m the fame of his father's and
his own liberality, with the security of their rule, had attracted to
Spain from other regions of Islam, we find in the pages of Al-Makkari
an extensive list of native authors, principally in the departments of
poetry, history, and philology, who are said to be "a few only of the
most eminent who flourished during this reign"--but none of their
names, however noted in their own day, are known in modern Europe.
Nor was the gentler sex, as is usually the case in the lands of Islam,
excluded from the general taste for letters; and one of our author's
chapters is almost entirely filled with a catalogue of the poetesses
who adorned Andalus at this and other periods of its history. One of
these, Mariam or Mary, the daughter of Abu-Yakub Al-ansari, who rose
into celebrity in the latter years of Al-hakem, appears to have been
one of the earliest _bas-bleus_ on record. Independent of her poetical
talents, she gave lectures at her residence at Seville "in rhetoric
and literature; which, united to her piety, virtue, and amiable
disposition, gained her the affection of her sex, and procured her
many pupils: she lived to old age, and died after the 400th year of
the Hejra," (A.D. 1010.) The favourite study of the Moslems, the
divinity and law of the Koran, was cultivated with especial zeal under
a monarch who was himself a rigid observer of its ordinances; and
various anecdotes are related by Al-Makkari of the extraordinary
deference paid by Al-hakem to the eminent theologians who frequented
his court. The Khalif himself "attended public worship every Friday,
and distributed alms to the poor; he laid out large sums in the
construction of mosques, hospitals, and colleges for youth;[21] and
being himself very strict in the observance of his religious duties,
he enforced the precepts of the _Sunnah_ (tradition) throughout his
dominions." With this view, severe edicts were directed against the
use of wine, which had become prevalent among the Andalusian Moslems;
and Al-hakem was with difficulty restrained, by representations of the
ruin which would be thus brought on the cultivators, from ordering the
destruction of all the vines in his dominions. But the reign of this
excellent and enlightened prince lasted only fifteen years; and at his
death, (Sept. 976,) which was caused by the same malady that had
proved fatal to his father, the glory of the house of Umeyyah expired.

[21] Eighty free schools are