Chapter XIII: The Caliph of the West

The great embassy to the Spanish caliph arrived at Cordova under command of Digenes Akritas, and was received with all the pomp and dignity that the mighty sovereign of the peninsula could display in his Andalusian capital. It was the policy both of the Roman and of the Arab statesmen to seek to impress their rivals with a full sense of their own high civilization, vast resources, and generous spirit. The deadly feuds that raged between the Ommeyad caliphs of Spain and the Abbassid caliphs of Bagdad, and also with the Fatimite dynasty of Mauritania, inclined the politic Abd-er-Rahman, who, the first of his house, had assumed the sacred and historic title of "Commander of the Faithful," to cultivate a good understanding with the Roman emperor at Byzantium. While Rome was carrying on the internecine warfare with the Moslems of Asia against the redoubtable Seif Eddauleh, the hero of the Hamdanide dynasty, the Basileus was a useful counterpoise in the divided world of Islam, on the principle that "the enemy of my enemy is my friend." The high intelligence of the great caliph and the prosperity of his kingdom, based upon a vast Mediterranean commerce, had made any fanatical hostility to Christians an obsolete and discredited infatuation which the sagacious sultan of Spain repudiated.

The mission which Nicephorus had despatched under orders from the Sacred Palace, but which he neither advised nor approved, was organized on a great scale. Many officers of rank and civil officials were included, and among them Bardas Skleros, commander of the Armenian guards, his young friend, the Varangian Eric, the poetic deacon, always in search of epic "motives," and some of the financiers and diplomatists, who were attached to every great imperial expedition. The Princess Fatima, dejected and indifferent for herself, had been induced to join the party for the sake of her young sister and brother and the ladies of her race, whose obvious interest it was to return to a Moslem court.

At Malaga, the seaport at which the embassy disembarked, it was met by a splendid array of emirs, chamberlains, and officers deputed by the caliph to conduct the Romans to the capital. Even to men accustomed to the shipping of all kinds that filled the Golden Horn and traversed the Hellespont, the fleet, docks, and warehouses of the Arab realm were an impressive sight. The vizier Ahmed conducted the lord warden and his staff by leisurely stages to Cordova. And he did not fail to draw attention to the dense population along the rich valley of the Guadalquivir (or, as they call it, al-Wad ul-Kebir), the profusion of its products, and the active state of agriculture and of manufactures. On the morning of the third day the cavalcade were able, from an eminence, to descry the towers of Cordova itself, as it lay washed by the noble river and surrounded by the spurs of the Sierra Morena mountains: The vizier watched in dignified silence the astonishment of the envoys, which they did not seek to conceal.

The royal city of the Ommeyad caliph appeared, indeed, vast and magnificent even to the inhabitants of Byzantium itself. Far as the eye could reach in that clear and sunny air, the towers, palaces, and mosques of the capital continued in endless variety and picturesque confusion.

"What may be the extent of your city?" asked Digenes of the vizier.

"One of our historians has calculated that it reaches twenty-four miles one way and six on the other, and beyond the city walls are the suburbs in twenty-seven quarters, each quarter having its mosques, markets, and baths for the use of those who live in the district."

And here the poetic deacon, ever keen to get accurate information, begged to be told the number of the inhabitants.

"I would rather not charge my own memory," said the vizier, indifferently, "but my librarian here, Ibn Khaldun, can doubtless give you the figures you seek."

"The inhabitants of the capital," said Ibn Khaldun, "are reckoned now to exceed a thousand thousand. There are three thousand eight hundred mosques, sixty thousand palaces and mansions, two hundred thousand houses of the common people; and for their convenience the city and its suburbs contain seven hundred baths and eighty thousand shops, together with markets, hostelries and caravansaries for merchants and their trains."

The poet, who was already resolved on a description of their visit, in verse, transferred all this to his notebook, when he had been assured by the librarian that it was not the exaggeration of Oriental eulogy, but the sober calculation of economic and historical writers.

At last the entire embassy reached the city, where they were received with interest and curiosity in the crowded streets. The Lady Fatima, her kinswomen, attendants, and slaves, had been consigned to the personal charge of the young Varangian, with a fitting retinue of male and female servitors. Eric, who had received strict instructions to see that the Cretan captives of all ranks were cared for with every possible honor, gazed upon the Lady Fatima with mute adoration; for he was unable to communicate with her in a single word. If he had any instructions to give they were interpreted to her by one of her attendants, who spoke the tongue of Rome, of which Eric himself had but a smattering. The contrast between these two young creatures, the finest types of Northern and Southern beauty, of Scandinavian strength and of Arab fire, struck every eye that fell on them, as they met and exchanged a dignified salute. The Cordovan monarch, like the Byzantine, had long maintained a bodyguard of Northern warriors, mainly Scandinavians, Alemans, or Slavonians, sold as slaves in youth, like the famous Janissaries of modern Turkey. The Spanish Saracens were familiar with the bone and sinew of these fair-haired Norsemen and mountaineers, but they rarely met one of such perfect symmetry and brilliant color as distinguished the young viking in his superb mail of gold. Nor could all the houris of Andalusia match the Lady Fatima in high-bred grace and the pensive and searching power of her eyes.

