|Abd ar-Rahman I| |al-HakamI| |Abd ar-Rahman II and II| |al-HakamII| |Conclusion|
Unfortunately though, the splendor of al-Andalus could not of remained eternal with the progressive political and social problems such as disunity and squabbling over leadership. It was the inevitable consequence, therefore, that towns and cities fell slowly to invaders and the death-blow soon came to the Islamic dynasty with the marriage of King Ferdinand and Isabella who slowly managed to occupy the very heart of al-Andalus and reach Granada. It is in this region that famous poets and writers such as Washington Irving are inspired to write in a historic climax and extremly melancholic tribute to the closing of this 800-year old golden age. Washington Irving writes of the last Emir, Boabdil, of Granada, where in an extract he says:
"I rode slowly thence across the Vega to a village where the family and household of the unhappy king awaited him, for he had sent them forward on the preceding night from the Alhambra, that his mother and wife might not participate in his personal humilation, or be exposed to the gaze of the conqerors. Following on in the route of the melancholy band of royal exiles, i arrived at the foot of a chain of barren and dreary heights, forming the skirt of the Al-puxarra Mountains. From the summit of one of these unfortunate Boabdil took his last look at Granada; it bears a name expressive to his sorrows, "La Cuesta de las Lagrimas," (the hill of tears). Beyond it, a sandy road winds across a rugged cheerless waste, doubly dismal to the unhappy monarch, as it led to exile. I spurred my horse to the summit of a rock, where Boabdil uttered his last sorrowful exclamation, as he turned his eyes from taking their farewell gaze: it is still denominated "el ultimo suspio del Moro," (the last sigh of the moor). Who can wonder at his anguish at being expelled from such a kingdom and such an abode? With the Alhambra seemed to be yielding up all honours of his line, and all the glories and delights of life. It was here, too, that his affliction was embittered by the reproach of his mother, Ayxa, who had so often assisted him in time of peril, and had vainly sought to instill into him her own resolute spirit. "You do well," said she, "to weep as a woman over what you could not defend as a man."
References:
- "Moorish architecture in Andalusia," Marianne Barrucand, Achim Bednor
- "Tales of the Al-Hambra," Washington Irving, Editorial Everest, S.A.
- "Islamic culture and Civilisation" at http://www.auvsi.org/zenithco
