The Monks of War

by Desmond Seward

  A determined attack was made on Murcia in 1243, and, seeing no hope, the wali of the capital surrendered. Fernando went on to capture Jaén and Carmona, before investing Seville in 1247. Surrounded by hills covered with olive orchards, with its beautiful mosque, the pink Giralda, its libraries, pleasure gardens, orange groves and luxurious baths, and guarded by the river Guadalquivir, flanked on each side by lighthouses with gilded roofs, the former capital of the Almohads recalled the splendours of Córdoba under the caliphs. Its junta had neglected to ally with other taifas and found itself isolated. Wisely the junta entrusted its beautiful city's defence to the brave wali of Niebla, Abu Ja'far. Ramón Borifaz, Castile's 'emir of the sea', destroyed the Moorish fleet in the Guadalquivir, cutting off all hope of African relief. An Andalusian army gathered in the hills among the villages, 'which gleamed like white stars in a sky of olives', but was cut to pieces by Fernando and Muhammad ibn-al-Ahmar, ruler of Granada; Abu Ja'far must have watched the rout from the great tower-minaret. Assault parties, in which freyles of Santiago and Calatrava were prominent, hammered at the Sevillanos night and day. The city's once-crowded wharves, divided by the river, were joined by a bridge of boats, but during a storm the Christians broke it in two, ramming the light craft with heavy-laden ships. Then they burst into Tirana, the northern suburb, whose inhabitants fought to the death. Finally, after a siege of sixteen months, Seville surrendered. Many of its grief-stricken citizens departed to Granada or Africa.

  First to enter were 270 Santaguistas whose Master planted the red damask standard of St James and the white horse high on the city walls.8 Fernando rode in to dedicate the mosque to Our Lady and to celebrate Christmas. It was here that the noblest Spaniard of the Middle Ages chose to be buried, in a Franciscan habit, when he died in 1252.

  There were many new commanderies and priories to pray for his soul, including convents of nuns. Those of Calatrava followed the Cistercian rule. However, some sisters of Santiago were married; these did not have the white cloak but wore a black habit, like the Order's chaplains who ranked as canons regular. Mother superiors were known as comendadoras.

  Fernando's successor, Alfonso X, had ambitions of playing 'Solomon' to his father's 'David'. Learned rather than wise, el Sabio was a patron of lawyers and astronomers but was no politician, reigning with great pomp and singular ineptitude. None the less the early years of his reign saw the destruction of what remained of western Andalus. By 1251 the Orders (notably Portuguese Santiago under Gonçalo Péres, Grand Commander of Palmela) had finally conquered and subdued the eastern Algarve, while in 1262 Castile captured the strong city of Niebla and then the port of Cadiz and, a year later, Cartagena.

  There were urgent problems of administration and resettlement. The only solution was to grant large estates to the nobles and the Orders. As early as 1158 Abbot Ramón had brought peasants from his domain at Fitero. Maestres and ricos hombres attracted colonists by fueros, charters which offered both townsmen and peasants more freedom than elsewhere. Soon the south flourished again, though the crown derived scant profit. The great lords' sole obligation was to provide troops, and they ruled their vast latifundios like independent princes. Freyles benefited most of all.9 Eventually Calatrava's lands reached to the Sierra Nevada, while Alcántara owned half Extremadura. Santiago's possessions equalled those of both Orders put together. Jewish stewards ran these estates very profitably indeed. In 1272 Frey Gonzalo Ruiz Girón, Master of Santiago, farmed his rents in Murcia, Toledo and La Mancha to the Jewish bankers Don Bono, Don Jacobo and Don Samuel.10 None the less brethren themselves spent much time in estate management.

  The mudéjares must have been heartened by the Mameluke victory in Syria at Ain-Jalud in 1260. Grasping settlers had goaded the Moorish landowners of Murcia beyond endurance, and suddenly in 1264 they rose without warning to massacre the Christians. Hundreds of towns and villages repudiated Castilian rule, and it took Alfonso two years, even with help from Aragon, to crush this desperate revolt.

  Al-Andalus was now confined to the kingdom of Granada. The creator of this last taifa was a border chieftain, Muhammad ibn-Yusuf ibn-Ahmed ibn-Nasr, called al-Ahmar, who realized that, since the Sierra Morena and the Guadalquivir had been lost, Spanish Islam must find new frontiers. The mountainous region around Granada – where he installed himself in 1238 – was ideal, extending from the sea to the Serranía de Ronda and the Sierra de Elvira, with the Sierra de Nevada as a backbone, while its ports gave access to Africa.