On the appointed day the ambassador and his following were escorted in state to the caliph's hall of audience. For Digenes himself, and for some of the higher officers, such as Bardas Skleros, of the Armenian guard, men who had seen the most renowned cities, both of the Saracen and of the Roman empires, the magnificence and beauty of the palace of Cordova was not so surprising. But the secretaries, diplomatists, and, above all, the poetic deacon, could not restrain their sense of awe and admiration. The patriotic heart of the poet almost misgave him as he asked himself if the city on the Golden Horn, "guarded of God," and the Sacred Palace of the Basileus itself, really outshone the city and residence of Abd-er-Rahman III. He even put the question in private to Michael, the protocolist, by his side, one of the acutest intellects in the Byzantine chancery.

"Yes, the courts of the caliph have almost as much gold as that of our Cæsar, and their fantastic richness of decoration may astonish the vulgar. But it is the profusion and intricacy of embroidery and lace. There is nothing here of the majesty of the massive colonnades of Santa Sophia, nor of the Golden Gate on our outer walls."

"But what miracles of color and of filigree design do we not see in those painted slabs and carved ceilings," said the poet; "it is like a grove of roses and myrtles in stone and enamel."

"Too much like the silken robes of our parakeimomenos, which cover a huge but emasculated frame," said Michael.

The poet laughed uneasily and looked round instinctively, for even in Spain he felt the risk of a jest at the expense of Bringas.

"And then you will not find there those sublime images of our saints and of Christ and His Mother, such as give so solemn a power to our Christian temples. These Saracen figures, where any living thing is shown, are conventional grotesques. There is neither statuary nor painting of any kind--least of all of women and of the Mother of God. These Hagarenes are worse than our rabid iconoclasts themselves."

The embassy passed on through a series of courts, surrounded by shady cloisters and rich with flowers and blossoming shrubs, along corridors and halls lined with troopers in coat-of-mail and with chamberlains and ushers in embroidered robes, till at last they reached the great hall, where the mighty caliph sat in audience. The salutes and obeisances on both sides were duly performed with all the stately ceremony of Constantinople itself, and with even more grace and reserve of manner. And those who have seen a state durbar in India may attain to some idea of the spectacle it afforded.

The great caliph, the Charlemagne of Saracen Spain, was now at the close of his long rule of half a century. He was seventy-three years of age, and a life of incessant toil and of continual warfare had caused him to look at least ten years older than his actual years. The reception of Digenes was almost the last act of his public life; but, in spite of his infirmities, he insisted on taking his place and doing honor to the lord warden, of whose family history and personal prowess he was perfectly aware.

Abd-er-Rahman III. still looked what he was, the greatest ruler of his age and the noblest type of the Saracen race. In fifty years he had reduced the rebels and traitors within his own dominion, had made vassals of the Christian princelets of north Spain, and had driven back the Mauritanian invaders from Africa. He possessed a magnificent fleet, a powerful army, and a treasury of twenty millions of gold pieces. The police of his realm secured perfect order and peace; the state of agriculture was in the highest degree thriving; commerce and manufactures were equally advanced. Supported by his son and successor, Hakim, and his able minister, Ghalib, the aged monarch received the lord warden right royally, and motioned him to a throne beside himself on the dais.

Then the credentials issued by Nicephorus were read by the chief of the protocol service:

