Book Review - The Lions of Al-Rassan

So not only am I writing a blog but this is first e-book I've ever read.  Guess I am finally entering the modern middle ages.  Next thing you know, I might start checking FB more than once or twice a month.  I still prefer to hold and read paper books.  However, I've come to the unfortunate conclusion that I can't afford to buy all of the books I'd like to read, nor do I have the space to store them.  However, the Orange County Public Library has a lot of books that interest me, and many of them are only available in e-book format.  I guess they don't have infinite storage capacity either.  This is one of those books that was only available as an e-book.

The Lions of Al-Rassan
Guy Gavriel Kay
(HarperCollins 1995, epub 2012)

Guy Gavriel Kay is one of my favorite authors.  I think I may have even reviewed one of his more recent works back when I was doing the review in the Revelry.  Kay is a Canadian author of fantasy.  One of his earliest works of "high fantasy" is the trilogy The Fionavar Tapestry which may be familiar to some readers.  I read this series and found it entertaining but the books of his I most enjoy are the ones where he uses history to inspire his characters and stories.  However, rather than writing and out and out historical fiction, he has created an alternate world that is unapologetically inspired by medieval Europe and the Mediterranean world.  In Kay, Al-Rassan is a parallel to Andalusia, Esperana is Spain, Ferrieres is France, Batiara is Italy, Sarantium parallel to the Byzantine Empire.  He has also created parallels to the three major religions of the middle ages.  Thus, the Jaddites who worship the "Sun" are the stand-ins for Christians, the Asharites are the people of the desert parallel to the Muslims, and the the Kindath are the 'Wanderers" and this world's Jews.  While there are some few fantasy elements in these historically inspired novels, such as brief encounters with the Fey or old gods, or in this novel a character with an unreliable power of prophecy, the historical is much more important to Kay.  By setting his novels in a fantasy setting he has more freedom to address medieval individuals and cultures without having to adhere to specific events.  Kay also states in an essay he wrote on this subject (Home and Away 1999, http://brightweavings.ca/ggk/globe/) that he feels he can better relate these themes from the past to his modern readers by means of fantasy.

The Lions of Al-Rassan is inspired by Moorish Spain.  In this story, Asharite Caliphate that once dominated the peninsula has broken up into mini-kingdoms and city states while the once native Jaddites, driven into the north and northwest, and themselves split into competing kingdoms, have in the intervening centuries begun to reconquer lost territory and assert rising dominance over the Asharite statelets.  Meanwhile the Kindath minority lives on the fringes, given grudging acceptance among the Asharites as long as they pay their taxes and otherwise keep to theirselves.  This is the period that modern scholars call the Convivencia, a time when at least among the elite there was some tolerance and respect among the peoples and cultures even amidst their political and religious conflicts.  However, the convivencia is not so much enlightened idealism but a function of the fact that in this fractured land no one people or kingdom is powerful enough to assert absolute dominance so that a kind of cultural equilibrium.

Their are four main characters that dominate the story.  The first is Rodrigo, the Jaddite captain from one of the Esperanan kingdoms, whom the author bases on the historic El Cid.  Due to the politics of Esperana, he has been exiled and he and his company are now serving as mercenaries in the Asharite city-state of Ragosa.  Ragosa represents the ideal of the convivencia (perhaps as Cordoba did in the days of the Calipahate...), rich, jaded, a cultured trading city where an Asharite king rules with the assistance of a Kindath chancellor defended by both Asharite and Jaddite mercenaries.  Enter Ammar ibn Khairan, assassin and statesman, also exiled after a coup has overthrown the Asharite king he served.  These two men, the best and most talented of their peoples, should be natural enemies but are throne together in a doomed friendship that you know at the outset cannot last.  The third major character is Jehane bet Ishak, a Kindath physician in service to both Ragosa and the mercenary company, who admires and is admired by these two champions.  Finally the fourth major character is Alvar de Pellino.  Son of a minor knight living in the rural borderlands, he has grown up on stories of knightly glory, of vanquishing the Asharites and restoring the glory of Jad to Esperana.  He is new to Rodrigo's company where he develops a crush on the Kindath doctor and while living amongst the mercenaries in a cosmopolitan city learns that the world is not as black and white as he thought it was.

