bdul Aziz, who had been made ruler over the
newly conquered territory. The young Moorish prince was soon a slave to
the charms of Egilona, and so great did his love for her become that he
married her, with the promise that he would always regard her as queen
and would never marry again; he never broke that promise. Seville was
his capital, and there his power was so great that the kalif in
Damascus, fearing that he might attempt to rule independently, sent out
men to take his life. These assassins found him so beloved by his
soldiers that they feared to attack him until they had circulated the
rumor that Egilona was about to convert him to the Christian faith and
that he would soon wear a crown upon his head, like any Christian king.
After this story had been spread abroad, the kalif's men followed Aziz
to a small mosque, where he went sometimes to pray, cut off his head,
and showed it in the public place, with the order for his death.

The Goths were driven to the north and west of the peninsula, while the
Moors, in the rich country to the south and east, strengthened their
position and laid the foundations for that empire which was to have such
a long and brilliant history, in the middle of the eighth century the
kalif at Damascus had lost his power to so great an extent that the seat
of government was transferred to Cordova, where Abd-el-Rhaman I. reigned
for more than a quarter of a century as the first kalif of the Moslem
Church resident in Spain. On the borderland there was continual fighting
between the Moors and the Christians, and many are the legends which
tell of this spirited epoch. The Christians had rallied about the
standards of various leaders in the hill countries, and they fought
among themselves quite as much as with the Moslem foe. There are even
stories to the effect that Christian leaders made alliances with the
Moors for more successful forays upon their Christian neighbors, and
there are also legends of shameful peace which was bought at the price
of Christian tribute. Among all these tales of tribute, that which has
most fired the national spirit and inspired the ballad writers is the
story of the tribute of a hundred Christian maidens, which was paid by
King Ramiro. The indignation of the people at this unworthy act and the
reproaches of the Spanish women, who preferred the hardships of war to
this cowardly repose, are well expressed in the following verses from
the ballad which sings of the ces