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A History of The Moslems In Spain – Spanish Islam pdf download

A History of The Moslems In Spain - Spanish Islam
Book Title A History Of The Moslems In Spain
Book AuthorReinhart Dozy
Total Pages822
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LanguageEnglish
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A History of The Moslems In Spain – Spanish Islam By Reinhart Dozy: Translated With A Biographical Introduction; And Additional Notes By Francis Griffin Stokes

Bigraphical introduction

Valenciennes, and the adjoining districts of Hainault, witnessed much fierce fighting during the second half of the sixteenth century. Though defended by strong ramparts and deep moats, the fortress was captured by Phihp de Noircarmes in 1567 and delivered up to the vengeance of his troops.

A HISTORY OF THE MOSLEMS IN SPAIN

Five years later it was wrested from the Spaniards, only to fall again immediately into their hands. But notwithstanding its vicissitudes as a stronghold, Valenciennes was looked upon as a harbor of refuge by the peasants and villagers of its environs.

Harassed by the depredations of a brutal soldiery, and exposed to savage outrages of every kind, the hapless country-folk flocked within its walls to seek comparative security, and many of the refugees who settled there became thrifty and industrious burghers who adopted surnames reminiscent of their ancestral homes.

If it cannot be rigorously proved that from a family of these refugees the immediate forefathers of the historian of Moorish Spain were descended, it is at least extremely probable that such was their origin. The connecting link is ready at hand.

At a short distance from Valenciennes, between Cambrai and Douai, lay the seigneury of Oisy. In a Gazetteer published early in the eighteenth century, it is recorded that the hamlet even then contained seventy-eight inhabitants and that the domain of Oisy formerly gave its name to a noble family which supplied the hereditary Constable of Cambrai.

That many of the inhabitants of the village betook themselves to the town in the troublous times we have referred to, and we’re still proud to speak of themselves as ” Oisy folk,” seems a reasonable inference.

 The conjecture, moreover, is supported by a very apposite fact, for it is certain that in 1603 there was living in Valenciennes one Francois Dozy, or Doizy [d’Oisy], from whom Dr. G. J. Dozy has traced, in an erudite genealogical work recently published,^ the descent of the numerous branches of the family now flourishing in the Netherlands.

It must suffice here to add that in 1647 the family quitted Valenciennes for Holland, and may thenceforth be claimed by the land of their adoption. On February 21, 1820, Sara Maria {nee Van Lelyveld), wife of Francois Jaques Dozy, physician, of Leyden, bore him a son who was christened ” Reinhart Pieter Anne,” but who, as the title pages of his chief works testify, usually contented himself in the afterlife with his first baptismal name. His mother having died when he was nine years old, the boy’s early education was entrusted to Heer Van Veen at Wassenaar, whence he was removed to a school at Hattem.

He made such good progress that at the age of fourteen he became a pupil of Dr. J. J. de Gelder, in order to be prepared for a university career, and so well had the boy employed his time at the preparatory schools that his tutor has recorded that he already had a competent knowledge of French, German, and English. De Gelder was accustomed to teaching the elements of Arabic to those of his pupils who studied Theology, and, observing young Dozy’s aptitude for languages, he offered to instruct him in that tongue. The lad eagerly grasped the opportunity thus afforded him, and studying the subject, as a mere parergon, in his spare time, outstripped all his fellows.

For the rest, it may be recorded that he displayed a linguist’s healthy distaste for mathematics, but that his interest in other branches of knowledge was so wide that his tutor feared lest—in emulation of Whewell, and to the sacrifice of sound scholarship in a limited field—omniscience might become his foible.

In September 1837, Dozy entered the University of Leyden, and in the Faculty of Letters at once attracted the attention of Professor Weijers, a young and brilliant philologist, who with great zeal devoted all his time to his pupils, and hence, while doing admirable work as an able and stimulating lecturer, was not destined to achieve literary fame.

