Disaster of the Vega de Granada | |||||||
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Part of the Spanish Reconquista | |||||||
The Nasrid Emirate of Granada | |||||||
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Belligerents | |||||||
Kingdom of Castile Order of Santiago Order of Calatrava | Emirate of Granada | ||||||
Commanders and leaders | |||||||
Infante Peter † Infante John † | Uthman ibn Abi al-Ula | ||||||
Strength | |||||||
More than 10,000 | About 5,000 | ||||||
Casualties and losses | |||||||
Unknown, but heavy | Unknown |
History of Spain |
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Timeline |
The Battle of Sierra Elvira, also called the Disaster of the Vega de Granada, was a battle of the Spanish Reconquista fought near the city of Granada on 25 June 1319 (6 Jumada al-Awwal 719 AH). The battle was fought between the troops of the Emirate of Granada and those of the Kingdom of Castile. The battle resulted in a catastrophic defeat for Castile. [1]
The Kingdom of Castile periodically conducted raids into the Emirate of Granada in order to collect plunder. Notwithstanding temporary agreements and truces with the Nasrid rulers, these expeditions were often under the leadership of the rulers of Castile. They were often true military expeditions with large armies numbering thousands of men.
In the late 1310s Castile was ruled by King Alfonso XI, a minor, under the joint regency of his grandmother Maria de Molina, of his granduncle infante John and of his uncle infante Peter. Infante Peter had led minor raids into Granadine territory in 1316 and 1317 [2] and an agreement had been reached with the nobility of Castile in the Cortes held at Medina del Campo in 1318 for a new expedition to begin in the late spring of 1319. This expedition was to be a large one, blessed by Pope John XXII who authorized it as a crusade and conceded the rebate to the crown of some of the Church tithes in order to finance it. [3]
The troops assembled in Cordoba in June 1319 and crossed the border under the command of infante Peter. With him were the Grand Masters of the Orders of Santiago, Calatrava and Alcántara and the Archbishops of Toledo and Seville. Infante John followed with his own troops. The two infantes resolved to march deep into Granada and to reach the Vega de Granada, the area surrounding the city characterized by its wealth and fertility. During the march the army skirmished with Moorish troops and captured several towns, collecting large amounts of plunder.
The large Castilian army encamped in the Vega de Granada [4] and, after looting the immediate area, resolved to return to Castile satisfied with the collected booty. A siege of the city of Granada was deemed impossible at the time. The withdrawal started on 25 June 1319, in very hot weather; infante Peter led the vanguard while infante John commanded the rearguard.
At this point Sultan Ismail decided to strike. A large force of elite Moorish cavalry, the "Volunteers of the Faith", led by Uthman ibn Abi al-Ula, exited from Granada and started harassing the retreating Castilians of infante John. These minor attacks turned into a general assault when the Granadines realized the Castilians were losing their cohesion during their retreat and were unable to fight back effectively.
Infante John requested the aid of infante Peter, but Peter, according to chroniclers, was at first dissuaded from this by his companions. When he finally decided to help his uncle, he fell from his horse as he led his men, and was trampled and killed. At this point the vanguard thought only of flight and to reach the Castilian border; in their panic, many men drowned while attempting to cross the river Genil in full armour. The unsupported rearguard collapsed, with infante John falling victim probably to stroke or heat stroke [5] leading to a spectacular Moorish victory. [6]
Most of the fighting took place in the present-day municipality of Pinos Puente. A hill on the battlefield was given the name Cerro de los Infantes ("Hill of the Infantes").
Numbers are not available for the Castilian losses but they had to be quite large. The border for some years after 1319 was undermanned and the Granadines could raid the southern Castilian territories almost at will. Maria de Molina remained as sole regent and was later joined by her other son, infante Philip and by a distant relative, the celebrated Juan Manuel. [7]
In 1325 Alfonso XI started to rule alone and soon started his lifelong, and in the end victorious, struggle with the Nasrid kingdom and its later ally, the Marinids of Fez, which was also intended to avenge the 1319 defeat.
Alfonso XI, called the Avenger, was King of Castile and León. He was the son of Ferdinand IV of Castile and his wife Constance of Portugal. Upon his father's death in 1312, several disputes ensued over who would hold regency, which were resolved in 1313.
The Battle of La Higueruela was fought in the vega of the river Genil near Granada on 1 July 1431 between the forces of John II of Castile, led by Álvaro de Luna, and troops loyal to Muhammed IX, Nasrid Sultan of Granada. The battle was a modest victory for the forces of Castile, with no territorial gain and failing to take Granada. Following this battle, John II of Castile installed Yusuf IV, grandson of Muhammed VI, as Sultan of Granada.
Muhammad II was the second Nasrid ruler of the Emirate of Granada in Al-Andalus on the Iberian Peninsula, succeeding his father, Muhammad I. Already experienced in matters of state when he ascended the throne, he continued his father's policy of maintaining independence in the face of Granada's larger neighbours, the Christian kingdom of Castile and the Muslim Marinid state of Morocco, as well as an internal rebellion by his family's former allies, the Banu Ashqilula.
Nasr, full name Abu al-Juyush Nasr ibn Muhammad, was the fourth Nasrid ruler of the Emirate of Granada from 14 March 1309 until his abdication on 8 February 1314. He was the son of Muhammad II al-Faqih and Shams al-Duha. He ascended the throne after his brother Muhammad III was dethroned in a palace revolution. At the time of his accession, Granada faced a three-front war against Castile, Aragon and the Marinid Sultanate, triggered by his predecessor's foreign policy. He made peace with the Marinids in September 1309, ceding to them the African port of Ceuta, which had already been captured, as well as Algeciras and Ronda in Europe. Granada lost Gibraltar to a Castilian siege in September, but successfully defended Algeciras until it was given to the Marinids, who continued its defense until the siege was abandoned in January 1310. James II of Aragon sued for peace after Granadan defenders defeated the Aragonese siege of Almería in December 1309, withdrawing his forces and leaving the Emirate's territories by January. In the ensuing treaty, Nasr agreed to pay tributes and indemnities to Ferdinand IV of Castile and yield some border towns in exchange for seven years of peace.
