Battle of Jerez

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Battle of Jerez
Part of the Reconquista

A 17th-century depiction of the battle
Date1231
Location
Jerez de la Frontera
Result Castilian victory
Belligerents
Castile Moors
Commanders and leaders
Álvaro Pérez de Castro[1][2]
infante Alfonso (ambiguous; see text)		 Ibn Hud
Strength
1,000 knights[2]
2,500 infantry[2]		 Unknown
Casualties and losses
Unknown Unknown
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The Battle of Jerez (

Alfonso de Molina, assisted by Álvaro Pérez de Castro; according to some accounts Castro led the Castilians, not Molina.[3] The battle is traditionally seen as marking the collapse of Ibn Hud's authority, and allowing the rise of his successor, Muhammad I
.

Battle

In April 1231, King

Vejer camping near the Guadalete River. In all likelihood this force was intended to distract Ibn Hud from the frontier, and in this it succeeded. Emir Ibn Hud pursued and caught the expedition, but in the subsequent battle his troops were routed and suffered heavy losses, allowing the Christians to depart loaded with loot. On a strategic level, the raid was also successful in that it allowed the unimpeded capture of Quesada by an army of Archbishop Rodrigo Jiménez de Rada, also ordered in April by Ferdinand.[4]

Castilian commander

It is not clear who led the Castilian expedition. It is undisputed that

Primera Crónica General (1906) interpreted it as Molina,[5] and so did historian Derek William Lomax [es] in 1978.[1] However, historian Gonzalo Martínez Diez [es] concluded in 2000 that it was the king's son, because of a passage that describes the infante as being very young ("muy moço") and under the protection of Álvaro Pérez de Castro who led the troops ("para guardar el infante y por cabdillo de la hueste").[2] Spanish historian Julio González [es] was aware of both interpretations, but in 1946 thought it was highly improbable that Ferdinand's son, who would have been aged nine, was involved in a military action at such a young age.[4] A 2003 biography of Alfonso X also places him alongside Álvaro Pérez de Castro in the raiding campaign of 1231, including the battle.[6]

Effect

In his chronicle, Alfonso X referred to the operation as a

cavalgada, a large-scale mounted raid.[2][6] Alfonso X described its impact as follows:

It is fitting that you who are hearing this story know that the thing in the world that most broke the Moors, why they had to lose Andalusia and the Christians gain it from them, was this battle of Jerez. That is how the Moors were shattered. They could never again muster the daring nor the effort which they had previously against the Christians, such was the level of the shock and fear they experienced on that occasion.[2]

Gonzalo Martínez Diez concludes that the defeat certainly weakened Ibn Hud's power base, for in April 1232 a challenger arose in the person of Muhammad ibn Nasr, who proclaimed himself emir in Arjona, and would eventually become the first Nasrid ruler of Granada.[2] According to Julio González, Ibn Hud was perhaps more concerned with eliminating the remnants of the Almohads, as he took Gibraltar from them in October 1231, finally driving them out of the peninsula, and later laid siege to Ceuta in 1232.[4] Ibn Hud's reign started to fall apart only a year later, between October 1232 and October 1233, suffering both internal and external setbacks: a rebellion in Seville sought alliance with ibn Nasr, the Christians took Úbeda, and the Almohads secured Ceuta.[7] Another measure of the unraveling of Ibn Hud's power is that a later raid against Cádiz went unopposed, and the city was ferociously sacked by Christian mercenaries in 1234–1235 (Hijri year 632).[8]

The battle was later glorified in the writings of the 19th-century Spanish romantic writer Adolfo de Castro.[8]

References

  1. ^
    ISBN 978-0-582-50209-3
    .
  2. ^
    ISSN 0561-3590
    .
  3. ^ "The Battle of Jerez in 1231 » De Re Militari". deremilitari.org. Retrieved 2017-12-09.
  4. ^
    ISBN 978-84-9761-277-7
    .
  5. ^ Fragment from Christians and Moors in Spain, edited by Colin Smith (Aris & Phillips: 1989-92)
  6. ^
    ISBN 978-90-04-18147-2
    .
  7. ISBN 978-84-9761-277-7
    .
  8. ^
    ISBN 978-84-7737-154-0
    .

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