further advances in some of the exact sciences;--accomplishments that he seems to have resorted to in the latter part of his life for consolation amidst unsuccessful wars with foreign enemies and a rebellious son. The following letter from him to one of the Guzmans, who was then in great favor at the court of the king of Fez, shows at once how low the fortunes of the Christian monarch were sunk before he died, and with how much simplicity he could speak of their bitterness. It is dated in 1282, and is a favorable specimen of Castilian prose at a period so early in the history of the language.[39]

[39] This letter, which the Spanish Academy calls “inimitable,”
though early known in MS., seems to have been first printed by
Ortiz de Zuñiga (Anales de Sevilla, Sevilla, 1677, fol., p.
124). Several old ballads have been made out of it, one of which
is to be found in the “Cancionero de Romances,” por Lorenço de
Sepúlveda (Sevilla, 1584, 18mo, f. 104). The letter is found in
the preface to the Academy’s edition of the Partidas, and is
explained by the accounts in Mariana, (Hist., Lib. XIV. c. 5,)
Conde, (Dominacion de los Árabes, Tom. III. p. 69,) and Mondejar
(Memorias, Lib. VI. c. 14). The original is said to be in the
possession of the Duke of Medina-Sidonia. Semanario Pintoresco,
1845, p. 303.

“Cousin Don Alonzo Perez de Guzman: My affliction is great, because it has fallen from such a height that it will be seen afar; and as it has fallen on me, who was the friend of all the world, so in all the world will men know this my misfortune, and its sharpness, which I suffer unjustly from my son, assisted by my friends and by my prelates, who, instead of setting peace between us, have put mischief, not under secret pretences or covertly, but with bold openness. And thus I find no protection in mine own land, neither defender nor champion; and yet have I not deserved it at their hands, unless it were for the good I have done them. And now, since in mine own land they deceive, who should have served and assisted me, needful is it that I should seek abroad those who will kindly care for me; and since they of Castile have been false to me, none can think it ill that I ask help among those of Benamarin.[40] For if my sons are mine enemies, it will not then be wrong that I take mine enemies to be my sons; enemies according to the law, but not of free choice. And such is the good king Aben Jusaf; for I love and value him much, and he will not despise me or fail me; for we are at truce. I know also how much you are his, and how much he loves you, and with good cause, and how much he will do through your good counsel. Therefore look not at the things past, but at the things present. Consider of what lineage you are come, and that at some time hereafter I may do you good, and if I do it not, that your own good deed shall be its own good reward. Therefore, my cousin, Alonzo Perez de Guzman, do so much for me with my lord and your friend, that, on pledge of the most precious crown that I have, and the jewels thereof, he should lend me so much as he may hold to be just. And if you can obtain his aid, let it not be hindered of coming quickly; but rather think how the good friendship that may come to me from your lord will be through your hands. And so may God’s friendship be with you. Done in Seville, my only loyal city, in the thirtieth year of my reign, and in the first of these my troubles.

Signed, THE KING.”[41]

[40] A race of African princes, who reigned in Morocco, and
subjected all Western Africa. Crónica de Alfonso XI., Valladolid,
1551, fol., c. 219. Gayangos, Mohammedan Dynasties, Vol. II. p.
325.

[41] Alonzo Perez de Guzman, of the great family of that name,
the person to whom this remarkable letter is addressed, went
over to Africa in 1276, with many knights, to serve Aben Jusaf
against his rebellious subjects, stipulating that he should not
be required to serve against Christians. Ortiz de Zuñiga, Anales,
p. 113.

The unhappy monarch survived the date of this very striking letter but two years, and died in 1284. At one period of his life, his consideration throughout Christendom was so great, that he was elected Emperor of Germany; but this was only another source of sorrow to him, for his claims were contested, and after some time were silently set aside by the election of Rodolph of Hapsburg, upon whose dynasty the glories of the House of Austria rested so long. The life of Alfonso, therefore, was on the whole unfortunate, and full of painful vicissitudes, that might well have broken the spirit of most men, and that were certainly not without an effect on his.[42]

[42] The principal life of Alfonso X. is that by the Marquis
of Mondejar (Madrid, 1777, fol.); but it did not receive its
author’s final revision, and is an imperfect work. (Prólogo de
Cerdá y Rico; and Baena, Hijos de Madrid, Madrid, 1790, 4to,
Tom. II. pp. 304-312.) For the part of Alfonso’s life devoted to
letters, ample materials are to be found in Castro, (Biblioteca
Española, Tom. II. pp. 625-688,) and in the Repertorio Americano
(Lóndres, 1827, Tom. III. pp. 67-77); where there is a valuable
paper, written, I believe, by Salvá, who published that journal.

