here is to extract a few of the most striking passages of the
_Chronicle_. The youth of the hero is, to a large extent, merged in
myth; he first comes into historical documents in 1064, when, though
scarcely more than twenty, he had already won his title of Challenger by
a triumphant single combat with a knight of Navarre, and was soon
afterwards appointed commander-in-chief of the forces of Castile. He
helped Sancho of Castile to overcome his brother Alfonso of Leon, by a
surprise which savoured strongly of treachery, but which passed for good
strategy in those rough-and-ready times. After the murder of Sancho by
Bellido, under the walls of Zamora, the Cid passed into the service of
his successor, the very Alfonso whom he had before driven into exile.
The king at first welcomed the invincible knight of Castile to his
court, and married him to his own cousin; but jealous rivals poisoned
his mind, already filled with the memory of past wrongs, against Rodrigo
(or Ruy Diez, as he is styled in the _Chronicle_), and in 1081 the Cid
was banished from his dominions. The _Chronicle_ must tell the story of
his farewells:
"And the Cid sent for all his friends and his kinsmen and vassals, and
told them how King Don Alfonso had banished him from the land, and asked
of them who would follow him into banishment, and who would remain at
home. Then Alvar Fanez, who was his cousin-german, came forward and
said, Cid, we will all go with you, through desert and through peopled
country, and never fail you. In your service will we spend our mules and
horses, our wealth and our garments, and ever while we live be unto you
loyal friends and vassals. And they all confirmed what Alvar Fanez had
said; and the Cid thanked them for their love, and said that there might
come a time in which he should guerdon them.
"And as he was about to depart he looked back upon his own home, and
when he saw his hall deserted the household chests unfastened the doors
open, no cloaks hanging up, no seats in the porch, no hawks upon the
perches, the tears came into his eyes, and he said, My enemies have done
this.... God be praised for all things. And he turned toward the East
and knelt and said, Holy Mary Mother, and all Saints, pray to God for
me, that He may give me strength to destroy all the Pagans, and to win
enough from them to requite my friends therewith, and all those who
follow and help me. Then he called for Alvar Fanez and said unto him,
Cousin, the poor have no part in the wrong which the king hath done us;
see now that no wrong be done unto them along our road; and he called
for his horse. And then an old woman who was standing at her door said,
Go in a lucky minute, and make spoil of whatever you wish, And with
this proverb he rode on, saying, Friends, by God's good pleasure we
shall return to Castile with great honour and great gain. And as they
went out from Bivar they had a crow on their right hand, and when they
came to Burgos they had a crow on the left.
"My Cid Ruydiez entered Burgos, having sixty streamers in his company.
And men and women went forth to see him, and the men of Burgos and the
women of Burgos were at their windows, weeping, so great was their
sorrow; and they said with one accord, _Dios!_ how good a vassal if he
had but a good lord! must be scanno?] and willingly would each have bade
him come in, but no one dared so to do. For King Don Alfonso in his
anger had sent letters to Burgos, saying that no man should give the Cid
a lodging; and that whosoever disobeyed should lose all that he had, and
moreover the eyes in his head. Great sorrow had these Christian folk at
this, and they hid themselves when he came near them because they did
not dare speak to him; and my Cid went to his Posada, and when he came
to the door he found it fastened for fear of the king. And his people
called out with a loud voice, but they within made no answer. And the
Cid rode up to the door, and took his foot out of the stirrup, and gave
it a kick, but the door did not open with it, for it was well secured; a
little girl of nine years old then came out of one of the houses and
said unto him, O Cid, the king hath forbidden us to receive you. We dare
not open our doors to you, for we should lose our houses and all that we
have, and the eyes in our head. Cid, our evil would not help you, but
God and all His saints be with you. And when she had said this she
returned into the house. And when the Cid knew what the king had done he
turned away from the door and rode up to St. Mary's, and there he
alighted and knelt down, and prayed with all his heart; and then he
mounted again and rode out of the town, and pitched his tent near
Arlanzon, upon the Glera, that is to say, upon the sands. My Cid
Ruydiez, he who in a happy hour first girt on his sword, took up his
lodging upon the sands, because there was none who would receive him
within his door. He had a good company round about him, and there he
lodged as if he had been among the mountains....
