King of Asturias Ordoño I of Asturias

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• Reference Number: 37412

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Ordoño I (821 - 27 May 866) was King of Asturias from 850 until his death.

He was born in Oviedo, where he spent his early life in the court of Alfonso II. He was probably associated with the crown from an early age.

When just nine years old, he moved to Lugo, capital of the province of Galicia, of which his father, Ramiro, had been named governor. There he was educated, including in the military arts.

Ordoño was named governor of Galicia when his father went to Vardulia to marry Paterna (his second wife). Whilst away, Alfonso died, and Ramiro was proclaimed king. However, with Ramiro still away, the impatient nobles elected Count Nepocian in opposition. Ordoño immediately began to raise an army to assist his father in putting down the usurper. He could not leave his post in Galicia to help, however, and his army went unused. When his father finally prevailed, he confirmed Ordoño in his heretofore provisional position.

In 847, at the age of 26, Ordoño married Muniadona, probably a sister of the count of Bierzo. She bore him six children, including his successor, Alfonso III.

On January 1, 850, Ordoño succeeded his father as king. As he was his father's heir, he was the first king of Asturias to ascend the throne without election. His first confrontation was with the Basques, who rebelled with the support of the Banu Qasi of Zaragoza. While returning to Oviedo after defeating the rebels, he received news of an impending Moorish assault on Vardulias. Before the Moors could attack, he met them near the Ebro and defeated them. These victories meant little in the long run, for the governor of Zaragoza, Musa ibn Musa fortified the city of Albaida (Albelda). In 859, Ordoño defeated him at Albelda and besieged and razed the city.

He supported the mozarab rebels, which cost him at Guadacelete in 854. But this fiasco only incited him to consolidate the "Desert of the Duero", the depopulated region between the Asturian cordillera and the river Duero. He directed the repoblación of the towns of León and Talamanka, Astorga, Tui, and Amaya.

He intended to advance against the governor of Tudela and thus control all access to the Navarre and the Basque Country, but the Emirate of Córdoba responded with the invasion and sacking of Álava. At Bureba, the Arabs defeated Rodrigo, first count of Castile, and set back the Reconquista for years.

Ordoño died in Oviedo and was succeeded by his eldest son.

Ordoño — . Unknown [Group Sheet]

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• Reference Number: 37410

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Alfonso III (c. 848-20 December 910), called the Great, was the king of León, Galicia and Asturias from 866 until his death. He was the son and successor of Ordoño I. According to some sources he was the first be called "Emperor of Spain", and he may have purchased a former "imperial crown". He was also titled "Prince of all Galicia" (Princeps totius Galletiae).

Little is known about Alfonso except the bare facts of his reign and of his comparative success in consolidating the kingdom henceforth known as "of Galicia" or "of Oviedo", during the weakness of the Umayyad princes of Córdoba. He fought against and gained numerous victories over the Muslims of al-Andalus, nonetheless his kingdom was always inferior to that of the Cordobans, and he was thus forced to pay them tribute.

He defeated a Basque rebellion in 867 and, much later, a Galician one as well. He conquered Oporto and Coimbra in 868 and 878 respectively. In about 869, he formed an alliance with the Kingdom of Pamplona, and solidified this link by marrying Jimena, who is thought to have been daughter of king García Íñiguez, or less likely, a member of the Jiménez dynasty, and also married his sister Leodegundia to a prince of Pamplona.

He ordered the creation of three chronicles in which was presented the theory that the kingdom of Asturias was the rightful successor of the old Visigothic kingdom. He was also a patron of the arts, like his grandfather before him. He built the church of Santo Adriano de Tuñón. According to a letter of disputed authenticity dated to 906, the Epistola Adefonsi Hispaniae regis, Alfonso arranged to purchase an "imperial crown" from the cathedral of Tours.

Alfonso died in Zamora, probably in 910. Upon his death his kingdom was divided among his three sons by Jimena. The eldest son, García, became king of León but died shortly after in 914 without an heir. The second son, Ordoño, reigned in Galicia from 910 and León after García's death. The youngest son, Fruela, received Asturias with Oviedo as his capital. When Ordoño died his children were too young to ascend and the territory of Alfonso was once again united under Fruela, but the latter did not enjoy his joint monarchy for long as he died the next year. Ordoño's eldest son, Alfonso, succeeded him.