Outside forces are active that will disrupt this equilibrium.  The Jaddite Esperanan kingdoms are growing in power and the petty Asharite states are forced to pay them tribute.  In order to hold onto their power, the largest of the Asharite states invite in fundamentalist Asharite tribesmen from across the straits from Al-Rassan.  These tribesmen, living in the deserts and mountains, consider their own fellow Asharites pampered and decadent and their is no room in their faith for unbelievers.  Meanwhile, in the other Jaddite kingdoms to the north of Esperana, a crusade is being organized to recapture the Jaddite holy land in the east from the Asharites.  Priests from Ferrieres come to encourage the Esperanan kings to cease their own conflicts and fight their common Asharite enemy in their own midst.  The kings of Esperana, being more pragmatic than their fellow religious from the north, are suspicious of these priests as they realize it is one thing to conquer in the name of religion and another thing to rebuild and rule after the conquest is complete.  As the story progresses, their are pogroms against the Kindath, massacres by both Asharites and Jaddites, and the eventual passing of convivencia.  Meanwhile our heroes attempt to maintain friendships amidst divided loyalties of kingdom and faith.

Book Review - The Account

Many years ago I had a book review column in the Darkwater Revelry.  The idea behind it was I would review recent-ish books that I thought would be of interest to Scadians.  I reviewed histories, historical fiction novels, a couple sci-fi/fantasy novels that I felt were clearly influenced by historical events or individuals, and even a literary novel where the character was in a medieval reenactment group much like the SCA.  Ilene asked that I resurrect my column for the blog and I thought I'd give it a try.  The format will be similar to what I did in the past subject-wise meaning my taste in generas is all over the map but I don't promise that what I'm reviewing will be especially current.  I hope that you find my reviews relevant to Scadian life, in and out of garb, and that you are inspired to check out these works or similar works for yourself.

The Account:  Alvar Nunez Cabeza de Vaca's Relacion
Martin A. Favata & Jose B. Fernandez (trs.)
(Arte Publica Press 1993)


The Relacion was written in 1542, with a second publication in 1555, by Alvar Nunez Cabeza de Vaca who with three companions was the first Spaniard to travel overland across North America.  This journey, which took from 1528-1536, predates De Soto's coming to Florida or Coronado's exploration of what is now the southwest US.   The account was done as a report to the Spanish Crown of Cabeza de Vaca's experiences on the journey and the lands and peoples he encountered.

The new Spanish governor of Florida left Cuba in 1527 with five ships to explore the territory.  Cabeza de Vaca served as treasurer and provost marshal for the expedition.  They landed in a large bay in Florida, possibly present day Sarasota or more likely Tampa Bay.  The governor made the ill-fated decision to abandon contact with the ships and strike out overland.  The expedition traveled up the west coast of Florida with the governor, against the advice of Cabeza de Vaca, antagonizing the Native Americans along the way.  They would eventually arrive at the Timucuan village of Apalachee, near present day Tallahassee.  Due to conflicts with the natives and lack of supplies, the Spaniards build four rafts, commanded by the governor, Cabeza de Vaca, and two other officers, and attempt to travel by water to New Spain (Mexico!).  Somewhere in the vicinity of the Mississippi delta, a storm scatters the rafts, the governor abandons his men, and Cabeza de Vaca ends up washed ashore in what is thought to be present day Texas.

This begins the main part of Cabeza de Vaca's odyssey.  He will make and lose contact with the other castaways.  He will spend a great deal of time as a virtual slave to one group of natives on the "Isle of Misfortune" (Galveston Island?) before breaking free of them and, along with two other Spaniards and a Moorish slave, travel across Texas before finally arriving in Mexico.

This chronicle remains important because it not only recounts the hardships endured on this incredible journey but it serves as one of the first eyewitness accounts of the Native American peoples and customs of the times.  Cabeza de Vaca witnesses hunting and gathering practises, marriage customs, and warfare and raiding between tribes.  Despite his time on the "Isle of Misfortune," he is extremely sympathetic to the natives.  Most seem to have treated him as best they could, sharing what little they had to subsist upon with him and his companions.  Unlike many of his compatriots, he speaks out against the ill treatment of the natives, both with the incidents of hostility in Florida and the exploitation of the natives he finds in New Spain.  Cabeza de Vaca's account is also extremely humble, especially when compared to the accounts of other explorers of the time.

If this account has any weakness, it is how much Cabeza de Vaca does not tell about his trip from Florida to Mexico.  After all, he chronicles an eight year journey in barely 130 pages.  One longs to hear more details about the many native tribes he encounters as well as more about the land he traveled. 

Besides being one of the first descriptions of Native Americans, this history also has what may be the first European description of a hurricane and one of the earliest accounts of lay Christian missionary work in the Americans.  This translation also contains many notes of modern scholarship that seek to match up The Account with specific tribes and locations.  There is also a bibliography that is sure to be helpful with a Spanish or even Native American persona in the early to mid 1500s.