I. _General Chronicles and Royal Chronicles._--Under such circumstances, we might well anticipate that the proper style of the Spanish chronicle would first appear at the court, or in the neighbourhood of the throne; because at court were to be found the spirit and the materials most likely to give it birth. But it is still to be considered remarkable, that the first of the chronicles in the order of time, and the first in merit, comes directly from a royal hand. It is called in the printed copies “The Chronicle of Spain,” or “The General Chronicle of Spain,” and is, no doubt, the same work earlier cited in manuscript as “The History of Spain.”[229] In its characteristic Prologue, after solemnly giving the reasons why such a work ought to be compiled, we are told: “And therefore we, Don Alfonso, ... son of the very noble King Don Fernando, and of the Queen Doña Beatrice, have ordered to be collected as many books as we could have of histories that relate any thing of the deeds done aforetime in Spain, and have taken the chronicle of the Archbishop Don Rodrigo, ... and of Master Lucas, Bishop of Tuy, ... and composed this book”; words which give us the declaration of Alfonso the Wise, that he himself composed this Chronicle,[230] and which thus carry it back certainly to a period before the year 1284, in which he died. From internal evidence, however, it is probable that it was written in the early part of his reign, which began in 1252; and that he was assisted in its composition by persons familiar with Arabic literature and with whatever there was of other refinement in the age.[231] [229] It is the opinion of Mondejar that the original title of the “Crónica de España” was “Estoria de España.” Memorias de Alfonso el Sabio, p. 464.