The Aristocracy of Leon-Castile in the Reign Of
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THE ARISTOCRACY OF LEON-CASTILE IN THE REIGN OF ALFONSO VII (1126-1157) 2 VOLUMES ii SIMON FRASER BARTON DPhil UNIVERSITY, OF, YORK Department of History (April, 1990) TABLE OF CONTENTS VOLUME II Page Table of figures 376 CHAPTER 4 KING AND COURT 377 Introduction 378 (a) Alfonso VII and the Nobility 381 i) Grants 'pro bono seruiciol 384 ii) Honores and tenencias 387 iii) Money fiefs 398 (b) The Court of Alfonso VII 399 i) Court membership 401 ii) The business of the curia 422 iii) The royal household 433 iv) The peripatetic court 443 Notes to Chapter 4 457 CHAPTER 5: THE WARRIOR ARISTOCRACY 474 Introduction 475 (a) A society organised for war 476 -374- (b) The wars of the reign of Alfonso VII 482 (c) The logistics of warfare 500 i) The summons to war 501 ii) The composition of the army 502 iii) Numbers 510 iv) Naval power 512 V) Finance, supply and strategy 513 vi) Castles 520 (d) Motivation 528 (e) Risks and rewards 540 Notes to Chapter 5 550 CONCLUSION 563 APPENDIX 1: Selected aristocratic charters 566 APPENDIX 2: Genealogical tables 631 MANUSCRIPTS AND BOOKS CONSULTED 641 I. Manuscript sources II. Guides, catalogues and registers III. Printed Primary Sources IV. Secondary material -375- TABLE OF FIGURES PaRe_ Figure 5: Royal majordomos, 1126-1157 436 Figure 6: Royal alf4reces, 1126-1157 437 Figure 7 Lay confirmants to royal 492 diplomas of 1137 Figure 8 Lay confirmants to royal 493 diplomas of 1139 Figure 9 Lay confirmants to royal 494 diplomas of 1147 -376- CHAPTER 4 KING AND COURT -377- Introduction The relationship between king and nobleman in the Middle Ages was more often than not based upon mutual support and co-operation rather than upon mutual antagonism. (1) The two parties had much to offer one other: for the king, lacking a professional army, the military service and contingents of troops provided by his magnates were indispensable if he were to maintain control within his kingdom and to make war against his enemies without. Furthermore, the king relied on his great nobles to advise him in matters of state at the periodic meetings of the curia and, by what has been termed 'a planned dispersal of his power', entrusted them with large areas of the realm to administer in his name. (2) Such important service was bought at a price, however; in return for the traditional services of auxilium (military service) and consilium (counsel), the nobles were awarded generous grants of royal properties, together with benefices in land, castles and moneyp enjoyed immunities over the lands they held and exemption from taxation, to name only the most A between king obvious privileges. status. -quo and magnate was maintained, therefore, but this could break down if latter he being , the felt was inadequately recompensed for his loyalty and service -378- by the former. In such circumstances, a powerful noble might choose to rebel against the king in an attempt to improve his position. Clearly, it was a relationship that neither side could take for granted. For, as Werner has observed, the nobility 'was at once the main enemy and the only ally of the central governmentl. (3) The fragile alliance that apparently existed between nobility and monarchy, is nowhere more clearly visible than in the medieval kingdom of Le6n-Castile. In the llth century, the profits of the military campaigns waged against the Taifa kingdoms of al- Andalus and the levying of parias, payments made by the Muslim rulers in return for Christian miltary 'protection', had enabled the kings of Le6n-Castile, Fernando I and his sons Sancho II and Alf onso VI, to reward their loyal followers generously. (4) The Almoravid onslaught of the 1090s, however, followed by the Christian debacle at UclSs in 1108 and the death of Alfonso VI the following year, unleashed an unparalleled period of social unrest and violence in Le6n-Castile which lasted for over twenty years. (5) The dominion of the Almoravids over the principalities of al-Andalus abruptly cut off the supply of Muslim gold and silver which had flowed steadily north to the Christian- realms for more than a generation. This, coupled wih the loss of more than half the kingdom, -379- and therefore its revenues, to her estranged husband, Alfonso I of Arag6n, plunged the new monarch of Le6n- Castile, queen Urraca, into an acute financial crisis. (6) Increasingly unable to raise sufficient cash to pay her armies and reward her magnates, unrest swiftly ensued and during the tumultuous years between 1111 and 1117 several members of the nobility rebelled against her rule. (7) Bonnassie has even gone as far as to speak of lun asalto global de la aristocracia contra la instituci6n mongrquical during this