[327] At the outset of the year 1100 in the sixty-third year of his life and the thirty-fifth of his reign, Alfonso found his own past expedients turning into policy and precedent. Although the record is clear that the king yet remained vigorous and as determined to rule his realm as he was to defend it, favor bestowed in the past had created expectations that now cabined about the alternatives available to him. With kings as with the rest of us each decision sets into motion a train of events that soon assumes its own logic and its own impetus. But precisely because the original initiative and conception was his, their author is most particularly helpless to alter the development of these implications. Just because they are everywhere regarded as the fruits of his policy, the king will be perceived as arbitrary and faithless should he interfere in a major way with that social dialectic. The monarch thus becomes, to some extent, dependent upon the lesser agents of the structure to restore the possibility of real initiatives to him. Only to the degree they abuse the new roles allotted them or as others react against those roles can the crown find general justification for revising its own policy.

So it was now to be with the dynastic policy that Alfonso had adopted long since. The enlisting of the nephews of his second wife, Constance, as his vicegerents in Galicia and in Portugal had been a useful device. In the aftermath of the defeat at Zalaca at the hands of the Murâbit in the fall of 1086 and an abortive revolt in Galicia in the spring of 1087, the employment of Count Raymond in Galicia had been good evidence of the resources of the crown. That the king had no male heir was an incentive for Raymond to take up the thankless task of overseeing a distant, isolated province for he was promised the hand of Urraca, then sole legitimate child of Alfonso. Whatever might or might not have been explicitly said at that time would have mattered not so much as the fact that all observers and the count himself came to consider Raymond as potential successor to the king.

For the monarch, such an expectation became increasingly binding as Queen Constance failed, down to her death in 1093, to provide him with that alternative heir which would have effectively reduced the [328] count's claim to a nullity by the ordinary operation of events had it been a boy. Deliverance was to come from another quarter. When Alfonso took the Muslim Zaida as a mistress in late 1091 or 1092, we cannot know the relative weight in the king's mind of the diplomatic and the dynastic considerations. Most probably they were so dissembled that contemporaries found an evaluation difficult as well. But the birth of Sancho Alfónsez in 1093 strengthened the capacity of the crown for maneuver. Nevertheless, when the king, after the death of Constance in the fall of 1093, took a new wife from the north of Italy he precipitated a dangerous crisis. Raymond and his cousin Henry, with the agreement of Hugh of Cluny himself, took steps to make the kingdom theirs when the death of Alfonso should occur.

The reaction of the Burgundian cousins was itself too extreme to secure wide support. That fact made it possible for the king to divide them and so gain time for the claim of Sancho Alfónsez to prosper and for his new marriage itself to bear fruit. Yet the promotion of Henry to the control of Portugal and his marriage to the king's natural daughter, Teresa, created another claim on the future of the dynasty as well. Consequently when Queen Berta died at the beginning of 1100 the royal tactic of 1094 could not be repeated. On the other hand, the right of the king to remarry was impossible to oppose though he might be constrained to accept a pliable scion of Burgundy.⁽¹⁾

In another respect the passage of time would tell against Alfonso. His sister, Elvira, had died toward the end of 1099.⁽²⁾ In the early months of 1101 his sole surviving sister, Urraca, died.⁽³⁾ The king now ruled over a court inevitably influenced by the commanding role of his daughters Urraca and Teresa as the senior female members of the dynasty. In turn their husbands Raymond and Henry assumed an ever more important status themselves. The former confirmed sixteen of the twenty-three surviving royal charters of the period between 1100 and the fall of 1107 whose text is complete and the latter confirmed twelve. In this symbolic function they had few rivals as we shall see. The very ceremonial of his court now weighed heavily upon Alfonso's possible freedom of choice in its public deliberations.

The area upon which this essentially courtly phenomenon would have had the least impact was that which involved relations with Rome. Thus the restoration of the episcopal see of Osma, as had been directed by the papal bull of May 3, 1099, was duly undertaken.⁽⁴⁾ The pace here [329] was leisurely and the first notice of a bishop at Osma dates to 1101.⁽⁵⁾ Bishop Pedro was one of those French clerics brought to Spain by Archbishop Bernard in 1096.⁽⁶⁾ Another of those protégés of the great archbishop, Jerome, was transferred from the lost see of Valencia to the newly restored one of Salamanca early in 1102.⁽⁷⁾ Indeed the dominance of the Toledan prelate seemed to be unchallengeable within the Leonese church. Not only did he enjoy the support of the king but on March 6, 1101, Paschal II had formally confirmed the primatial dignity and the jurisdiction of Toledo over all churches and diocese whose ancient metropolitan sees still lay under the control of the Muslim.⁽⁸⁾ In January 1103 Bernard was to be found presiding over a council of the church of the realm, so to speak, at Carrión de los Condes.⁽⁹⁾

The reality was more complex, however. Rivera Recio presumed that Bernard had gone to Rome to obtain the bull of March 1101, but a variety of documents of that season attest to the primate's presence at the royal court.⁽¹⁰⁾ More likely the agent of the primate on this occasion was Bishop Maurice of Coimbra, another of the former's protégés. On March 24, Paschal II confirmed the possessions of the church of Coimbra. Maurice may have used this opportunity to enlarge the prerogatives of his church beyond what the primate could have anticipated, however, for the pope also granted to his diocese the administration of the suppressed sees of Lamego and Viseu.⁽¹¹⁾ Thereby the seeds of a long dispute between the churches of Braga and Coimbra as well as a future spectacular conflict between Archbishop Bernard and Maurice were sown. It seems unlikely that either the king or Bernard himself had authorized any such initiative since it would have militated against the interests of their appointee at Braga, Archbishop Gerald. The possibility exists though that Bishop Maurice had been quietly encouraged in that direction by Count Henry.