So much the more remarkable is it, that he should be distinguished among the chief founders of his country’s intellectual fame,--a distinction which again becomes more extraordinary when we recollect that he enjoys it not in letters alone, or in a single department, but in many; since he is to be remembered alike for the great advancement which Castilian prose composition made in his hands, for his poetry, for his astronomical tables, which all the progress of science since has not deprived of their value; and for his great work on legislation, which is at this moment an authority in both hemispheres.[43]

[43] The works attributed to Alfonso are:--IN PROSE: 1. Crónica
General de España, to be noticed hereafter. 2. A Universal
History, containing an abstract of the history of the Jews. 3.
A Translation of the Bible. 4. El Libro del Tesoro, a work on
general philosophy; but Sarmiento, in a MS. which I possess, says
that this is a translation of the Tesoro of Brunetto Latini,
Dante’s master, and that it was not made by order of Alfonso;
adding, however, that he has seen a book entitled “Flores de
Filosofía,” which professes to have been compiled by this king’s
command, and may be the work here intended. 5. The Tábulas
Alfonsinas, or Astronomical Tables. 6. Historia de todo el Suceso
de Ultramar, to be noticed presently. 7. El Espéculo ó Espejo
de todos los Derechos; El Fuero Real, and other laws published
in the Opúsculos Legales del Rey Alfonso el Sabio (ed. de la
Real Academia de Historia, Madrid, 1836, 2 tom., fol.). 8. Las
Siete Partidas.--IN VERSE: 1. Another Tesoro. 2. Las Cántigas.
3. Two stanzas of the Querellas. Several of these works, like
the Universal History and the Ultramar, were, as we know, only
compiled by his order, and in others he must have been much
assisted. But the whole mass shows how wide were his views, and
how great must have been his influence on the language, the
literature, and the intellectual progress of his country.

Of his poetry, we possess, besides works of very doubtful genuineness, two, about one of which there has been little question, and about the other none; his “Cántigas,” or Chants, in honor of the Madonna, and his “Tesoro,” a treatise on the transmutation of the baser metals into gold.

Of the Cántigas, there are extant no less than four hundred and one, composed in lines of from six to twelve syllables, and rhymed with a considerable degree of exactness.[44] Their measure and manner are Provençal. They are devoted to the praises and the miracles of the Madonna, in whose honor the king founded in 1279 a religious and military order;[45] and in devotion to whom, by his last will, he directed these poems to be perpetually chanted in the church of Saint Mary of Murcia, where he desired his body might be buried.[46] Only a few of them have been printed; but we have enough to show what they are, and especially that they are written, not in the Castilian, like the rest of his works, but in the Galician; an extraordinary circumstance, for which it does not seem easy to give a satisfactory reason.

[44] Castro, Biblioteca, Tom. II. p. 632, where he speaks of the
MS. of the Cántigas in the Escurial. The one at Toledo, which
contains only a hundred, is the MS. of which a fac-simile is
given in the “Paleographía Española,” (Madrid, 1758, 4to, p.
72,) and in the notes to the Spanish translation of Bouterwek’s
History (p. 129). Large extracts from the Cántigas are found in
Castro, (Tom. II. pp. 361, 362, and pp. 631-643,) and in the
“Nobleza del Andaluzia” de Argote de Molina, (Sevilla, 1588,
fol., f. 151,) followed by a curious notice of the king, in Chap.
19, and a poem in his honor.

[45] Mondejar, Memorias, p. 438.

[46] Mondejar, Mem., p. 434. His body, however, was in fact
buried at Seville, and his heart, which he had desired should
be sent to Palestine, at Murcia, because, as he says in his
testament, “Murcia was the first place which it pleased God I
should gain in the service and to the honor of King Ferdinand.”
Laborde saw his monument there. Itinéraire de l’Espagne, Paris,
1809, 8vo, Tom. II. p. 185.

The Galician, however, was originally an important language in Spain, and for some time seemed as likely to prevail throughout the country as any other of the dialects spoken in it. It was probably the first that was developed in the northwestern part of the Peninsula, and the second that was reduced to writing. For in the eleventh and twelfth centuries, just at the period when the struggling elements of the modern Spanish were disencumbering themselves from the forms of the corrupted Latin, Galicia, by the wars and troubles of the times, was repeatedly separated from Castile, so that distinct dialects appeared in the two different territories almost at the same moment. Of these, the Northern is likely to have been the older, though the Southern proved ultimately the more fortunate. At any rate, even without a court, which was the surest centre of culture in such rude ages, and without any of the reasons for the development of a dialect which always accompany political power, we know that the Galician was already sufficiently formed to pass with the conquering arms of Alfonso the Sixth, and establish itself firmly between the Douro and the Minho; that country which became the nucleus of the independent kingdom of Portugal.

