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Updated: June 13, 2025
Gadea at Burgos, and that so he should be cleared. XI. So the King and all his company took horse and went to Burgos. And when the day appointed for the oath was come, the King went to hear mass in the church of Gadea, and his sisters the Infantas Dona Urraca and Dona Elvira with him, and all his knights.
X. As soon as King Don Alfonso arrived at Zamora, he pitched his tents in the field of Santiago, and took counsel with his sister. And the Infanta Dona Urraca, who was a right prudent lady and a wise, sent letters throughout the land, that a Cortes should assemble and receive him for their Lord.
The King your father commended me to them as well as to you, when he divided his kingdoms, and I have lost their love for your sake, having done them great evil. And now neither can I go before King Don Alfonso, your brother, nor remain among the Christians before Dona Urraca your sister, because they hold that whatsoever you have done against them was by my counsel.
And when Don Arias Gonzalo saw the misery, and the hunger, and the mortality which were there, he said to the Infanta Dona Urraca, You see, Lady, the great wretchedness which the people of Zamora have suffered, and do every day suffer to maintain their loyalty; now then call together the Council, and thank them truly for what they have done for you, and bid them give up the town within nine days to the King your brother.
And when they were all assembled, Dona Urraca arose and said, Friends and vassals, ye have seen how my brother King Don Sancho hath disherited all his brethren, against the oath which he made to the King my father, and now he would disherit me also. He hath sent to bid me give him Zamora, either for a price or in exchange.
Then he and his sons mounted their horses, and as they rode through the gates of their house, Dona Urraca, with a company of dames met them, and said to Don Arias, weeping, Remember now how my father, King Don Ferrando, left me to your care, and you swore between his hands that you would never forsake me; and lo! now you are forsaking me.
The great-grandson of Urraca, Alfonso III. of Castile, received as his heritage the usual complement of strife and warfare which belonged to almost all of the little Spanish monarchies throughout the greater part of the twelfth century; but in the year 1170, arriving at his majority, he entered into a friendly treaty of peace with Aragon, and in that same fortunate year he married the Princess Eleanor, daughter of the English king, Henry II. Apropos of this marriage and its general effect upon the fortunes of Castile, Burke has written the following interesting sentences: "Up to the time of this happy union, the reign of Alfonso III. in Spain had been nothing but a succession of intrigues and civil wars of the accustomed character; but from the day of his marriage in 1170 to the day of his death in 1214, after a reign of no less than fifty-six years, he exercised the sovereign power without hindrance, if not entirely without opposition, within his dominions.
And King Don Sancho said, Brother, you well know that King Don Garcia our brother hath broken the oath made unto our father, and disherited our sister Dona Urraca: for this I will take his kingdom away from him, and I beseech you join with me. But Don Alfonso answered that he would not go against the will of his father, and the oath which he had sworn.
And when all was appointed as ye have heard, Don Arias returned to Zamora, and told the Infanta Dona Urraca all that had been done, and she ordered a meeting to be called, at which all the men of the town assembled.
Toro also submitted to him, but not so Zamora, held by the dauntless Urraca and the governor of the citadel, Arias Gonzalo. So it was besieged by the royal troops and asked to surrender, the message being taken by the great Cid from Don Sancho to his sister. She, of course, refused to give up the town.
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