Alfonso — Jimena of Pamplona. [Group Sheet]

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• Reference Number: 37409

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Ordoño II (c. 873-924, León) was king of Galicia from 910, and king of Galicia and León from 914 until his death. He was the second son of King Alfonso III the Great and his wife, Jimena of Pamplona.

His father sent him to Zaragoza to be educated in the court of the Banu Qasi. Upon Alfonso's death in 910, the kingdom was divided between his three sons; León went to García, Galicia to Ordoño, and Asturias to Fruela. Asturian primacy was nevertheless recognised, though Ordoño was of a harder temperament than his brothers. Upon García's death in Zamora in 914, Ordoño succeeded him to the throne of the León.

Ordoño continued thereafter the expansion of the Christian polity of his forefathers on two fronts. In his south-western territiories, he sacked Mérida and Évora and forced the Muslim governor of the region to buy his retreat.

In his eastern territories, he united with Sancho I Garcés, king of Navarre, against the emir of Córdoba, Abd-ar-Rahman III. The Moors were put to rout at San Esteban de Gormaz (917). Arnedo and Calahorra were taken the next year from the Banu Qasi. The reaction of Abd-ar-rahman, however, was severe. In 920, he put to march an army to recover Osma and San Esteban de Gormaz. He crossed into Navarre and defeated the Christians at Valdejunquera and took the bishops of Tui and Salamanca captive. Though intending to crush Pamplona itself, he turned around to deal with his immense booty.

Ordoño II-who had come at King Sancho's request-attributed the loss to the absence of the counts of Castile, who had not come at his call. He brought them together at Tejares and had them killed. The Christian counteroffensive was immediate, occupying La Rioja and incorporating into Navarre Nájera and Viguera.

He suffered frequent raids into his territory from the armies of Abd-ar-Rahman III and he confronted the Castilians who were aspiring to foment revolt in León.

Ordoño married three times. His first wife, and the mother of his children, was Elvira Menendez, daughter of count Hermengildo Gutierrez and aunt of San Rosendo. He then married Aragonta Gonzalez, daughter of count Gonzalo Betotez. He set her aside because "she was not pleasing to him". And when he formed a political alliance with Sancho I of Pamplona, he was married to that king's daughter, Sancha. He died in 924 leaving young children, and was succeeded by his eldest surviving brother, Fruela, the king of Asturias, thereby reuniting their father's patrimony.

Ordoño — . Unknown [Group Sheet]

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• Reference Number: 37408

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Ramiro II (c. 900-1 January 951), son of Ordoño II, was King of León from 931 until his death. Initially titular king only of a lesser part of Asturias, he gained the crown of León (and with it, Galicia) after his brother Alfonso IV abdicated in 931. The scant Anales castellanos primeros are a primary source for his reign.

Ramiro was the creator of a Navarrese/Leonese coalition that defeated the Muslims in the Battle of Simancas (939). This victory allowed the advance of the Leonine border of the Duero to the Tormes.

In the last years of his reign he could not avoid Castilian independence under the direction of Fernán González of Castile, but still in 950 he launched an expedition to the valley of the Edge and defeated the Muslims at Talavera.

He married twice, first to Adosinda Gutierrez, Ramiro's first cousin, being daughter of Gutier Osoriz and Ildonzia Menendez, niece of Ramiro's mother, queen Elvira Menendez and cousin of San Rosendo. By her had sons Bermudo and Ordoño III, and presumably daughter Teresa, wife of García Sánchez I of Pamplona. He subsequently married Urraca, sister of García, having Sancho I and Elvira.

He figures prominently in the romantic poem, the Miragaia, which tells the apocryphal story of Ramiro bedding Ortega, the daughter of a local Arab lord. By her he is given a son Alboazar, the progenitor of the Galician/Portuguese Maya family.[1] This Maya tradition was subsequently linked to another legend, that told in the Cantar de los Siete Infantes de Lara by giving Ramiro and Ortega (sometimes called Ortigueda) a daughter Ortega Ramírez, who is made to marry Gustios Gonzalez, grandfather of the legendary hero Mudarra Gonzalez de Lara. Subsequent elaboration of this legend gave further supposed descendants, but none of these Lara connections are accepted by modern scholars.

Ramiro — . Unknown [Group Sheet]