atest fame lay in its university, founded toward 1215, by
Alfonso IX. of Leon, who was jealous of his cousin Alfonso VIII. of
Castile, the founder of the luckless university of Palencia.

The fate of the last named university has been duly mentioned elsewhere;
that of Salamanca was far different. In 1255 the Pope called it one of
the four lamps of the world; strangers--students from all corners of
Europe--flocked to the city to study. Perhaps its greatest merit was the
study of Arabic and Arabian letters, and it has been said that the study
of the Orient penetrated into Europe through Salamanca alone.

What a glorious life must have been the university city's during the
apogee of her fame! Students from all European lands, dressed in the
picturesque costume worn by those who attended the university, wended
their way through the streets, singing and playing the guitar or the
mandolin; they mingled with dusky noblemen, richly dressed in satins and
silks, and wearing the rapier hanging by their sides; they flirted with
the beautiful daughters of Spain, and gravely saluted the bishop when he
was carried along in his chair, or rode a quiet palfrey. At one time the
court was established in the university city, lending a still more
brilliant lustre to the every-day life of the inhabitants, and to the
sombre streets lined with palaces, churches, colleges, convents, and
monasteries.

Gone! To-day the city lies beneath an immense weight of ruins of all
kinds, that chain her down to the past which was her glory, and impede
her from looking ahead into her future with ambitions and hopes.

The cathedrals Salamanca can boast of to-day are two, an old one and a
comparatively new one; the latter was built beside the former, a
praiseworthy and exceptional proceeding, for, instead of pulling down
the old to make room for the new, as happens throughout the world, the
cathedral chapter convocated an assembly of architects, and was
intelligent enough--another wonder!--to accept the verdict that the old
building, a Romanesque-Byzantine edifice of exceptional value, should
not be demolished. The new temple was therefore erected beside the
former, and, obeying the art impulses of the centuries which witnessed
its construction, is an ogival church spoilt--or bettered--by
Renaissance, plateresque, and grotesque decorative elements.

* * * * *

_The Old Cathedral._--The exact date of the erection of the old see