Battle of Alarcos

Coordinates: 38°57′10″N 4°0′0″W / 38.95278°N 4.00000°W / 38.95278; -4.00000
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Battle of Alarcos
Part of the Reconquista

Alarcos castle
DateJuly 18, 1195
Location
Alarcos, Ciudad Real province
38°57′10″N 4°0′0″W / 38.95278°N 4.00000°W / 38.95278; -4.00000
Result
Almohad victory[1]
Belligerents
Order of St. Benedict
 Almohad Caliphate
Castilian rebels
Commanders and leaders
Alfonso VIII of Castile
Diego López de Haro
Abu Yusuf Ya'qub al-Mansur
Pedro Fernández de Castro
Strength
Undetermined
Modern estimate:
More than 25,000 [2]		 Undetermined
Modern estimate:
20,000-30,000 [2]
Battle location.

Battle of Alarcos (July 18, 1195),

Abu Yusuf Ya'qub al-Mansur and King Alfonso VIII of Castile.[4] It resulted in the defeat of the Castilian forces and their subsequent retreat to Toledo, whereas the Almohads reconquered Trujillo, Montánchez, and Talavera.[3]

Background

In 1189 the

Silves
. He successfully recaptured the city and went back to his capital.

An armistice between the Almohads and the Christian kings of

archbishop of Toledo (Martín López de Pisuerga), which included the military Order of Calatrava, ransacked the province. Having successfully crushed his brother's ambitions, Yaqub al-Mansur was left with no choice other than to lead an expedition against the Christians, who were now threatening the northern province of his empire.[5]

On the first day of June, 1195, he landed at

Muslim scouts and almost massacred,[citation needed
] but managed to provide information to the Castilian king.

Alfonso gathered his forces at Toledo and marched down to Alarcos (al-Arak, in Arabic), near the Guadiana River, a place which marked the Southern limit of his kingdom and where a fortress was under construction. He intended on barring the access to the rich Tagus valley, and did not wait for the reinforcements the Kings Alfonso IX of León and Sancho VII of Navarre were sending.[4] When on July 16 the Almohad host came in view, Yaqub al-Mansur did not accept battle on this day or the day after, preferring to give rest to his forces; but early the day after that, Wednesday, July 18, the Almohad army formed for battle around a small hill called La Cabeza, two bow-shots from Alarcos.

Battle

Yusuf Ya'qub al-Mansur gave to his vizier, Abu Yahya ibn Abi Hafs, command of a very strong vanguard: on the first line the

Almohad forces commanded by Yabir ibn Yusuf, Abd al-Qawi, Tayliyun, Muhammad ibn Munqafad, and Abu Jazir Yajluf al-Awrabi and the black guard (of black Africans). It was a formidable army, whose strength Alfonso had badly underestimated. The Castilian king put most of his heavy cavalry in a compact body, about 8,000 strong, and gave its command to Diego López de Haro
, lord of Vizcaya. The king himself would follow with the infantry and the Military Orders.

The

Arab
right under Yarmun had been enveloping the Castilian flank and rear; at this point the best of the Almohad forces attacked, with the sultan himself clearly visible in the front ranks; and finally the knights were almost completely surrounded.

Alfonso advanced with all his remaining forces into the melee, only to find himself assaulted from all sides and under a rain of arrows. For some time he fought hand-to-hand, until removed from the action, almost by force, by his bodyguard; they fled towards Toledo. The Castilian infantry was destroyed, together with most of the Orders which had supported them; the Lord of Vizcaya tried to force his way through the ring of enemy forces, but finally had to seek refuge in the unfinished fortress of Alarcos with just a fraction of his knights. The castle was surrounded with some 3,000 people trapped inside, half of them women and children. The king's enemy, Pedro Fernández de Castro, who had taken little part in the action, was sent by the

Amir
to negotiate the surrender; López de Haro and the survivors were allowed to go, leaving 12 knights as hostages for the payment of a great ransom.

The Castilian field army had been destroyed. Those killed included three bishops (from Avila, Segovia, and Siguenza);

Order of St. Benedict
, Gonçalo Viegas. Losses for the Muslims included the death of the vizier and Abi Bakr, commander of the Bani Marin volunteers, who died of his wounds in the following year.

Aftermath

The outcome of the battle shook the stability of the

Abu Yusuf Yaqub al-Mansur
moved back to Seville to make good his own considerable losses; there he took the title of al-Mansur Billah ('The one victorious by God').

For the next two years, al-Mansur's forces devastated Extremadura, the

Almohad diplomacy did obtain an alliance with King Alfonso IX of León (who had been enraged when the Castilian king had not waited for him before the battle of Alarcos) and the neutrality of Navarre
. These alliances proved to be temporary only.

But the caliph was losing interest in the affairs of the Iberian Peninsula; he was in poor health, his objective of retaining a hold over al-Andalus appeared to be a complete success, and in 1198 he returned to Africa. He died in February 1199.

However, the success of the battle proved to be short-lived. When the Almohad caliph

Almohad
Empire itself collapsed a few decades later.

Notes

References

Citations

  1. ^ Battle of Alarcos, Theresa M. Vann, Medieval Iberia: An Encyclopedia, Ed. E. Michael Gerli and Samuel G. Armistead, (Taylor & Francis, 2003), 42.
  2. ^ a b Kaufmann, Kaufmann & Jurga 2004, p. 101
  3. ^ a b Britannica.com
  4. ^ a b c Medieval Iberia: an encyclopedia, 42.
  5. ^
    Abdelwahid al-Marrakushi
    "Al-Mojib fi Talkhis Akhbar al-Maghrib" [The Pleasant In Summarizing the History of the Maghreb"] (1224), pp. 136–137
  6. ^ Aḥmad ibn Muḥammad Maqqarī, Ibn al-Khaṭīb, The history of the Mohammedan dynasties in Spain, (Johnson Reprint Corporation, 1843), lxv.
  7. ^ King, Georgiana Goddard, A brief account of the military orders in Spain, (The Hispanic Society of America, 1921), 26.

Bibliography

  • Kaufmann, J. E.; Kaufmann, H. W.; Jurga, Robert M. (2004). The Medieval Fortress: Castles, Forts, And Walled Cities Of The Middle Ages. Cambridge: Da Capo Press.
    ISBN 978-0-306-81358-0
    .
  • Aḥmad ibn Muḥammad Maqqarī, Ibn al-Khaṭīb, The history of the Mohammedan dynasties in Spain, Vol.2, Johnson Reprint Corporation, 1843.
  • Britannica.com
  • King, Georgiana Goddard, A brief account of the military orders in Spain, The Hispanic Society of America, 1921.
  • Medieval Iberia: an encyclopedia, Ed. E. Michael Gerli and Samuel G. Armistead, Taylor & Francis, 2003.
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