Such local rivalries and ambitions always worked insensibly to strengthen the appellate jurisdiction of Rome and to present the opportunity for direction that the ordinary conditions of distance and time usually denied. In that vein the application of the abbot of the Castilian [330] monastery of Oña for confirmation of that abbey's exemption from all but Roman authority was welcomed, and the bull so granting was issued on January 10, 1102.⁽¹²⁾

Even at home the influence of the primate was not without its limits. Sometime in 1101 or early 1102 a new bishop was named to Oviedo. The first reliable notice we have of him dates to March 6, 1102. This was the famous Bishop Pelayo, later a biographer of the king and an enthusiastic promoter of the dignity and honor of his see. We know nothing certain about his earlier career but that his origins may have been in León rather than Asturias.⁽¹³⁾ His appointment should be regarded as the choice of Alfonso himself. In general the archbishop of Toledo continued to share a favored spot in the royal counsels with the other bishops of the meseta as reflected in confirmations to the royal charters of the period. Toledo confirmed fourteen of the twenty-three, León fifteen, Palencia twelve, Astorga eleven, and Burgos nine.

The evidence of the royal charters as to the relative positions of the lay magnates of the court demands a greater subtlety of analysis. There seems to be somewhat more uneasiness reflected, for example, in the rapid alternations in the office of royal majordomo. Fernando Múñoz, a Leonese, continued in that position, which he had held from 1096, only until sometime in 1101.⁽¹⁴⁾ Already before January 2, 1102, Alfonso Téllez, another Leonese, had replaced him but his tenure lasted little over a year.⁽¹⁵⁾ Diego Fernández held the office before June 22, 1103, but lost it within a year. We cannot be sure of his identity but twenty years later someone of that name was married to a granddaughter of Count [331] Pedro Ansúrez.⁽¹⁶⁾ Before March 16, 1104, the honor had changed hands again, passing this time to Pelayo Rodríguez whose tenure lasted through May 14, 1107.⁽¹⁷⁾

One might initially postulate, then, some developing struggle within the royal curia reaching its peak in 1102-1103 and having been resolved late in the latter year. On the other hand, Ordoño Alvarez, son of Alvar Díaz, continued to be royal alférez through April 13, 1101, and had been succeeded by his brother, Alvar Díaz, already by January 12, 1102, who would continue therein at least until May 14, 1107. ⁽¹⁸⁾ On this basis we might infer that this clash did not involve the Castilian element at court.

Turning to the twenty holders of the comital dignity who appear in the royal diplomas, appearances are largely unremarkable. Only six of the entire group confirm with such regularity as to allow identification as court figures. Counts Raymond and Henry have already been treated. Martín Laíñez, the Leonese, confirmed thirteen. García Ordóñez, he of Nájera, confirmed eleven. Gomez González, the Lara count, confirmed ten. All of these were established personages at court. What is remarkable is that Count Pedro Ansúrez, peer among them, confirmed nine of the fifteen royal charters issued before July 1103 and none of the eight issued subsequently. In fact, from the middle of 1103 the oldest and closest associate of Alfonso VI will disappear completely from his court and kingdom and will only reappear, again as a powerful and influential figure, in that of Alfonso's daughter Urraca.

As we have already seen, Pedro Ansúrez became regent for young Ermengol VI of Urgel in the northeast of the peninsula sometime in early 1104. His only biographer to date has simply assumed that the Leonese count was drawn there by the claims of family loyalty for the young heir to Urgel was his grandson.⁽¹⁹⁾ The dangerous situation in that quarter after the fall of Valencia to the Murâbit in 1102 gave additional plausibility to such a premise. I believe, however, that Pedro was the victim of an intense struggle for power at the court of Alfonso and was forced into exile there.

[332] The prime evidence for this assertion rests on the donation by the count of the church of Valladolid and all of his possessions to the bishop of Palencia on November 7, 1103.⁽²⁰⁾ Such extraordinary largesse was not likely to be voluntary even though the language of the document itself adduces piety as the motive. More likely this was probably one of a series of forced donations that stripped Pedro Ansúrez of all his possessions within the realm. Certainly the count held at least a portion of one property in the territory of Toledo which later is found in the hands of Alfonso and passed from him to Urraca.⁽²¹⁾ It may also be indicative of the consequences of the fall of the count that on March 14, 1104, Pedro Sarracínez made a donation to Sahagún of property that he had been awarded by Pedro Ansúrez, acting as royal judge two years earlier, in a suit against that monastery.⁽²²⁾

The latter's brother seems also to have been affected by this turn of events. Gonzalo Ansúrez was not ordinarily a court figure but between January 15, 1100, and February 10, 1103, he confirmed four Alfonsine charters. After this last date he vanishes from the documents only to reappear in 1110. If the royal majordomo, Diego Fernández, was indeed an ally and possibly even related by marriage to Count Pedro then his disappearance from the documents after December 1103 may also form a part of a drastic shift of power at court.⁽²³⁾ Finally, that the count's surrender of Valladolid in 1103 was not done of his own volition is irrefutably demonstrated by the fact that very early in the reign of Urraca we again find him exercising clear jurisdiction over that collegiate church and its possessions.⁽²⁴⁾

Later historiography would associate the exile of Pedro Ansúrez with the early reign of Urraca. Again the theme is that of a loyal vassal and an unworthy lord with the count, restored through the influence of Alfonso I of Aragón, risking his own life by confronting el Batallador to assert his higher loyalty to the queen once those two have been estranged.⁽²⁵⁾ This version obviously derives from an epic tale but the literary version at least built on the historic facts of the count's exile and Urraca's implication in it if only perhaps through loyal support to the [333] interests of her husband, Count Raymond. The documents, however, place the exile from 1104 to late 1109 rather than in the queen's reign.

