Spain

ain in the south and in the north, yet have mingled their currents somewhat; but we shall soon find that th

I. At the same time the Moslems were governed by Mohammed abu Abdallah, the son of Yacoub, who had won the great battle of Alarcos. These are names merely, some of which have hardly survived, in connection with great deeds, the lives of those who bore them. But it was permitted Alfonso VIII, in the year 1212, to inflict a defeat upon the Moors

at great event the followers of Mahommed lost steadily in Spain, retreating ever nearer the

o his son Henry I, and under the regency of his daughter Berenguela, who, when Henry was accidentally killed, secured the kingdom for her own son Ferdinand. Two momentous events came to pass at this time-the battle of Tolosa, which drove back the Moslems,

a curious fact that his cousin, Louis of France, son of his mother's sister, and likewise a grandson of Alfons

red their capital, Cordova, in 1236, the city of Jaen in 1246, and at last the "Queen of the Guadalquivir," beautiful Seville (ancient port of the Ph?

o, before he died in 1276, had gained thirty pitched battles with the enemy, and had founded, some say, more than two thousand Christian churches. But he has the cre

been changing, and it was now in a sense crystallized when Alfonso caused the Bible to be translated into the Castilian, as well as works on chemistry and philosophy, and wrote a chronicle of Spain down to the time of

ore his death. His son, Sancho IV, who was as vigorous as his father was feeble, drove the Emir of Morocco back to Africa in 1291, and after a short reign left the kingdom to his son, Ferdinand IV, who, dying in 1

bly devoted himself to the great work bequeathed him by his ancestors. Under him the Castilian frontiers were extended to Gibraltar, the fortress of which he took, in the year 1302. But his

the great victory of the Rio Salado, in 1340, Alfonso retrieved his damaged reputation in the eyes of the people and firmly established the kingdom upon an impregnable basis. The combined hosts of Spanish Moors and Africans had assembled and laid siege to Tarifa, the sout

n in Moorish possession since 1333-but failed to dislodge the enemy, and it was not until more than a hundred years later, in 1462, that it again fell into the hands of the Spaniards. Alfonso doubtless held the ambitious project of ridding the peninsula entirely of the Moors; but his country was not sufficiently united, and one hu

ople than the nobility, his lust, covetousness, and cruelty caused a revolt. He overcame his opponents, but signalled his return to power by the murder of his half-brother, Don Fadrique, his mother, many of his relatives, and his wife. It is charged against him that he cut the throats of the Emir of Granada and fifty of his nobles, while they were his guests under a flag of truce, and committed other atrocious deeds. His half-brother, Henry, having esc

ombat, which ended by Pedro's being stabbed in the back, and pouring out his life-blood at the fratricide's feet. Thus wer

sh Duke of Lancaster, Pedro's son-in-law. At the same time, as enemies, he could count the Kings of Moorish Granada, Aragon, and Navarre. But he defeated the machinations of all these opponents and even

Constance, daughter of Pedro the Cruel and Maria de Padilla) should marry Henry III, who succeeded to the throne of Castile in 1390, and reigned until 1406. The heir of this union was John II, who was King of Castile from 1406 to 1454, and whose chief claim to distinction

had married a daughter of Pedro of Aragon, who was almost as cruel and implacable as Pedro of Castile. Ferdinand, son of John I, and grandson of Henry, became King of Aragon, a