Nationalism and Culture (74 page)

In Christian Spain, too, one can see clearly how the tide of cultural development rises and falls according as the power of the state confines its activities within definite limits or assumes a scope which frees it from all internal restrictions and delivers to it all fields of social life. When the Visigoths were defeated by the Arabs a part of their scattered army fled into the mountains of Asturia. There they established a miserable little state from which they kept up constant attacks on the territory occupied by the Arabs. Thus developed that endless war between cross and crescent which lasted over seven hundred years. Out of it arose that cooperation of the church with the nationalistic endeavors of the Spaniards which gave to the later unified Spanish state its characteristic stamp, and to Spanish Catholicism that peculiar structure which it had assumed in no other country.

When, then, in the course of these bloody and bitter struggles the Arabs lost more and more territory, there arose, at the beginning of the twelfth century, in the north and west of the peninsula, a host of other Christian states, like Aragon, Castile, Navarre and Portugal, which, because of unceasing struggles for the throne, were constantly in one another's hair and did not emerge from this internal confusion until, at the end of the fifteenth century, Ferdinand the Catholic, of Aragon, and Isabella of Castile came to reign over the various states. In the smaller states there existed at first the elective monarchy, from which only later evolved hereditary succession to the throne. But even when, by the capture of Granada, the last bulwark of Islam in Spain had fallen and the first foundation for a unified national state had been laid by the marriage of Ferdinand and Isabella, there still elapsed a considerable time before the

monarchy could bring all the social institutions of the country under its control. "In economics, in methods of administration, and from the political point of view it was still no nation," as Garrido remarked. "Its unity was embodied only in the person of the king, who ruled over several kingdoms, of which each had its own legislature, constitution, money, even its own system of weights and measures. . . ." Before the unified national state could develop its full power it had to get rid of the ancient rights of the towns and provinces, whose liberties were anchored in the Fueros or city constitutionsj this was no small job.

When the Arabs had come into the country only a small part of the population, principally the noblemen, had fled into the rough mountainous land to the north. The great majority of the Iberian and Romanic inhabitants, as well as a much greater part of the poorer Gothic population, remained quietly on their ancient homesteads, especially when they saw that the conquerors were treating them with mercy and consideration. Many were even converted to Islam. But all, Moslem and Christian, enjoyed the advantages of the free local administration of the Arabs, Berbers and Syrians5 and this assured them of a wide scope for their love of independence. When, now, the Spaniards in the course of this endless struggle with the Arabs had gained possession of one or another city or a new district, they were compelled to respect the old rights of the community and to leave them undisturbed. In those places where the conquest had been preceded by long battles with the population and had been achieved either by a massacre of the inhabitants or by driving them into flight, the conquerors found it necessary to grant to the new settlers a Fuero which guaranteed to them far-reaching local rights and liberties. This was the only way to get an effective hold on the recaptured territories and attach them to the victors. Spanish literature contains a large number of important works upon the history of these city and country communities and their Fueros^ from which we gather that the city administration rested with the popular assembly, to which the inhabitants were called every Sunday by the ringing of the bells in order to discuss all the public affairs and interests and to adopt resolutions.-'

The spirit which prevailed in these communities was thoroughly democratic and looked zealously after the local rights of the municipality, prepared at any time to defend them by all means at their command and to protect them against the attacks of the nobilit\ and the crown. In these struggles the corporations of the manual laborers of the city played an important partj these constituted everywhere a ver\ useful factor in the rich and changing history of the Spanish municipalities, in which the affairs of the people were incorporated. Thus Zancada remarks:

• Eduardo Hinojosa, El origen del regimen municipal en Castillo y Leon.