  Al-Ahmar came to terms with the Reconquista. When Ferdinand was besieging Jaén in 1246, the sultan suddenly rode into his camp to pay homage, and as Ferdinand's vassal he intervened decisively at Seville. His most remarkable innovation was European armour, and Granadine troops began to wear Spanish mail and ride heavier horses, attacking in dense formations. Supported by jinetes, the traditional light cavalry, this new army proved most effective. Granada was a microcosm of al-Andalus. Refugees had fled to it from all over the peninsula; many Granadine labourers were supposedly descended from Moorish noblemen. Its capital's glories are well known, especially the Alhambra with its Court of Lions and Court of Myrtles, but the seaports of Malaga and Almería were even richer. Peasants tilled and irrigated every inch of fertile soil, famous for wheat and fruit. Merchants exported silks, jewellery and slaves, returning with African and Asiatic spices, while a vigorous intellectual life produced many poets and historians.

  When al-Ahmar died in 1273 a new Berber dynasty was established at Fez, the Banu Marin, which was under the gifted Yakub, a philosopher-warrior. Muhammad II of Granada offered him Tarifa, north-west of Gibraltar. Yakub arrived in 1275 with his Berber 'Guzat', fanatical troops similar to the rabitos. The Moroccan horde swarmed up to Jerez in the old style, killing and burning. Yakub then retired, but he launched another raid in 1279. Christian Spain lived in dread of a further invasion.

  The Reconquista made small progress during the reigns of Sancho IV (1284–94) and Ferdinand IV (1294–1312), though the former took Tarifa and the latter Gibraltar, attacking from the seaward side. The rock was too exposed to attract settlers, so Ferdinand granted it a fuero, giving asylum to all criminals, robbers, murderers and even women who had run away from their husbands. Then it was the turn of Islam. In 1319 the two Castilian regents perished in 'the disaster of the Vega' and the frontier towns were so horrified that they formed a league to. make peace with Granada at any cost. Five years later, the Berbers took Baza and Martos, then in 1333 recaptured Gibraltar.

  All this time the brethren continued to raid. The background was the hot yellow plains, their monotony broken only by rocks, olive orchards and the sheep which grazed on the parched, dusty scrub, the bleak sierras with deep valleys and high passes, or the carefully tilled Granadine vega. Towns were built of whitewashed mud-brick, their narrow streets resembling a Moroccan souk. Despite its dangers, the military vocation had become an attractive career; a commander was a rich landowner. Before, a desire for spiritual perfection had been the sole requirement for a postulant, but by the end of the thirteenth century Orders stipulated that he must show all four grandparents to have been of noble birth.*

  Iberian Orders were proud of their history. A frey caballero of Santiago, Pere López de Baeza (fl. c. 1329), commander of Mohernando, wrote a brief chronicle of his brotherhood's origins. No doubt this was read in the refectories.

  By this date Maestres were transformed into princes with rich commanderies in their gift; they could not only command the Orders' troops but hire mercenaries. Half of Calatrava's revenues, the mesa maestral, went to the Master, who on one occasion brought 1,200 lances to the field. A magistral palace was built near Ciudad Real at Almagro, in the centre of Calatrava's enormous domains; it became the administrative capital and, though its Gothic splendours have not survived, was probably the nearest approach to a Spanish Marienburg. At Alcántara freyles kept their court in a palace next to the castle. Maestres now spent too much time with the king, and the Chapter of Calatrava had to stipulate that
their Master must visit Calatrava at least three times a year. In place of the Grand Prior, the Maestres of Calatrava began to profess knight brethren themselves, an innovation copied by Alcántara and Aviz. Masters were exposed to many temptations, for it was easy to defy authority. The feudal levies' disorderly appearance made the frejles' discipline all the more alarming. Inevitably they became involved in politics.

  In 1287 the Portuguese Master of Alcántara took his freyles to the aid of King Dinis of Portugal, whose brother, the Infante Dom Afonso, was in revolt. By this date Portuguese São Thiago (Santiago), under pressure from Dinis, had become a separate order, electing its own Mestre at the headquarters in Palmela, though it was many years before Castile recognized the secession.11 Aviz had received the visitation by Frey Martín Ruiz of Calatrava as late as 1238 but was, in practice, independent. Lack of strong authority and employment on purely secular campaigns weakened the vocation.12 In 1292 Frey Ruy Pérez Ponce, Master of Calatrava, demanded payment from Sancho IV when asked to garrison Tarifa.