But if not the inconstancy of a woman, what then lay behind the exile of the companion of the king's youth, a mainstay of his court, and the premier magnate of León? The likely answer, it seems to me, is that the count had been a supporter, or even the chief proponent at court, of a formal recognition of the young Sancho Alfónsez, which seemingly took place about Christmas of 1102. The young potential heir would then have been about nine, the proper age for emergence from the tutelage of women and into at least a partial public life. From 1103 until his death in 1108 Infans Sancho would confirm thirteen of the sixteen royal diplomas issued.⁽²⁶⁾ During the year 1103 alone he confirmed eight of these charters. Such a royal initiative would have been most distressing to both Count Raymond and Count Henry, but direct opposition to the royal will would have been the most dangerous course. A more satisfactory beginning would have been to bring down the most visible lay supporter of the young Sancho.

To understand why they could have been successful, bending the king to their will, one must understand what a dynastic, and therefore social and political, jungle the court constituted at this time. The old order of things had perished there along with Urraca, the king's sister and last surviving member of his generation of the royal family, in early 1101. The king's oldest child, Urraca, had the defunct Queen Constance as mother. His second offspring there, Teresa, had been born of a liaison with a noblewoman of Asturias. His yet younger and only son, Sancho, resulted from another political liaison with the Muslim Princess Zaida. Finally, by this time Alfonso had at least one and possibly two daughters, Sancha and Elvira, by his new French wife, Queen Elizabeth.⁽²⁷⁾ The resultant tangle of ambitions must have made serenity and amity the scarcest of attributes at court.

It is possible as well that relationships were even more tense as the result of the recent birth of a male to either Count Raymond or Count Henry. We do know, of course, that the only male heirs of either who survived were Alfonso Raimúndez, born in 1105, and Alfonso Enríquez, born in 1109 or 1110, respectively. Yet infants whose life span did not reach a year left no mark in the chronicles but could affect political considerations during that brief time. Raymond's known children at the time included only Sancha Raimúndez, born before November 11, [334] 1095.⁽²⁸⁾ Count Henry's situation remains even more enigmatic for the only child of his known to history is his son and eventual heir.

Even so both Burgundians would have entertained very real hopes by this time either for themselves directly or as consorts for their respective wives. The increased dignity of Sancho Alfónsez would have lessened those understandable ambitions and boded ill for those who might counsel the king to move to such a policy. The element that supported the recognition of the young Sancho may have included the primate as well as Pedro Ansúrez. At least in April 1103 Paschal II addressed letters to the churches of Mondoñedo, Santiago de Compostela, Astorga, and Coimbra warning all of them to respect the rights of Braga.⁽²⁹⁾ Archbishop Bernard was at all times sensitive to the possibility of a rival to his metropolitan dignity in Braga in general and, in the case of Coimbra, he had his own claims to be regarded as the proper metropolitan. To encourage Braga to such action would seem to be pointless for either Bernard or the king, and it is difficult to imagine that the Archbishop Gerald had taken such an initiative of himself. More likely he had been encouraged to do so by Count Henry.

In the same year even the bishop of the modest backwoods bishopric of Mondoñedo in Galicia dared to appeal to the pope against the judgment of the primate, given in the royal presence at Carrión earlier in 1103. The matter concerned rival claims to some rural districts, but the rival of Mondoñedo in this case was the shrine of Santiago himself at Compostela, the clear recipient of recent favors by both Alfonso and Count Raymond. Bishop Gonzalo must have been able to detect, even from the vantage point of his diminutive diocese, very troubled waters indeed if he could hope to go unscathed after such an act of defiance.⁽³⁰⁾

All indications, then, point to the conclusion that late in 1103 Alfonso VI had to sacrifice to his old friend Pedro Ansúrez in order to secure the acquiescence of his powerful sons-in-law and his daughters to the new status accorded the young Sancho. Doubtless some other pretext was alleged to put the best face possible on the exile of the most powerful single noble of the realm, but the event inevitably encouraged unrest generally, underlining publicly as it did the discord and tension within the dynasty itself. Still, Alfonso had achieved the end that he [335] could not but regard as most essential, regardless of the sacrifice it required.

As we have already seen, the Ansúrez count would contribute to the security of León-Castilla indirectly in 1104 by acting energetically to shore up the northeast of Christian Spain against the Murâbit drive north from Valencia. The position of Alfonso at home would also have improved that year as a result of his capture of Medinaceli and the success of his subsequent raid through the territories of Sevilla. The stubborn persistence of the old warrior would continue to confound his opponents within the realm just as it did the Muslim world of Andalucía and North Africa. Yet a certain anticipatory loosening of authority continued and is manifest in the affairs of the church.