"Illustrious and renowned sovereign, commander of those faithful to the Prophet, I am ordered by our Imperial Majesty, Romanus, to send to your capital city a mission of the chief officers and administrators from the army of Crete, to treat of urgent affairs between our respective realms. I have placed at the head of this embassy the chivalrous lord warden of the eastern marches, Basil Digenes, the akritas, in whose veins are mingled the blood of Saracen emirs and of Armenian princes. He and the noble and learned envoys in this mission will fully explain the objects in view, which are to secure amity and reciprocal concessions between your Majesty and our own Sovereign Lord. We send to the court of your Majesty many eminent persons of both sexes, whom the issues of war, which God above us decrees, have placed in our hands. And we seek an exchange of an equal number of those followers of Christ who are now detained in your realm. Finally, we propose an agreement between our two councils for the better disposal of those Moslems who remain under our rule in Crete, and also of those Christians who abide under your rule in Spain. The issues of the great struggle between the followers of Christ and of the Prophet are in the hands of God, whom we all alike worship and obey. We are His servants and His creatures, and we can do nothing of ourselves save what He permits. In this we can unite in one purpose. And it is our fervent hope that He Who has given your Majesty power and authority so great may guide your counsels to meet in a spirit of amity the proposals we are ordered by our sovereign lord, the Basileus, to submit to your wisdom. And may God the Merciful, the Just, bring this mission to a right end!"

The aged and now infirm caliph bowed his head solemnly, and his white beard flowed over his royal robes; but his eyes showed some of their ancient fire as with a trembling voice he said:

"No envoy from the Basileus of Rome could be more welcome to our court then yourself, lord warden of the marches, whose very name reminds us all of the blending of the races of Christ and of Islam, and whose deeds of valor and chivalry of soul are sung by the poets of Europe and of Asia. It was most fitting that an agreement between our two powers should be intrusted to one who embodies in his own person and in his career of service the qualities which both people so deeply respect. The illustrious lord general of your Basileus is as well known to Islam as to Rome itself. We cannot wonder and complain if his people name him 'the Victorious,' for the most redoubted soldiers of the Prophet have too often felt the weight of his sword. Islam has never met any adversary whom it has reason to hold in such respect. We well know the fiery zeal which burns within his soul, and we can see in the despatch that has been read how little to his taste is the proposal of amity that he has been ordered to submit. But this shall not prevent our willingness to treat and to agree to equitable terms. As Commander of the Faithful, we have our own duties of peaceful government as well as the defence of our realm in war. Our court has statesmen as well as warriors. Peace hath its victories, as well as war. The proposals of your Basileus, with whom we have as yet many bonds of good understanding, shall be referred to our counsellors and not to our soldiers. Nicephorus, 'the Victorious,' has subdued in Crete a tribe who were but rebels to our dynasty, outcasts and fugitives from our rule in Spain. Now that he speaks words of peace, however little they seem natural to his soldier's mouth, they shall be considered and answered by our men of peace. When the time comes he may find in the sons of Arabia and followers of the Prophet a zeal as fiery as that with which he himself is consumed. When that day shall dawn, tell your illustrious general that it is the daily prayer of the Commander of the Faithful that God, the Just, the Almighty, may give the crown of glory to the right."

The aged caliph was visibly affected by the effort he had made to receive the mission; he sank back on his divan exhausted, and was only prevented from fainting by the care of his son, Hakim, and the staff around him. The durbar was hastily closed, and officers of the mission withdrew with appropriate salaams and compliments. They were now placed in the hands of the vizier's secretaries and the librarian, Ibn Khaldun, who were directed to escort them to view the chief sights of the capital. After exploring all the courts and halls of the caliph's palace, they were taken to the famous mosque, which still remains in part in the singular cathedral of Cordova. The vast and stately Court of Oranges had recently been completed, and was adorned with a thousand orange-trees in bloom, at which the Byzantines gazed in delight and wonder. This splendid fruit was not yet acclimatized in Europe, and had been introduced but recently into Andalusia from Syria by the care of Abd-er-Rahman himself. Mixed with roses from Damascus, the groves of oranges in the quadrangular court, shaded with a rich cloister, seemed to the Romans a vision of paradise. Close by rose the exquisite Campanile, which resembled the lower part of that which we know as the Giralda at Seville, though it was in a style of art more solid and severe. And the centre of the Court of Oranges was occupied with the beautiful fountain of African marbles, porcelain, and enamel, which the caliph had only finished within a few years.

But all the surprise of the Romans was doubled as they entered the great mosque itself, which was still being further enlarged and adorned. They found themselves in a forest of marble columns bearing arches in fantastic forms, with exquisite patterns traced in relief and bright with enamel and gold. Again the deacon had recourse to his note-book, and was anxious to learn their number and origin. "There are said to be twelve hundred columns, arranged in eleven aisles; and they have been collected from temples and palaces of the ancients in Spain and Africa, or they have been carved by our artificers from antique models," said the librarian, "but his Highness, the Lord Hakim, is even now enlarging the aisles and carrying them on to double their extent."

