Note 223 — Chapter XVI

Alcalá de Guadaira; Arabic, Al-Kal’ah, the fort, or castle. A name necessarily often repeated in Spain, where the Goths, who are so proudly remembered, have left so few records of their three hundred years’ dominion in the place-names of the Peninsula, and where the Arab, at all times detested, is yet remembered in the modern names of wellnigh every town, river, and headland in Southern Spain, and in many places throughout the entire Peninsula. The most celebrated of all these castles is, of course, Alcalá de Henares, the birthplace of Cervantes, the seat of the great university of Ximenes. This Alcalá is known as that of Guadaira, i.e. the river of Aira, the Arabic Wady al Aira. The town at the present day, though small, is a very important place, with some eight thousand inhabitants, and over two hundred flour-mills, and is known as the “oven of Seville,” El horno de Sevilla. Carmona—the Roman Carmo and Arab Karmanah—with double the population, was the last stronghold of Peter the Cruel, and is full of historic associations.