Spanish chivalry

[1] Chivalry, or chivalric codes of manners and proper military engagement, is believed to have arrived in the Iberian Peninsula during the 10th century, in the context of the Reconquista.

This was when Frankish knights, who were willing to fight the Muslim invaders of Iberia prior to the Crusades, appeared to protect pilgrims flocking to what was believed to be the tomb of the apostle James in Galicia.

One determinate factor to the strong adoption of chivalric orders in Spain is the Reconquista, in which Christian kingdoms attempted to expel Muslims from the peninsula.

For instance, Ferdinand III of Castile’s reign facilitated the rise of more Spanish orders because of the desire in the kingdom, led by the king, to crusade against the Moors.

Finally, by the Bull Dum intra of Pope Adrian VI dated 4 May 1523, the perpetual administration' of the three orders was transferred to "Charles I (the Holy Roman Emperor Charles V), King of Spain, and his heirs and successors…” [11] After the Reconquista and the loss of their prominence, Spanish orders would find a new role as an elite corps of the nobility, maintaining their castles and estates as commanderies to provide incomes for those who had distinguished themselves in the service of the monarch.

“The rewards for the conquistador were similar to those of his medieval predecessor, the reconquistador: land to conquer, people to convert to Christianity, and glory or fame.

The one major difference was that the conquistadors and reconquistadores were real people who also sought wealth whereas the knight-errant of the romances was a fictional creature indifferent to material gain.

Bernal Díaz de Castillo, a soldier who took part in the conquest of Mexico, put the conquistador’s objective succinctly: 'we came here to serve God and the king and also to get rich'”.

“The protagonist of the poem is the historical Rodrigo Díaz de Vivar (1045–1099), also known as Cid (a dialectal form of the Arabic word sayyid, 'lord' or 'master') and Campeador ('Battler' or 'Victor').

“A Spanish knight, about fifty years of age, who lived in great poverty in a village of La Mancha, gave himself up so entirely to reading the romances of chivalry, of which he had a large collection, that in the end they turned his brain, and nothing would satisfy him but that he must ride abroad on his old horse, armed with spear and helmet, a knight-errant, to encounter all adventures, and to redress the innumerable wrongs of the world.

The knight saw the world only in the mirror of his beloved romances; he mistook inns for enchanted castles, windmills for giants, and country wenches for exiled princesses.

He and his poor squire were beaten, trounced, cheated, and ridiculed on all hands, until in the end, by the kindliness of his old friends in the village, and with the help of some new friends who had been touched by the amiable and generous character of his illusions, the knight was cured of his whimsies and was led back to his home in the village, there to die.” [16] Order of Calatrava – was the first military order founded in Castile, but the second to receive papal approval.