The History of the Siege of Lisbon by Jose Saramago

Author:Jose Saramago [Saramago, Jose]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Mariner Books
Published: 1998-09-01T06:00:00+00:00

WITHOUT ANY WARNING, Japanese aeroplanes suddenly made a surprise attack on the United States fleet that was docked in Pearl Harbour, an act of destruction, as everyone knows, that was nothing out of the ordinary regarding the loss of human lives, if we compare it with Hiroshima and Nagasaki, but with catastrophic consequences in terms of material losses, battleships, aircraft-carriers, destroyers, and the rest, a serious financial loss, thirteen ships sunk in all without a single shot being fired seriously, apart from the usual manoeuvres. One remote cause of this naval disaster was having lost, at some hour in that night of ages that guards secrets, having lost, as we were saying, the gentlemanly custom of declaring wars with three days' notice, in order to give the enemy enough time to prepare themselves or, if they preferred, to seek refuge, also so that anyone who might decide to break the truce should not be accused of having sullied military honour. Those times are gone for ever. Because, when all is said and done, it is one thing to attack at dead of night, without either drums or trumpets, but having sent a message, and another to arrive surreptitiously and with blackened weapons, enter gates that have been carelessly left unlocked, and massacre everyone in sight. We know that no one can escape his destiny, and it is obvious that the women and children of Santarém were fated to die that night, this had been agreed between the Allah of the Moors and the God of the Christians, but at least the poor wretches could not complain that they had not been warned, if they remained it was of their own free will, for our good king, had despatched Martim Moab along with two companions to the town of Santarém to warn the Moors that there would be war in three days' time, so there was no guilt on the part of Dom Afonso Henriques when he told his men, before engaging in battle, Kill regardless of sex or age, no matter whether a babe in arms, some senile old man, a young maiden, or a decrepit old woman, because he imagined, having given the notice prescribed in the code, that they might be expecting to find only Moorish warriors awaiting them, all male and in their prime.

Now then, in this episode with which we are concerned, namely, the Siege of Lisbon, any warning would have been superfluous, not only because the peace, in a manner of speaking, had been broken since the capture of Santarém, but also because the objectives of whosoever had assembled this huge army on the hills beyond were clear for all to see, and he had only been prevented from adding several more divisions because of a typographical error aggravated by feelings of resentment and wounded pride. But even so, formalities have to be observed and respected, adapting them to every situation, therefore the king determined that Dom João Peculiar together with Dom Pedro Pitões, and

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