It is not its intrinsic value which causes the joyful explosion of happiness among the chroniclers, but the consequences that resulted from it ... because it definitely discourages the supporters of Juana (p. 157) [20]... but … does not contradict in any way the reality of the fact that a part of the Portuguese army, having defeated the Castilian right wing, remained on the field, withdrawing in the next day without opposition.

(p. 161) [21] … Not a military victory, but a political victory, the battle of Toro is in itself, a decisive event because it solves the civil war in favour of the Catholic Monarchs, leaving as a relic, a border clash between the two countries (p. 163) " [22]The death of Henry IV of Castile, in 1474, led to a succession crisis and the formation of two rival parties: Isabella, the King's half sister, received the support of the majority of the noblemen, clerks and people, whereas Juana de Trastámara, the King's daughter, was supported by some powerful nobles.

It is the turning point of the war: Ocaña and other places changed side, the Estuñiga family defected, the mighty Marquis of Villena, Diego López Pacheco, denied his military support and the Juanista band began its dissolution.

[citation needed] The forces of Prince John and of the Bishop of Évora, formed by arquebusiers, javelin throwers, and by the Portuguese elite knights, screaming "St. George!

(...) and after the sound of the trumpets and screaming all for S. George invested so bravely the enemy battles, and in spite of their enormous size, they could not stand the hard fight and were rapidly beaten and put on the run with great losses.

[27] Bernaldez painted a grandiose picture of the loot mentioning many horses, prisoners, gold, silver and clothes, which was doubtful given the dark and rainy night described by the chroniclers.

In fact, Pulgar recognises that the product of the loot was modest: "and the people who participated on the battle during the previous day divided the captured spoils: which were in small quantity because it was a very dark night".

[44] Isabella immediately ordered a thanks giving procession at Tordesillas, and in many other cities feasts and religious ceremonies were organised to celebrate the great "victory God has given to the King and to her people.

[36] Damião de Góis: "being the night so advanced (...) the Castilians left the camp in small groups (...) and neither the Cardinal of Castile nor the duke of Alba could impose them order; they also went to Zamora with the men who remained with them in the most silent way possible as all the people had fled (...) and the Prince realizing their retreat didn't pursue them (...) because he feared [that the Castilian retreat was] a war trap, but that wasn't the intention of the Castilians because by morning not a soul was seen on the field (...), resulting in a victorious Prince with all his people in order (...)"[38] Álvaro de Chaves: "They abruptly left the camp towards Zamora as defeated men"[47] Garcia de Resende: "And after the Prince had been most of the night on the battlefield, and seeing that the enemy had fled leaving no soul behind, and having nothing more to do, he decided to stand on the camp for three days (...)".

[40] After defeating their direct opponents and because of the dark and rainy night, Prince John's tactical choice had been to prevent the dissemination of his forces during the subsequent chase, slowly gathering the scattered men from all proveniences, in order to recover his lost operational power and attack the Castilians early the next day.

"[1] Juan de Mariana corroborates him: "(...) the enemy led by prince D. John of Portugal, who without suffering defeat, stood on a hill with his forces in good order until very late (...).

This was certainly common knowledge, because other way it would be a gratuitous slander to the King Afonso V (uncle of the monarch Manuel I to whom Rui de Pina wrote his chronicle) from which his author wouldn't benefit at all.

Indeed, a few years later, after investigating the episode and many other facts in order to write his Chronicle of the reign of the Catholic Monarchs, Pulgar reviewed this first version and eventually stated plainly that Ferdinand's men simply lost the Portuguese royal standard in the battle of Toro, thus converging his own report with that of the Portuguese chroniclers and increasing its reliability since it included an embarrassing fact: "And the standard of the King of Portugal was taken there by the Cardinal and by the men of arms of his guard.

[61] Thereby Isabella conceived the remaining fallback solution: an invasion of Portugal led by herself in order to retake the Castilian royal standard lost to the Portuguese on the battle of Aljubarrota.

"[27] But to this, we must add the time required for the prior defeat and chase of the Castilian right wing, the withdrawal of Alfonso V´men and their pursuit during the dark night into Toro −5 km away.

From this initial number of 8,500 men, it is necessary to discount the losses by desertion, disease,[68][69] and fight during the Zamora's siege, after 15 days of hard winter,[1] putting the final figure in more than 8,000 Luso-Castilians.

From the Portuguese side, this number reflects the high desertion suffered by its initial army (14,000 footmen and 5,600 chevaliers – but many of them were used as garrison of strongholds and thus did not fight in the Battle of Toro),[70][71] due to the unpopularity of the war among them.

[73] Other reasons were the high losses by disease,[74] especially fevers from the hot and also because the Luso-Castilian army included many Castilian contingents who easily and massively changed sides after the aborted expedition to Burgos and its consequent fall on 28 January 1476.

After all, despite the reinforcement troops[75] brought by Prince John, when the Battle of Toro was fought, the invader army had suffered the erosion of 10 months of permanency in enemy territory.

[34] Besides the chronicles, there is additional evidence pointing to low losses in the Battle of Toro: during the Lisbon courts of 1476, the procurators of Évora called the attention of Prince John to the strong contingent given by the city to his father's army.

After the battle, Afonso V – who wanted to avoid the renewal of the truces between France and Aragon, which would expire in July 1476[87] – became convinced that Portugal wouldn't be able to impose his niece's rights to the Castile's throne without external aid.

Many nobles still loyal to Juana since the Burgos episode turned sides[23] along the next months and years – like the Portocarrero and Pacheco-Girón families plus the hesitant Marquis of Cadiz – and the majority of the undecided cities and castles would bound to the Isabella's party specially the fortress of Zamora, Madrid and other places from the Central region of Castile.

[96] In spite of having been weakened by the countless defections from the Juanistas to the Isabelistas, the Portuguese troops maintained a winning attitude especially in the district of Salamanca (and later around Toro), conquering[97] and burning many castles and villages.

In 1479, the same master of Santiago defeats at Albuera[109] a force of 700 or 1,000 (depending on the sources) Portuguese and allied Castilians who had invaded Extremadura (Castile) to help the rebel cities of Medellin and Mérida.

That's corroborated by all the four Portuguese chroniclers,[32][36][47][80] and also by Zurita and Mariana, who respectively added that, after this, the Prince's forces remained "always in good order",[2] and "without suffering defeat",[34] during the whole battle (or "intact", according to Pedro de Medina).

[34] Both Kings Ferdinand and Afonso left the battlefield of Toro (to Zamora and Castronuño respectively) in the night of the battle according to all chroniclers of both sides and the Portuguese recovered its lost royal standard.

[97] For that he was criticised by chronicler Damião de Góis: "[Afonso V] never stopped to make raids and horse attacks along the land, acting more like a frontier's captain than like a King as it was convenient to his royal person.

"[97] Shortly after the Battle of Toro (April 1476), the Portuguese army organised two large military operations to capture[98][99] first King Ferdinand himself (during the siege to Cantalapiedra) and then Queen Isabella (among Madrigal and Medina del Campo).

[148] The so-called "monk of Westminster", who wrote near 1390 possibly recording the testimony of English participants in the battle of Aljubarrota, puts the total losses (common people and men at arms) at more than 7,500 dead.

The academic Rafael Dominguez Casas: "...San Juan de los Reyes resulted from the royal will to build a monastery to commemorate the victory in a battle with an uncertain outcome but decisive, the one fought in Toro in 1476, which consolidated the union of the two most important Peninsular Kingdoms.