early period on the coasts of Spain, founding such places as Tartesus (the Tarsliish of the Uil)le) and (Jades, now Cadiz. Next came the Carthaginians, who succeeded in gradualh- subduing no small part of Andalusia, and brought it under subjection to Carthage, B.C. 238. Then followed the conquest of Spain by the Roman arms, two centuries being occupied in almost continual fighting. The Piniic wars are among the most celebrated in his- tory — wars which always more or less atfected the fortunes of .Spain, because of the intimate connection which that country held with Carthage, the rival and foe of Rome. Upon its subjugation the name by which the country had been known, Iberia, was changed to Hispania ; and the whole region, brought under the Roman power, was divided by the river P^bro into two sections, the one called Citerior and the other Ulterior. These two sections Augustus formed into three, giving them the names of B;etica, Lusitania, and Tarraco, the second of these divisions corresponding in large part with what is now Portugal. The Roman emperor, with a wise policy, removed the cohorts of the army, composed mostly of natives of the country, to other and more dis- tant sections of the empire, substituting for them the im- perial legions, and in this way Romanizing the country which he had brought under his subjection. The end aimed at was at length in great measure secured, and Hispania, or Spain, became very largely Roman in spirit and manners, and perhaps the wealthiest and the most productive of all the provinces annexed to the empire, (libbon, quoting from Strabo and Pliny, after alluding to the circumstance that almost " every part of the soil was found pregnant with copper, silver, and gold," says that "mention is made of a mine near Cartagena which yielded every day twenty-five thousand drachms of silver, or about three hundred thousand pounds a year. Twenty thousand pounds' weight of gold was an- nually received from the provinces of Asturia, Galicia, and Lusitania." On the whole, general prosperity at- tended the administration of affairs under the emperors down to the death of Constantine, A.D. 337. Some- what more than a half century passed away when the vast hordes of Northern barbarians, who brought such desolation to the Roman empire, had made no incon- siderable progress in their attacks upon their more civ- ilized neighbors of the South. Spain fell before their victorious onsets. The Vandals, the Suevi, and other Germanic tribes so wasted the country that many parts of it became almost literally a desert. After the con- querors had somewhat restored the desolated region, there came another fierce tribe, the Goths, who under Wallia wrested it from their hands. The tribes which for so many years had hold sway over the land were in part subjugated and in part destroyed or exiled from the country, and the Goths remained masters of nearly the whole of Spain (427).
2. We date the commencement of the second period of the history of Spain at A.D. 427, when, as we have seen, the (ioths were in possession of the country. But that possession was never an undisturbed one. The subju- gated Suevi called to their aid the Romans, and suc- ceeded in recovering a part of the territory they had lost. "The peninsula, having become one great battle- field to three contending hosts — the (ioths, the Romans, and the Suevi — was plunged into the most abject misery, and, from the Pyrenees to the Sea of Africa, was over- spread with innumerable swarms, which, like so many locusts, utterly destroyed the spots on which they set- tled." The names of the (iothic kings which stand out in special prominence during the next century or two are Euric, who ascended the throne in A.D. 400, and was really the founder of the (Jothic kingdom in Spain and its first legislator; Amalaric, the grandson of Euric, A.D. 522, the first king who set up anything like a court in Spain; Recared I, A.D. 587, who induced the (ioths, who had been Arians, to adopt the Catholic faith ; Wamba, A.D. 673, who, anticipating the inroads of the Saracens into Spain, built a fleet to guard the coasts
SPAIN"
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against tlioir attacks; and Roderic, who came into pos- session of tin- throne in A.l). (J)-iO. A party was formcii against liim wliich callt-il to its assistance tlie Arabs dwelling on the north coast of Alrica, in iMauritania, and hence calle<l Moors — a name so memorable in sub- suHjuent Spanish history. A battle. waj;ed for three davs and accompanied with fearful slaughter on both sides, was fought on the plains of .Jeres de la Frontera in July. 71 1. and the (Joths were defeated. Other vic- tories (if the Moors in a few years brought the whole of .Spiiin, with the exception of sonie mountain fast- ness«'s. under tlie dominion of the Jloors. Tlie story of MiNirish ascendency in Spain is too long to rehearse in this place. There were periods of great prosperity under the rule of the Moors. So celebrated became some of their institutions of learning that they were re- sorted to by Christian scholars from all parts of civilized Euro|)e. (iradually the Christians of Spain, who, un- der the general subjugation of the country, had tied to its hills an<l mountains, grew more courageous, and were able not only to stand on the defensive, but even to attack the common f(H?. Three confederated provinces — Xavarre, Castile, and Leon — took up arms against the (oe. and nearly succeedeil in gaining a victory over the Moors in UMJl. A check was given to their hitherto successful career from which they never fully recovered; and henceforth there was very distinctly a Christian Spain in the more northerly sections of the countr^^ and a .Moliainmcdan Spain in the more southerly sec- tions, which were continually at war with each other. Neither side was seldom in perfect accord within its own domains. Petty rivalries existed among both the Christian and the Moorish princes, which prevented long-coniinned success on the side of either party. At last, the Christian princes succeeded in laying aside for a time their )ietty animosities, and formed a league combining all their forces. A sanguinary battle was fought in A.I). 1212 on the plains of Tolosa, in the Sier- ra Moreiia, in which the Moors were defeated. During the next half-century the conquest of the Moors went on. Their territorial limits conliniially grew more re- stricted, until there was left to them little besides the kingdom of (;rana<la. At length, in the year 1482, in the reign of Ferdinand and Isabella, the last sovereign of (Jranada, lioabdil, was defeated, and the empire of the Moors in Spain, after an existence of nearly eight centuries, came to an end.