Thence the visitors were led into the chapel, adorned with mosaics obtained from Byzantium direct, through the easy munificence of Romanus himself. In the Ceca they were shown the pavement of pure silver, and the exquisite marbles and alabaster with which the shrine was adorned. By special grace of Prince Hakim they were even permitted to look on the sacred copy of the Alcoran which had been used by the Caliph Osman, the successor of the Prophet, and stained with his blood when he fell. From the roof hung two hundred chandeliers, containing ten thousand lamps. And as they passed out into the court-yard from this forest of marble and gold, a vehement debate arose between Michael, the protocolist, and the poetic deacon, whether the solemn vaults of the Holy Wisdom of Justinian could hold their own against the myriad shafts and arabesques of the mosque of the Caliph Abd-er-Rahman.

The younger members of the mission were then conducted through a country crowded with villas, gardens, and orchards, for an hour's ride to the vast palace of Az-zahra, or "The Beautiful," built by the great caliph for his favorite wife. It was constructed entirely of marble of various hues--white, onyx, rose-colored, and green. The courts and fountains were adorned with gold and enamels, and gardens and shady cloisters stretched around. In the palace were four thousand three hundred columns of marble. Into the great hall of the caliphate were eight lofty doors, overlaid with plates of gold and studded with precious stones. And the walls were adorned with carved traceries in alternate squares of ebony and ivory. The separate apartments numbered more than a thousand, and the service of the palace was conducted by thirteen thousand male and six thousand female domestics, while the guard and watch were kept by Slavonians and Northern Janissaries, who were said to number no less than three thousand seven hundred and fifty in all.

In the mean time the deacon, Michael, the protocolist, and other secretaries were conducted by the librarian, Ibn Khaldun, to the great library of the caliph, which at that time was reckoned as the largest and most important collection in the civilized world, and was said to contain four hundred thousand manuscripts. All the works which had been collected by Haroun-al-Rashid and the caliphs of Bagdad, by the Ommeyads of Damascus, as well as by the dynasty of Spain, were here gathered together. Lexicons, biographies, grammars, histories, geographies, rhetoric, works on chemistry, geometry, medicine, astronomy, and poetry--all were in turn exhibited and discussed.

But what impressed the diplomatists most strikingly was the great library of Greek works, from Aristotle and Plato downward, Theophrastus, Galen, Hippocrates, and Appollonius, and complete collections of the astronomical and mathematical works of Archimedes, Hipparchus, Eudoxus, Diophantus, and Ptolemy. These Greek philosophers and physicists were far more highly valued and better understood by the savants of Islam than by the Christians of the empire. The deacon and his diplomatists were not so much astonished to see in the book-cases of Cordova the entire works of Aristotle, Theophrastus, Hipparchus, Galen, and Heron, as a modern scholar would be, for these writers were still to be found for the most part in the libraries of the empire. But they saw with pride and no small surprise that the entire extant writings of the philosophers and physicists of Greece were the ordinary equipment of a Saracen library.

The members of the mission were occupied for days in surveying the capital of the great caliph--its resources, architectural, mechanical, commercial, artistic, and literary. They were shown over the great aqueduct which Abd-er-Rahman III. had recently erected to convey to the city pure spring water from the mountains of the Sierra Morena. His predecessors had already supplied Cordova with abundant aqueducts, fountains, and baths, so that it almost vied with ancient Rome in the age of the Antonines, and was quite as well supplied as Byzantium in the age of Romanus. The new aqueduct had only been completed twenty years before. It rose on three tiers of arches, similar to those of the Aqua Claudia, which spans the Campagna at Rome, and it discharged a constant river of pure water into a vast central reservoir, which supplied public fountains and private palaces. Every mansion of any importance had its garden, fountain, and flowing rivulet. The hydraulic system was, indeed, more complete than what Rome had known in the age of the Cæsars, for the Arabs of Spain were the first engineers of that age. The poet and the young guardsman were particularly delighted with the gardens of Rusafa, which had been stocked with rare plants and flowers from all parts of the world, especially from the gardens of Syria, Persia, India, and Egypt. The orange, the lemon, citron, the almond, and the palm, laurel, and myrtle, were cultivated in sheltered spots and were a never-failing delight to the northern visitors. But that which most fascinated the Byzantines were the wild animals confined in houses connected with the gardens, especially the various kinds of gazelles of the East, the golden-pheasants, the ostrich, the white ibis, the cheetahs, and the lions. The young Varangian was quite excited out of his natural placidity by a hunt of deer by the cheetah, as now used in India, while the poet was equally excited by a kind of race between antelopes which were allowed a free run in an enclosed course.