"The cocks were crowing amain, and the day began to break, when the good
Campeador reached St. Pedro's. The Abbot Don Sisebuto was saying matins,
and Dona Ximena (the Cid's wife) and five of her ladies of good lineage
were with him, praying to God and St. Peter to help my Cid. And when he
called at the gate and they knew his voice, _Dios!_ what a joyful man
was the Abbot Don Sisebuto! Out into the courtyard they went with
torches and with tapers, and the Abbot gave thanks to God that he now
beheld the face of my Cid. And the Cid told him all that had befallen
him, and how he was a banished man; and he gave him fifty marks for
himself, and a hundred for Dona Ximena and her children. Abbot, said he,
I leave two little girls behind me, whom I commend to your care. Take
you care of them and of my wife and of her ladies: when this money be
gone, if it be not enough, supply them abundantly; for every mark which
you expend upon them I will give the monastery four. And the Abbot
promised to do this with a right good will. Then Dona Ximena came up,
and her daughters with her, each of them borne in arms, and she knelt
down on both her knees before her husband, weeping bitterly, and she
would have kissed his hand; and she said to him, Lo, now you are
banished from the land by mischief-making men, and here am I with your
daughters, who are little ones and of tender years, and we and you must
be parted, even in your life-time. For the love of St. Mary tell me now
what we shall do. And the Cid took the children in his arms, and held
them to his heart and wept, for he dearly loved them. Please God and St.
Mary, said he, I shall yet live to give these my daughters in marriage
with my own hands, and to do you service yet, my honoured wife, whom I
have ever loved even as my own soul.
"A great feast did they make that day in the monastery for the good
Campeador, and the bells of St. Pedro's rung merrily. Meantime the
tidings had gone through Castile how my Cid was banished from the land,
and great was the sorrow of the people. Some left their houses to follow
him, others forsook their honourable offices which they held. And that
day a hundred and fifteen knights assembled at the bridge of Arlanzon,
all in quest of my Cid; and there Martin Antolinez joined them, and they
rode on together to St. Pedro's. And when he of Bivar knew what a goodly
company were coming to join him, he rejoiced in his own strength, and
rode out to meet them and greeted them full courteously; and they kissed
his hand, and he said to them, I pray to God that I may one day requite
ye well, because ye have forsaken your houses and your heritages for my
sake, and I trust that I shall pay ye twofold. Six days of the term
allotted were now gone, and three only remained: if after that time he
should be found within the king's dominions, neither for gold nor for
silver could he then escape. That day they feasted together, and when it
was evening the Cid distributed among them all that he had, giving to
each man according to what he was; and he told them that they must meet
at mass after matins, and depart at that early hour. Before the cock
crew they were ready, and the Abbot said the mass of the Holy Trinity,
and when it was done they left the church and went to horse. And my Cid
embraced Dona Ximena and his daughters, and blessed them; and the
parting between them was like separating the nail from the quick flesh:
and he wept and continued to look round after them. Then Alvar Fanez
came up to him and said, Where is your courage, my Cid? In a good hour
were you born of woman. Think of our road now; these sorrows will yet be
turned into joy."
The Cid offered his services to the Moorish King of Zaragoza, the most
powerful of the northern Moslem princes; and they were joyfully
accepted. At the head of his own followers, who were the more devoted to
him since they lived by the booty he procured them, he made a raid
through Aragon, and so rapid was his riding that he harried a vast tract
of country in five days, and was off before the Christians could sound
the alarm. He led the Moors against the Count of Barcelona, won a
signal victory, and made the Count his ally. How the Cid and his merry
men triumphed in the battle-field, let the _Chronicle_ again relate:
"Pero Bermudez could not bear this, but holding the banner in his hand,
he cried, God help you, Cid Campeador; I shall put your banner in the
middle of that main body; and you who are bound to stand by it--I shall
see how you will succour it. And he began to prick forward. And the
Campeador called unto him to stop as he loved him, but Pero Bermudez
replied he would stop for nothing, and away he spurred and carried his
banner into the middle of the great body of the Moors. And the Moors
fell upon him that they might win the banner, and beset him on all
sides, giving him many and great blows to beat him down; nevertheless,
his arms were proof, and they could not pierce them, neither could they
beat him down, nor force the banner from him, for he was a right brave
man and a strong and a good horseman, and of great heart. And when the
Cid saw him thus beset, he called to his people to move on and help him.
