The Arab historian[18] thus contemptuously describes the origin of the Christian kingdom: "During Anbasa's administration a despicable barbarian, whose name was Pelayo, rose in the land of Galicia, and, having reproached his countrymen for their ignominious dependence and their cowardly flight, began to stir them up to avenge their past injuries and to expel the Moslems from the land of their fathers. From that moment the Christians of Andalus began to resist the attacks of the Moslems on such districts as had remained in their possession, and to defend their wives and daughters. The commencement of the rebellion happened thus: there remained no city, town, or village in Galicia but what was in the hands of the Moslems, with the exception of a steep mountain on which this Pelayo took refuge with a handful of men; there his followers went on dying through hunger, until he saw their numbers reduced to about thirty men and ten women, having no other food for support than the honey which they gathered in the crevices of the rock which they themselves inhabited like so many bees. However, Pelayo and his men fortified themselves by degrees in the passes of the mountain, until the Moslems were made acquainted with their preparations; but, perceiving how few they were, they heeded not the advice conveyed to them, and allowed them to gather strength, saying, 'What are thirty barbarians, perched up on a rock? They must inevitably die!'" "Would to God!" adds another historian--"Would to God that the Moslems had then extinguished at once the sparks of a fire which was destined to consume the whole dominions of Islam in those parts!"