At Rome confidence in Archbishop Bernard of Toledo seems to have been on the wane. Rivera Recio believed on the basis of an entry in the "Anales Toledanos" that the primate departed for Jerusalem on March 3, 1104, and perhaps visited Rome as well. The documents indicate to the contrary that he remained at court.⁽³¹⁾ On April 15, 1104, Paschal II issued a bull to the bishop of the royal city of León exempting that church from the metropolitan jurisdiction of Toledo.⁽³²⁾

In so doing the pope not only reversed his own previous decision of 1099 but also altered fundamentally the lines of authority in the church of León-Castilla, crafted by Bernard and the king himself.⁽³³⁾ There can be no question that Bishop Pedro would not have dared to take such a step without royal approval. That Afonso felt constrained to grant it is a measure of his weakness in 1103 when the appeal of León would have been initiated. Worse yet, the king was obliged, perhaps after news of León's success reached Spain or perhaps at the very time of the latter's appeal, to allow Bishop Pelayo of Oviedo to make his case in Rome as well. Oviedo too had secured its exemption from Toledo by September 30, 1105.⁽³⁴⁾

This slackening of Bernard's control over the church of the realm, which power had originally been prompted by the king and which was symbolized by Bernard's papal legateship, continued. In the fall of 1104 [336] the pope took the jurisdiction in the dispute between Mondoñedo and Santiago de Compostela out of the hands of the legate and entrusted it rather to Bishop García of Burgos.⁽³⁵⁾ The significance of this action is heightened by the fact that Burgos was party to a suit of long duration against Toledo in the papal court. In this latter, Paschal II, on April 25, 1105, empowered the bishops of Pamplona, León, Compostela, Palencia, Nájera, and Astorga to investigate the boundary dispute.⁽³⁶⁾ Finally, on May 4, 1105, the pontiff wrote to Bernard in the most severe terms, correcting him for persecuting the church of Burgos and removing that see from the primate's legatine authority.⁽³⁷⁾

This progressive decline of the authority of the Archbishop of Toledo now led to the beginning of a long struggle between his see and that of the ambitious Bishop Diego Gelmírez of Santiago de Compostela for preeminence in the peninsula which would endure until Bernard's death in 1125. During the late summer of 1105 Gelmírez sought out the king in the region of Palencia and requested from Alfonso permission to go to Rome. That monarch could not have been pleased but again he felt obliged to agree.

Royal consent obtained, the Compostelan first visited Bishop García at Burgos and then made a wide sweep in southern France from Auch to Toulouse, Moissac, Cahors, Limoges, and then to Cluny where he was received warmly by Abbot Hugh.⁽³⁸⁾ This was to take the long way to Rome indeed, and the author of the "Historia Compostelana" explains it in terms of Gelmírez's, desire to have the advice of the great Cluniac leader on how to pursue his case at the papal court. There is no reason why such an explanation should not be accepted. The bishop of [337] Santiago was time and time again during the course of his career to show himself to be just such a careful politician. At the same time one may, for the same reason, expect confidently that he also sought the advice and the support of the "black pope" for his patron, Raymond of Burgundy, in the tangled court intrigues of León-Castilla. After all Gelmírez had served as notary in Raymond's court for at least two years prior to assuming control of the diocese of Santiago de Compostela.

His business concluded at the great Benedictine mother house, the bishop continued to Rome. There, on October 31, 1105, Paschal II formally bestowed on him the privilege of using the pallium on a variety of liturgical feast days.⁽³⁹⁾ This ecclesiastical vestment was ordinarily a symbol of the archiepiscopal rank, and it seems impossible to avoid the conclusion that such a status for the shrine-church of Santiago was precisely what Gelmírez had been seeking.⁽⁴⁰⁾ It was that dignity he would achieve only in 1120 from another pope and in the reign of another sovereign, and then to the consternation of the churchmen of León-Castilla. Paschal II in 1105 must have found the request bizarre, but nonetheless he was careful not to alienate a possibly ally as the bull itself testifies. Clearly the pope was interested in having other sources of information and support within the peninsula than simply the primate of Toledo, his official vicar.

On this occasion it was the pope who prevented the ambitious prelate of Compostela from overstepping himself badly. That Gelmírez had informed anyone else of the extent of his ambitions was unlikely. Alfonso VI surely would have wished to avoid the major problems that would have resulted from the Galician's success. Bernard of Toledo was to demonstrate amply his absolute opposition to any such scheme. Even Raymond of Burgundy in 1105 was still primarily interested in the throne of León-Castilla itself and would have opposed an ecclesiastical coup which would have alienated its king and its clergy as well as his cousin, Count Henry. For all of these excellent reasons it is doubtful that the Compostelan had revealed even to Hugh of Cluny the ultimate end sought although his biographer indicated that he did inform the abbot of his desire for the pallium. As it turned out, that consolation prize was treated by that author as if it had been the entire object of the journey.⁽⁴¹⁾

[338] There had been no major campaign during the year of 1105 and so neither success nor defeat in the field operated to alter the royal position in internal politics. Early in the year Count Henry had been at pains to mend his own fences with the Cluniacs both within and without the realm, and the notable and unusual presence of Portuguese magnates at the royal court in early January may have been intended to bolster his prestige.⁽⁴²⁾ But the most significant event of this year took place on March 1 when a male heir was born to Count Raymond and Infanta Urraca.⁽⁴³⁾ This was Alfonso Raimúndez, who was to rule later as Alfonso VII of León-Castilla. That birth established an alternative to the succession of Sancho Alfónsez and with it, of course, the very real possibility of a regency dominated by Raymond in the name of the only legitimately born male heir.

While Alfonso VI must have been pleased to have thus received a further guarantee that his own direct line would endure, the old king was evidently not willing to settle for a long minority and the real rule of his Burgundian son-in-law. Under such circumstances he would have realized that the sole role left to his illegitimate son Sancho would be that of potential or actual rebel. To avoid that danger of civil war he decided that Sancho should be king after him. This course too was fraught with danger, given the multiplicity of possible claims that now existed within the dynasty itself, and the necessary political settlement must be carefully prepared. Immediate action could not be taken, but such haste was not imperative since everyone would have played a waiting game in view of the fact that something like a quarter of all infants born never survived their first year.

