The cycling of history............

For neither the first nor the last time in history, heady success sowed some of the seeds of its own demise, and what had been a court that proudly displayed its community's wealth and superiority began to be perceived as a self-indulgent and narcissistic court unwilling or unable to tend directly to the governance of that community.

-Maria Rose Menocal,  The Ornament Of The World:  How Muslims, Jews, and Christians Created A Culture Of Tolerance In Medieval Spain