| Sancho III | |
|---|---|
 The burial stone of Sancho III, bearing his effigy | |
| King of Pamplona King of theKingdom of Najera | |
| Reign | 1004–1035 |
| Predecessor | García Sánchez II |
| Successor | García Sánchez III |
| Count of Aragon | |
| Reign | 1004–1035 |
| Predecessor | García Sánchez II |
| Successor | Ramiro I |
| Born | c. 992–996 |
| Died | c. 1035 |
| Burial | |
| Spouse | Muniadona of Castile |
| Issue | |
| House | House of Jiménez |
| Father | García Sánchez II of Pamplona |
| Mother | Jimena Fernández |
Sancho Garcés III (c. 992–996 – 18 October 1035), also known asSancho the Great (Spanish:Sancho el Mayor,Basque:Antso Gartzez Nagusia), was theKing of Pamplona from 1004 until his death in 1035. He also ruled theCounty of Aragon and by marriage the counties ofCastile,Álava andMonzón. He later added the counties of Sobrarbe (1015),Ribagorza (1018) and Cea (1030), and would intervene in theKingdom of León, taking its eponymous capital city in 1034.
He was the eldest son ofGarcía Sánchez II and his wife Jimena Fernández.
The year of Sancho's birth is not known, but it is no earlier than 992 and no later than 996. His parents wereGarcía Sánchez II the Tremulous and Jimena Fernández, daughter ofFernando Bermúdez, count ofCea on theLeonese frontier. García and Jimena are first recorded as married in 992, but there is no record of their son Sancho until 996. The first record of the future king is a diploma of his father's granting the village of Terrero to the monastery ofSan Millán de la Cogolla. The king describes Sancho merely as "my son" (filius meus). The same diploma also shows the future duke of Gascony,Sancho VI, at the court of Pamplona.[1]
Sancho was raised in themonastery of Leyre. His father last appears in 1000, while Sancho is first found as king in 1004, inheriting the kingdom of Pamplona (later known as Navarre). This gap has led to speculation as to whether there was an interregnum, while one document showsSancho Ramírez of Viguera reigning in Pamplona in 1002, perhaps ruling as hadJimeno Garcés during the youth ofGarcía Sánchez I three generations earlier. On his succession, Sancho initially ruled under acouncil of regency led by the bishops, his mother Jimena, and grandmotherUrraca Fernández.
Sancho aspired to unify the Christian principalities in the face of the fragmentation of Muslim Spain into thetaifa kingdoms following theBattle of Calatañazor. In about 1010 he marriedMuniadona of Castile, daughter ofSancho García of Castile, and in 1015 he began a policy of expansion. He displaced Muslim control in the depopulated former county of Sobrarbe. In Ribagorza, another opportunity arose. The 1010 partition of the county left it divided between William Isarn, illegitimate son of count Isarn, andRaymond III of Pallars Jussà and his wife, Mayor García of Castile, who was both niece of Isarn and aunt of Sancho's wife. In 1018, William Isarn tried to solidify his control over the Arán valley, but was killed, and Sancho jumped on the opportunity to take his portion, presumably based on some loose claim derived from his wife. Raymond and Mayor annulled their marriage, creating a further division finally resolved in 1025 when Mayor retired to a Castilian convent and Sancho received the submission of Raymond as vassal.[2] He also forcedBerengar Raymond I of Barcelona to become his vassal, though he was already a vassal of theFrench king. Berengar met Sancho inZaragoza and in Navarre many times to confer on a mutual policy against thecounts of Toulouse.
In 1016, Sancho fixed the border between Navarre and Castile, part of the good relationship he established by marryingMuniadona, daughter ofSancho García of Castile. In 1017, he became the protector of Castile for the youngGarcía Sánchez. However, relations between the three Christian entities of León, Castile, and Navarre soured after the assassination of Count García in 1027. He had been betrothed to Sancha, daughter of Alfonso V, who was set thus to gain from Castile lands between the riversCea andPisuerga (as the price for approving the marital pact). As García arrived in León for his wedding, he was killed by the sons of a noble he had expelled from his lands.
