The Battle of San Esteban de Gormaz was a battle of the Spanish

Reconquista The ' (Spanish, Portuguese and Galician for "reconquest") is a historiographical construction describing the 781-year period in the history of the Iberian Peninsula between the Umayyad conquest of Hispania in 711 and the fall of the Nasrid ...

which occurred in the year 917. The battle pitted the

Umayyad The Umayyad Caliphate (661–750 CE; , ; ar, ٱلْخِلَافَة ٱلْأُمَوِيَّة, al-Khilāfah al-ʾUmawīyah) was the second of the four major caliphates established after the death of Muhammad. The caliphate was ruled by the ...

forces of the

Emirate of Córdoba The Emirate of Córdoba ( ar, إمارة قرطبة, ) was a medieval Islamic kingdom in the Iberian Peninsula. Its founding in the mid-eighth century would mark the beginning of seven hundred years of Muslim rule in what is now Spain and Port ...

under Abu-Abdallah against the troops of the Kingdom of León under

Ordoño II of León Ordoño II (c. 873 – June 924, León) was a king of Galicia from 910, and king of Galicia and León from 914 until his death. He was an energetic ruler who submitted the kingdom of Leon to his control and fought successfully against the Mus ...

. The battle resulted in a Leonese victory.

Context

In 912, Ordoño II ordered the

repoblación The ''Repoblación'' (, ; pt, Repovoação, ) was the ninth-century repopulating of a large region between the River Duero and the Cantabrian Mountains, which had been depopulated in the early years of the Reconquista. In the reign of Alfonso ...

San Esteban de Gormaz San Esteban de Gormaz is a municipality in the province of Soria in the autonomous community of Castile-Leon, Spain. Its population is approximately 3,500. The town is located in the Wool Route and the Way of the Cid, the route of the exile of ...

as the city had been one of the borderline cities in between the Moorish and Christian zones of the

Iberian Peninsula The Iberian Peninsula (), ** * Aragonese and Occitan: ''Peninsula Iberica'' ** ** * french: Péninsule Ibérique * mwl, Península Eibérica * eu, Iberiar penintsula also known as Iberia, is a peninsula in southwestern Europe, def ...

. This region had become depopulated early in the Muslim takeover and acted as a buffer zone between the two groups.

The battle

Upon hearing of Ordoño II's efforts to repopulate and take control of the city, Abi-Abda ordered a siege of the city in 917. Ordoño II was able to successfully come to the city's aid and routed the Muslim forces. Abi-Abda himself was captured during the fray and executed by decapitation. His head was put on display on the city's ramparts as a warning to the Muslims.

Aftermath

A similar battle took place in 919 where the Muslims were repulsed; however, by 920 the city was again in Muslim hands. The city changed hands several times until 1054 when the town was permanently retaken by the Christian forces under the command of

Rodrigo Diaz de Vivar Rodrigo Díaz de Vivar (c. 1043 – 10 July 1099) was a Castilian knight and warlord in medieval Spain. Fighting with both Christian and Muslim armies during his lifetime, he earned the Arabic honorific ''al-sīd'', which would evolve into El C ...

, also known as ''el Cid''.

References

* San Esteban de Gormaz 917

San Esteban 10th century in the Kingdom of León 917 {{Al-Andalus-stub