Muhammad XII of Granada
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Boabdil (a corruption of the name Abu Abdullah, or, in full, Abu 'abd-Allah Muhammad XII, Arabic: أبو عبد الله محمد الثاني عشر) (b. 1460?; d. 1533) was the last Moorish king of Granada (of the Nasrid dynasty). He was also called el chico, the little, and also el zogoybi, the unfortunate. A son of Abu l-Hasan Ali, king of the taifa of Granada, he was proclaimed king in 1482 in place of his father, who was driven from the land.
Boabdil soon after sought to gain prestige by invading Castile. He was taken prisoner at Lucena in 1483, and only obtained his freedom by consenting to hold Granada as a tributary kingdom under Ferdinand and Isabella, king and queen of Castile and Aragon. The next few years were consumed in struggles with his father and his uncle Abdullah ez Zagal.
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[edit] Surrender of Granada
In 1489 Boabdil was summoned by Ferdinand and Isabella to surrender the city of Granada, and on his refusal it was besieged by the Castilians. Eventually, on 2 January 1492, Granada was surrendered. In most sumptuous attire the royal procession moved from Santa Fe to a place a little more than a mile from Granada, where Ferdinand took up his position by the banks of the Genil. A private letter written by an eyewitness to the bishop of León only six days after the event recorded the scene.
With the royal banners and the cross of Christ plainly visible on the red walls of the Alhambra: …the Moorish king with about eighty or a hundred on horseback very well dressed went forth to kiss the hand of their Highnesses. Whom they received with much love and courtesy and there they handed over to him his son, who had been a hostage from the time of his capture, and as they stood there, there came about four hundred captives, of this who were in the enclosure, with the cross and a solemn procession singing the Te Deum Laudamus, and their highnesses dismounted to adore the Cross to the accompaniment of the tears and reverential devotion of the crowd, not least of the Cardinal and Master of Santiago and the Duke of Cadiz and all the other grandees and gentlemen and people who stood there, and there was no one who did not weep abundantly with pleasure giving thanks to Our Lord for what they saw, for they could not keep back the tears; and the Moorish King and the Moors who were with him for their part could not disguise the sadness and pain they felt for the joy of the Christians, and certainly with much reason on account of their loss, for Granada is the most distinguished and chief thing in the world…
Christopher Columbus seems to have been present; he refers to the surrender on the first page of his Diario de las Derrotas y Caminos:
After your Highnesses ended the war of the Moors who reigned in Europe, and finished the war of the great city of Granada, where this present year [1492] on the 2nd January I saw the royal banners of Your Highnesses planted by force of arms on the towers of the Alhambra, which is the fortress of the said city, I saw the Moorish king issue from the gates of the said city, and kiss the royal hands of Your Highnesses…
[edit] Exile
Legend has it that as the royal party moved south toward exile, they reached a rocky eminence which gave a last view of the delectable city. Boabdil reined in his horse and surveying for the last time the Alhambra and the green valley that spread below he burst into tears. "You do well", said his unsympathetic mother, "to weep like a woman for what you could not defend like a man". The spot from which Boabdil looked for the last time on Granada is still shown, and is known as "the Moor's last sigh" (el último suspiro del Moro).
The vanquished Nasrid was given an estate in Alpujarras, a mountainous area between the Sierra Nevada and the Mediterranean Sea, but he soon crossed the Strait of Gibraltar to Fez, where he died in 1533.
[edit] Boabdil in popular culture
- He was the subject of the three-act opera "Boabdil, der letzte Maurenkönig", Op. 49, written in 1892 by the German composer Moritz Moszkowski.
- Spanish composer Gaspar Cassadó wrote the Lamento de Boabdil for cello and piano, in memory of the moor.
- Andalusian singer-songwriter and poet Carlos Cano dedicated a song to Boabdil in his album Crónicas Granadinas, titled Caída del Rey Chico.
- Salman Rushdie's book, The Moor's Last Sigh, also features consistent references to Boabdil.
- Louis Aragon's book Le Fou d'Elsa renders a dramatized and poetic version of the story of Granada's capture, which includes Boabdil as one of the two main characters present in the novel (Majnun being the other. Elsa, whom it could be argued is the second major character, is absent from the book.)
[edit] See also
[edit] References
- This article incorporates text from the Encyclopædia Britannica Eleventh Edition, a publication now in the public domain.
[edit] External links
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Muhammad XII of Granada
Born: 1460? Died: 1533 |
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| Regnal titles | ||
|---|---|---|
| Preceded by Abu l-Hasan Ali |
Sultan of Granada 1482–1483 |
Succeeded by Abu l-Hasan Ali |
| Preceded by Muhammed XIII |
Sultan of Granada 1487–1492 |
Succeeded by -- |
