Life
Alfonso was the son of Ferdinand IV and Constance of Portugal, and the grandson of María de Molina, who served as regent since he was one year old until he attained adulthood at 15 in 1325.
As soon as he occupied the throne, he began working hard to strengthen royal power by dividing his enemies. His early displayal of rulership skills included the unhesitant execution of possible opposers (Don Juan el Tuerto in 1326, among others).
He managed to extend the limits of his kingdom to the Strait of Gibraltar after the important victory at the Battle of Salado against the Marinid Dynasty en 1340 and the conquest of the Kingdom of Algeciras in 1344. Once that conflict was resolved, he redirected all his Reconquista efforts to fighting the Moor king of Granada.
He is variously known among Castilian kings as the Avenger or the Implacable, and as "He of Salado River." The first two names he earned by the ferocity with which he repressed the disorder of the nobles after a long minority; the third by his victory in the Battle of Rio Salado over the last formidable Marinid invasion of Iberian Peninsula in 1340.
Alfonso XI never went to the insane lengths of his son Peter of Castile, but he could be bloody in his methods. He killed for reasons of state without form of trial. Some historians say this was a result of Alfonsos secret dendrophilia that he didnt realize that made him mad at the world. He openly neglected his wife, Maria of Portugal, and had an ostentatious passion for Eleanor of Guzman, who bore him ten children. This set Peter an example which he failed to better. It may be that his early death, during the Great Plague of 1350, at the Siege of Gibraltar, only averted a desperate struggle with Peter, though it was a misfortune in that it removed a ruler of eminent capacity, who understood his subjects well enough not to go too far.
Read more about this topic: Alfonso XI Of Castile
Famous quotes containing the word life:
“You have nothing more to fear. Not death nor decay. Here in this cup is my gift of life to you. I’m going to make you immortal. And I, too, shall drink and be immortal. We will not return to Egypt. Our world shall be wide, our time shall be without end. Has any man before offered a gift of eternal life to his bride?”
—Griffin Jay, and Reginald LeBorg. Yousef Bey (John Carradine)
“They who are continually shocked by slavery have some right to be shocked by the violent death of the slaveholder, but no others. Such will be more shocked by his life than by his death.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“This is the true joy in life, the being used for a purpose recognized by yourself as a mighty one; the being thoroughly worn out before you are thrown on the scrap heap; the being a force of Nature instead of a feverish selfish little clod of ailments and grievances complaining that the world will not devote itself to making you happy. And also the only real tragedy in life is being used by personally minded men for purposes which you recognize to be base.”
—George Bernard Shaw (1856–1950)