Table Of ContentSTUDIES IN ROMANCE LANGUAGES: 47
John E. Keller, Editor
<&• d v-ey fev uxp {Si. % ttc finnu tttgtt aw i U»« fct
Chronicle
of Alfonso
&aE
Translated by
Shelby Thacker
and Jose Escobar
With an Introduction
by Joseph F. O'Callaghan
Publication of this volume was made possible in part
by grants from the Program for Cultural Cooperation
between Spain's Ministry of Education, Culture, and Sports
and United States Universities, Asbury College, the College
of Charleston, and the National Endowment for the Humanities.
Copyright © 2002 by The University Press of Kentucky
Scholarly publisher for the Commonwealth,
serving Bellarmine University, Berea College, Centre
College of Kentucky, Eastern Kentucky University,
The Filson Club Historical Society, Georgetown College,
Kentucky Historical Society, Kentucky State University,
Morehead State University, Murray State University,
Northern Kentucky University, Transylvania University,
University of Kentucky, University of Louisville,
and Western Kentucky University.
All rights reserved.
Editorial and Sales Offices: The University Press of Kentucky
663 South Limestone Street, Lexington, Kentucky 40508-4008
02 03 04 05 06 5 4 3 2 1
Frontispiece: Cantiga 192. "How St. Mary saved from death
by drowning one of the King's men"
Endpaper map and family tree from The Learned King:
The Reign of Alfonso X of Castile, courtesy of Joseph F. O'Callaghan.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Cronica de Alfonso X. English
Chronicle of Alfonso X / translated by Shelby Thacker and
Jose Escobar ; with an introduction by Joseph F. O'Callaghan.
p. cm. — (Studies in Romance languages ; 47)
Often attributed to Fernan Sanchez de Valladolid.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 0-8131-2218-X (cloth : alk. paper)
1. Castile (Spain)—History—Alfonso X, 1252-1284. 2. Alfonso X,
King of Castile and Leon, 1221-1284. I. Sanchez de Valladolid, Fernan,
fl. 1325-1348? II. Thacker, Shelby, 1956- III. Escobar, Jose.
W. O'Callaghan, Joseph F. V. Title. VI. Studies in
Romance languages (Lexington, KY.); 47.
DP140.3 .C76 2002
946'.03—dc21 2001007150
Contents
Preface vii
Acknowledgments x
Introduction 1
Chronicle of Alfonso X 23
Selected Bibliography 260
Index 265
Preface
For decades scholars, students, and the general educated public
have relied upon the edition of the Cronica de Alfonso X prepared
by Cayetano Rosell for the Biblioteca de Autores Espanoles (hereafter
BAE) published in 1875. With minor corrections it was published
again in 1953. We believe that Rosell chose for his edition the manu-
script we know as Biblioteca Nacional 826 (hereafter BN 826) be-
cause it was penned in such a clear manuscript hand. We know
that thirty-four manuscripts are extant, but Rosell could not have
realized there were so many.
Today various scholars consider BN 826 to be defective, and
this, of course, means that they regard Rosell's edition as defective.
A great many of the defects in the edition are due to the
requirements of the BAE, a series designed to enable readers to
understand medieval texts. Therefore, Rosell altered orthography;
for example, he changed auja {avid) to habia; he inserted accent
marks not in existence in the fourteenth century; he failed to
correct certain chronological and factual errors; he erroneously
transcribed a few geographical names, as well as the proper names
of some Moorish individuals; when BN 826 abbreviated some
sequences, so did Rosell; and what critics regard as his worst defect
is that he did not examine other manuscripts, even though he must
have known that the archives of El Escorial contained at least two
he could have seen. Rosell studied the earliest printed edition
(1793) and corrected some of its errors. A complete list of defects
in BN 826 was made known by Paula K. Rodgers in her doctoral
viii Preface
dissertation, Prolegomena to a Critical Edition of the Cronica de Alfonso X
(University of California at Davis, 1983). We had expected a critical
edition by her, but it has not yet appeared.
The occurrence of so many defects was troubling to Jose
Escobar and Shelby Thacker when they planned their translation.
Since they are not specialists in the transcription of medieval
manuscripts, they believed that their best source for a translation
was Rosell's edition. Of course, they were cognizant of the edition
of BN 826 prepared by Nancy Joe Dyer for the Madison Texts
transcribed in the format of that series. Since she edited BN 826,
she also must have included the various defects. Thacker and
Escobar saw the problem of the defects solved when Joseph F.
O'Callaghan wrote his scholarly introduction to their translation,
together with nearly two hundred detailed notes. Manuel Gonzalez
Jimenez, in the introduction to his forthcoming edition, which I
believe we may regard as definitive, parallels much of the thinking
and corrections of O'Callaghan.
Readers of the Chronicle of Alfonso X, with the explanations and
corrections of O'Callaghan along with his copious notes, can now
read in English much of what can be learned about the reign of the
Learned King. The serious errors and defects of Part I have been
resolved, as have the much fewer and less serious mistakes in the
latter parts of the Cronica. Alfonso's last fifteen years were fraught
with terrible problems: the revolt of the nobles, the incursions of
the Benimerines Moors, the critical problems of the royal
succession, and the attempts to take the royal power away from the
maddened and dying monarch.
In my opinion, the author of the Cronica—believed by most
scholars to be Fernan Sanchez de Valladolid, commissioned to
write the history of the reign of Alfonso X, of Alfonso's son Sancho IV,
and of Fernando IV—wrote what he had found in various docu-
ments and from hearsay from people whose forebears had given
them information about the reign of Alfonso X. He knew that
Alfonso had gone mad, that he had committed some incredible
atrocities, such as having his brother Fadrique strangled without a
trial and Fadrique's friend (lover?) burned at the stake, also with
no trial; and he related some of Sancho's savage deeds as he
removed his own enemies. If he leaned toward favoring Sancho
over Alfonso, I cannot detect indications in the Cronica.
Preface ix
In decades of experience in transcribing and translating
medieval Spanish manuscripts, I have never encountered prose as
turgid or cumbersome, convoluted syntax as difficult to follow, nor
sentences that run as long as those of this author. Escobar and
Thacker's work was onerous, and they are to be congratulated for
translating the Cronica. Perhaps Sanchez's peculiar writing was due
to his professions: he was counselor of King Alfonso XI, he was a
legist, an ambassador, and a diplomat.
Let us regard The Chronicle of Alfonso Xas the first, and probably
the only, translation of the reign of Spain's most significant
monarch, who was so vigorous in the pursuit of knowledge and
culture. It is proper that the distinguished historiographer Robert
I. Burns, S.J., called Alfonso X the Emperor of Culture.
John Esten Keller