  Unrest was perhaps highest at Alcántara. In 1318 some brethren, both caballeros and clerigos, complained to Master Garcia López de Padilla of Calatrava that their own Master, Frey Ruy Vásquez, was ill-treating them. Calatrava had the right of visitation, so Frey Garcia arrived at Alcántara with two Cistercian abbots, whereupon Ruy, his Grand Commander and the clavero barricaded themselves in the conventual buildings, protesting that the privilege had lapsed. However, a chapter of only twenty-two knights declared Frey Ruy deposed and stormed the commandery; Suero Pérez de Maldonado was elected Master in his place. Ruy Vasquez escaped to Morimond and appealed, but the abbot recognized the deposition's legality, forbidding Frey Ruy to leave France. This lamentable incident indicates spiritual decline, though the Master of Alcántara still remained a power in the land, and in 1319 Frey Suero attended the wedding of Ferdinand's sister to the King of Aragon, making a hermandad with the Masters of Calatrava and Santiago the same year.13

  The suppression of the Templars gave the peninsula two new. brotherhoods. King Dinis did not wish St John to become over-mighty in Portugal, and, as the pope would not agree to the crown's acquisition of the Poor Knights' property, the king created the Order of the Knights of Christ, simply deleting the words 'of the Temple' from their title. In 1318 the new brotherhood was installed in all former Templar preceptories, though it is unlikely that any Poor Knights were admitted. The first Mestre was a brother of Aviz, Dom Gil Martíns, who by 1321 had sixty-nine knights, nine chaplains and six sergeants, with constitutions modelled on those of Aviz and Calatrava.14 Under the Mestre was the Prior Mor – who summoned brethren to the castle-convent at Castro Marim for magistral elections – the Grand Commander, the clavero and the alferes or standard-bearer.

  The Aragonese Order of Montesa was erected on the ruins of the Temple, with Frey Guillem d'Eril as Mestre; several Mercedarian Knights enrolled, now that their own brotherhood had ceased to be military. Like the Knights of Christ, the Order of Montesa was based on a headquarters house staffed by knight and chaplain brethren with a prior and clavero, and affiliated to the White Monks. Its first members, including Fra' Guillem, were mainly Aragonese frares of Calatrava, whose Grand Commander presided over its inauguration, assisted by Hospitallers, Mercedarians and Knights of Alfama. The brethren retained the white mantle but, unlike the Portuguese, exchanged their red cross for a black one. They took their name from their headquarters, a former Templar preceptory in Valencia where more Moslems remained than anywhere in Spain. Here they could deal with mudéjar revolts or pirate raids. Soon the new brethren numbered four or five times as many as their predecessors, which resulted in severe impoverishment, and they seem to have had difficulty in recruiting chaplains. Though rich and respected, the three orders – Montesa, Calatrava at Alcafñz and Santiago at Montalbán* – never dominated Aragonese politics.15

  Alfonso XI (1312–50) was the leader who met and broke the Moslem resurgence. His subjects feared him even more than the Moors, for he used treachery and murder to intimidate the nobles, killing rebels without trial. They called him 'the avenger' or 'the implacable' but admired his grim courage. In the end they named him after his finest victory, 'el rey del Rio Salado'. He was determined to be a strong king and, as he could not merge the brotherhoods into a single royal military Order, he brought them firmly under his control. The beginning of his personal rule coincided with a peculiarly unedifying display on the part of Calatrava.

  Since 1325 the aged Maestre of Calatrava, Garcia López, had been quarrelling with his Grand Commander, Juan Núñez de Prado, who disputed the maestrazgo, alleging that Frey Garcia had shown cowardice in the battle of Baena, abandoning the Order's standard.16 After a pitched battle, the old man agreed to abdicate in return for the rich commandery of Zorita de los Canes. Frey Juan was duly installed in 1329 but then refused to honour the bargain. The indignant Frey Garcia thereupon set himself up as Master in Aragon and, though he died in 1336, the schism lasted until 1348, when Don Joan Fernández, the Grand Commander, recognized the Castilian Maestre, though Alcañiz remained semi-autonomous. Soon the Grand Commander had the authority of a separate mestrat.

