1925-02-14 — Page 7

SATURDAY, FEBRUARY 14, 1925.

THE CHINA MAIL.

THE GLORY CORDOVA

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When Rome was in ruins and Europe plunged in the darkness

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of almost total ignorance Cordova," the Magnificent, the capital of the learned Moors in the west, was the resplender? sun of art; learn-metal, la the court were five fountains, ing and all tolerance and wisdom. When so-called Christianity overcame and drave the Moors out of Europe and burned their wonderful libraries and destroyed in Cordova alone some three hundred, and fifty of their magnificent bathing establishments, "as being a relic of barbarism and unnecessary for Christian' people," and razed their artistic palaces, "as for luxurious and beautiful nottains that fell into the basins were per to be the work of the deyil," all progress was at a complete standstill and the blackness of the so-called dark ages Settled down completely Over all of Europe. It put back the civilization of Europe by some hundreds of years.

By LILIAN HAYDEN HIESTON, I

The gloringa masque of Carlorn was the rival of that at Mesra, and even in its ruin to-day is one of the most beautiful buildings in the world. It www too vast und toe superb to be com pletely rained, tay as the conquerors might, and even the Christian king him- self who gave orders for a cathedral to be built within the munque, using the materials at hand, repented and said it

was the most wigked deed of his life to have destroyed evonen portion of such exquisite beauty, and that it was the net of a madman to have erected the church there rather than on some vacant land. The walls around the musque to protect and defend it were watch towers, nine immense gates, and six feet in thkekness and has forty-eight were at one time strongly fortiled.

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Within was another wall and a magni- were of the most beautiful wrought fent court of oranges whose gates

Feach of whose basing was made of one enormous piece of marble, to bring which from the quarries a special in- clined road was built. It took eventy oxen tu haul each piece. bathe the hands before entering a In the Mohammedtan faith, it is obligatory to musique, hence the fountains. ancient times the waters of these foun.

utilized water in so picturesque, a way fumed. Perhaps no"people have ever as the Moors, Even now the visitor to all through southern Spain and in Sicily the ruins of their magnificent palaces is shown the ingenious system by which, in all directors its of perfumed spray directions through the warm air Even the paths ware arched with n perfumed mist of spray so fine bat rendered the air cool without descend-, ing as rain upon the heads of those who walked there. The ruthless conquerors spitefully destroyed, or left so long marvellous irrigation system, and the unused that it went to ruin, the Moors" lovely gardens died, its vineyards perished.. its fertile land became dry and barren, its extensive almond and fruit orchards deteriorated and to-day serve only to show in their tangled wild-sant to lay it. ness what 'ance was there. Cordova from a population of over three hundred sand and its glory had departed, thousand was reduced to thirty: thou

ANE OF THE MA ENTRANCES TO TH COURT OF APA

Beauties Of The Mosque. The stand from which the Koran was read to the faithful, took seven years to make. It was constructed of ebony,

Eight artists designed it and its adorn- sandalwood, Ivory, olive and stron wend, and all the nails were of gold. ing was a labour of love. The Araba (Saracens), were a warlike race. but have given to the world a more exquisite and ethereally lovely architecture," as

Abd-er-Rahman I witness the Taj Mahal and the remnants The famous king who made Cordova of their buildings in Sicily and Spain, the most beautiful city in the world was han any other nation. The world has never seen their ke mosque is a veritable forent of slender the rewarder of all who could add to Within the the patron of art, the lover of wisdom, columns of Jasper, porphyry, lapis inzul the loveliness of his capital, or the and the most beautiful of the world's colour marbles. There are some twelve happiness of his people, Abd-cr-Rabman hundred of these still intact. exquisite corrugated single and doubic

There probably never has been a Moorish horseshoe arches above these. columns give an indescribable effect of

ruler who ruled so wisely and who so lightness and grace, to the long aisles,tributed so lavishly to the joyousness adored learning and art and who con-

direction und some fifteen in the other. of which there are nearly thirty in one of his people. The floor was of the rarest mosaic, Taller Romo and Carthage lived again, rale all the wisdom of the uast and of Under his beneficent

masnic was brought from Constan- much of it in gold. Sixteen tons of science mide enormous strides forward, tinople and the most skilled workmen

every known book copied for his libraries, many palacce was laboriotisly were twelve thousand hanging lamps

The records say there rose for his followers in this city of of real silver, made by the most cele

Cordova, nine hundred bathing estab- brated silversmiths, and in these lamps Rome, were at the service of the people, Hahments, more complete than those of perfumed all was burned continuously. his very wives were chosen for their

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its marvellous palaces and they carried the tale of its magnificence to the uttermost parts of the earth. Venice was a babe in its cradio when Cordova was at the height of its glory. France and Germany were wilds as yet un- touchod by the teachinga of the great Charlomagne who was to come later."

The Koran.

The sacred Koran was kept in a case of solid gold, inlaid with immense rubles, and pearls. Its home when not boing read was in the golden Mih-rab, whose walls and floor were of the purest" gold. On the summit of the graceful minorot was a huge ly of gold and three apples of allver. The present ugly tower was erected by the zealous Christians who built the encroaching church rising from out the mosque liko same great excrescence on a graceful tree. The myriad schools and colleges' wert the same way as the baths and mosques when the Moors were driven from the capital city of Cordova. The only knowledge we have.of them is in the triumphant statements relative to their destruction. The Moors had the, first paved atreets known in Spain, other than the great roads the Romans built. Cordova was at first subject t the Kaliph of Damascus, but soon be came not only independent but the capital of all the Mohammedan world..

I have sat during lang hours in the dreamy mosque among its foreat of columns and tried to imagine it us was with the soft coloured prayer rugs, the swaying silver lamps with the fragrance, the serene and prayerful silences, of Islam, the poetry and beauty of life there: I have wandered through the ruins of the exquisite Mohammadan palaces in Granada and Cadiz and Cordova and fancied them filled with the lovely children and women, and rich learning and their intelligence even with rare Persian rugs and hanging more than for their beauty. There were their vast unglazed windows open to their walls alive with wondrous colour, in Cordova three hundred mosques, each that southern, sunshine and the swel wreat mosque. Even Christian, history the air moist with the fine perfumed one a gem worthy of being near the fragrance of almond trees in blusson. relates of him that he was just and mourned with those saddened exiles enlightened monarch, a brilliant and a return. I think in all my life I have tolerant, wise and merciful, jeaving all this loveliness, never to charming man.

never seen more stately, and im

these proud exiles from their home at periously handsome man than Moorish dragoman in Tangier and he was a descendant of the humblest of bean in the day of its glory! Will the Cordova: What must. the race havá time come when some energetic tourist or digger-into-graves of the future. wonders what queer. race inhabited these States of America? If so will he find plains and hillsides we call our United evidence that we were wise and just and their inveterate enemies say the Moors lovers of beauty and of wisdom as even

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Guadalquivir and is approached by a A Dead City." Cordova is on the bark of the river massive Reman bridge. The atmosphere is warm and full of colour and needs just the airy richness of the dainty Moorish architecture, their gardens and dend and one is vexed to think of what their fountains. To-day the place is it was and is. One sits among the ruins prime. All Islam sent pilgrims to its of its glories and dreams of its golden gorgeous shrines, its splendid collegen, were?

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