His last sigh
Sir: I always much enjoy Paul Johnson's columns. They are mostly to the point, witty and knowledgable.
However, in his column of 28 November, he seems to have given too free a rein to his imagination. It was not a Spanish mistress who was provoked by the tears of Boabdil, the last Nasrid sultan of Granada, to spit at him, 'You weep like a woman for what you cannot defend like a man', but Boabdil's own mother.
To this day, the place called El Sospiro del Moro, where Boabdil looked back for the last time on his beloved Granada, still exists.
Furthermore, I doubt very much if Boab- dil had a 'Spanish' mistress. Spain, as such, did not exist at that time. It is, however, quite likely that he did have a seraglio, viz. a harem.
J.H. Baron Mackay
Ary Schefferstraat 29, The Hague, The Netherlands
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