Download PDF | Michael B. Barry - Homage to Al-Andalus. The Rise and Fall of Islamic Spain-Andalus Press (2008).
257 Pages
Introduction
It was June in southern Andalucfa. As we walked along the dusty track through remote hills, a cluster of old buildings appeared on a tory. No roofs, just the outline of stone walls. Shards of red bri · la; among rhe surrounding bushes. A few trees provided welcome hade. was this? Ir was a small fortification from rhe rime of al-Andalus, a wa_ -poin on a mule track from the Mediterranean coast. Intrigued, I resolved co iin more information on that era. I later travelled through Spain and saw che wonderful legacy: the exquisite derail of the Alhambra; the unique ambience of the Grear Mosque in Cordoba and more. I looked for a book char would cell the srory. However, apart from a few volumes, mainly of academic bent, chere was no information at this level, complete with full illustration. Driven by a growing fascination I decided to fill the gap. Here is the story of al-Andalus, from A to Z, set out in an accessible form.
Once I had begun my research, I realised char there was an intriguing historical connection with my native West Cork in Ireland: a village, nor more than ten kilometres from where I grew up, had suffered, at least in part, due to the aftermath of the fall of al-Andalus. Baltimore was sacked in 1631 by Barbary pirates and over a hundred souls were taken into slavery. Piracy in the Maghreb expanded enormously after rhe expulsion of the Moriscos from Spain. Many of the Moriscos became pirates and even established a pirate republic in Sale, in (present-day) Morocco. There is another historical connection, too. In West Cork, and all over Ireland, there are many deserted famine villages, visible symbols of oppression and involuntary emigration. As I also learned on my journey, there are despobfados (abandoned villages) dotted around Spain, lefr after the Moriscos were expelled from Spain. My story starts with the Iberian Peninsula before rhe invasion in AD 711.
The rise of the new successful religion of Islam and the resultant conquest of the Peninsula is sketched our. Any resistance of the original inhabitants was extinguished, save char of a tiny part of rhe north. Turbulence and conflict marked the early years of al-Andalus, at char rime a far-flung provincial outpost of the Umayyad Caliphate based in Damascus. Then, in a twist of fare, as the ruling family of the Caliph was overthrown and massacred, a survivor of this massacre managed to seize independent power in al-Andalus. Over the 250 years that followed, the Umayyads in al-Andalus developed a sociery char was sophisticated, learned and technologically advanced. And it came about char, in rhe southern extremities of Europe, brilliance flamed, all the more luminous when set against the reigning obscuriry and backwardness of the rest of the continent.
A new sociery was forged, based on an Islamic foundation and using rhe Arabic language. Ir melded together the Arab and Berber invaders and rhe original Hispano-Iberian inhabitants of rhe Peninsula. In those rimes, Islam was supremely adaptable in terms of raking rhe best of architecture, learning and science and coming up with a new and enhanced derivation. By the middle of the tenth century, Cordoba was to the forefront, rivalled only by Constantinople and Baghdad. Cordoba had mosques, bathhouses, 7 public lighting, sanitation, water supply and libraries. It had sumptuous palaces, advanced craftsmanship and produced luxury goods such as silks and jewellery. It had no rival in the unsanitary, cramped, small capitals of Northern Europe.
The Umayyad Caliphate fell apart at the beginning of the eleventh century. A mass of statelets (the taifas) emerged and began to devour each other. Seizing their opportunity, the Christian kingdoms in the north of Spain began to dominate, expand and extract huge amounts of money from the disparate taifas. The fall ofToledo in 1085 prompted the takeover of al-Andalus by Islamic fundamentalists from the Maghreb - the Almoravids. In time, they were overthrown by a new fundamentalism that was manifested by the Almohads. Despite the rigour of the Almohads, there was still appreciation of literature, art and architecture. The brilliance of al-Andalus shone on the Maghreb where Andalusi technology, arr and architecture flowed sourhwards, a heritage that remains today. A by-product of the fall of Toledo to the Christians was the start of a process that became immeasurably beneficial to western civilisation.
An enlightened Archbishop of Toledo encouraged scholars to come from afar and translate the trove of books in Arabic that was found there. From then on the advanced learning in al-Andalus (which had been built on that of the east and earlier Greek works) was unlocked and disseminated throughout the Christian countries to the north. Europe, in turn, was able to use these Andalusi advances as the foundation for later developments in science and philosophy in the run-up to the Renaissance. The decline of the Almohads in the mid-thirteenth century went hand-inhand with a massive conquest of territory by the Christian kingdoms, ending with Islamic rule being restricted to a sliver of the Peninsula, the Kingdom of Granada, in what is more or less present-day Andaluda.
Nevertheless, the brilliance continued, particularly with the sublimity of the palace-city of the Alhambra. The shine was taken off the brilliance in the last painful hundred years, after the fall of Granada in 1492, when the remaining Muslims were firstly converted forcibly and then summarily expelled. Al-Andalus forms an illustrious part of the history oflslam. It is also part of the Spanish heritage. The Spanish language has inherited a legacy of several thousand words daring from the Arabic of al-Andalus. The placenames across the country - towns, rivers and districts - are an indelible reminder of the time when Arabic was the dominant language. The present-day irrigation systems in Spain are evidence of the technology of that time.
The learning and literature, science, mathematics and medicine were incorporated into European thought and practice. Through the prism of the Mudejar style can still be seen the glory of Andalusi architecture and decoration. Spain today is a vigorous modern country. It is no longer the intolerant mono-faith country that emerged from the Inquisition, in parallel with the expulsion of the Jews and the Muslims. It has shaken off the shackles of Francoism, although still has to fully exorcise the demons of the Civil War or indeed, the centuries-old expulsions. To me, Spain is certainly is a more interesting country as a result of its heritage from al-Andalus. With all its rich culture, Spain has duende. Enjoy this book. Michael B. Barry, Dublin.
Link
Press Here
0 التعليقات :
إرسال تعليق