period. (8) Thus, in the preamble to a charter of Alfonso VII drawn up on 21 March 1136, the emperor could ref er back to the Imultis perturbationibus et calamitatibus I which had af f licted the kingdom af ter the death of his grandfather Alfonso VI. (9) This chapter aims to examine the relationship between Alfonso VII and the lay magnates of his kingdom. In the first part, the means by which the emperor was able to restore royal authority and ensure the loyalty of the aristocracy after the near-anarchy of his mother's reign will be considered, with particular attention being paid to the rewards that nobles could expect to receive in return for their loyal service. Subsequently, the court of Alfonso VII will be placed under the microscope: the membership of the curia imperatoris will be examined and the role -380- played by lay nobles in the administration of the royal household vill be investigated. (a) Alfonso VII and the nobility Queen Urraca died on 8 or 9 March 1126. (10) Her 21-year old son, Alfonso RaimUndez, then resident at Sahag,(In, wasted no time in making good his claim to the throne and the following day, according to the Chronica, was crowned king in Le6n 'cum magno gaudiol. (11) Nevertheless, the deep-seated discontent among important sections of the nobility that had severely undermined royal power during the reign of Urraca, did not die down immediately on the accession of her son either. The early years of the reign of Alfonso VII were marked by similar upheaval, as the young king struggled to assert his authority over the magnates of his kingdom. Thus, if he was able to rely from the outset on the support of count Suero Vermudez and his kinsmen, together with that of other Leonese worthies, the Chronica also makes clear that some members of the lay aristocracy were rather slower to recognise his authority. (12) It was only once the rebels in the royal citadel of Le6n had surrendered, we are toldq that a substantial part of the Leonese nobility, including Rodrigo and Osorio Martfnez, Ramiro Froilaz, and Pedro and Lope L6pez, travelled to -381- pay homage to the king. (13) Shortly afterwards, we hear, the chief members of the Galician nobility 'ad regem venerunt et in Zamora supplici devotione se illius imperiis subdideruntl. (14) Notwithstanding these important demonstrations of fealty, the author of the Chronica does not conceal the fact that Alfonso VII faced numerous rebellions against his authority during the early years of his reign, the most serious of which were led by the Castilian counts, Pedro and Rodrigo Gonzalez de Lara, and by the Asturian count Gonzalo Pelgez. (15) What precisely lay behind these revolts we are not told. In the case of the Lara brotherss the Chronica claims that they were in league with king Alfonso I of Arag6n, which may contain more than a grain of truth. (16) At Timara in 1127, for example, the chronicler declares that 'comes Petrus de Lara, qui stabat in prima acie regis Legionis., noluit pugnare adversus regem Aragonensem, quia cor eius cum eo erat et sermonem cum illo habebat'. (17) A little later, in June 1130, we hear that count Pedro de Lara and his son-in-law count Bertran were imprisoned by Alfonso VII 'pro eo quod conturbabant suum regnum'9 whereupon 'Rodericus comes, et gentes et amici eorum, protinus rebelles facti suntl. (18) The Chronica goes on to relate that while count Pedro subsequently launched an unsuccessful rebellion in Castile, his brother Rodrigo -382- carried on his insurrection in the region of Asturias de Santillana. (19) At roughly the same time, we hear of revolts led by the Leonese nobles Pedro DIaz and Pelayo Froilaz, who held the fortress of Valle, and by Jimeno Iftfguez, the castellan of Coyanza, modern-day Valencia de Don Juan. (20) The exasperating vagueness with which the Chronica describes the events of these years, makes it difficult for us to make out in any detail either the chronology or the extent of the unrest. Nevertheless, it is abundantly clear that during the early years of his reign, Alfonso VII's rule was being challenged by important sections of the lay nobility and that the monarch encountered serious difficulty in imposing his authority. The king, like his mother before him, had to resort to desperate measures in order to be able to pay his knights. In a charter of 2 April 1127, he restored to the abbey of Sahagun its dependent monastery of Nogal which, he confessed, 'pro captando regno necessitudinibus circumuentus ... meis illud militibus dedil. (21) That same year, the Historia Compostellana reports in aggrieved tone, Alfonso VII extorted 1000 silver marks out of archbishop Diego Gelm1rez Iquam necessitate pecuniae coactus: pecunia enim quae sibi ad pacandos milites stipendiarios tunc temporis multum necessaria eratl.