Rodrigo Jiménez de Rada (Puente la Reina

Puente La Reina

Puente La Reina is a town and municipality located in the autonomous community of Navarra, in northern Spain....

, Navarre

Kingdom of Navarre

The Kingdom of Navarre , originally the Kingdom of Pamplona, was a European kingdom which occupied lands on either side of the Pyrenees alongside the Atlantic Ocean....

, Spain

Spain

Spain , officially the Kingdom of Spain languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Spain's official name is as follows:;;;;;;), is a country and member state of the European Union located in southwestern Europe on the Iberian Peninsula...

, c. 1170 - on the Rhone

Rhône

Rhone can refer to:* Rhone, one of the major rivers of Europe, running through Switzerland and France* Rhône Glacier, the source of the Rhone River and one of the primary contributors to Lake Geneva in the far eastern end of the canton of Valais in Switzerland...

, near Lyon

Lyon

Lyon , is a city in east-central France in the Rhône-Alpes region, situated between Paris and Marseille. Lyon is located at from Paris, from Marseille, from Geneva, from Turin, and from Barcelona. The residents of the city are called Lyonnais....

s, France

France

The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...

, 10 June 1247) was a Navarrese-born Castilian

Kingdom of Castile

Kingdom of Castile was one of the medieval kingdoms of the Iberian Peninsula. It emerged as a political autonomous entity in the 9th century. It was called County of Castile and was held in vassalage from the Kingdom of León. Its name comes from the host of castles constructed in the region...

 Roman Catholic bishop

Bishop

A bishop is an ordained or consecrated member of the Christian clergy who is generally entrusted with a position of authority and oversight. Within the Catholic Church, Eastern Orthodox, Oriental Orthodox Churches, in the Assyrian Church of the East, in the Independent Catholic Churches, and in the...

 and historian

Historian

A historian is a person who studies and writes about the past and is regarded as an authority on it. Historians are concerned with the continuous, methodical narrative and research of past events as relating to the human race; as well as the study of all history in time. If the individual is...

.

He was born from a Navarrese noble family and was educated by his uncle, Martín de la Finojosa, abbot

Abbot

The word abbot, meaning father, is a title given to the head of a monastery in various traditions, including Christianity. The office may also be given as an honorary title to a clergyman who is not actually the head of a monastery...

 of Saint Mary of Huerta and bishop of Sigüenza. He studied Law

Law

Law is a system of rules and guidelines which are enforced through social institutions to govern behavior, wherever possible. It shapes politics, economics and society in numerous ways and serves as a social mediator of relations between people. Contract law regulates everything from buying a bus...

 and Theology

Theology

Theology is the systematic and rational study of religion and its influences and of the nature of religious truths, or the learned profession acquired by completing specialized training in religious studies, usually at a university or school of divinity or seminary.-Definition:Augustine of Hippo...

 in the Universities of Bologna

University of Bologna

The Alma Mater Studiorum - University of Bologna is the oldest continually operating university in the world, the word 'universitas' being first used by this institution at its foundation. The true date of its founding is uncertain, but believed by most accounts to have been 1088...

 and Paris

University of Paris

The University of Paris was a university located in Paris, France and one of the earliest to be established in Europe. It was founded in the mid 12th century, and officially recognized as a university probably between 1160 and 1250...

. When he returned to Navarre he mediated between that kingdom and Castile and he became friend of Castilian king Alfonso VIII, who nominated him as bishop of Osma and later put pressure on the chapter

Chapter (religion)

Chapter designates certain corporate ecclesiastical bodies in the Roman Catholic, Anglican and Nordic Lutheran churches....

 of Toledo to elect him as archbishop of Toledo. His election as archbishop of Toledo was confirmed by Pope Innocent III

Pope Innocent III

Pope Innocent III was Pope from 8 January 1198 until his death. His birth name was Lotario dei Conti di Segni, sometimes anglicised to Lothar of Segni....

 on 12 February 1209. In addition, Alfonso VIII appointed him as major chancellor

Chancellor

Chancellor is the title of various official positions in the governments of many nations. The original chancellors were the Cancellarii of Roman courts of justice—ushers who sat at the cancelli or lattice work screens of a basilica or law court, which separated the judge and counsel from the...

 of Castile.