  Alfonso needed crack troops led by good generals, not a squabbling rabble under fractious grandees, and in 1335 he forced the abdication of Alcántara's Master, Ruy Pérez de Maldonado, precipitating a bitter struggle within the Order which lasted for over two years until, after a short but bloody siege, Valencia de Alcántara was stormed by royal troops and the Master, Gonzalo Martínez, beheaded and burned. Alfonso17 then installed the obedient Nuño Chamiro. There was even greater interference with Santiago. When Maestre Vasco Rodríguez Coronado died in 1338, Alfonso ordered the trezes to elect his eight-year-old bastard by Leonor de Guzmán, Don Fadrique. Instead they chose Frey Vasco López, whereupon the king advanced on Uclés and Frey Vasco fled to Portugal. Alfonso forced the brethren to depose Frey Vasco and accept Leonor's brother, Alonso Meléndez de Guzmán, promising the succession to Fadrique. Frey Alonso was killed two years later, whereupon the ten-year-old boy was solemnly installed as Master of Santiago.

  Alfonso was faced by an alliance between the able Sultan Yusuf of Granada and the formidable Marinid Abul Hassan, 'the Black Sultan'; both dreamt of recovering their 'lost land' just as did Henry V of France or Louis IX of Outremer. In 1340 the African fleet defeated the Castilian navy off Gibraltar, sinking thirty-two warships, whereupon Abul Hassan of Fez landed at Algeciras with the largest Moorish army seen in Spain since the Almohads. Granadine troops hastened to join the Marinids, and Tarifa was invested. It took Alfonso six months to gather his army, which assembled at Seville by October. By northern standards Spanish troops were old-fashioned, their armour too light. The king had one modern asset – cannon, thick tubes of cast iron bound with iron bands, firing large stones; frequently these blew up, killing their gunners. Alfonso himself commanded the centre, accompanied by the Archbishop of Toledo, and all three Maestres, Nuño Chamiro of Alcántara, Juan Nunez of Calatrava and Alonso Meléndez de Guzmán of Santiago. Afonso IV of Portugal arrived with 1,000 lances and sent ships to the joint Castilian–Catalan fleet commanded by the Hospitaller Prior of Castile, Alfonso Ortiz Calderón. Tarifa still held out.

  Though a few Granadines had European armour, most Moorish horsemen were lightly equipped jinetes and Abul Hassan relied on numbers and speed. On 30 October Alfonso attacked him at the river Salado, the Portuguese taking the Granadines, the Castilians the Moroccans. Suddenly a sortie from Tarifa burst into the unguarded enemy camp. The Moors panicked and the Christians proved heavy enough to break them, Berbers and Granadines fleeing with ghastly losses. Christian casualties were relatively light, though Frey Alonso died a glorious death. Santiago and the Hospitallers had ridden with the Castilians, Calatrava and Alcántara with the Portuguese. It was the end of the Marinid threat.

  Alfonso invested the port of Algeciras in 1342, beginning a long siege during which two Masters of Alcántara died; one drowned fording the river
Guadarranque at night, while his successor succumbed to wounds.18 The straits of Gibraltar were again blockaded. Early in 1344 the Earls of Derby and Arundel arrived in Alfonso's camp, and he used them to impress a Moorish embassy, who were intrigued by the Englishmen's ornate crests – animals and perhaps even an odd Saracen's head modelled in boiled leather. Chaucer's knight was present at this siege, possibly in the earls' retinue.19 The starving town surrendered the same year, in March.

  One last Moroccan foothold remained – Gibraltar. In 1350 Alfonso advanced on the rock with a large army, but the Black Death came to its rescue and he died of bubonic plague. The Moors admired their savage enemy and a number joined the black-robed mourners of his funeral procession as it crossed the sands. This cruel, brilliant soldier was the last king of Castile able to unite his subjects in Holy War. Unfortunately he had involved the brethren even more deeply in secular politics. Now kings would use them to fight barons instead of Moors.

  10

  KINGS AND MASTERS

  Alfonso's son, the boy Pedro III, inherited a kingdom which was almost impossible to govern. Great lords hired troops, keeping these private armies on a permanent footing, and even the townsmen's cofradias municipal leagues – had their own soldiers. Alfonso had left a maîtresse en titre, Leonor de Guzmán, with five sons, the eldest being Enrique, Count of Trastámara, and Fadrique, Master of Santiago.1 She was dangerous and ambitious for her children, and King Pedro murdered her in 1351. Next year Enrique rebelled, beginning a long and terrible struggle for the crown. The king's problem was to survive at all, for he had little money, few troops, no obvious allies and an uncontrollable nobility. Pedro therefore turned to treachery and murder.