The upsurge of the Christian kingdoms of the north, nostalgic for the powerful Visigothic Toledo, found a providential ferment in the discovery of the body of St James at Compostela. But unity in the willingness to reconquer crumbled in the face of the increase in territories won in the south: Castile and Aragon separated at the beginning of the 11th century. At the same time, the necessary political alliances, but above all pilgrimages, opened Spanish land to Europe, on the chemin français. Castile was first in line in the Reconquista; she annexed Toledo in 1085, then more temporarily Valencia (with the legendary Cid). Aragon did the same with Saragossa, but for both kingdoms the problems of succession, and sudden bursts of resistance by Islam complicated and delayed the advance. At the end of the 13th century, after the taking of Córdoba (1262) and the relegation of Islam for two centuries to the extreme south of the Peninsula, in the kingdom of Granada, Christian Spain had acquired an appearance which would be strangely reflected in that of the wise king, Alfonso X of Castile: brilliant cultural power but political and social weaknesses, which would get the better of a hypothetical golden age.
Poet, wiseman, king
When Alfonso X ascended to the throne of Castile in 1252, his state was the largest in the Peninsula, and only Aragon, three times smaller, disputed supremacy. The skillful alliances of King Alfonso VIII, marrying his four daughters to the kings of Leon, Portugal, Aragon and France (Blanche of Castile), had consolidated this position well. Alfonso X’s father, Ferdinand III, was a cousin of Saint Louis, and was also canonized.
The population of Castile then totalled some five million inhabitants, including strong Mudejar (Muslim) and Jewish populations. Alfonso X allowed the nobility to benefit from important privileges: the ricos hombres, the eldest of noble families whose riches were indivisible, often employed directly by the King, dominated the more modest hidalgos, and the simple caballeros. The nobles also dominated local administration, including military, and the centralization of power, an element of the power of the Moors, was something unknown in the Christian Kingdom of Castile.
Alfonso was born in Toledo on 23rd November, 1221, and succeeded his father at the age of 31. He showed himself then to be much more concerned with increasing Castilian territory at the expense of her neighbours, and cementing his prestige in Europe (to the extent of dreaming of becoming Emperor), than with the internal political and economic management of the kingdom. His incessant struggles impoverished the kingdom and turned the powerful nobility against him. Within his own family he found serious difficulties. The heir to the throne died in 1275, and Alfonso X was unable to oppose, in spite of a will disinheriting him, the seizure of power by his son Don Sancho the Brave, to the detriment of his nephews. On Alfonso’s death in 1284, the Castilian monarchy would be hampered for almost two centuries by dynastic struggles, and Castile would only rediscover her real political prestige with the Catholic Kings.
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