He played a key role in the war against the Almohads and at the battle of Las Navas de Tolosa

Battle of Las Navas de Tolosa

The Battle of Las Navas de Tolosa, known in Arab history as the Battle of Al-Uqab , took place on 16 July 1212 and was an important turning point in the Reconquista and in the medieval history of Spain...

 (1212). He was the moral leader of that war, which was considered in Europe as a crusade in which many European knights took part. He sent afterwards missionaries to Morocco

Morocco

Morocco , officially the Kingdom of Morocco , is a country located in North Africa. It has a population of more than 32 million and an area of 710,850 km², and also primarily administers the disputed region of the Western Sahara...

. His archbishopric gained a lot of possessions throughout the Guadalquivir

Guadalquivir

The Guadalquivir is the fifth longest river in the Iberian peninsula and the second longest river to be its whole length in Spain. The Guadalquivir is 657 kilometers long and drains an area of about 58,000 square kilometers...

 valley, especially around Quesada

Quesada

Quesada is a Spanish name originating from the region of Jaén, Andalucia. It was originally the surname of the nobility from the town of Quesada...

 and received further generous donations from kings and lords.

As archbishop of Toledo, he promoted the building of the cathedral

Cathedral of Toledo

The Primate Cathedral of Saint Mary of Toledo is a Roman Catholic cathedral in Toledo, Spain, seat of the Metropolitan Archdiocese of Toledo....

 and placed the first stone in 1226 (it was not completed until 1493), restored the dioceses of Baeza and Córdoba after the Christian conquest of those cities and defended the primacy

Primate (religion)

Primate is a title or rank bestowed on some bishops in certain Christian churches. Depending on the particular tradition, it can denote either jurisdictional authority or ceremonial precedence ....

 of his see in Spain against the pretensions of Braga and Santiago.

He promoted the cultural life of Toledo

Toledo, Spain

Toledo's Alcázar became renowned in the 19th and 20th centuries as a military academy. At the outbreak of the Spanish Civil War in 1936 its garrison was famously besieged by Republican forces.-Economy:...

, a city that was the cultural entrepôt of Christian and Muslim civilizations during the Middle Ages. He ordered the translation of the Koran

Qur'an

The Quran , also transliterated Qur'an, Koran, Alcoran, Qur’ān, Coran, Kuran, and al-Qur’ān, is the central religious text of Islam, which Muslims consider the verbatim word of God . It is regarded widely as the finest piece of literature in the Arabic language...

 to Latin

Latin

Latin is an Italic language originally spoken in Latium and Ancient Rome. It, along with most European languages, is a descendant of the ancient Proto-Indo-European language. Although it is considered a dead language, a number of scholars and members of the Christian clergy speak it fluently, and...

 and composed a wide historiographic work. His De rebus Hispaniae

De rebus Hispaniae

De rebus Hispaniae or Historia gothica is a history of the Iberian peninsula written in Latin by Archbiship of Toledo Rodrigo Jiménez de Rada en the first half of the thirteenth century on behalf of King Ferdinand III of Castile....

, a general history of Spain, was very soon translated into Spanish

Spanish language

Spanish , also known as Castilian , is a Romance language in the Ibero-Romance group that evolved from several languages and dialects in central-northern Iberia around the 9th century and gradually spread with the expansion of the Kingdom of Castile into central and southern Iberia during the...

 and was very influential on the General History of Alfonso X.

He died near Lyons while returning from a visit to the pope, and is interred in the monastery of Saint Mary of Huerta.

Writings

• De rebus Hispaniae
  De rebus Hispaniae
  De rebus Hispaniae or Historia gothica is a history of the Iberian peninsula written in Latin by Archbiship of Toledo Rodrigo Jiménez de Rada en the first half of the thirteenth century on behalf of King Ferdinand III of Castile....
  
  
• Hunnorum, Vandalorum et Silingorum Historia
• Ostrogothorum Historia
• Historia Romanorum
• Historia Arabum