Yet the infant must have been a lusty one for shortly after he did in fact attain his first birthday the king had decided to take the first step toward proclaiming young Sancho as his heir. The record of his action comes to us most casually as part of the dating formula of a document of March 27, 1106, of Galician provenance. It reads, "regnante rege illdefonso in legione eiusdemque helisabet regina sub maritali copula legaliter aderente."⁽⁴⁴⁾ By itself the notice would be inexplicable, but in context it cannot be understood in any other fashion than that Alfonso [339] formally married the mother of Sancho on or about that date, perhaps on Easter Monday which that year fell on March 26.

Understood as a reference to that French queen, also named Elizabeth, who had been his wife since 1102 the statement would make no sense. Clearly the reference is to the proper marriage of a former mistress. Now we know that such had been the status of Zaida on the authority of no less than Bishop Pelayo of Oviedo, who also informs us that she "babtizata Helisabeth fuit vocitata."⁽⁴⁵⁾ Pelayo, however, seemed to keep her separate from the queen of the same name. The epitaph of the French Elizabeth in the pantheon of the shrine-church of San Isidora in León gives the date of her death as 1107.⁽⁴⁶⁾

There seems to be no warrant then to confuse the two and to imagine that the Elizabeth who is named as Alfonso's queen in no less than seventeen documents between 1102 and 1106 was really that Princess Zaida who bore Sancho Alfónsez, living with the old king those four years but spared by the delicacy of the scribes from the revelation of her status of concubinage. A more sound conclusion is that this French noblewoman and queen actually existed but in 1106 was forced, on some legal pretext or other, into retirement while the mother of Sancho duly took her place, to the confusion of historians ever since. The action was extreme but necessary if the latter's son was to take his proper place as heir to the realm.

The document of March 27 and the charter that Alfonso had granted to Oviedo on March 19, 1106, indicate the presence of the whole of the living members of the dynasty at court at this time. The young Sancho confirmed this last just after the unfortunate queen whom his mother was about to displace. Raymond and Urraca, the daughters of the French Elizabeth, Sancha and Elvira, and Henry and Teresa confirmed after him.⁽⁴⁷⁾ Of the bishops, only those of León, Palencia, Oviedo, and Astorga can be asserted absolutely to have been at court but Bernard of Toledo must have been there. He certainly was on March 14.⁽⁴⁸⁾ It was essential to Alfonso VI that he have at least the appearance of unity and solidarity for such a momentous step.

Yet truly there could be no enthusiasm for the measure on the part of [340] any of the members of the dynasty apart from the king himself, his new queen, and the young Sancho. Even among the bishops his action would have occasioned grave misgivings. The king must have employed all the authority of his years and the charisma of the crown to have secured even nominal agreement.

But for the next two years almost every circumstance worked in the king's favor and he was able to proceed triumphantly with his plans. A great razzia through Andalucía in the summer of 1106 succeeded brilliantly and brought major additions to the strength of the kingdom as well as its monarch. In the late summer his old enemy, Emir Yusuf ibn-Tashufin, died and the Murâbit empire was temporarily immobilized. By late April or early May 1107 Alfonso was prepared to have Zaida's son formally recognized by the realm as his official heir. If he had given way on so many fronts, from the spoliation of the Ansúrez to the virtual dismantling of the primateship, here he could not be denied. Sancho was his son, the royal blood flowed in the heir's veins, no matter the circumstances of the boy's birth.

A charter of Alfonso to the church of Toledo on May 8, 1107, which places the king, the court, and his army at Monzón just north of Palencia, reveals that a council at León had recently been concluded.⁽⁴⁹⁾ Sancho confirmed it immediately after the queen, his mother. Six days later at Burgos Alfonso VI granted a charter to the church of Santiago de Compostela which the young Sancho Alfónsez confirmed even more explicitly as "regnum electus patri factum."⁽⁵⁰⁾ We may conclude then that the recent council had had as its major purpose the recognition of the latter as the officially designated successor to Alfonso. Prior to the royal heir's acclamation in León, his father had already bestowed on him at least the formal military command of the key fortress of Medinaceli.⁽⁵¹⁾

Counts Raymond and Henry, and their respective wives, confirmed both of the royal charters of May 1107. Despite the relative decline in their prospects which the council at León had effected, both remained at court. No fewer than four private documents of Sahagún demonstrate that fact for the period from June through August.⁽⁵²⁾ For the present they had no alternative, and they could only hope that some unforeseeable circumstance, helped by their continuing ability to politic [341] energetically at the center of the realm, would alter the situation in which they now found themselves.

In the later part of the year, however, it was the power of the king that would grow. First, sometime in late August or early September, Count Raymond became sick with what was to prove a mortal illness. The author of the "Historia Compostelana" relates how Bishop Diego Gelmírez of Santiago obtained the monastery of San Mamed in Galicia from the count and that the latter issued it in the presence of Alfonso VI, who had come to visit his son-in-law in his illness.⁽⁵³⁾ The text of the donation still exists and is dated September 13, 1107.⁽⁵⁴⁾ In all probability it was issued at the count's castle at Grajal southwest of Sahagún. Within a week the powerful Burgundian died on September 20, 1107.⁽⁵⁵⁾ Consulting with Bishop Pedro of León and others, Bishop Gelmírez received permission to remove the body to Galicia where it was interred in the cathedral of Santiago.⁽⁵⁶⁾

On December 13, 1107, Raymond's widow Urraca granted a charter of a Galician monastery to Santiago de Compostela in her own name as "imperatoris filia et totius gallecie domina."⁽⁵⁷⁾ This action was taken in the course of what seems to have been a meeting of the magnates of the Galician province for the bishops of Lugo, Mondoñedo, Túy, and Orense all confirmed the charter as did counts Suero Vermúdez and Pedro Froilaz also. The grant was a generous one and may have been designed to secure the enthusiastic support of Bishop Gelmírez of Compostela in the crucial negotiations which were perhaps already in progress. It has usually been assumed that the charter was executed in [342] that episcopal city because of the identity of those who confirm but it may, in fact, have been issued at León instead.