Abu'l-Walid Ismail I ibn Faraj was the fifth Nasrid ruler of the Emirate of Granada on the Iberian Peninsula from 1314 to 1325. A grandson of Muhammad II on the side of his mother Fatima, he was the first of the lineage of sultans now known as the al-dawla al-isma'iliyya al-nasriyya. Historians characterise him as an effective ruler who improved the emirate's position with military victories during his reign.
The Emirate of Granada, also known as the Nasrid Kingdom of Granada, was an Islamic polity in the southern Iberian Peninsula during the Late Middle Ages, ruled by the Nasrid dynasty. It was the last independent Muslim state in Western Europe.
Blanche of Castile was by birth a member of the Castilian House of Burgundy. She was the only child of Infante Peter of Castile and Infanta Maria of Aragon.
John of Castile, called the "el de Tarifa" was an infante of Castile and León. He was engaged in a decades-long fight for control over the Lordship of Biscay with Diego López V de Haro, the uncle of his wife.
Alfonso Fernández el Niño was a Spanish nobleman, the illegitimate son of King Alfonso X of Castile and Elvira Rodríguez de Villada. He was the lord of Molina and Mesa through his marriage to Blanca Alfonso de Molina, daughter of the infante Alfonso of Molina and niece of King Alfonso IX of León.
The siege of Algeciras was the first of many sieges of the city by Christian forces in the lengthy period of the Spanish Reconquista. The siege, ordered by King Alfonso X of Castile also known as "el Sabio", was a fruitless military campaign initiated by the Kingdom of Castile with the objective of removing the Benimerins from Algeciras. The siege on Algeciras, then known to the Muslims as Al-Jazira Al-Khadra, was strategically important because Algeciras had been at the time the main fortress and landing place for African reinforcement troops in the Iberian Peninsula. Castile, which had a powerful armada of ships anchored in the Bay of Gibraltar to blockade such reinforcement, had a few days previously to the siege, seen that fleet obliterated by the Muslim admiral, Abu Yusuf Yaqub at the Naval Battle of Algeciras.
The Battle of Écija was a battle of the Spanish Reconquista that took place in September 1275. The battle pitted the Muslim troops of the Nasrid Emirate of Granada and its Moroccan allies against those of the Kingdom of Castile and resulted in a victory for the Emirate of Granada.
The second siege of Gibraltar was an abortive attempt in 1316 by the forces of the Azafid Ceuta and the Nasrid Emirate of Granada to recapture Gibraltar, which had fallen to the forces of Ferdinand IV of Castile in 1309.
The Battle of Los Alporchones was a battle of the Spanish Reconquista that took place on 17 March 1452. The battle was fought between the troops of the Emirate of Granada and the combined forces of the Kingdom of Castile and its client kingdom, the Kingdom of Murcia. The Moorish army was commanded by Malik ibn al-Abbas and the Castilian troops were commanded by Alonso Fajardo el Bravo, the head of the House of Fajardo and the Alcalde of Lorca Castle. The battle was fought in the area around the city of Lorca and resulted in a victory for the Kingdom of Castile.
The Battle of Guadix was an engagement between Castilian and Granadan forces at Guadix, then in the Emirate of Granada and now in Spain, that took place in January 1362. The Castilians were routed by forces loyal to Muhammed VI, Sultan of Granada. Despite his victory, Muhammed VI soon after sued for peace. He was murdered on the orders of King Peter of Castile.
The Battle of Martos was a minor battle of the Spanish Reconquista fought between Martos and Torredonjimeno in Andalusia in 1275. The battle was fought between the troops of the Kingdom of Granada and those of the Crown of Castile. The Castilian force was completely destroyed as a result of the battle. There is some confusion in the dates since different authors report different dates. Zurita, for example, reports that the events described here took place between May and August; the more modern authors, however, put them between September and October.
The Battle of the Strait was a military conflict contesting the ports in the Straits of Gibraltar taking place in the late thirteenth century and the first half of the fourteenth. The conflict involves principally the Spanish Muslim Emirate of Granada, the Spanish Christian Crown of Castile and the North African Muslim Marinid state. The ports' strategic value came from their position linking Spain and North Africa, thus connecting Muslims in Spain with the rest of the Islamic world. The campaign had mixed results. Castile gained Tarifa permanently, and managed to take Gibraltar and Algeciras but both would revert to Muslim rule. Castile also failed to gain any port in the African side of the strait.
Diego Fernández de Córdoba y Mendoza, 3rd Count of Cabra, was a Castilian nobleman. He served with distinction during the war in which the Emirate of Granada was conquered by the forces of Castile and Aragon, and subsequently had great influence in Castile.
Abu Sa'id Uthman ibn Abi al-Ula was a Marinid prince who led an unsuccessful rebellion aiming to capture the throne, and fled to the Nasrid Emirate of Granada in its aftermath. There he served as the Commander of the Volunteers of the Faith of Granada, and became one of the most important political figures of the Nasrid realm.
The Battle of Ceuta (1309) was a military confrontation between the Crown of Aragon and the Nasrid kingdom of Granada in the city of Ceuta during the Castilian-Granadian War from 1309 to 1319. The Benimerin Sultanate wished to occupy the city but lacked a navy to carry out the enterprise. The Crown of Aragon, which had gone to war against Granada, set out to conquer the city for the Benimerins.
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