Rodrigo's army was immense; Tarik's only numbered twelve thousand men. The battle took place on the banks of the Wadi-becca; it lasted a week, beginning on July 19th, 711. Two wings of the Spanish army were commanded by Witiza's worthless sons, chiefly manned by malcontents and their serfs. So when the commanders ordered their men to give their backs to the enemy, there was no difficulty on the question of obedience. The centre, commanded by Rodrigo, stood its ground valiantly, but unassisted, at length gave way, and the Turks literally hacked the Christians to pieces. It was an appalling massacre. Rodrigo's fate, as I have said, remains unknown. Did he fly, was he killed? Did he sink into the marsh where his embroidered saddle and silken cloak were found? We hear on one side that Roderick disappeared mysteriously from the battle-field; on the other, that he fought valiantly and when forced to retreat, did so, fighting his way step by step, sword in hand, and fell with his face to the enemy as befits a soldier. He was supposed in this version to have been buried at Visein, and 160 years later, Alfonso the Great, in reconstituting that fallen town, discovered the dust of the defeated monarch with the inscription on a stone--_Hic requiescit Rudericus (ultimus) rex Gothorem_.[8] It is idle now to ask what is true in all these conflicting accounts, or stop to ask which statement is the right one, that Rodrigo was a gallant prince in the prime of life when he began his short reign of one year, or, as an Arabian historian has asserted, a sick and feeble old man of over eighty. His defection or disappearance completed the catastrophy, the most fatal and final in the record of any land, and Tarik profited by the circumstance. Both malcontents and Jews joyfully received him and threw wide open the gates of Toledo to his advance. Hither he came with fresh laurels gathered at Ecija, surrounded with the flower of his army, while he sent around detachments against Cordova, Archidme, and Elvira.