In the midst of the festivities and the hospitalities a sudden event plunged the whole city in gloom. The aged caliph, exhausted by the effort he had made to receive with dignity the envoys of Nicephorus, had been seized with a succession of fainting fits, in the course of which he had died. His death had been concealed even from the foreign mission until the succession of his son, Hakim II., had been duly secured. And this was carried out with great energy and despatch by the Grand Vizier Ahmed and the commander-in-chief, the Emir Ghalib. In due time the new caliph, having been recognized by the heads of the army, the mosques, and the administration, received in audience Digenes and his officers and suite. After official compliments and addresses, Hakim admitted Digenes to a private audience. With all the zeal of his father for good government, peace, prosperity, and order, the new Commander of the Faithful had an even greater devotion to art, science, and literature, and was conscious that he had a harder task and inferior powers. In reply to the felicitations of the lord warden on the glory of the late caliph's rule, and on the noble empire to which he had now succeeded, Hakim replied, with a sigh:

"Yes, my royal father ruled over his realm for fifty years; and those who look at the power, wealth, renown, and splendor of his caliphate may be disposed to call him one of the happiest of men, with a double measure of the goodness of Allah. But I, who have lived in his home and for long years shared his duties, know too well that he was the most sombre, if not one of the most miserable of men. His favorite wife, for whom the palace of Az-zahra was built and after whom it was named, died before it was completed, and since the death of my elder brother, our father was never seen to smile."

"But was not your brother killed in the hour of victory?" said Digenes.

"Not my eldest brother, Abdallah. He had been so infatuated as to put himself at the head of a revolt, and suffered himself to be proclaimed as caliph by rebels. When defeated and captured, our father in solemn council decided that he must die the death of a traitor to Islam. Our sacred faith is being put in peril by treason in the families of the descendants of the Prophet. It was held to be fatal to our empire of the West if treason were suffered to prosper in the house of the Ommeyads of Andalusia. I myself, my mother and my sisters, threw ourselves on our knees in tears at my father's feet and implored his mercy for my brother, who had been formally named as his successor. It was not to be. He said, 'I am caliph first, and father afterwards. As father I shall weep tears of blood for my son all my life, but as caliph I must purge this fair land of a traitor!' So our brother was bowstrung in the court of the palace, and my father never had a happy day after. Here, see," said Hakim, with tears filling his eyes, "this is a paper attached to my father's testament. It runs thus, and is inscribed in his own scholarly hand: 'Fifty years have I been on this throne. Riches, honors, pleasures have been poured on me, and I have drained them all to the dregs. The sovereigns who are my rivals respect me or fear me--both envy me; for all that men desire has been showered on me by Allah, the Bountiful, the All-merciful. But in all these years of apparent felicity, I can only count fourteen days wherein I have been truly happy. My son, meditate on this, and judge at their true value human grandeur, this world, and man's life.'"

"Our priests talk thus," said Digenes, "but I never heard of an emperor who spoke such words."

"Remember," said Hakim, "that a caliph who descends from the Prophet and occupies his place, is at once a Prophet of Allah and sovereign lord--priest, king, and commander!"

The whole mission were present at the funeral of the great caliph, which was conducted with extraordinary magnificence. Forty thousand troopers in full array on black barbs guarded the procession from the palace to the royal burial-place in the hills outside the walls. The whole population of the city, the suburbs, and the country round came to honor their deceased chief. Banners and trophies of war were displayed in profusion. The funeral procession itself was on foot. First came long files of imaums, sheiks, and learned elders, then a crowd of dervishes, who chanted dirges of plaintive sound, slaves, attendants, and ministers, and, at last, Hakim, the new caliph, on foot and alone before the bier. The coffin of Abd-er-Rahman was covered with a carpet that had once been a relic in the mihrab of Mecca: it was borne on a platform raised on the shoulders of twelve gigantic guards in the uniform of the palace troops. The envoys of Rome gazed on a sight which, accustomed as they were to the vast extent of Constantinople, and to the vehemence of a Byzantine populace, astonished them both by the enormous numbers of the people and by their frenzied expressions of grief. The deacon roundly insisted that more than one million of men and women had witnessed or taken part in the funeral ceremony. As the bier of the great caliph approached the crowd, and even long after it had passed, cries of grief and despair, of Asiatic pungency, and wild notes of agony re-echoed along the streets and across the squares of the city.

"We have seen the passing of a great man--of an emperor truly beloved by his people," said Michael, the protocolist, in a low voice, to the deacon. "What would the funeral of our own beloved lord and master be like, think ye, my friend? Ay, and what would be the funeral of his successor, if successor he is to have? Is it certain that Christ and His Blessed Mother have ordained that the Cross shall prevail over the Crescent forever?"