This was between the years 1095 and 1109; and though the establishment of a Burgundian dynasty on the throne erected there naturally brought into the dialect of Portugal an infusion of the French, which never appeared in the dialect of Galicia,[47] still the language spoken in the two territories under different sovereigns and different influences continued substantially the same for a long period; perhaps down to the time of Charles the Fifth.[48] But it was only in Portugal that there was a court, or that means and motives were found sufficient for forming and cultivating a regular language. It is therefore only in Portugal that this common dialect of both the territories appears with a separate and proper literature;[49] the first intimation of which, with an exact date, is found as early as 1192. This is a document in prose.[50] The oldest poetry is to be sought in three curious fragments, originally published by Faria y Sousa, which can hardly be placed much later than the year 1200.[51] Both show that the Galician in Portugal, under less favorable circumstances than those which accompanied the Castilian in Spain, rose at the same period to be a written language, and possessed, perhaps, quite as early, the materials for forming an independent literature.

[47] J. P. Ribeiro, Dissertaçoes, etc., publicadas per órdem da
Academia Real das Sciencias de Lisboa, Lisboa, 1810, 8vo, Tom. I.
p. 180. A glossary of French words occurring in the Portuguese,
by Francisco de San Luiz, is in the Memorias da Academia
Real de Sciencias, Lisboa, 1816, Tom. IV. Parte II. Viterbo
(Elucidario, Lisboa, 1798, fol., Tom. I., Advert. Preliminar.,
pp. viii.-xiii.) also examines this point.

[48] Paleographía Española, p. 10.

[49] A. Ribeiro dos Santos, Orígem, etc., da Poesía Portugueza,
in Memorias da Lett. Portugueza, pela Academia, etc., 1812, Tom.
VIII. pp. 248-250.

[50] J. P. Ribeiro, Diss., Tom. I. p. 176. It is _possible_ the
document in App., pp. 273-275, is older, as it appears to be
from the time of Sancho I., or 1185-1211; but the next document
(p. 275) is _dated_ “Era 1230,” which is A. D. 1192, and is,
therefore, the oldest _with a date_.

[51] Europa Portugueza, Lisboa, 1680, fol., Tom. III. Parte IV.
c. 9; and Diez, Grammatik der Romanischen Sprachen, Bonn, 1836,
8vo, Tom. I. p. 72.

We may fairly infer, therefore, from these facts, indicating the vigor of the Galician in Portugal before the year 1200, that, in its native province in Spain, it is somewhat older. But we have no monuments by which to establish such antiquity. Castro, it is true, notices a manuscript translation of the history of Servandus, as if made in 1150 by Seguino, in the Galician dialect; but he gives no specimen of it, and his own authority in such a matter is not sufficient.[52] And in the well-known letter sent to the Constable of Portugal by the Marquis of Santillana, about the middle of the fifteenth century, we are told that all Spanish poetry was written for a long time in Galician or Portuguese;[53] but this is so obviously either a mistake in fact, or a mere compliment to the Portuguese prince to whom it was addressed, that Sarmiento, full of prejudices in favor of his native province, and desirous to arrive at the same conclusion, is obliged to give it up as wholly unwarranted.[54]

[52] Bibl. Española, Tom. II. pp. 404, 405.

[53] Sanchez, Tom. I., Pról., p. lvii.

[54] After quoting the passage of Santillana just referred to,
Sarmiento, who was very learned in all that relates to the
earliest Spanish verse, says, with a simplicity quite delightful,
“I, as a Galician, interested in this conclusion, should be glad
to possess the grounds of the Marquis of Santillana; but I have
not seen a single word of any author that can throw light on the
matter.” Memorias de la Poesía y Poetas Españoles, Madrid, 1775,
4to, p. 196.

We must come back, therefore, to the “Cántigas” or Chants of Alfonso, as to the oldest specimen extant in the Galician dialect distinct from the Portuguese; and since, from internal evidence, one of them was written after he had conquered Xerez, we may place them between 1263, when that event occurred, and 1284, when he died.[55] Why he should have chosen this particular dialect for this particular form of poetry, when he had, as we know, an admirable mastery of the Castilian, and when these Cántigas, according to his last will, were to be chanted over his tomb, in a part of the kingdom where the Galician dialect never prevailed, we cannot now decide.[56] His father, Saint Ferdinand, was from the North, and his own early nurture there may have given Alfonso himself a strong affection for its language; or, what perhaps is more probable, there may have been something in the dialect itself, its origin or its gravity, which, at a period when no dialect in Spain had obtained an acknowledged supremacy, made it seem to him better suited than the Castilian or Valencian to religious purposes.

[55]
Que tolleu
A Mouros Neul e Xeres,

he says (Castro, Tom. II. p. 637); and Xerez was taken in 1263.
But all these Cántigas were not, probably, written in one period
of the king’s life.

[56] Ortiz de Zuñiga, Anales, p. 129.

But however this may be, all the rest of his works are in the language spoken in the centre of the Peninsula, while his Cántigas are in the Galician. Some of them have considerable poetical merit; but in general they are to be remarked only for the variety of their metres, for an occasional tendency to the form of ballads, for a lyrical tone, which does not seem to have been earlier established in the Castilian, and for a kind of Doric simplicity, which belongs partly to the dialect he adopted and partly to the character of the author himself;--the whole bearing the impress of the Provençal poets, with whom he was much connected, and whom through life he patronized and maintained at his court.[57]

[57] Take the following as a specimen. Alfonso beseeches the
Madonna rather to look at her merits than at his own claims, and
runs through five stanzas, with the choral echo to each, “Saint
Mary, remember me!”

