ratify the capricious fancy of a beautiful and beloved mistress,
expended millions, and tasked the labour of thousands, in erecting on
the plain beyond Cordova a fairy palace and city which might bear her
name and be her own. And like a fairy fabric did Az-zahra vanish; for
so utterly was it destroyed, during the wars and civil tumults
attending the fall of the race which raised it, that at the present
day not a stone can be found, not a vestige even of the foundations
traced, to show where it once stood; and all that we know of this
"wondrous freak of magnificence" is drawn from the glowing accounts of
contemporary writers, who saw it during the brief period of its glory.
It is principally from Ibn Hayyan that Al-Makkari has copied the
details of this marvellous structure, with its "15,000 doors, counting
each flap or fold as one," all covered either with plates of iron, or
sheets of polished brass; and its 4000 columns, great and small, 140
of which were presented by the Emperor of Constantinople, and 1013,
mostly of green and rose-coloured marble, were brought from various
parts of Africa. Among the principal ornaments were two fountains
brought from Constantinople, "the larger of gilt bronze, beautifully
carved with basso-relieve representing human figures,"--the smaller
surrounded by twelve figures, made of red gold in the arsenal of
Cordova: they were all ornamented with jewels, and the water poured
out of their mouths. The famous fountain of quicksilver, which could
be set in motion at pleasure, was placed in the _Kasr-al-Kholaifa_, or
hall of the khalifs, "the roof and walls of which were of gold, and
solid but transparent blocks of marble of various colours: on each
side were eight doors fixed on arches of ivory and ebony, ornamented
with gold and precious stones, and resting on pillars of variegated
marble and transparent crystal:--and in the centre was fixed the
unique pearl presented to An-nassir by the Greek Emperor." The mosque
and baths attached to the palace were on a corresponding scale of
magnificence: and the number of inmates, male and female, is said to
have been not less than 20,000. The expenses of the establishment must
have consumed the revenues of a kingdom, if we are to believe the
statement, that 12,000 loaves of bread were daily allowed to feed the
fish in the ponds! "But all this and more is recorded by orators and
poets who have exhausted the mines of eloquence in the description,"
--says A