Then placed they their shields before their hearts, and lowered their
lances with the streamers thereon, and, bending forward, rode on. Three
hundred lances were they, each with its pendant, and every man at the
first charge slew his Moor. Smite them, knights, for the love of
charity! cried the Campeador. I am Ruydiez, the Cid of Bivar! Many a
shield was pierced that day, and many a false corselet was broken, and
many a white streamer dyed with blood, and many a horse left without a
rider. The misbelievers called on Mahomet, and the Christians on
Santiago, and the noise of the tambours and of the trumpets was so great
that none could hear his neighbour. And my Cid and his company succoured
Pero Bermudez, and they rode through the host of the Moors, slaying as
they went, and they rode back again in like manner; thirteen hundred did
they kill in this guise. If you would know who they were, who were the
good men of that day, it behoves me to tell you, for though they are
departed, it is not fitting that the names of those who have done well
should die, nor would they who have done well themselves, or who hope so
to do, think it right; for good men would not be so bound to do well if
their good feats should be kept silent. There was my Cid, the good man
in battle, who fought well upon his gilt saddle; and Alvar Fanez Minaya,
and Martin Antolinez the Burgalese of prowess, and Muno Gustios, and
Martin Munoz who held Montemayor, and Alvar Alvarez, and Alvar
Salvadores, and Galin Garcia the good one of Aragon, and Felez Munoz the
nephew of the Campeador. Wherever my Cid went, the Moors made a path
before him, for he smote them down without mercy. And while the battle
still continued, the Moors killed the horse of Alvar Fanez, and his
lance was broken, and he fought bravely with his sword afoot. And my
Cid, seeing him, came up to an Alguazil, who rode upon a good horse, and
smote him with his sword under the right arm, so that he cut him through
and through, and he gave the horse to Alvar Fanez, saying, Mount Minaya,
for you are my right hand."
[Illustration: GATE OF SERRANO, VALENCIA.]
The great feat of the Cid's career was the conquest of Valencia. By
force of political troubles he came to occupy the position of protector
of the Moorish King of Valencia in the name of the King of Zaragoza. His
first entry was peaceful and unopposed:
"Then the Cid went to Valencia, and King Yahya received him full
honourably, and made a covenant with him to give him weekly four
thousand maravedis of silver, and he on his part was to reduce the
castles to his obedience, so that they should pay the same rents unto
him as had been paid unto the former kings of Valencia; and that the Cid
should protect him against all men, Moors or Christians, and should have
his home in Valencia, and bring all his booty there to be sold, and that
he should have his granaries there. This covenant was confirmed in
writing, so that they were secure on one side and on the other. And my
Cid sent to all those who held the castles, commanding them to pay their
rents to the King of Valencia as they had done aforetime, and they all
obeyed his command, every one striving to have his love."
From the vantage post of Valencia the Cid carried his triumphant arms
against the neighbouring kingdoms. He "warred against Denia and against
Xativa, and abode there all the winter, doing great hurt, insomuch that
there did not remain a wall standing from Orihuela to Xativa, for he
laid everything waste, and all his booty and his prisoners he sold in
Valencia." On one of these expeditions, however, he lost his capital for
a while. Alfonso, in 1089, has received him back to favour, given him
castles, and decreed that all the Cid's conquests should be his own
property. In other words, he recognized the Cid as an almost independent
prince. Almost immediately, however, the king became again suspicious of
his powerful vassal, and seized the opportunity of the Cid's absence in
the north to besiege his peculiar possession, the city of Valencia. When
the Campeador heard this he was very wroth, and, by way of retaliation,
carried fire and sword through Alfonso's districts of Najera and
Calahorra, razed Logrono to the ground, and, in the words of the old
Latin _Gesta_, "with terrible and impious despoilment he wasted and
harried the land, and stripped it bare of its riches and seized them for
himself." Alfonso hastily abandoned the siege of Valencia, and returned
to defend his own country. But the Cid, having effected his purpose,
came back another way, and found the gates of Valencia closed against
him.
