"These Men Are Arabs, But They Have More Clothes On."
Many Saracenic words (chiefly of marine and commercial import) have
survived from this period; I could quote a hundred or more, partly in
the literary language (balio, dogana, etc.), partly in dialect (cala,
tavuto, etc.) and in place-names such as Tamborio (the Semitic Mount
Tabor), Kalat (Calatafimi), Marsa (Marsala).
Dramatic plays with Saracen subjects are still popular with the lower
classes; you can see them acted in any of the coast towns. In fact, the
recollection of these intruders is very much alive to this day. They
have left a deep scar.
Such being the case, it is odd to find local writers hardly referring to
the Saracenic period. Even a modern like l'Occaso, who describes the
Castrovillari region in a conscientious fashion, leaps directly from
Greco-Roman events into those of the Normans. But this is in accordance
with the time-honoured ideal of writing such works: to say nothing in
dispraise of your subject (an exception may be made in favour of
Spano-Bolani's History of Reggio). Malaria and earthquakes and Saracen
irruptions are awkward arguments when treating of the natural
attractions and historical glories of your native place. So the once
renowned descriptions of this province by Grano and the rest of them are
little more than rhetorical exercises; they are "Laus Calabria." And
then - their sources of information were limited and difficult of access.
Collective works like those of Muratori and du Chesne had not appeared
on the market; libraries were restricted to convents; and it was not to
be expected that they should know all the chroniclers of the Byzantines,
Latins, Lombards, Normans and Hohenstaufen - to say nothing of Arab
writers like Nowairi, Abulfeda, Ibn Chaldun and Ibn Alathir - who throw a
little light on those dark times, and are now easily accessible to
scholars.
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