Among the various causes of the communal uprising there is one common factor which greatly favored that popular organization. This factor, which commanded great power, was the craft unions of the working population, which had arisen as reaction against the tyranny of the feudal barons, and under whose protection the manual laborer was able to secure respect for his rights} these unions were, in general, an outstanding means for the betterment of the social and economic status of the craftsmen.*

As in other countries at that time, so also in Spain, the municipalities united into larger and smaller federations in order more effectively to protect their ancient rights. Out of these alliances and the city Fueros there developed in the separate Christian states the CorteSy the first attempts at popular representation, which took form in Spain a whole hundred years earlier than in England. In fact, the memory of the free municipalities, the Municipos LibreSy was never completely lost in Spain and stepped into the foreground in almost all the uprisings which periodically disturbed the country for centuries. Even the Cantonalist Revolution of 1873 was undertaken in this spirit. Today there is in all Europe no other country in which the spirit of federalism is so deeply alive in the people as it is in Spain. This is also the reason why the social movements in that land even today are characterized by a libertarian spirit which we no longer find in the same measure in any other country.

It was some time before any definite culture could be noticed at all in the Christian states in the northern part of the Iberian peninsula. Among the remnants of the Visigothic population social life retained for four hundred years very primitive forms, so that one could not speak at all of any higher independent culture among them. Diercks remarks in his Geschichte Sf aniens:

The culture of northern Spain was, then, entirely different from that of the southern part of the peninsula. Here we see all branches of material and spiritual culture come to flower; the state organization, on the other hand, remained at a relatively very low level and was little changed; thus the institutions which were formed in the north carried along with them the development of the state and the exacting control of legal institutions.

This is a fact of the greatest importance. Of its significance, however, Diercks is apparently not at all aware. Exactly because in Arabian Spain the power of the state could never really be centralized, culture was able to develop there undisturbed, while it was for a long time unable to make itself felt in the north where the struggles for political power pushed all other interests into the background. Only after the capture of Zaragossa and Toledo did any great change appear there, and in this the Moorish influence was of decisive importance.

* Praxiteles Zancada, El Obrero en Esfana. Barcelona, 1902, p. 44.

Only Catalonia, and above all, Barcelona, constitute an exception, for they, long before any other Christian state in Spain, reached a high degree of social and intellectual culture. This was owing to their intimate relations with Southern France, which before the crusade against the heretical Albigenses was one of the countries most highly developed, intellectually and culturally, in all Europe. Besides, the Catalonians did not feel themselves bound by the pope's prohibition and they carried on a flourishing trade with the Arabian states of the south, which, of course, brought them into closer contact with Moorish culture. Thus there developed in Catalonia a freer spirit and a higher standard of cultural life than in any of the other Christian states of the peninsula. This difference, of which royal despotism made the Catalonians still more vividly aware by its forcible suppression of their ancient rights and liberties, changed them into sworn enemies of Castile, and created that sharp antagonism between Catalonia and the rest of Spain which has not even yet been completely overcome.

So long as the royal power—which grew constantly firmer after the marriage of Ferdinand of Aragon with Isabella of Castile—was still compelled to respect the ancient rights of the municipalities and the provinces, there flourished in the cities the rich culture which had been transmitted to them by the Arabs and which gradually stimulated them to independent creation. At the beginning of the sixteenth century all the industries were still in full bloom. As Fernando Garrido tells us, the Spaniards had learned wool-combing and dyeing from the Arabs; and the weaves of Leon, Segovia, Burgos, and Estramadura were the best in the world. In the provinces of Cordova, Granada, Murcia, Seville, Toledo, and Valencia the silk industry flourished and supported the greatest part of the local population. Life in the cities resembled the industry of a beehive. And along with the handicrafts the arts, especially architecture, reached a glorious expansion ; the cathedrals of Burgos, Leon, Toledo and Barcelona bear notable testimony to this.

