Eminent literary and scientific men of Italy, Spain, and Portugal. Vol. 3 (of 3)Shelley, Mary Wollstonecraft
History
Eminent literary and scientific men of Italy, Spain, and Portugal. Vol. 3 (of 3)
Shelley, Mary Wollstonecraft
Authors -- Biography; Scientists -- Biography
Philip II., a bigoted tyrant, drove this portion of his subjects to
despair. Mendoza tells us that just before their revolt, "the
inquisition began to persecute them more than ever. The king ordered
them to quit the Morisco language, and all commerce and communication
one with the other: he took from them their negro slaves, whom they had
brought up with the same kindness as if they had been their children: he
forced them to cast off their Arab dress, in which they held invested a
large capital, and obliged them, at a great expense, to adopt the
Castilian costume. He forced the women to appear with uncovered faces,
opening all that portion of their houses which they were accustomed to
keep closed; and both of these orders appeared intolerable to this
jealous people. It was spread abroad also that he intended to possess
himself of their children, and to educate them in Castile: he forbade
the use of baths, which contributed at once to their cleanliness and
pleasure. Their music, songs, feasts, and weddings, held according to
their manners and customs, and all assemblies of a joyful nature, were
already interdicted; and these new regulations were published without
augmenting the guards, without sending troops, without reinforcing the
garrisons or establishing new ones."[22]
The effect of such a system on a proud and valorous people, passionately
attached to their religion and customs, might be anticipated. The Moors
collected arms secretly, and laid up stores in the rugged mountains of
the Alpujarra: they chose for king the young Fernando de Valor,
descended from their ancient sovereigns, who assumed the name of Aben
Humeya. The progress of the revolt, however, met with various checks,
and they did not receive the aid they expected from the sultan Selim.
Instead, therefore, of taking Granada, their war became guerilla; and
the spirit of vengeance incited them to the exercise of frightful
cruelties, by way of reprisal, on the Christian prisoners who fell into
their hands. An army was sent against them, commanded by don John of
Austria, natural son of Charles V..; Mendoza's nephew, the marquis of
Mondejar, was one of the principal generals under him: Mendoza,
therefore, had full opportunity to learn the details of the war, which
terminated in the success of the Spaniards, whose cruelties rivalled
those of the unfortunate rebels. The Moriscos were put down by the
massacre of several villages, and the selling of the inhabitants of a
whole territory into slavery. This total destruction of the Morisco
people is described by Mendoza, with a truth that prevented his history
from being published until 1610, and even then with great omissions: a
complete edition did not appear till 1776.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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