The Moors regarded green or white as pleasant and well-omened colours, symbolic of the angels and of all good fortune. Perhaps this preference was suggested to them by the cool oasis in the desert. Nevertheless, when Ibn-Hud became ruler of Andalusia, his shields and banners were black, as well as his costume. Black, too, was the colour adopted by the Abbaside Sultans, to whom Ibn-Hud was subject. Under the Beni-Nasr and Beni-Alahmar, this gloomy hue was changed, as we have seen, to purple or to scarlet, though black continued to be used in sign of mourning. [Illustration: V THE TUNIC OF BOABDIL EL CHICO (_National Museum of Artillery, Madrid_)] The chronicle says that Abu-Said, "the Red," who was assassinated at Tablada, under the walls of Seville, by Pedro the Cruel, was clothed in scarlet at the time of that atrocious deed. Boabdil was also clothed in red at the battle of Lucena. The _History of the House of Cordova_, from which I have already quoted, says: "Il était armé d'une forte cuirasse à clous dorés, doublée de velours _cramoisi_, d'un morion teint de _grenat_ et doré.... Sur sa cuirasse était passé un caban de brocart et de velours cramoisi" (Plate v.). Eguilaz quotes a further passage from Hurtado de Mendoza, to prove that red continued to be the official colour of the Moorish rulers of Granada; for when the Moriscos had risen in the Alpujarra, and met together to invest their leaders, Aben-Abu and Aben-Humeya, with the insignia of royalty, they clothed the former in a red costume and the latter in purple, "passing about his neck and shoulders a red token in the form of a scarf."[12] [12] Eguilaz Yanguas, _Les Peintures de l'Alhambra_. As I remarked in speaking of the _tiraz_, the clothing of the Moorish kings of Spain was of the richest quality obtainable, massively wrought, embroidered in colours and in gold, and bearing "sometimes a prince's name, sometimes his device or motto, or even a portrait of himself embroidered on the right breast of his _caban_ or robe, thus following the fashion of the monarchs of Assyria and Persia." SPANISH SILK