*

were distinguished by the white; and the black, as the most adverse, was naturally adopted by the Abbassides. Their turbans and garments were stained with that gloomy colour: two black standards, on pike-staves nine cubits long, were borne aloft in the van of Abu Moslem; and their allegorical names of the night and the shadow obscurely represented the indissoluble union and perpetual succession of the line of Hashem. From the Indus to the Euphrates, the East was convulsed by the quarrel of the white and the black factions the Abbassides were most frequently victorious; but their public success was clouded by the personal misfortune of their chief. The court of Damascus, awakening from a long slumber, resolved to prevent the pilgrimage of Mecca, which Ibrahim had undertaken with a splendid retinue, to recommend himself at once to the favour of the prophet and of the people. A detachment of cavalry intercepted his march and arrested his person; and the unhappy Ibrahim, snatched away from the promise of untasted royalty, expired in iron fetters in the dungeons of Haran. His two younger brothers, Saffah and Almansor, eluded the search of the tyrant, and lay concealed at Cufa, till the zeal of the people and the approach of his Eastern friends allowed them to expose their persons to the impatient public. On Friday, in the dress of a caliph, in the colours of the sect, Saffah proceeded with religious and military pomp to the mosch: ascending the pulpit, he prayed and preached as the lawful successor of Mahomet; and, after his departure, his kinsmen bound a willing people by an oath of fidelity. But it was on the banks of the Zab, and not in the mosch of Cufa, that this important controversy was determined. Every advantage appeared to be on the side of the white faction: the authority of established government; an army of an hundred and twenty thousand soldiers, against a sixth part of that number; and the presence and merit of the caliph Mervan, the fourteenth and last of the house of Ommiyah. Before his accession to the throne, he had deserved, by his Georgian warfare, the honourable epithet of the ass of Mesopotamia (36); and he might have been ranked among the greatest princes, had not, says Abulfeda, the eternal order decreed that moment for the ruin of his family; a decree against which all human prudence and fortitude must struggle in vain. The orders of Mervan were mistaken, or disobeyed the return of his horse, from which he had dismounted on a necessary occasion, impressed the belief of his death; and the enthusiasm of the black squadrons was ably conducted by Abdallah,

(36) Al Hemar. He had been governor of Mesopotamia, and the Arabic proverb praises the courage of that warlike breed of asses who never fly from an enemy. The surname of Mervan may justify the comparison of Homer (Iliad A. 557, &c.), and both will silence the moderns, who con sider the ass as a stupid and ignoble emblem (D'Herbelot, Bibliot. Orient. p. 558.).

*He is called Abdullah or Abul Abbas in the Tarikh Tebry. Price, vol. i. p. 609. Saffah or

Saffauh (the sanguinary) was a name which he acquired after his bloody reign, vol. ii. p. 1.—M.

Fall of the

Ommiades,

A. D. 750,

Feb. 10.

Revolt of
Spain,

the uncle of his competitor. After an irretrievable defeat, the caliph escaped to Mosul; but the colours of the Abbassides were displayed from the rampart; he suddenly repassed the Tigris, cast a melancholy look on his palace of Haran, crossed the Euphrates, abandoned the fortifications of Damascus, and, without halting in Palestine, pitched his last and fatal camp at Busir on the banks of the Nile (37). His speed was urged by the incessant diligence of Abdallah, who in every step of the pursuit acquired strength and reputation: the remains of the white faction were finally vanquished in Egypt; and the lance, which terminated the life and anxiety of Mervan, was not less welcome perhaps to the unfortunate than to the victorious chief. The merciless inquisition of the conqueror eradicated the most distant branches of the hostile race: their bones were scattered, their memory was accursed, and the martyrdom of Hossein was abundantly revenged on the posterity of his tyrants. Fourscore of the Ommiades, who had yielded to the faith or clemency of their foes, were invited to banquet at Damascus. The laws of hospitality were violated by a promiscuous massacre: the board was spread over their fallen bodies; and the festivity of the guests was enli– vened by the music of their dying groans. By the event of the civil war the dynasty of the Abbassides was firmly established; but the Christians only could triumph in the mutual and common loss of the disciples of Mahomet (38).