Sancho III had opposed the wedding and the expected expansion of Leonese power to Castile, and used García's death to reverse this. Using the pretext of the protectorship he had exercised over Castile, he immediately occupied the county and named as successor his own younger sonFerdinand, who was nephew of the deceased count, bringing it fully within his sphere of influence.
Sancho established relations with theDuchy of Gascony, probably of asuzerain–vassal nature, him being the suzerain.[3] In consequence of his relationship with the monastery ofCluny, he improved the road from Gascony to León. This road would begin to bring increased traffic down to Iberia as pilgrims flocked toSantiago de Compostela. Because of this, Sancho ranks as one of the first great patrons of theSaint James Way.
Sancho VI of Gascony was a relative of King Sancho and spent a portion of his life at the royal court in Pamplona. He also partook alongside Sancho the Great in theReconquista. In 1010, the two Sanchos appeared together withRobert II of France andWilliam V of Aquitaine, neither of whom was the Gascon duke's suzerain, atSaint-Jean d'Angély. After Sancho VI's death in 1032, Sancho the Great extended his authority definitively into Gascony, where he began to mention his authority as extending as far as theGaronne in the documents issued by his chancery.
In southern Gascony, Sancho created a series of viscounties:Labourd (between 1021 and 1023),Bayonne (1025), andBaztán (also 1025).
After the succession ofBermudo III to León, Sancho negotiated the marriage of his son Ferdinand to Sancha, the former fiancée of García Sánchez and Bermudo's sister, and along with it a dowry that included disputed Leonese lands. Sancho was soon engaged in a full-scale war with León, and combined Castilian and Navarrese armies quickly overran much of Bermudo's kingdom, occupyingAstorga. By March 1033, he was king fromZamora to the borders of Barcelona.
In 1034, even the city ofLeón, theimperiale culmen (imperial capital, as Sancho saw it), fell, and there Sancho had himself crowned again. This was the height of Sancho's rule which now extended from the borders of Galicia in the west to the county of Barcelona in the east. In 1035, he refounded thediocese of Palencia, which had been laid waste by the Moors. He gave the see and its several abbacies to Bernard, of French or Navarrese origin, to whom he also gave the secular lordship (as afeudum), which included many castles in the region. However, he died on 18 October 1035 and was buried in the monastery of San Salvador de Oña, an enclave in Burgos, under the inscriptionSancius, gratia Dei, Hispaniarum rex.
Before his death in 1035, Sancho divided his possessions among his sons. Of the three surviving sons by Muniadona, the eldest,García, had already appeared asregulus in Navarre, inheriting the kingdom including theBasque country as well as exercisingsuzerainty over the kingdom's lands given to his brothers.Gonzalo had been placed in control of the counties of Sobrarbe and Ribagorza, which he would hold asregulus.Ferdinand had been given Castile on the death ofcount García Sánchez in 1029, holding it first under his father and later of Vermudo III of León, before killing that king to take León and the royal title.Ramiro, the eldest but illegitimate son of Sancho by mistress Sancha of Aybar, was given property in the former county of Aragón with the provision that he should ask for no more lands of his brother García, under whom he first acted asbaiulus but from whom he later achievedde facto independence. Documents report two further sons, a second Ramiro and Bernard, but scholarship is divided on whether they were legitimate sons who died in youth, or if their appearance instead results from either scribal error or forgery. Sancho left two daughters, Mayor and Jimena, the former perhaps the wife ofPons, Count of Toulouse, the latter the wife of Vermudo III.
Taking residence inNájera instead of the traditional capital ofPamplona, as his realm grew larger, he considered himself a European monarch, establishing relations on the other side of thePyrenees.
