Europe in the Middle Ages

by Ierne L. Plunket

All day long the battle raged; and the Christian kings and their knights fought like heroes; but in spite of their efforts they were pressed back and defeat seemed almost certain. ‘Here must we die,’ exclaimed Alfonso bitterly, determined to sell his life at a high price; but Rodrigo Ximenez, the fiery Archbishop of Toledo, replied, ‘Not so, Señor, here shall we conquer!’ and with his cross-bearer he charged so resolutely against the foe that the Christians, rallying to save their sacred standard, drove the Moors headlong from the field. So overwhelming was the victory that the advance of the Almohades was completely checked, and the Christian states became the dominating power in the peninsula.

At first in their battles amongst themselves it had been Navarre that took the lead amongst the Christian states; but later this little mountain kingdom, that lay across the Pyrenees like a saddle and was half French in her sympathies and outlook, lost her supremacy. Spanish interest ceased to be centred in France, and focused itself instead in the lands that were slowly being recovered from the Moors. Portugal declared itself an independent kingdom, Castile broke off the yoke of Navarre and united with Leon, Aragon absorbed the important province of Catalonia, with its thriving seaport Barcelona.

James ‘the Conqueror’

One of the most famous of Aragonese heroes in the thirteenth century was James ‘the Conqueror’, son of Pedro II of Aragon, who during the Albigensian Crusade had died fighting on behalf of his brother and vassal, the Count of Provence, against Simon de Montfort.[32] James, who was only six at the time, was taken prisoner by the cruel Count, but Innocent III insisted that he should be handed back to his own people, and these gave him to the Templars to educate. It was natural that in such a military environment the boy should grow up a soldier; but he was to prove himself a statesman as well, and a lover of literature, writing in the Catalan dialect a straightforward, manly chronicle of his reign, and encouraging his Catalan subjects in the devotion to poetry they had shared from early days with their Provençal neighbours.

According to contemporary accounts the young king was handsome beyond all ordinary standards, nearly seven feet tall, and well built in proportion. Unfortunately he was so attractive that he became thoroughly spoilt, and was dissolute in his way of life and uncontrolled in his temper. When in one of his rages he was capable of any crime, though ordinarily so generous and tender-hearted that he hated to sign a death-warrant. In his chronicle he tells us how on one of his campaigns he found a swallow had built her nest by the roundel of his tent: ‘So I ordered the men not to take it down,’ he says, ‘until the swallow had flown away with her young, since she had come trusting to my protection.’

The combination of good looks, brains, and chivalry found in James I appealed to the imagination of the Aragonese, but still more did his fighting qualities that were typically Spanish. ‘It has ever been the fate of my race’, he wrote, ‘to conquer or die in battle’; and when quite a small boy he made up his mind that he would become a crusader.

For many years after he was declared old enough to reign for himself King James was forced to spend his time and energy in subduing the nobles who during his long minority had been allowed to become a law unto themselves. This vindication of his authority accomplished, he led his armies against the Moors, and under his conquering banner ‘Valencia of the Cid’ passed finally into Christian hands.

The Moorish kingdom was now reduced to Granada in the south and the dependent province of Murcia to the north-east that was claimed by the Castilians, though Alfonso ‘the Learned’ of Castile was quite unable to make himself master of it.

Hearing of the Aragonese victories in Valencia, Alfonso, who was ‘the Conqueror’s’ son-in-law, asked King James if he would help him by invading Murcia, a project that first aroused the anger of the Aragonese because it seemed to them that they were expected to do the hard work in order that some one else might reap the spoils.

King James was more far-seeing than his subjects and held a different view. The Moors were weak at the moment; but, owing to the influx of fresh warriors from North Africa, they had always been able to rally their power in the past and might do so again. ‘If the King of Castile happen to lose his land I shall hardly be safe in mine,’ was his shrewd summary of the case; and with this he invaded and overran Murcia, which he gave to his son-in-law in 1262.