Molina and its land (the lordship)

Who holds it

Name

Pedro Manrique de Lara

Title

Count; lord of Molina and Mesa 'by the grace of God'

Since

1164

Born

not pinned (first documented 1157)

Family

See the lord record Molina (Count Pedro)

Confidence

high

Barton 1997; Doubleday 2001; Sánchez de Mora 2003 (via Wikipedia).

Lord in 1200

Pedro Manrique de Lara, count, lord of Molina (hereditary).

Overlord

Count Pedro Manrique de Lara (lord), a Castilian magnate serving Alfonso VIII

How things stand that morning

Held firmly by Count Pedro; a lordship between two crowns that serves Castile.

Wealth

Sheep and wool, with flocks moving each year between the summer grass of the sierras and the winter pastures of the Tajo and La Mancha (transhumance). The Mesta, the royal guild of the herders, is a creation of 1273 and does not exist yet. Tolls on the road between Castile and Aragon; salt and iron of the district (not pinned for 1200).

Military

The castle with its outer circuit and the hill tower called the Torre de Aragón; town walls; the castle of Mesa.

Threats

• Pressure from Aragon on a lordship between the crowns
• The count's age

Fuero

Fuero de Molina, granted by Count Manrique Pérez de Lara (usually placed in the 1150s; the date is debated).

Council

One concejo of the town and its villages under the lord; it elects its juez and alcaldes and runs the common pastures of the four sexmas.

Communities

Castilian and Aragonese settlers; Jewish and Muslim quarters are recorded (dates not pinned for 1200).

Fairs and markets

Market on the Castile to Aragon road; none pinned.

Militia

Molina's own militia under its fuero, serving the lord and, through him, the king of Castile.

What the year holds

What happened next, if nothing in play changes it. Each event carries what it depends on and what would stop it.

1. early 1202Count Pedro dies (buried at Huerta 14 January 1202); his son Gonzalo succeeds in MolinaDepends on: his natural course of life Stopped by: nothing short of play changing his circumstances

Where the sources disagree

Evidence: Lordship and fuero well known; fuero date debated.

On the map: Tierra drawn as seeds from the villages of the comunidad as recorded in the 13th to 15th centuries (Martínez Díez); the 1200 edges were not surveyed lines, and some villages were still being founded or quarrelled over. Treat the outline as approximate. Tragacete, the lords' property in the Serranía of Cuenca, is given as a detached seed (sold to Cuenca in 1202).

Primary sources for Castile

Chronicles, registers, sagas and inscriptions written in or near 1200 that cover this entry. Each has its own page with editions, translations and where to read it.

• Annals of Toledo and other short Iberian annals (12th and 13th centuries; Anales Toledanos I to 1219). Florez's volume 23 gathers the short annals of the peninsula. Read online
• Chronicle of the World (Lucas of Tuy), Lucas de Tuy (1236, for Queen Berenguela). The Leonese counterpart to Rodrigo, written at San Isidoro for Berenguela. Read online
• Latin Chronicle of the Kings of Castile, Anonymous, probably Juan of Osma, chancellor of Castile (about 1223 to 1239). The chancellor's chronicle of Alfonso VIII's reign, detailed from the 1190s. Read online
• Chronicle of Roger of Howden, Roger of Howden (about 1192 to 1201). The fullest single narrative for the year. Read online
• The Complete History: the passages on the Maghreb and al-Andalus, Ibn al-Athir (about 1220 to 1231, at Mosul). The year entries for 595 to 597 of the Hijra (late 1198 to 1201) record the death of Yaqub al-Mansur, the accession of al-Nasir and the opening of Yahya ibn Ghaniya's war in Ifriqiya; the following years follow Yahya and the Ghuzz captain Qaraqush through Tripoli, Gabès and Mahdia to al-Nasir's reconquest in 1206, with the best eastern account of Qaraqush's career. Read online
• The Garden of Pages: a History of the Kings of the Maghreb and of the City of Fez, Ibn Abi Zar al-Fasi (completed in 1326 at Fez, for the Marinid sultan Abu Said Uthman). The Almohad chapters give a brisk dated narrative of al-Mansur's death and burial, al-Nasir's accession and the Banu Ghaniya troubles, with the kind of detail (coinage, public works at Fez and Rabat, prices, plagues) that a Fez compiler cared about, and the annals of Fez supply the city's governors and markets. Read online
• The Wondrous Account of the History of al-Andalus and the Maghreb, Ibn Idhari al-Marrakushi (about 1312, at Marrakesh). The Almohad section is the fullest year-by-year narrative of the caliphate around 1200: the last campaigns and the death of Abu Yusuf Yaqub al-Mansur in January 1199, the accession of his son Muhammad al-Nasir, the renewed war of the Banu Ghaniya in Ifriqiya under Yahya ibn Ishaq and his ally Qaraqush, the Almohad losses of Mahdia and Tunis a few years later, and al-Nasir's reconquest of Ifriqiya in 1205 to 1206 followed by the appointment of Abd al-Wahid ibn Abi Hafs as governor. Read online
• Deeds of Philip Augustus, Rigord (about 1186 to 1206, in stages). The French court's own chronicle for the year, from the monk of Saint-Denis who called himself the king's chronographer. Read online

13 more in the sources library for France and Iberia.