 No teacher could have been better suited to curb Dozy’s tendency to dilettantism than Weijers, who had a passion for minute accuracy as well as a lucid precision of exposition which had no tinge of pedantry, and the master’s insistence on the supreme importance of exactitude had a lifelong influence on the pupil, with whom he read Arabic, Hebrew, Chaldee, and Syriac. The ardent student of eighteen desired, however, to scale forthwith the alluring heights of Oriental poetry.

But Weijers, who looked upon the matter with the eyes of a philologist and a grammarian, dissuaded Dozy from pursuing his too fascinating dream and suggested Arabian history as a preferred subject for him to attack.

The young student, soon growing wearied and bewildered over the barren chronicle of countless battles and the shifting scenes of transient dynasties, not unnaturally became disheartened.

Casting about, therefore, for a more congenial outlet for his energies, he was attracted by the subject of lexicography. Freytag’s Leodcon Arabic-Latinum, though an esteemed work, was meager and unsatisfactory for European students, since it was a mere compilation from Arabic dictionaries, and, being confined to the ” classical ” language of the Koran, its pages might be ransacked in vain for a multitude of words used by later writers.

To enlarge his vocabulary. Dozy accordingly took up the works of Etienne Marc Quatremere and studied them with great thoroughness, giving special attention to the valuable notes, which he learned almost by heart. In December 1841, the Royal Institute proposed as a subject for competition a thesis thus specified:

De vestibus, quibus Arabes utriusque sexus diversis temporibus et in. diversis terris usi sunt, aut etiam nunc utuntur, sic exponatur, ut, post brevem de universis disputationem, singulae secundum ordinem litterarum Arabicarum deinceps recenseatur, earumque forma, materia atque usus explicentur. In short, a monograph on the Arabian costume was demanded.. The subject instantly appealed to young Dozy’s restless intellect. Yet the preliminary labor would be very severe if intrinsically valuable results were to be reached.

 A mass of manuscripts must be consulted, the most intricate researches must be made, and there was little more than a year in which to carry them out. Quite undaunted, however, by the difficulties which confronted him, and undeterred by the warnings of friends, the enthusiastic student flung himself into the task.

So exceptional were the demands which he consequently made upon the resources of the University Library that the authorities—amongst whom was Weijers—were at last constrained to inform Dozy that the supply must be cut short unless he could give a satisfactory reason for his inordinate requisitions.

The question was a most embarrassing one; strict anonymity was imposed on the competitors — and Weijers was one of the adjudicators. Dozy promptly cut the Gordian knot, and informed Weijers, ” unofficially,” of his intention.

The Professor was not a little astonished at his pupil’s audacity; he did not, however, attempt either to dissuade or encourage him, but merely gave him permission to use the library as freely as he desired.

The months flew by, but with the aid of a friendly amanuensis the essay, or rather treatise, was ready just in time. On November 20, 1843, the prize was awarded to the youth of twenty-three.

The conditions under which the treatise had been written naturally prevented it from being as complete as its author desired; but he immediately undertook to remedy its deficiencies, and in 1845 there appeared Dozy’s first published book: Dictionnaire detaille des noms des vetements chez les Arabes— a valuable and brilliant piece of lexicographical work displaying great acumen and an immense width of reading.

The foundation- stone of Dozy’s reputation as a profound scholar was securely laid. Weijers had given a good deal of attention to the writings of the Arabs of Spain, and he early introduced Jose Antonio Conde’s Historia de la dominacion de los Arabes en Espana to his former pupil’s notice. This work must be more fully referred to later; it suffices here to mention that Dozy speedily recognised that it was hopelessly uncritical and teemed with errors.

Forthwith he threw himself with ardor into the study of Spanish. In a letter dated 1841 he had asked for grammar and dictionary of the language, and an edition of Don Quixote; ” for,” he adds, ” Spanish I must learn ! “

Two years later he writes: ” I give up all the time I can spare to Spanish. Thanks to my London Correspondent, I have already formed the best Spanish library in the place. Before collecting the belles-lettres, however, I must get together the books relating to the Middle Ages. . . .

 This will not, I hope, take me long.” This extract can scarcely fail to suggest what was indeed the case, namely, that Dozy possessed that inestimable advantage

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