Non catedes como
Pequei assas,
Mais catad o gran
Ben que en vos ias;
Ca uos me fesestes
Como quen fas
Sa cousa quita
Toda per assi.
Santa Maria! nenbre uos de mi!

Non catedes a como
Pequey greu,
Mais catad o gran ben
Que uos Deus deu;
Ca outro ben se non
Uos non ei eu
Nen ouue nunca
Des quando naci.
Santa Maria! nenbre uos de mi!

Castro, Bibl., Tom. II. p. 640.

This has, no doubt, a very Provençal air; but others of the
Cántigas have still more of it. The Provençal poets, in fact, as
we shall see more fully hereafter, fled in considerable numbers
into Spain at the period of their persecution at home; and that
period corresponds to the reigns of Alfonso and his father. In
this way a strong tinge of the Provençal character came into the
poetry of Castile, and remained there a long time. The proofs of
this early intercourse with Provençal poets are abundant. Aiméric
de Bellinoi was at the court of Alfonso IX., who died in 1214,
(Histoire Littéraire de la France, par des Membres de l’Institut,
Paris, 4to, Tom. XIX. 1838, p. 507,) and was afterwards at the
court of Alfonso X. (Ibid., p. 511.) So were Montagnagout, and
Folquet de Lunel, both of whom wrote poems on the election of
Alfonso X. to the throne of Germany. (Ibid., Tom. XIX. p. 491,
and Tom. XX. p. 557; with Raynouard, Troubadours, Tom. IV. p.
239.) Raimond de Tours and Nat de Mons addressed verses to
Alfonso X. (Ibid., Tom. XIX. pp. 555, 577.) Bertrand Carbonel
dedicated his works to him; and Giraud Riquier, sometimes called
the last of the Troubadours, wrote an elegy on his death, already
referred to. (Ibid., Tom. XX. pp. 559, 578, 584.) Others might be
cited, but these are enough.

The other poetry attributed to Alfonso--except two stanzas that remain of his “Complaints” against the hard fortune of the last years of his life[58]--is to be sought in the treatise called “Del Tesoro,” which is divided into two short books, and dated in 1272. It is on the Philosopher’s Stone, and the greater portion of it is concealed in an unexplained cipher; the remainder being partly in prose and partly in octave stanzas, which are the oldest extant in Castilian verse. But the whole is worthless, and its genuineness doubtful.[59]

[58] The two stanzas of the Querellas, or Complaints, still
remaining to us, are in Ortiz de Zuñiga, (Anales, p. 123,) and
elsewhere.

[59] First published by Sanchez, (Poesías Anteriores, Tom. I.
pp. 148-170,) where it may still be best consulted. The copy he
used had belonged to the Marquis of Villena, who was suspected
of the black art, and whose books were burnt on that account
after his death, temp. John II. A specimen of the cipher is
given in Cortinas’s translation of Bouterwek (Tom. I. p. 129).
In reading this poem, it should be borne in mind that Alfonso
believed in astrological predictions, and protected astrology by
his laws. (Partida VII. Tít. xxiii. Ley 1.) Moratin the younger
(Obras, Madrid, 1830, 8vo, Tom. I. Parte I. p. 61) thinks that
both the Querellas and the Tesoro were the work of the Marquis
of Villena; relying, first, on the fact that the only manuscript
of the latter known to exist once belonged to the Marquis; and,
secondly, on the obvious difference in language and style between
both and the rest of the king’s known works,--a difference which
certainly may well excite suspicion, but does not much encourage
the particular conjecture of Moratin as to the Marquis of
Villena.

Alfonso claims his chief distinction in letters as a writer of prose. In this his merit is great. He first made the Castilian a national language by causing the Bible to be translated into it, and by requiring it to be used in all legal proceedings;[60] and he first, by his great Code and other works, gave specimens of prose composition which left a free and disencumbered course for all that has been done since,--a service perhaps greater than it has been permitted any other Spaniard to render the prose literature of his country. To this, therefore, we now turn.

[60] Mariana, Hist., Lib. XIV. c. 7; Castro, Bibl., Tom. I.
p. 411; and Mondejar, Memorias, p. 450. The last, however, is
mistaken in supposing the translation of the Bible printed at
Ferrara in 1553 to have been that made by order of Alfonso, since
it was the work of some Jews of the period when it was published.

