THE UMA YYAD REGIME 203communities coexisted in sufficient physical proximity in the towns
for their religious ideas to be mutually influential. It is possible too
that Jews, driven or persuaded into conversion during the Visigothic
period, still maintained links with their former co-religionists.
The overthrow of the Visigothic kingdom altered the position of
the Christians in the peninsula, in that their religion was no longer
that of the rulers of the state. They thus lost their identification with
the secular power that had been characteristic of the previous period,
and could no longer turn to it for aid in the suppression of hetero-
doxy. However, a complete divorce of church and state does not
seem to have occurred, in that the Umayyad amirs appear to have
had a controlling interest in the appointment of bishops and were
required to give their approval for the holding of councils. Thus
the chancery official Reccimund obtained the bishopric of Elvira
(Granada) from 'Abd al-Ral)man III as his reward for undertaking a
diplomatic mission to Otto I of Germany. This also gave him status in
the eyes of the Christians to whom he was being sent. A number of
councils were held in the ninth century at irregular intervals, although
the acts of only one of them have survived.^48 As well as requiring the
prior sanction of the Muslim ruler for their calling, they were possibly
also attended by Christian officials of the court, as in Visigothic days.
Most of the local Christian communities seem to have been initially
little affected by the conquest. This was largely as a result of the
agreements made by the conquerors with members of the Visigothic
aristocracy then holding regional authority. The name of one of these,
Theodemir, is recorded in a contemporary Latin chronicle, and the
text of a treaty that he made with 'Abd al-'Aziz ibn Milia dated 5 April
713 has been preserved in a thirteenth-century Arabic biographical
dictionary.49 By it the Christian inhabitants of seven towns in south-
east Spain - Orihuela, Valencia, Alicante, Mula, Bigastro, Eyyo (EIche?)
and Lorca - were guaranteed their freedom, under the lordship of
Theodemir, and liberty of their religion, in return for an annual
tribute of one dinar and a specified quantity of cereals, vinegar, honey
and oil per person, with a half rate to be paid for each slave. In
addition they were required not to receive deserters or enemies of
'Abd al-'Aziz, or attack those under his protection. Theodemir is
reported to have visited Damascus to receive confirmation of this
treaty from the caliph in person, and it was still in force in 754 by
which time he had been succeeded by his son Athana(g)ild. A refer-
ence in the Toledan Chronicle of that year to the Goths having elected