Yet the thousands who were swept away by the sword of war Spa. might have been speedily retrieved in the succeeding generation, if the consequences of the revolution had not tended to dissolve the power and unity of the empire of the Saracens. In the proscription of the Ommiades, a royal youth of the name of Abdalrahman alone escaped the rage of his enemies, who hunted the wandering exile from the banks of the Euphrates to the vallies of Mount Atlas. His presence in the neighbourhood of Spain revived the zeal of the white faction. The name and cause of the Abbassides had been first vindicated by the Persians: the West had been pure from civil arms; and the servants of the abdicated family still held, by a precarious

(37) Four several places, all in Egypt, bore the name of Busir, or Busiris, so famous in Greek fable. The first, where Mervan was slain, was to the west of the Nile, in the province of Fium, or Arsinoe; the second in the Delta, in the Sebennytic nome; the third, near the pyramids; the fourth, which was destroyed by Dioclesian (see above, vol. i. p. 326.), in the Thebais. I shall here transcribe a note of the learned and orthodox Michaelis: Videntur in pluribus Ægypti superioris urbibus Busiri Coptoque arma sumpsisse Christiani, libertatemque de religione sentiendi defendisse, sed succubuisse quo in bello Coptus et Busiris diruta, et circa Esnam magna strages edita. Bellum narrant sed causam belli ignorant scriptores Byzantini, alioqui Coptum et Busirim non rebellasse dicturi, sed causam Christianorum suscepturi (Not. 211. p. 100.), For the geography of the four Busirs, see Abulfeda (Descript. Egypt. p. 9. vers. Michaelis. Gottinga, 1776, in 4to.), Michaelis (Not. 122-127. p. 58-63.), and D'Anville (Mémoire sur l'Égypte, p. 85. 147. 205.).

(38) See Abulfeda (Annal. Moslem. p. 136-145.), Eutychius (Annal. tom. ii. p. 392. vers. Pocock), Elmacin (Hist. Saracen. p. 109-124.), Abulpharagius (Hist. Dynast. p. 134-140.), Roderic of Toledo (Hist. Arabum, c. xviii. p. 33.), Theophanes (Chronograph. p. 356, 357. who speaks of the Abbassides under the names of Χωρασάνιται and Μαυροφόροι), and the Bibliotheque of D'Herbelot, in the articles Ommiades, Abbassides, Mærvan, Ibrahim, Saffah, Abou Moslem.

tenure, the inheritance of their lands and the offices of government. Strongly prompted by gratitude, indignation, and fear, they invited the grandson of the caliph Hashem to ascend the throne of his ancestors; and, in his desperate condition, the extremes of rashness and prudence were almost the same, The acclamations of the people. saluted his landing on the coast of Andalusia; and, after a successful struggle, Abdalrahman established the throne of Cordova, and was the father of the Ommiades of Spain, who reigned above two hundred and fifty years from the Atlantic to the Pyrenees (39). He slew in battle a lieutenant of the Abbassides, who had invaded his dominions with a fleet and army: the head of Ala, in salt and camphire, was suspended by a daring messenger before the palace of Mecca; and the caliph Almansor rejoiced in his safety, that he was removed by seas and lands from such a formidable adversary. Their mutual designs or declarations of offensive war evaporated without effect; but instead of opening a door to the conquest of Europe, Spain was dissevered from the trunk of the monarchy, engaged in perpetual hostility with the East, and inclined to peace and friendship with the Christian sovereigns of Constantinople and France. The example of the Ommiades was imitated by the real or fictitious progeny of Ali, the Edrissites of Mauritania, and the more powerful Fatimites of Africa and Egypt. In the tenth century, the caliphate. the chair of Mahomet was disputed by three caliphs or commanders of the faithful, who reigned at Bagdad, Cairoan, and Cordova, excommunicated each other, and agreed only in a principle of discord, that a sectary is more odious and criminal than an unbeliever (40).

Triple division of

of the caliphs, A. D.

Mecca was the patrimony of the line of Hashem, yet the Abbassides Magnificence were never tempted to reside either in the birth-place or the city of the prophet. Damascus was disgraced by the choice, and polluted 750-960. with the blood, of the Ommiades; and, after some hesitation, Almansor, the brother and successor of Saffah, laid the foundations of Bagdad (41), the Imperial seat of his posterity during a reign of five hundred years (42). The chosen spot is on the eastern bank of

(39) For the revolution of Spain, consult Roderic of Toledo (c. xviii. p. 34, &c.), the Biblotheca Arabico-Hispana (tom.ii. p. 30. 198.), and Cardonne (Hist. de l'Afrique et de l'Espagne, tom. i. p. 180-197. 205. 272. 232, &c.)..

(40) I shall not stop to refute the strange errors and fancies of Sir William Temple (his Works, vol. iii. p. 371-374. octavo edition) and Voltaire (Histoire Générale, c. xxviii. tom. ii. p. 124, 125. édition de Lausanne), concerning the division of the Saracen empire. The mistakes of Voltaire proceeded from the want of knowledge or reflection; but Sir William was deceived by a Spanish impostor, who has framed an apocryphal history of the conquest of Spain by the Arabs. (41) The geographer D'Anville (l'Euphrate et le Tigre, p. 121-123.), and the Orientalist D'Herbelot (Bibliothèque, p. 167, 168.), may suffice for the knowledge of Bagdad. Our travellers, Pietro della Valle (tom. 1. p. 688-698.), Tavernier (tom. i. p. 230-238.), Thevenot (part ii. p. 209-212.), Otter (tom. i. p. 162-168.), and Niebuhr (Voyage en Arabie, tom. ii. p. 239-271.), have seen only its decay; and the Nubian geographer (p. 204.), and the travelling Jew, Benjamin of Tudela (Itinerarium, p. 112-123. à Const. l'Empereur, apud Elzevir, 1633), are the only writers of my acquaintance, who have known Bagdad under the reign of the Abbassides.