And here the first work we meet with is one that was rather compiled under his direction, than written by himself. It is called “The Great Conquest beyond Sea,” and is an account of the wars in the Holy Land, which then so much agitated the minds of men throughout Europe, and which were intimately connected with the fate of the Christian Spaniards still struggling for their own existence in a perpetual crusade against misbelief at home. It begins with the history of Mohammed, and comes down to the year 1270; much of it being taken from an old French version of the work of William of Tyre, on the same general subject, and the rest from other less trustworthy sources. But parts of it are not historical. The grandfather of Godfrey of Bouillon, its hero, is the wild and fanciful Knight of the Swan, who is almost as much a representative of the spirit of chivalry as Amadis de Gaul, and goes through adventures no less marvellous; fighting on the Rhine like a knight-errant, and miraculously warned by a swallow how to rescue his lady, who has been made prisoner. Unhappily, in the only edition of this curious work,--printed in 1503,--the text has received additions that make us doubtful how much of it may be certainly ascribed to the time of Alfonso the Tenth, in whose reign and by whose order the greater part of it seems to have been prepared. It is chiefly valuable as a specimen of early Spanish prose.[61]

[61] La Gran Conquista de Ultramar was printed at Salamanca, by
Hans Giesser, in folio, in 1503. That additions are made to it
is apparent from Lib. III. c. 170, where is an account of the
overthrow of the order of the Templars, which is there said to
have happened in the year of the Spanish era 1412; and that it
is a translation, so far as it follows William of Tyre, from an
old French version of the thirteenth century, I state on the
authority of a manuscript of Sarmiento. The Conquista begins
thus:--

“Capitulo Primero. Como Mahoma predico en Aravia: y gano toda la
tierra de Oriente.

“En aql. tiēpo q̄ eraclius emperador en Roma q̄ fue buē Xpiano,
et mātuvo gran tiēpo el imperio en justicia y en paz, levantose
Mahoma en tierra de Aravia y mostro a las gētes necias sciēcia
nueva, y fizo les creer q̄ era profeta y mensagero de dios, y que
le avia embiado al mundo por saluar los hombres qēle creyessen,”
etc.

The story of the Knight of the Swan, full of enchantments, duels,
and much of what marks the books of chivalry, begins abruptly
at Lib. 1. cap. 47, fol. xvii., with these words: “And now the
history leaves off speaking for a time of all these things, in
order to relate what concerns the Knight of the Swan,” etc.;
and it ends with Cap. 185, f. lxxx., the next chapter opening
thus: “Now this history leaves off speaking of this, and turns
to relate how three knights went to Jerusalem,” etc. This story
of the Knight of the Swan, which fills 63 leaves, or about a
quarter part of the whole work, appeared originally in Normandy
or Belgium, begun by Jehan Renault and finished by Gandor or
Graindor of Douay, in 30,000 verses, about the year 1300. (De
la Rue, Essai sur les Bardes, etc., Caen, 1834, 8vo, Tom. III.
p. 213. Warton’s English Poetry, London, 1824, 8vo, Vol. II. p.
149. Collection of Prose Romances, by Thoms, London, 1838, 12mo,
Vol. III., Preface.) It was, I suppose, inserted in the Ultramar,
when the Ultramar was prepared for publication, because it was
supposed to illustrate and dignify the history of Godfrey of
Bouillon, its hero; but this is not the only part of the work
made up later than its date. The last chapter, for instance,
giving an account of the death of Conradin of the Hohenstauffen,
and the assassination in the church of Viterbo, at the moment
of the elevation of the host, of Henry, the grandson of Henry
III. of England, by Guy of Monfort,--both noticed by Dante,--has
nothing to do with the main work, and seems taken from some later
chronicle.

Castilian prose, in fact, can hardly be said to have existed earlier, unless we are willing to reckon as specimens of it the few meagre documents, generally grants in hard legal forms, that begin with the one concerning Avilés in 1155, already noticed, and come down, half bad Latin and half unformed Spanish, to the time of Alfonso.[62] The first monument, therefore, that can be properly cited for this purpose, though it dates from the reign of Saint Ferdinand, the father of Alfonso, is one in preparing which, it has always been supposed, Alfonso himself was personally concerned. It is the “Fuero Juzgo,” or “Forum Judicum,” a collection of Visigoth laws, which, in 1241, after his conquest of Córdova, Saint Ferdinand sent to that city in Latin, with directions that it should be translated into the vulgar dialect, and observed there as the law of the territory he had then newly rescued from the Moors.[63]