Then began that memorable siege of nine months, during which the people
of Valencia suffered agonies of hunger and thirst, while the Cid
maintained his remorseless leaguer round the walls. The besieged were
reduced to the agonies of starvation, and those who rushed out, or were
thrust forth as useless burdens by the townspeople, were massacred or
sold into slavery by the Cid's soldiers. It is even said by the Moorish
historians that the Cid had many of them burnt alive. The _Chronicle_
pathetically records: "Now there was no food to be bought in the city,
and the people were in the waves of death; and men were seen to drop and
die in the streets." Thus wrote a poet of the devoted city:
"Valencia! Valencia! trouble is come upon thee, and thou art in the hour
of death; and if peradventure thou shouldst escape, it will be a wonder
to all that shall behold thee.
"But if ever God hath shown mercy to any place, let Him be pleased to
show mercy unto thee; for thy name was joy, and all Moors delighted in
thee and took their pleasure in thee.
"And if it should please God utterly to destroy thee now, it will be for
thy great sins, and for the great presumption which thou hadst in thy
pride.
"The four corner stones whereon thou art founded would meet together and
lament for thee, if they could!
"Thy strong wall which is founded upon these four stones trembles, and
is about to fall, and hath lost all its strength.
"Thy lofty and fair towers which were seen from far, and rejoiced the
hearts of the people, ... little by little they are falling.
"Thy white battlements which glittered afar off, have lost their truth
with which they shone like the sunbeams.
"Thy noble river Guadalaviar, with all the other waters with which thou
hast been served so well, have left their channel, and now they run
where they should not.
"Thy water-courses, which were so clear and of such great profit to so
many, for lack of cleansing are choked with mud.
"Thy pleasant gardens which were round about thee; ... the ravenous wolf
hath gnawn at the roots, and the trees can yield thee no fruit.
"Thy goodly fields, with so many and such fair flowers, wherein thy
people were wont to take their pastime, are all dried up.
"Thy noble harbour, which was so great honour to thee, is deprived of
all the nobleness which was wont to come into it for thy sake.
"The fire hath laid waste the lands of which thou wert called Mistress,
and the great smoke thereof reacheth thee.
"There is no medicine for thy sore infirmity, and the physicians despair
of healing thee.
"Valencia! Valencia! from a broken heart have I uttered all these things
which I have said of thee.
"And this grief would I keep unto myself that none should know it, if it
were not needful that it should be known to all."
At last, in June, 1094, Valencia surrendered, and the Cid stood once
more upon her towers and ramparts. He made hard conditions with the
people, many of whom he sent away to the suburbs to make room for his
Castilians. But if he was harsh and not quite honest in his dealings
with the vanquished, his triumph was stained by no wholesale butchery.
The people were sometimes ruined; but their lives, except their
leader's, were safe. The Cid had now attained the summit of his power.
He sent for his wife and daughters from the abbey, and established
himself permanently as King of Valencia and suzerain of the country
round about. The King of Aragon besought his alliance. He exacted heavy
tribute from his neighbours; his revenue included 120,000 pieces of gold
yearly from Valencia, 10,000 from the lord of Albarracin, 10,000 from
the heir of Alpuente, 6,000 from the Master of Murviedro, and so forth.