Certainly there was a major council of the entire realm held in that royal city in late December 1107. Inevitably the demise of Count Raymond involved major alterations in the real political balance of the kingdom, and these changes had to be addressed formally. A portion of the decisions taken at León is revealed to us by the "Historia Compostelana."⁽⁵⁸⁾ From that source we know that Archbishop Guy of Vienne, brother of the late count, a member of the reform party in the church, and the future Pope Calixtus II, was present. Given the time span involved it seems likely that he had been summoned to help protect the interests of the Burgundian and his son already during the illness of Raymond.

Indeed the account from this source is chiefly concerned to establish that the old king himself granted to the infant Alfonso Raimúndez the unconditional right to inherit the rule of the province of Galicia.⁽⁵⁹⁾ The chief men of Galicia had been summoned to the royal city to witness this settlement and to swear to uphold it. The person of his grandson Alfonso VI entrusted to the tutelage of Bishop Gelmírez of Santiago de Compostela.

For the next twenty years that position was to be the foundation of the political fortune and misfortune of Gelmírez. As guardian of the young heir he would enjoy, after Alfonso VI's death in 1109, an influence scarcely second to that of Queen Urraca herself and one which he seldom failed to exploit. All of this involved him in a famous series of struggles with that queen, and the "Historia Compostelana" was, in part, both result and record of that rivalry. Nevertheless, if it does not tell us the entire truth about the council at León in December 1107, there seems to be small reason to doubt what it does assert.

Even so obviously a partisan source acknowledges indirectly that Urraca had become, as her charters of the period confirm, the ruler of Galicia after her husbands death. Her son was only to enter into his rights there if she chose to remarry. Doubtless the council at León also recognized Urraca in the former capacity. However, there is no mention, in the "Historia" or in her charters, of the dominance the late count had also enjoyed in the district of Zamora or in the Leonese Extremadura from the Duero south to Salamanca and Ávila. It is safe to conclude that the king seized the opportunity created by Raymond's death to reassert direct royal control in these latter regions and to demolish [343] what had assumed almost the dimensions of a dependent kingdom in the west of the realm.

Such a conclusion appears to be warranted as well by a charter of Alfonso VI, dated December 30, 1107, confirming to Bishop Jerome of Salamanca the rights and privileges previously granted by Count Raymond.⁽⁶⁰⁾ This document exists only in copies and has very obviously been considerably improved upon. Among other things it is confirmed by Bishop Maurice of Braga at a time when that see was already an archbishopric and when Gerald was still its ordinary. Nevertheless the other evidence adduced seems adequate to support the belief that the charter was based upon a contemporary authentic one.⁽⁶¹⁾ As we have it, the charter is confirmed by Archbishop Bernard of Toledo and eight bishops of the then two archbishops and fifteen bishops of the realm.

There are no secular magnates in the confirmation list nor other members of the dynasty. Yet we may assume the presence not only of Urraca and her son but also of Sancho Alfónsez whose presence, as heir to León-Castilla, would have been essential to the validity of the arrangements concerning Galicia at the very least.

So too we can posit the attendance of Count Henry of Portugal and his wife Teresa. Their acquiescence in this settlement would have been dictated by self-interest. They could hardly have openly opposed the guarantee of the rights of Urraca and her son in Galicia. Still the diminution of the former holdings of Count Raymond elsewhere might eventually be expected to redound to their benefit as the other great power of the west of the kingdom. The aging king might soon find that his need for a vicegerent of the west had not died with Raymond of Burgundy. In addition, the death of the latter sensibly increased the prominence of Count Henry and his wife. The road to the throne itself was still blocked by the persons of Sancho Alfónsez, Urraca, and the young and legitimate grandson, Alfonso Raimúndez. Even so, Henry remained as the one mature and experienced male with a tangible claim on the royal prize through the person of his wife, despite her illegitimate birth. At the very least future power and influence might be his in virtue of the very manipulable claims of his young cousin.

By the end of 1107 then, the seventy-year-old Alfonso might rest content in a fashion that had been denied him, in varying degrees, since his marriage to Constance of Burgundy had proved infertile in male [344] progeny. Despite the gaggle of potential aspirants about the throne, his sole son had been formally proclaimed and accepted as his heir. The illegitimacy of Sancho's birth and the religion of his mother had been rectified, so far as might be, by the latter's conversion to Christianity and her formal recognition as his consort. The future of the dynasty, and therefore the kingdom, seemed assured as it had not been for three decades.

Within that larger determination, the future of his and Constance's daughter had been assigned a subordinate but still honorable place. Her portion would one day pass to the king's grandson and that beginning of a cadet line would be provided with some small scope, at least, for its appetites. If at some future point Alfonso' s direct heir should find himself in the predicament of his father, a possible recourse existed there.

The exact position of his natural daughter, Teresa, and her husband Count Henry was less clearly defined. As subsequent events were to demonstrate, they had very real ambitions and hopes and the king would have been aware of them. For now the count had become the king's main support in the distant and vulnerable western reaches of the kingdom. That arrangement could be expected to endure and even prosper under Alfonso's heir. An able and lucky man might be content to make much of the inherent advantages of that position. The vagaries of dynasty might eventually even bring one of the offspring of Teresa and Henry to the throne of León-Castilla.

