page_title: Order of Calatrava
section_title: Battle of Alarcos
hierarchical_section_title: Order of Calatrava / Battles during the Reconquista / Battle of Alarcos
caption_attribution_description: Portrait of Farinelli (1705-1782)
context_page_description: The Order of Calatrava was one of the four Spanish military orders and the first military order founded in Castile, but the second to receive papal approval. The papal bull confirming the Order of Calatrava as a Militia was given by Pope Alexander III on September 26, 1164. Most of the political and military power of the order dissipated by the end of the 15th century, but the last dissolution of the order's property did not occur until 1838.
context_section_description: After the disastrous Battle of Alarcos, the knights abandoned their bulwark of Calatrava to the Almohads (1195). Velasquez lived long enough to witness the failure of his daring scheme. He died the next year in the monastery of Gumiel (1196). The order in Castile appeared to be finished, and the branch of Aragon sought primacy. The Knights of Alcañiz actually proceeded to elect a new grand master, but the grand master still living in Castile claimed his right. Finally, by a compromise, the master of Alcañiz was recognized as second in dignity, with the title of Grand Commander for Aragon.
  The scattered remains of Castilian knights sheltered in the Cistercian monastery of Cirvelos, and there began to regroup and expand. They soon erected a new bulwark, Salvatierra Castle, where they took the name, which they kept for fourteen years, of Knights of Salvatierra (1198). But Salvatierra itself fell to the Almohad Caliphate in 1209. 
  Summoned by Pope Innocent III, foreign crusaders joined Iberian Christians. An early battle was the reconquest of Calatrava (1212), which was returned to its former masters. In the same year the battle of Las Navas de Tolosa turned the tide of Muslim domination in Spain. Having recovered its stronghold, and resumed the title of Calatrava (1216), the order nevertheless removed to more secure quarters of Calatrava la Nueva, eight miles from old Calatrava (1218). In 1221 the Order of Monfragüe was merged into that of Calatrava. 
  With the decline of Muslim power, new orders sprang up, including the Alcántara in the Kingdom of León and Avis in Portugal. Both began under Calatrava's protection and the visitation of its grand master. This age marks the climax of Iberian chivalry: it was then that King Ferdinand the Saint, after the definitive coalition of Castile and León (1229), in (1235) captured the capital of the old caliphate, Cordova, soon afterwards Murcia, Jaén, and Seville. The European crusade seemed at an end. Encouraged by these victories, Ferdinand's successor, Alfonso X, the Wise, planned a crusade in the East and contemplated marching, with his Castilian knights, to restore the Latin Kingdom of Jerusalem (1272). 
  Calatrava had developed abundant resources of men and wealth, with lands and castles scattered along the borders of Castile. It exercised feudal lordship over thousands of peasants and vassals. Thus, more than once, we see the order bringing to the field, as its individual contributions, 1200 to 2000 knights, a considerable force in the Middle Ages. Moreover, it enjoyed autonomy, being by its constitutions independent in temporal matters and acknowledging only spiritual superiors—the Abbot of Morimond and, in appeal, the pope. These authorities interfered, in consequence of a schism which first broke out in 1296 through the simultaneous election of two grand masters, García Lopez and Gautier Perez. 
  Lopez, dispossessed a first time by a delegate of Morimond, appealed to Pope Boniface VIII, who quashed the sentence and referred the case to the general chapter at Cîteaux, where Lopez was re-established in his dignity (1302). Dispossessed a second time, in consequence of a quarrel with his lieutenant, Juan Nuñez, Lopez voluntarily resigned in favour of Nuñez, who had taken his place (1328), on condition that he should keep the commandery of Zurita; as this condition was violated, Lopez again, for the third time, took the title of Grand Master in Aragon, where he died in 1336. These facts sufficiently prove that after the fourteenth century the rigorous discipline and fervent observance of the order's earlier times had, under the relaxing influence of prosperity, given place to a spirit of intrigue and ambition. 
  Peter of Castile entered into a conflict with the order. That prince had three grand masters in succession sentenced to death, as having incurred his suspicion: the first of these was beheaded (1355) on a charge of having entered into a league with the King of Aragon; the second, Estevañez, having competed for the grand mastership with the king's candidate, García de Padilla, 
caption: The Italian castrato singer Carlo Broschi in robes of the order. Behind, Ferdinand VI and his wife Barbara of Portugal, c. 1753.
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