(42) The foundations of Bagdad were laid A. H. 145, A. D. 762. Mostasem, last of the Abbassides, was taken and put to death by the Tartars, A. H. 656, A. D. 1258, the 20th of February.

143) Medinat al Salem, Dar al Salem. Urbs pacis, or, as is more neatly compounded by the Byzantine writers, Eloois Irenonolis). There is some dispute concerning the etymology of Bagdad, but the first syllable is allowed to signify a garden in the Persian tongue; the garden of Dad, a Christian hermit, whose cell had been the only habitation on the spot.

(44) Reliquit in ærario sexcenties millies mille stateres, et quater et vicies millies mille aureos aureos. Elmacin, Hist. Saracen. p. 126. I have reckoned the gold pieces at eight shillings, and the proportion to the silver as twelve to one. But I will never answer for the numbers of Erpenius; and the Latins are scarcely above the savages in the language of arithmetic.

(45)

Herbelot, p. 530. Abulfeda, p. 154. Nivem Meccam apportavit, rem ibi aut nunquam aut

rarissime visam.

(46) Abulfeda, p. 184. 189., describes the splendour and liberality of Almamon. Milton has al

luded to this Oriental custom :

- Or where the gorgeous East, with richest hand,
Showers on her kings Barbaric pearls and gold.

I have used the modern word lottery, to express the Missilia of the Roman emperors, which entitled to some prize the person who caught them, as they were thrown among the crowd.

"upon the Tigris. Nor was the palace itself less splendid, in which were hung up thirty-eight thousand pieces of tapestry, twelve "thousand five hundred of which were of silk embroidered with "gold. The carpets on the floor were twenty-two thousand. An "hundred lions were brought out, with a keeper to each lion (47). "Among the other spectacles of rare and stupendous luxury was a "tree of gold and silver spreading into eighteen large branches, on "which, and on the lesser boughs, sat a variety of birds made of "the same precious metals, as well as the leaves of the tree. While "the machinery affected spontaneous motions, the several birds warbled their natural harmony. Through this scene of mag"nificence, the Greek ambassador was led by the vizir to the foot "of the caliph's throne (48)." In the West, the Ommiades of Spain supported, with equal pomp, the title of commander of the faithful. Three miles from Cordova, in honour of his favourite sultana, the third and greatest of the Abdalrahmans constructed the city, palace, and gardens of Zehra. Twenty-five years, and above three millions sterling, were employed by the founder: his liberal taste invited the artists of Constantinople, the most skilful sculptors and architects of the age; and the buildings were sustained or adorned by twelvehundred columns of Spanish and African, of Greek and Italian marble. The hall of audience was encrusted with gold and pearls, and a great basin in the centre was surrounded with the curious and costly figures of birds and quadrupeds. In a lofty pavilion of the gardens, one of these basins and fountains, so delightful in a sultry climate, was replenished not with water, but with the purest quicksilver. The seraglio of Abdalrahman, his wives, concubines, and black eunuchs, amounted to six thousand three hundred persons; and he was attended to the field by a guard of twelve thousand horse, whose belts and cimeters were studded with gold (49).

In a private condition, our desires are perpetually repressed by poverty and subordination; but the lives and labours of millions are devoted to the service of a despotic prince, whose laws are blindly obeyed, and whose wishes are instantly gratified. Our imagination is dazzled by the splendid picture; and whatever may be the cool dictates of reason, there are few among us who would obstinately refuse a trial of the comforts and the cares of royalty. It may therefore be of some use to borrow the experience of the same Abdalrahman, whose magnificence has perhaps excited our admira

(47) When Bell of Antermony (Travels, vol. i. p. 99.) accompanied the Russian ambassador to the audience of the unfortunate Shah Hussein of Persia, two lions were introduced, to denote the power of the king over the fiercest animals.

(48) Abulfeda, p. 237. D'Herbelot, p. 590. This embassy was received at Bagdad, A. H. 305, A. D. 917. In the passage of Abulfeda, I have used, with some variations, the English translation of the learned and amiable Mr. Harris of Salisbury (Philological Enquiries, p. 363, 364.).

(49) Cardonne, Histoire de l'Afrique et de l'Espagne, tom. i. p. 330-336. A just idea of the taste and architecture of the Arabians of Spain may be conceived from the description and plates of the Alhambra of Grenada (Swinburne's Travels, p. 171-188.).

Its

consequences on private

and public

happiness.