[62] There is a curious collection of documents, published by
royal authority, (Madrid, 1829-33, 6 tom. 8vo,) called “Coleccion
de Cédulas, Cartas, Patentes,” etc., relating to Biscay and
the Northern provinces, where the Castilian first appeared.
They contain nothing in that language so old as the letter of
confirmation to the Fueros of Avilés by Alfonso the Seventh
already noted; but they contain materials of some value for
tracing the decay of the Latin, by documents dated from the year
804 downwards. (Tom. VI. p. 1.) There is, however, a difficulty
relating both to the documents in Latin and to those in the
early modern dialect; e. g. in relation to the one in Tom. V. p.
120, dated 1197. It is, that we are not certain that we possess
them in precisely their _original_ form and integrity. Indeed,
in not a few instances we are sure of the opposite. For these
Fueros, Privilegios, or whatever they are called, being but
arbitrary grants of an absolute monarch, the persons to whom they
were made were careful to procure confirmations of them from
succeeding sovereigns, as often as they could; and when these
confirmations were made, the original document, if in Latin, was
sometimes translated, as was that of Peter the Cruel, given by
Marina (Teoría de las Cortes, Madrid, 1813, 4to, Tom. III. p.
11); or, if in the modern dialect, it was sometimes copied and
accommodated to the changed language and spelling of the age.
Such confirmations were in some cases numerous, as in the grant
first cited, which was confirmed thirteen times between 1231 and
1621. Now it does not appear from the published documents in
this Coleccion what is, in each instance, the true date of the
particular version used. The Avilés document, however, is not
liable to this objection. It is extant on the original parchment,
upon which the confirmation was made in 1155, with the original
signatures of the persons who made it, as testified by the most
competent witnesses. See _post_, Vol. III., Appendix (A), near
the end.

[63] Fuero Juzgo is a barbarous phrase, which signifies the
same as Forum Judicum, and is perhaps a corruption of it.
(Covarrubias, Tesoro, Madrid, 1674, fol., _ad verb._) The first
printed edition of the Fuero Juzgo is of 1600; the best is that
by the Academy, in Latin and Spanish, Madrid, 1815, folio.

The precise time when this translation was made has not been decided. Marina, whose opinion should have weight, thinks it was not till the reign of Alfonso; but, from the early authority we know it possessed, it is perhaps more probable that it is to be dated from the latter years of Saint Ferdinand. In either case, however, considering the peculiar character and position of Alfonso, there can be little doubt that he was consulted and concerned in its preparation. It is a regular code, divided into twelve books, which are subdivided into titles and laws, and is of an extent so considerable and of a character so free and discursive, that we can fairly judge from it the condition of the prose language of the time, and ascertain that it was already as far advanced as the contemporaneous poetry.[64]

[64] See the Discurso prefixed to the Academy’s edition, by Don
Manuel de Lardizabal y Uribe; and Marina’s Ensayo, p. 29, in Mem.
de la Acad. de Hist., Tom. IV., 1805. Perhaps the most curious
passage in the Fuero Juzgo is the law (Lib. XII. Tít. iii. Ley
15) containing the tremendous oath of abjuration prescribed to
those Jews who were about to enter the Christian Church. But
I prefer to give as a specimen of its language one of a more
liberal spirit, viz., the eighth Law of the Primero Titolo, or
Introduction, “concerning those who may become kings,” which in
the Latin original dates from A. D. 643: “Quando el rey morre,
nengun non deve tomar el regno, nen facerse rey, nen ningun
religioso, nen otro omne, nen servo, nen otro omne estrano, se
non omne de linage de los godos, et fillo dalgo, et noble et
digno de costumpnes, et con el otorgamiento de los obispos, et
de los godos mayores, et de todo el poblo. Asi que mientre que
fórmos todos de un corazon, et de una veluntat, et de una fé,
que sea entre nos paz et justicia enno regno, et que podamos
ganar la companna de los angeles en el otro sieglo; et aquel que
quebrantar esta nuestra lee sea escomungado por sempre.”

But the wise forecast of Saint Ferdinand soon extended beyond the purpose with which he originally commanded the translation of the old Visigoth laws, and he undertook to prepare a code for the whole of Christian Spain that was under his sceptre, which, in its different cities and provinces, was distracted by different and often contradictory _fueros_ or privileges and laws given to each as it was won from the common enemy. But he did not live to execute his beneficent project, and the fragment that still remains to us of what he undertook, commonly known by the name of the “Setenario,” plainly implies that it is, in part at least, the work of his son Alfonso.[65]

[65] For the Setenario, see Castro, Biblioteca, Tom. II. pp.
680-684; and Marina, Historia de la Legislacion, Madrid, 1808,
fol., §§ 290, 291. As far as it goes, which is not through the
first of the seven divisions proposed, it consists, 1. of an
introduction by Alfonso; and 2. of a series of discussions on the
Catholic religion, on Heathenism, etc., which were afterwards
substantially incorporated into the first of the Partidas of
Alfonso himself.

Still, though Alfonso had been employed in preparing this code, he did not see fit to finish it. He, however, felt charged with the general undertaking, and seemed determined that his kingdom should not continue to suffer from the uncertainty or the conflict of its different systems of legislation. But he proceeded with great caution. His first body of laws, called the “Espejo,” or “Mirror of all Rights,” filling five books, was prepared before 1255; but though it contains within itself directions for its own distribution and enforcement, it does not seem ever to have gone into practical use. His “Fuero Real,” a shorter code, divided into four books, was completed in 1255 for Valladolid, and perhaps was subsequently given to other cities of his kingdom. Both were followed by different laws, as occasion called for them, down nearly to the end of his reign. But all of them, taken together, were far from constituting a code such as had been projected by Saint Ferdinand.[66]

[66] Opúsculos Legales del Rey Alfonso el Sabio, publicados,
etc., por la Real Academia de la Historia, Madrid, 1836, 2 tom.
fol. Marina, Legislacion, § 301.