Of course the internal antagonisms of the several states, especially those of Castile, with the other parts of the country were not at once overcome. Therefore the royal power could not at once launch its attack on the municipalities and was often obliged to submit to the control of the Cortes, which alone could supply it with the money that it needed for its undertakings. But the powerful Cardinal Ximenes de Cisneros, Confessor to Queen Isabella, had already planned the campaign against the "special rights" of the municipalities. One of the most eff^ective weapons in the struggle for the triumph of kingly absolutism was the Inquisition, which is often regarded merely as the creature and tool of the church— incorrectly; for the Inquisition was only a special department of the administrative apparatus of the kingdom which helped to strengthen the

power of absolutism and bring it to full expansion. Since in Spain the efforts for the erection of the unified national state were most intimately intergrown with the unity of religious belief, the church and the monarchy worked together. Still, the church was in great measure just a tool in the hands of royal despotism, whose plans it helped to carry out and to which, by its savage fanaticism, it gave that peculiar tone which is lacking to the absolutism of all other countries. In fact, it was by the Spanish kingdom that the Inquisition was first raised to that frightful importance that has loaded it with the curses of all later generations. In his book about modern Spain, Garrido gives us some statistics of the Abbe Montgaillard according to which, from 1481 to 1781, 31,920 persons were burned alive and 16,759 were burned in effigy. The total number of persons who were sacrificed—and whose property was confiscated by the state—reached 341,029. This estimate, Garrido adds, is very moderate.

Ferdinand the Catholic had already tried to impose limitations on the ancient municipal rights in various parts of the country and had been successful in many instances, but he had to proceed cautiously and to conceal his real purposes under all sorts of subterfuges. Under Charles I (the German Emperor, Charles V) the crown continued its efforts in this direction with redoubled zeal, and so brought about the great uprising of the Castilian cities in 1521. At first the rebellion achieved a few small successes, but a little later the army of the Comuneros was disastrously defeated at Villalarj and Juan de Padilla, commander-in-chief of the revolt, was executed. Almost at the same time the revolt of the Ger-maniasy the brotherhoods and craft guilds, in the province of Valencia was put down after a terrific battle. As a result of these victories the crown was in a position to put a bloody end to the ancient municipal constitutions which had been in force in the Christian states of Spain since the beginning of the eleventh century. When, therefore, under Philip II the revolt of the Aragonese was drowned in the blood of the rebels of Saragossa and Chief Justice Lanuza was beheaded at the command of the constitution-smashing despot, absolutism was firmly in the saddle and was never seriously shaken by the later uprisings in other parts of the country.

So the unified national state was established under the dominion of an absolute monarchy. Spain became the first of the great powers of the world, and its political exertions strongly influenced European policy. But with the triumph of the unified Spanish state and the brutal suppression of all local rights and liberties there dried up the sources of all material and intellectual culture, and the country sank into a condition of hopeless barbarism. Even the inexhaustible streams of gold and silver that flowed in from the young Spanish colonies in America could not check the cultural decline i they only hastened it.

By the cruel expulsion of the Moors and the Jews Spain had lost its

best craftsmen and farmers j the ingenious irrigation works fell into ruin, and the most fertile regions were transformed into deserts. Spain, which as late as the first half of the sixteenth century was still exporting grain to other countries, was already in 1610 compelled to import it, despite the fact that the population was steadily diminishing. After the capture of Granada there were dwelling in the country almost twelve million persons. Under Philip II the number of inhabitants had fallen to about eight million. A census which was taken in the second half of the seventeenth century gave 6,843,672 inhabitants. Although formerly Spain could not only supply her own colonies with all the manufactured products they needed but could also export considerable quantities of silks, cloth and other manufactures to foreign countries, at the end of the seventeenth century three-fourths of her people were clothed in foreign fabrics. Industry had fallen into utter ruin, and in Castile and other regions the government was compelled to lease land to foreigners. Above all, under the unceasing oppression men had lost all joy in work. Whoever could in any way manage it became a monk or a soldier, and the intellectual darkness was impenetrable. Labor was so despised that the Academy of Madrid in 1781 offered a prize for an essay which should show that a useful handicraft in no way degraded a man nor derogated from his personal dignity. According to Garrido: