Si gran traidor fue el padre, mayor traidor es el hijo.—
Gritos dan en el real: ¡A don Sancho han mal herido:
muerto le ha Vellido Dolfos, gran traición ha cometido!
The Castilians were in a difficult position: the assassination of Sancho II. left them without a candidate for the vacant thrones of Castile and León. The Cid was not eligible; for, though of good family, he was not of royal—nor even of illustrious—descent. The sole legitimate claimant was the dethroned Alfonso, and there was nothing for it but to offer him both crowns. It is alleged that the exasperated Castilians found a salve for their wounded pride by inflicting a signal humiliation on the Leonese prince whom they invited to rule over them. According to tradition, Alfonso was compelled to swear that he had no complicity in Sancho’s death, and this oath was publicly administered to him by the Cid and eleven other Castilian representatives in the church of Santa Gadea at Burgos. This story reaches us in ancient romances, and Hartzenbusch has given it a further lease of life by dramatising it in La Jura en Santa Gadea. There may be some basis for it, and any one may believe it who can. There is, however, no positive proof that any such incident took place, and the tale reads rather like a later invention, fabricated to account for the bad blood made subsequently between the king and his formidable subject. Picturesque stories concerning historical personages are always ‘suspect,’ and are generally untrue. As there was no pretender in the field, why should Alfonso submit to insulting conditions? Is it not simpler to suppose that he regarded the Cid with natural suspicion as the man mainly responsible for his expulsion from León, and that the Leonese nobles were careful to keep this resentful memory alive? Now, as in the time of Fernán González:—
Castellanos y leoneses tienen malas intenciones.
Is it not intrinsically probable that the Cid, like a true Castilian, smarted under the Leonese supremacy; that his allegiance was from the outset reluctant and half-hearted; and that he scarcely troubled to conceal his ultimate design [6]of carving out for himself a semi-independent principality with the help of his famous sword Colada? However this may be, king and subject were, for the moment, mutually indispensable. Neither could afford an absolute breach at this stage; both were deep dissemblers; and on July 19, 1074, Alfonso VI. gave his cousin Jimena in marriage to the Cid. The wedding contract has been preserved—a prosaic document providing for the due disposition of property on the death of one of the contracting parties.
After this diplomatic marriage the Cid vanishes for some time into the dense obscurity of domestic bliss, emerging again into the light of history as defeating the Emir of Granada, and then as being charged with malversation. The details are by no means clear. What is clear is that the Cid was exiled about 1081, that he entered the service of Al-muktadir, Emir of Saragossa, and that he continued in the pay of the Emir’s successors—his son Al-mutamen, and his grandson Al-mustain. Henceforward we have a relatively full account of the Cid’s exploits. He defeated the combined forces of the King of Aragón, the Count of Barcelona and their Mohammedan allies at Almenara near Lérida; he routed the King of Aragón once more, this second battle being fought on the banks of the Ebro; he played fast-and-loose with Alfonso VI., was reconciled to his former master, quarrelled, and was again banished. His possessions were confiscated. But confiscation is a game at which subjects can play as well as kings, and the Cid was in a position to recoup his losses. By this time he had gathered round him a motley host of raiders, men of diverse creeds eager for any enterprise that offered chances of plunder. Fortune was now about to furnish him with a great opportunity. On the surrender of Toledo to Alfonso VI. in 1085 it was agreed that Yahya Al-kadir, the defeated Emir, should receive Valencia by way of compensation; and he was imposed on the restive inhabitants by a force under the Cid’s nephew, Alvar Fáñez Minaya. In ordinary circumstances the intruder might have held his own; but the incursion of the African Almoravides, the Jansenists of Mohammedanism, abruptly changed the political aspect. It soon became clear that the gains of the Reconquest were in jeopardy, and that Alfonso VI. must concentrate his army for a momentous struggle.
He might fairly plead that he had kept his bargain by installing the ex-Emir of Toledo at Valencia, and that his own kingdom was now at stake. He had no sooner recalled Alvar Fáñez and his troops than the Valencians revolted, and Al-kadir besought Al-mustain to come over and help him. The inducements offered were considerable. But Al-mustain was a mere figurehead at Saragossa; effective aid could come only from his lieutenant, the Cid: the two feigned acceptance of Al-kadir’s proposals, but secretly agreed to oust him and to divide the spoil. The relief expedition was commanded by the Cid in Al-mustain’s name. It was a post after his own heart. Valencia was then, as it is now, ‘the orchard of Spain,’ and the Cid was in no hurry to reach the capital. He ravaged the outlying districts of the fertile province, levied forced contributions, or induced the inhabitants to pay blackmail to escape his forays. He advanced cautiously, fortifying his position, and scattering delusive promises as he went along. He assured Alfonso VI. that he was working in the interest of Castile, and he assured Al-mustain that he was working in the interest of Saragossa; he encouraged Al-kadir to put down the Valencian rebels, and he encouraged the rebels to throw off Al-kadir’s authority. A master of dissimulation, resolved to make Valencia his own, he successfully deceived all parties till the murder of Al-kadir by Ibn-Jehaf, and the threatened advance of the Almoravides, forced him to drop the mask. Failing to carry the city of Valencia by storm, the Cid reduced it by starvation, and in June 1094 the Valencians surrendered on generous conditions. These conditions were flagrantly violated. Ibn-Jehaf was tortured till he revealed where his treasure was hidden; he was finally burned alive, his chief supporters shared his fate, and the Mohammedan population was given its choice between banishment and something like slavery.
In all but name the Cid was now a king, and he was careful to strengthen his hold on his prize. By taking a census of Christians, and by forbidding them to leave the city, he kept his most trustworthy troops together; and he promoted military efficiency as well as religion by founding a bishopric to which he nominated Jerónimo, the French prelate mentioned in the Poema del Cid, and as valiant a fighter as Archbishop Turpin in the Chanson de Roland:—
Tels curunez ne cantat unkes messe,