Alfonso I of Asturias
Encyclopedia
He was son of Duke Peter of Cantabria
Peter of Cantabria
Peter was the Duke of Cantabria. While various writers have attempted to name his parentage, , early sources say nothing more specific than the chronicle of 'Pseudo-Alfonso': that he was "ex semine Leuvigildi et Reccaredi progenitus"...
and held many lands in that region. He may have been the hereditary chief of the Basques, but this is uncertain. He is said to have married Ermesinda, daughter of Pelagius, who founded the kingdom after the Battle of Covadonga
Battle of Covadonga
The Battle of Covadonga was the first major victory by a Christian military force in Iberia following the Muslim Moors' conquest of that region in 711...
in which he reversed the Moorish conquest
Umayyad conquest of Hispania
The Umayyad conquest of Hispania is the initial Islamic Ummayad Caliphate's conquest, between 711 and 718, of the Christian Visigothic Kingdom of Hispania, centered in the Iberian Peninsula, which was known to them under the Arabic name al-Andalus....
of the region. He succeeded Pelagius' son, his brother-in-law, Favila
Favila of Asturias
Fafila, Favila, or Favilac was the second King of Asturias from 737 until his death. He was the only son and successor of Pelagius, the first Asturian monarch. In 737 he founded the church of Santa Cruz, probably in his capital of Cangas de Onís, but aside from this, nothing else about his reign...
, on the throne after the latter's premature death.
Whether Pelagius or Favila were ever considered kings in their own lifetime is debatable, but Alfonso certainly was. He began a lifelong war against the Moors. In 740, he conquered Galicia and in 754, León
Kingdom of León
The Kingdom of León was an independent kingdom situated in the northwest region of the Iberian Peninsula. It was founded in AD 910 when the Christian princes of Asturias along the northern coast of the peninsula shifted their capital from Oviedo to the city of León...
. He went as far as La Rioja. However, the few urban populations of these frontier regions fled to his northern dominions, leaving a depopulated buffer between the Christian
Christian
A Christian is a person who adheres to Christianity, an Abrahamic, monotheistic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus of Nazareth as recorded in the Canonical gospels and the letters of the New Testament...
and Muslim
Muslim
A Muslim, also spelled Moslem, is an adherent of Islam, a monotheistic, Abrahamic religion based on the Quran, which Muslims consider the verbatim word of God as revealed to prophet Muhammad. "Muslim" is the Arabic term for "submitter" .Muslims believe that God is one and incomparable...
states.
This created the so-called Desert of the Duero, an empty region between the River Duero and the Asturian Mountains. Alfonso intended it this way; he wished to leave such a zone where any invading army would find it too difficult to survive. Besides the martial, the demographic and cultural effects of this policy on later Asturian, Spanish and Portuguese history is large. It was over a hundred years before the region was repopulated (an event known as the Repoblación
Repoblación
The Repoblación was the ninth-century repopulating of a large region between the River Duero and the Cantabrian Cordillera which had been depopulated in the early years of the Reconquista....
).
The Arab
Arab
Arab people, also known as Arabs , are a panethnicity primarily living in the Arab world, which is located in Western Asia and North Africa. They are identified as such on one or more of genealogical, linguistic, or cultural grounds, with tribal affiliations, and intra-tribal relationships playing...
writers speak of the kings of the northwest of Iberia as the Beni-Alfons
Pérez Dynasty
The Beni Alfons or Banu Alfonso were the family of kings which ruled in Asturias, Galicia, and León from the succession of Alfonso the Catholic, son of Peter of Cantabria in 740. For the next century, rule shifted between Alfonso's descendants and those of his brother Fruela...
(descendants of Alfonso), and appear to recognize them as a Galician royal stock derived from Alfonso I. Alfonso is credited with establishing the shrine of Our Lady of Covadonga
Our Lady of Covadonga
Our Lady of Covadonga is a title of the Virgin Mary, and a shrine devoted to her at Covadonga in the province of Asturias in north west Spain. The shrine rose to prominence following the Battle of Covadonga in 722, at which the Moorish invasion of Spain was first resisted...
, in commemoration of his father in law's victory at the Battle of Covadonga
Battle of Covadonga
The Battle of Covadonga was the first major victory by a Christian military force in Iberia following the Muslim Moors' conquest of that region in 711...
.