Page:History of the Reign of Ferdinand and Isabella the Catholic Vol. II.djvu/246

222 222 CASTILIAN LITERATURE. PART sometimes even of the rudeness, of a primitive ■ — age. Their merits have raised them to a sort of classical dignity in Spain, and have led to their cultivation by a higher order of writers, and down to a far later period, than in any other country in Europe. The most successful specimens of this imitation may be assigned to the early part of the seventeenth century ; but the age was too late to enable the artist, with all his skill, to seize the true coloring of the antique. It is impossible, at this period, to ascertain the authors of these venerable lyrics, nor can the exact time of their production be now determined ; although, as their subjects are chiefly taken from the last days of the Spanish Arabian empire, the larger part of them was pro- bably posterior, and, as they were printed in collec- tions at the beginning of the sixteenth century, could not have been long posterior, to the capture of Granada. How far they may be referred to the conquered Moors, is uncertain. Many of these wrote and spoke the Castilian with elegance, and there is nothing improbable in the supposition, that they should seek some solace under present evils in the splendid visions of the past. The bulk of this poetry, however, was in all probability the creation of the Spaniards themselves, naturally attracted by the picturesque circumstances in the character and condition of the conquered nation to invest them with poetic interest, "utc'*'"*^' "^^^ Moorish romances fortunately appeared after the introduction of printing into the Peninsula, so that they were secured a permanent existence, in-