Along the southern frontier the now twenty-year-old struggle against the Murâbit was proceeding more favorably. In the past three years Medinaceli had been taken and now safeguarded the eastern flank of the realm. Behind the front the repopulation of the trans-Duero progressed steadily. Along the line of the Tajo the initiative now lay in Christian hands and recently great raids had been able to penetrate deep into Andalucía as in the days of the taifa kingdoms before 1086. Yusuf ibn-Tashufin, Alfonso's old nemesis, was dead, and it was hoped that his like would not be seen again in the world of Western Islam.

All in all, the king must have celebrated the Christmas season with good cheer and more hope than circumstances had vouchsafed him in long years. Ahead of him, however, lay disaster.

1. See chapter 14, notes 59 through 71.

2. See chapter 13, note 55.

3. See chapter 15, note 7.

4. See chapter 13, note 52.

5. Engels, "Papsttum," p. 251.

6. Jiménez de Rada, "De rebus Hispaniae," p. 140

7. See chapter 15, notes 39 and 40.

8. Mansilla, ed., La documentación pontificia hasta Innocencio III, pp. 64-66.

9. See chapter 15, notes 44-46.

10. Rivera Recio, La Iglesia de Toledo, pp. 154-55.

11. Erdmann, "Papsturkunden in Portugal," pp. 154-56. Almeida, Historia da Igreja em Portugal 1:181, n. 1, and Manuel Gonçalves da Costa, História do bispado e cidade de Lamego, vol. 1 (Lamego, 1977), p. 81, both date this bull to 1102 but are not aware of all of the extant copies.

12. Alamo, ed., Colección diplomática de San Salvador de Oña. 1:145-48. But another bull, dated Dec. 3 1, 1102, confirming the rights of Santiago de Compostela should be regarded with the utmost caution. It was surely interpolated for it includes reference to the bogus "votos" of that church and there are difficulties with its dating formula as well. It appears in the "Historia Compostelana," ES 20:32-34.

13. See chapter 15, note 30. A succinct introduction to Pelayo is given in Fletcher, The Episcopate in the Kingdom of Leon, p. 73. Pelayo has also sometimes been regarded as coadjutor bishop of the see in the latter years of the episcopate of Bishop Martín whose own last appearance dates to Dec. 5, 1100. See chapter 13, note 51. The former appears in Aug. 24, 1097, pub. García Larragueta, Documentos de Oviedo, p. 308. Fernández Conde, Libro de Testamentos, pp. 325-28, no. 2, points out that the name of Pelayo is added in a different ink in the original, in Jan. 17, 1098, a forgery, see chapter 14, note 23; and in Jan. 23, 1099, badly dated at the least, see chapter 13, note 36. Marcos G. Martínez, "Regesta de Don Pelayo, obispo de Oviedo," BIEA 18 (1964): 227, gives the notice of his consecration which is also garbled. Fernández Conde, Libro de Testamentos, p. 36, comments on his possible Leonese ancestry.

14. See chapter 13, note 57, and chapter 15, note 10.

15. Ibid, notes 27 and 51.

16. Ibid, notes 55 and 64. On June 3, 1124, the daughter of Pedro Ansúrez made a donation to Cluny and San Isidro de Dueñas. BN, Manuscritos, 720, fol. 294r-v.

17. See chapter 15, notes 67 and 104.

18. Apr. 13, 1101. AHN, Clero, Carpeta 890, no. 15; copy in the Palacio Real del Oriente, Madrid, Biblioteca, signatura II-534, following a late ms. of the "Historia Compostelana," pub. Escalona, Historia de Sahagún, pp. 501-502. Jan. 12, 1102. See chapter 15, note 27. May 14, 1107. Ibid., note 104. Alvar Díaz had a son named García in 1077. See Serrano, ed., Cartulario de San Millán, pp. 239-40.

19. See chapter 15, note 74.

20. AC Palencia, armario 3, legajo 10, ff. 21r-22r; copy in Acad. Hist., Catedrales de España, 9-25-1-C-4, ff. 12r-14r.

21. González, Repoblación de Castilla la Nueva 1:118.

22. AHN, Clero, Carpeta 891, no. 11, and Códices, 989B, fol. 56r-v.

23. See note 16.

24. Mar. 31, 1110. BN, Manuscritos 13.074, ff. 167r-68v.

25. Jiménez de Rada, "De Rebus Hispaniae," pp. 147-48. From there it passes into the Primera crónica general, ed. Ramón Menéndez Pidal, 2:646.

26. Earlier purported confirmations by Sancho Alfónsez have to be rejected. Jan. 17, 1098. See chapter 14, note 23. Apr. 22, 1099. See chapter 13, note 43. Jan. 12, 1102. See chapter 15, note 27.

27. See chapter 15, note 67.

28. She is first mentioned to my knowledge in a charter of Infanta Elvira of that date. ASI, Reales, no. 132. A brief biography has appeared by Luisa García Calles, Dõna Sancha, hermana del Emperador (León, 1972).

29. Erdmann, Papsturkunden in Portugal, pp. 156-60.

30. The episode is recorded only in the "Historia Compostelana," ES 74-77. For the dating of the papal bulls included see the edition and translation of Manuel Suarez and José Campelo (Santiago de Compostela, 1950), pp. 84-85.

31. Iglesia de Toledo, pp. 147 and 157. For example, on March 14, 1104, he confirmed a donation to Sahagún. See note 22. The "Anales" were composed in the first half of the thirteenth century.