He dreamed of reconquering all Andalusia. "One Roderick," he said, "lost
Spain; another shall recover it." When the Almoravides came against him,
he put them to rout. The _Chronicle_ tells the story:
"Day is gone, and night is come. At cock-crow they all assembled
together in the Church of St. Pedro, and the Bishop Don Hieronymo sang
mass, and they were shriven and assoyled and howselled. Great was the
absolution which the bishop gave them: He who shall die, said he,
fighting face forward, I will take his sins, and God shall have his
soul. Then said he, A boon, Cid Don Rodrigo; I have sung mass to you
this morning: let me have the giving the first wounds in this battle and
the Cid granted him this boon in the name of God. Then, being all ready,
they went out through the gate which is called the Gate of the Snake,
for the greatest power of the Moors was on that side, leaving good men
to guard the gates. Alvar Fanez and his company were already gone forth,
and had laid their ambush. Four thousand, lacking thirty, were they who
went out with my Cid, with a good will, to attack fifty thousand. They
went through all the narrow places and bad passes, and, leaving the
ambush on the left, struck to the right hand, so as to get the Moors
between them and the town. And the Cid put his battles in good array,
and bade Pero Bermudez bear his banner. When the Moors saw this they
were greatly amazed; and they harnessed themselves in great haste, and
came out of their tents. Then the Cid bade his banner move on, and the
Bishop Don Hieronymo pricked forward with his company, and laid on with
such guise, that the hosts were soon mingled together. Then might you
have seen many a horse running about the field with the saddle under his
belly, and many a horseman in evil plight upon the ground. Great was the
smiting and slaying in short time; but by reason that the Moors were so
great a number, they bore hard upon the Christians, and were in the hour
of overcoming them. And the Cid began to encourage them with a loud
voice, shouting God and Santiago! And Alvar Fanez at this time issued
out from ambush, and fell upon them, on the side which was nearest the
sea; and the Moors thought that a great power had arrived to the Cid's
succour, and they were dismayed, and began to fly. And the Cid and his
people pursued, punishing them in a bad way. If we should wish to tell
you how every one behaved himself in this battle, it is a thing which
could not be done, for all did so well that no man can relate their
feats. And the Cid Ruydiez did so well, and made such mortality among
the Moors, that the blood ran from his wrist to his elbow! Great
pleasure had he in his horse Bavieca that day, to find himself so well
mounted. And in the pursuit he came up to King Yusuf, and smote him
three times; but the king escaped from under the sword, for the horse of
the Cid passed on in his course, and when he turned, the king being on a
fleet horse, was far off, so that he might not be overtaken; and he got
into a castle called Guyera, for so far did the Christians pursue them,
smiting and slaying, and giving them no respite, so that hardly fifteen
thousand escaped of fifty that they were."
[Illustration: TOMB OF THE CID AT SAN PEDRO DE CARDENA.]
But the fortune of war is fickle. The troops of the Cid were defeated at
last by the invaders; and the Campeador died of grief in July, 1099.
They took his body and embalmed it, and kept vigil by its side; then, in
the legend of the poets, they did as the Cid had bidden them: they set
him upon his good horse Bavieca, and fastened the saddle well, so that
he sat erect, with his countenance unchanged, his eyes bright and fair,
and his beard flowing down his breast, and his trusty sword Tizona in
his hand. No one would have known that he was dead. And they led Bavieca
out of the city: Pero Bermudez in front with the banner of the Cid and
five hundred knights to guard it, and Dona Ximena behind with her
company and escort. Slowly they cut a path through the besiegers, and
took the road to Castile, leaving the Moors in sore amazement at their
strange departure: for they did not know that the Cid was dead. But the
body of the hero was set in an ivory chair beside the great altar of San
Pedro de Cardena, under a canopy whereon were blazoned the arms of
Castile and Leon, Navarre and Aragon, and of the Cid Campeador. Ten
years the Cid sat upright beside the altar, his face still noble and
comely, when the signs of death at last began to appear; so they buried
him before the altar, where Dona Ximena already lay; and they left him
in the vault, still upright in the ivory chair, still in his princely
robes with the sword Tizona in his hand,--still the great Campeador
whose dinted shield and banner of victory hung desolate over his tomb.
[Illustration]
XII.
THE KINGDOM OF GRANADA.
With such soldiers as the Cid, and such kings as Fernando and Alfonso,
the recovery of all Spain by the Christians was only a matter of time.
Every nation, it appears, has its time of growth and its period of
efflorescence, after which comes the age of decay. As Greece fell, as
Rome fell, as every ancient kingdom the world has known has risen,
triumphed, and fallen, so fell the Moors in Spain. Their time was now
near at hand. They had been divided and undisciplined before the
Almoravide annexation: they were not less so when their Berber masters
had been expelled. But hardly had the Almoravides disappeared, when a
new enemy came on the scene. The Almohades, or fanatical "Unitarians,"
who had overthrown the power of the Almoravides in Africa, resolved to
imitate their vanquished predecessors by including Andalusia in their
empire. The dissensions among the princes of the long-shattered kingdom
of the Moors made the task an easy one. In 1145 the Almohades took
Algeciras; in 1146 they occupied Seville and Malaga, and the next four
years saw Cordova and the rest of southern Spain united under their
sway. Some princes, indeed, held out for a while, but the hordes of
African fanatics were too overpowering for any single chief to make a
protracted stand against them.
[Illustration: BANNER OF THE ALMOHADES.]