This last great work was undertaken by Alfonso in 1256, and finished either in 1263 or 1265. It was originally called by Alfonso himself “El Setenario,” from the title of the code undertaken by his father; but it is now always called “Las Siete Partidas,” or The Seven Parts, from the seven divisions of the work itself. That Alfonso was assisted by others in the great task of compiling it out of the Decretals, and the Digest and Code of Justinian, as well as out of the Fuero Juzgo and other sources of legislation, both Spanish and foreign, is not to be doubted; but the general air and finish of the whole, its style and literary execution, must be more or less his own, so much are they in harmony with whatever else we know of his works and character.[67]

[67] “El Setenario” was the name given to the work begun in the
reign of St. Ferdinand, “because,” says Alfonso, in the preface
to it, “all it contains is arranged by sevens.” In the same way
his own code is divided into seven parts; but it does not seem
to have been cited by the name of “The Seven Parts” till above a
century after it was composed. Marina, Legislacion, §§ 292-303.
Preface to the edition of the Partidas by the Academy, Madrid,
1807, 4to, Tom. I. pp. xv.-xviii.

The Partidas, however, though by far the most important legislative monument of its age, did not become at once the law of the land.[68] On the contrary, the great cities, with their separate privileges, long resisted any thing like a uniform system of legislation for the whole country; and it was not till 1348, two years before the death of Alfonso the Eleventh, and above sixty after that of their author, that the Partidas were finally proclaimed as of binding authority in all the territories held by the kings of Castile and Leon. But from that period the great code of Alfonso has been uniformly respected.[69] It is, in fact, a sort of Spanish common law, which, with the decisions under it, has been the basis of Spanish jurisprudence ever since; and becoming in this way a part of the constitution of the state in all Spanish colonies, it has, from the time when Louisiana and Florida were added to the United States, become in some cases the law in our own country;--so wide may be the influence of a wise legislation.[70]

[68] Much trouble arose from the attempt of Alfonso X. to
introduce his code. Marina, Legislacion, §§ 417-419.

[69] Marina, Legis., § 449. Fuero Juzgo, ed. Acad., Pref., p.
xliii.

[70] See a curious and learned book entitled “The Laws of
the Siete Partidas, which are still in Force in the State of
Louisiana,” translated by L. Moreau Lislet and H. Carleton, New
Orleans, 1820, 2 vols. 8vo; and a discussion on the same subject
in Wheaton’s “Reports of Cases in the Supreme Court of the United
States,” Vol. V. 1820, Appendix; together with various cases in
the other volumes of the Reports of the Supreme Court of the
United States, e. g. Wheaton, Vol. III. 1818, p. 202, note (a).
“We may observe,” says Dunham, (Hist. of Spain and Portugal, Vol.
IV. p. 121,) “that, if all the other codes were banished, Spain
would still have a respectable body of jurisprudence; for we
have the experience of an eminent advocate in the Royal Tribunal
of Appeals for asserting, that, during an extensive practice of
twenty-nine years, scarcely a case occurred which could not be
virtually or expressly decided by the code in question.”

The Partidas, however, read very little like a collection of statutes, or even like a code such as that of Justinian or Napoleon. They seem rather to be a series of treatises on legislation, morals, and religion, divided with great formality, according to their subjects, into Parts, Titles, and Laws; the last of which, instead of being merely imperative ordinances, enter into arguments and investigations of various sorts, often discussing the moral principles they lay down, and often containing intimations of the manners and opinions of the age, that make them a curious mine of Spanish antiquities. They are, in short, a kind of digested result of the opinions and reading of a learned monarch, and his coadjutors, in the thirteenth century, on the relative duties of a king and his subjects, and on the entire legislation and police, ecclesiastical, civil, and moral, to which, in their judgment, Spain should be subjected; the whole interspersed with discussions, sometimes more quaint than grave, concerning the customs and principles on which the work itself, or some particular part of it, is founded.

As a specimen of the style of the Partidas, an extract may be made from a law entitled “What meaneth a Tyrant, and how he useth his power in a kingdom when he hath obtained it.”