32. For the text from the original see Fita, "Concilios nacionales de Carrión y León," pp. 326-28.

33. See chapter 13, note 46.

34. Fita, "Concilios nacionales de Carrión y León," pp. 325-26, corrected the date of the copy printed in ES 38:340-41. García Larragueta, Colección de Oviedo, pp. 329-30, printed the text from a copy at Oviedo dated to Sept. 30, 1102.

35. Oct. 14, 1104. Pub. Serrano, Obispado de Burgos 3:121. Papal notices of the action to Toledo and Mondoñedo are given in ES 20:78-80.

36. That is the date given by Demetrio Mansilla, ed., Catálogo documental del archivo catedral de Burgos, 804-1416 (Madrid, 1971), p. 39. Serrano, Obispado de Burgos 3:125-26, dated it to 1106. The context makes the earlier date preferable.

37. Ibid. pp. 122-23. The letter also warns Bernard about undue absence from his own diocese. Quite possibly the multiplying troubles of that prelate had emboldened some of the Toledan clergy to complain against him. Certainly the bishop of Burgos would not have instigated the complaint since he was at court almost as often.

38. The account of the journey is given by the "Historia Compostelana," ES 20:42-50, which also provides the text of the resultant papal bull. The trip has ordinarily been dated to 1104 following the date of the bull. See Biggs, Diego Gelmírez, pp. 47-51, and most recently Fletcher, Saint James' Catapult, p. 196. However Vones, Kirchenpolitik des nordwestspanischen Raumes, p. 161, n. 60a, found a discrepancy in the manuscript edition which led him to redate it to 1105. I believe he is correct since Gelmírez was at Sahagún still on Sept. 13, 1104. AHN, Clero, Carpeta 891, no. 21; copy in AHN, Códices, 989B, ff. 32v-33r. The "Historia" had him at Auch on Sept. 8. No such difficulty exists for 1105 to my knowledge.

39. ES 20:48-50.

40. Fletcher, Saint James' Catapult, pp.196-97, seems to me to understand better the motives of Gelmírez than Vones, Kirchenpolitik des nordwestspanischen Raumes, pp. 289-92. A time of troubles provided precisely the immunity necessary to such a bold scheme, and similar conditions would inspire like initiatives at later dates.

41. ES 20:42-50. The account is written as a coherent unit.

42. See chapter 15, note 77.

43. The testimony as to the date of birth of Alfonso Raimúndez is mixed but no new evidence has been discovered since Enrique Flórez, Memorias de las reinas católicas de Espána 1:316-18, properly fixed on this date on the basis of those accounts closest to the event.

44. AHN, Códices, 1.044B, fol. 63r. The copy is contained in the thirteenth-century Tumbo of the monastery of Lorenzana. The subscriptions make it evident that the document was drawn up at court.

45. Sánchez Alonso, ed., Crónica del Obispo Don Pelayo, p. 87.

46. Risco, Iglesia de León, p. 151. An inscription at Sahagún, where Zaida was buried, dates her death to September 13 but lacks the year. It also supplies the information that this date was a second ferial day. If the inscription was misread as a II for a VI, September 13 was a Friday in 1107. See Gago and Díaz-Jiménez, "Los restos mortales de Alfonso VI," p. 51.

47. See chapter 15, note 88.

48. Ibid, note 87.

49. Ibid, note 103. Unfortunately the original is lost.

50. Ibid, note 104. Again, the original is lost.

51. Apr. 23, 1107. AHN, Clero, Carpeta 272, no 9; pub. Alamo, ed., Colección de Oña 1:163-64. It is an original.

52. See chapter 15, note 105.

53. ES 20:64.

54. AC Santiago, Tumbo A, fol. 30r; Chartularum, ff. 74v-75r; pub. López Ferreiro, Historia de Santiago de Compostela 3:73-74 append., who placed its issuance at Santiago, presumably on the basis of the confirmants who are all Galicians. We should rather understand that these persons were part of the entourage of Gelmírez.

55. The notice comes from the necrology of a Burgundian monastery which had been the recipient of his largesse. Georges Chevrier and Maurice Chaume, eds., Chartes et documents de Saint-Bénigne de Dijon, vol. 2 (Dijon, 1943), p. 198. A private donation of Sahagún dated Nov. 17, 1107, AHN, Clero, Carpeta 892, no. 20, pub. Escalona, Historia de Sahagún, pp. 506-507, has a subsequent notice of Raymond but it is a copy and suspect on diplomatic grounds. Fita, "Concilios nacionales de Carrión y de León," pp. 338-40, accepted it and dated Raymond's death subsequently. John E. Slaughter, "Sobre la fecha de la muerte del Conde Raimundo de Galicia," AEM 13 (1983): 93-106, has printed the relevant sources and accepts the September date.

56. "Historia Compostelana," ES 20:64-65. For the site of Raymond's tomb see Campelo, ed., Historia Compostelana, pp. 71-72, note 4.

57. AC Santiago, Tumbo A, fol. 30r; Chartularum, fol. 75r-v; pub. López Ferreiro, Historia de Compostela 3:76 append., and Estefanía "Memorias," pp. 239-40.

58. ES 20:95-96.

59. Ibid, p. 96 "nec ab eo etiam mihi ipsi ulla ulterius obsequia deposco."

60. Pub. Martín, Villar García, Marcos Rodríguez, and Sánchez Rodríguez, eds. Documentos de Salamanca, pp. 85-87.

61. Yepes, Crónica general de San Benito 6:495v, has a garbled reference to an otherwise unknown charter of Alfonso VI to Salamanca given to the church of Salamanca at a council in León.