He introduced French feudal theories and ecclesiastic and intellectual currents into Iberia. Through his close ties with the count of Barcelona and the duke of Gascony and his friendship with the monastic reformer Abbot Oliva, Sancho established relations with several of the leading figures north of the Pyrenees, most notablyRobert II of France,William V of Aquitaine,William II and Alduin II of Angoulême, andOdo II of Blois and Champagne.[4] It was through this circle that theCluniac reforms first probably influenced his thinking. In 1024 a Navarrese monk, Paterno of San Juan de la Peña fromCluny, returned to Navarre and was made abbot ofSan Juan de la Peña, where he instituted the Cluniac custom and founded thus the first Cluniac house in Iberia west of Catalonia, under the patronage of Sancho. TheMozarabic rite continued to be practiced at San Juan, and the view that Sancho spread the Cluniac usage to other houses in his kingdom has been discredited byJusto Pérez de Urbel. Sancho sowed the seeds of the Cluniac reform and of the adoption of theRoman rite, but he did not widely enact them.
Sancho also began the Navarrese series of currency by minting what theEncyclopædia Britannica calls "deniers ofCarolingian influence." The division of his realm upon his death, the concepts of vassalage and suzerainty, and the use of the phrase "by the grace of God" (Dei gratia) after his title were imported from France, with which he tried to maintain relations. For this he has been called the "first Europeaniser of Iberia."[5]
His most obvious legacy, however, was the temporary union of all Christian Iberia. At least nominally, he ruled over León, the ancient capital of the kingdom won from theMoors in the eighth century, and Barcelona, the greatest of theCatalan cities. Though he divided the realm at his death, thus creating the enduring legacy of Castilian and Aragonese kingdoms, he left all his lands in the hands of one dynasty, theJiménez, which kept the kingdoms allied by blood until the twelfth century. He made the Navarrese pocket kingdom strong, politically stable, and independent, preserving it for the remainder of theMiddle Ages. It is for this that his seal has been appropriated byBasque nationalism, though, by dividing the realm, he isolated the kingdom and inhibited its ability to gain land at the expense of theMuslims. Summed up, his reign defined the political geography of Iberia until its union under theCatholic Monarchs.
Throughout his long reign, Sancho used a myriad of titles. After his coronation in León, he styled himselfrex Dei gratia Hispaniarum, or "by the grace of God, king of the Spains", and may have minted coins with the legend "NAIARA/IMPERATOR".[a] The use of the first title implied his kingship over all the independently founded Iberian kingdoms and the use of the formDei gratia, adopted from French practice, stressed that his right to rule was of divine origin and sustenance. The latter, imperial title was only rarely employed, for it is not documented, being found only on coins only probably datable to his reign. It is not unlikely, however, that he desired to usurp the imperial title which the kings of León had thitherto carried.[5]
Despite this, the contemporary ecclesiasticAbbot Oliva only ever acknowledged Sancho asrex Ibericus orrex Navarrae Hispaniarum, while he called both Alfonso V and Vermudo III emperor. The first title considers Sancho as king of all Iberia, as does the second, though it stresses his kingship over Navarre alone as if it had been extended to authority over the whole Christian portion of the peninsula. The near-contemporary writerIbn Bassam, besides highlighting his virtues, calls him Lord of theBasques.[6]
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Sancho III was married toMuniadona of Castile, daughter ofSancho García of Castile, count ofCastile andÁlava. They had three sons and two daughters:
Before marrying Muniadona, Sancho III had a son with Sancha of Aibar:
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| Preceded by | King of Pamplona 1004–1035 | Succeeded by |
| Vacant | Count of Sobrarbe 1015–1035 | Succeeded by |
| Preceded by | Count of Ribagorza 1018–1035 withMayor (1018-1032) | |
| New title | — TITULAR — Emperor of All Spain 1034–1035 | Vacant Title next held by Ferdinand I of León |