“A tyrant,” says this law, “doth signify a cruel lord, who by force, or by craft, or by treachery, hath obtained power over any realm or country; and such men be of such nature, that, when once they have grown strong in the land, they love rather to work their own profit, though it be in harm of the land, than the common profit of all, for they always live in an ill fear of losing it. And that they may be able to fulfil this their purpose unencumbered, the wise of old have said that they use their power against the people in three manners. The first is, that they strive that those under their mastery be ever ignorant and timorous, because, when they be such, they may not be bold to rise against them nor to resist their wills; and the second is, that they be not kindly and united among themselves, in such wise that they trust not one another, for, while they live in disagreement, they shall not dare to make any discourse against their lord, for fear faith and secrecy should not be kept among themselves; and the third way is, that they strive to make them poor, and to put them upon great undertakings, which they can never finish, whereby they may have so much harm, that it may never come into their hearts to devise any thing against their ruler. And above all this, have tyrants ever striven to make spoil of the strong and to destroy the wise; and have forbidden fellowship and assemblies of men in their land, and striven always to know what men said or did; and do trust their counsel and the guard of their person rather to foreigners, who will serve at their will, than to them of the land, who serve from oppression. And, moreover, we say, that, though any man may have gained mastery of a kingdom by any of the lawful means whereof we have spoken in the laws going before this, yet, if he use his power ill, in the ways whereof we speak in this law, him may the people still call tyrant; for he turneth his mastery which was rightful into wrongful, as Aristotle hath said in the book which treateth of the rule and government of kingdoms.”[71]

[71] Partida II. Tít. I. Ley 10, ed. Acad., Tom. II. p. 11.

In other laws, reasons are given why kings and their sons should be taught to read;[72] and in a law about the governesses of king’s daughters, it is declared:--

[72] Partida II. Tít. VII. Ley 10, and Tít. V. Ley 16.

“They are to endeavour, as much as may be, that the king’s daughters be moderate and seemly in eating and in drinking, and also in their carriage and dress, and of good manners in all things, and especially that they be not given to anger; for, besides the wickedness that lieth in it, it is the thing in the world that most easily leadeth women to do ill. And they ought to teach them to be handy in performing those works that belong to noble ladies; for this is a matter that becometh them much, since they obtain by it cheerfulness and a quiet spirit; and besides, it taketh away bad thoughts, which it is not convenient they should have.”[73]

[73] Partida II. Tít. VII. Ley 11.

Many of the laws concerning knights, like one on their loyalty, and one on the meaning of the ceremonies used when they are armed,[74] and all the laws on the establishment and conduct of great public schools, which he was endeavouring, at the same time, to encourage, by the privileges he granted to Salamanca,[75] are written with even more skill and selectness of idiom. Indeed, the Partidas, in whatever relates to manner and style, are not only superior to any thing that had preceded them, but to any thing that for a long time followed. The poems of Berceo, hardly twenty years older, seem to belong to another age, and to a much ruder state of society; and, on the other hand, Marina, whose opinion on such a subject few are entitled to call in question, says, that, during the two or even three centuries subsequent, nothing was produced in Spanish prose equal to the Partidas for purity and elevation of style.[76]

[74] Partida II. Tít. XXI. Leyes 9, 13.

[75] The laws about the Estudios Generales,--the name then given
to what we now call Universities,--filling the thirty-first
Título of the second Partida, are remarkable for their wisdom,
and recognize some of the arrangements that still obtain in many
of the Universities of the Continent. There was, however, at that
period, no such establishment in Spain, except one which had
existed in a very rude state at Salamanca for some time, and to
which Alfonso X. gave the first proper endowment in 1254.

[76] Marina, in Mem. de la Acad. de Hist., Tom. IV., Ensayo, p.
52.

But however this may be, there is no doubt, that, mingled with something of the rudeness and more of the ungraceful repetitions common in the period to which they belong, there is a richness, an appropriateness, and sometimes even an elegance, in their turns of expression, truly remarkable. They show that the great effort of their author to make the Castilian the living and real language of his country, by making it that of the laws and the tribunals of justice, had been successful, or was destined speedily to become so. Their grave and measured movement, and the solemnity of their tone, which have remained among the characteristics of Spanish prose ever since, show this success beyond all reasonable question. They show, too, the character of Alfonso himself, giving token of a far-reaching wisdom and philosophy, and proving how much a single great mind happily placed can do towards imparting their final direction to the language and literature of a country, even so early as the first century of their separate existence.[77]

[77] As no more than a fair specimen of the genuine Castilian of
the Partidas, I would cite Part. II. Tít. V. Ley 18, entitled
“Como el Rey debe ser granado et franco”: “Grandeza es virtud que
está bien á todo home poderoso et señaladamente al rey quando
usa della en tiempo que conviene et como debe; et por ende dixo
Aristóteles á Alexandro que él puñase de haber en si franqueza,
ca por ella ganarie mas aina el amor et los corazones de la
gente: et porque él mejor podiese obrar desta bondat, espaladinol
qué cosa es, et dixo que franqueza es dar al que lo ha menester
et al que lo meresce, segunt el poder del dador, dando de lo suyo
et non tomando de lo ageno para darlo á otro, ca el que da mas de
lo que puede non es franco, mas desgastador, et demas haberá por
fuerza á tomar de lo ageno quando lo suyo non compliere, et si de
la una parte ganare amigos por lo que les diere, de la otra parte
serle han enemigos aquellos á quien lo tomare; et otrosi dixo que
el que da al que non lo ha menester non le es gradecido, et es
tal come el que vierte agua en la mar, et el que da al que lo non
meresce es como el que guisa su enemigo que venga contra él.”