Old Battlefield Reveals the Past

By Rafael Fermoselle, Ph. D.

While conducting research on my Spanish ancestors, I came across a significant battle that took place in 1476, near a small village called Peleagonzalo, next to the river Duero, between the cities of Toro and Zamora. According to legend, the village may owe its name to the demand made by a young maiden of the village, calling on her beau to fight for Spain !Pelea, Gonzalo! (Fight, Gonzalo!) I was so impressed with the description and importance of the battle, that I decided to write about it. I have to confess that the relative proximity of the battle site to the village of Fermoselle and the good chance that some of my ancestors may have participated in it also enticed me to dig into the particulars of this event.

Site of the battle, looking down on the battlefield from low hills on the southern edge. Off to the distance on the east, is the city of Toro. I visited several military museums in Spain looking for weapons in use in 1476, as well as for any paintings or descriptions of the battle. I obtained permission from Don David Malmierca, Mayor of the village to visit the site and carry out a preliminary archeological search of the area.

About 523 years after the battle, I found what seems to be one of the mass burial locations of victims of the conflict. As many as 15,000 soldiers may have died, perhaps more. Finding the human remains sticking out of the ground compelled me to set an additional goal for my research: proper reburial and some kind of a historical marker for the site.

This is more than the story of an episode in the History of Spain. I have developed a personal interest in recognizing the sacrifice of thousands of soldiers, whose bones are now coming up to the surface of a mass grave, without any kind of marker or proper burial. People who made the ultimate sacrifice for their country deserve at least that much.

Historical Background

The story starts with King John II of Castille, who married María de Aragón, daughter of Fernando de Antequera, in the early 1400’s. From this marriage three daughters and a son were born. Their only son, don Enrique, was destined to be the next monarch of León & Castilla. When John II’s first wife died, the king married Isabel of Portugal, with whom he had two additional children, Isabel, future Queen of Spain, and Alfonso.

Juan II En el retablo de la Cartuja de Miraflroes (Picture by the author)

John II’s Condestable de Castilla, which was a position similar to that of a Prime Minister, was Alvaro de Luna. The king delegated a substantial portion of the management of monarchy to his Prime Minister and titular head of the armed forces. The title Condestable comes from comes stabili, which literally means Count of the Cavalry.

Alvaro de Luna made a good number of enemies among the nobility, as he protected the interests of the crown, particularly against the desires of the king’s cousins. He favored the marriage of John II to the Portuguese princess, who was only twenty years old. The princess, despite having had the Prime Minister’s support, turned against him and managed to convince John II to condemn him to death.

The form of execution depicts life in the Spain of the mid-15th century. Alvaro de Luna was taken to a specially built platform in central Valladolid, near the Monastery of San Francisco. His thumbs were tied together so that he would not try to stop the executioner from cutting his head with a sharp knife. After the execution, his head was left in exhibition for nine days on top of a stick and the body for three days elsewhere. Mercedary priests finally picked up the body for burial outside of the city gates, together with other executed criminals. Later, the corps was united with its head and taken to the Cathedral of Toledo, for a luxurious burial in line with his membership in the nobility.

John II was deeply affected by what he had done and regretted his decision to execute his most favored assistant. He did not seem to have much of a problem enjoying the vast fortune owned by de Luna, which was confiscated by the king. The king’s health began to suffer, as he became very melancholic about what he had done. Within two years, John II died after a high fever, and was taken to Burgos for burial. In his last two years of life- from 1452 to 1454, Rodrigo and Juan Fermoselle, served as John II’s body guard and chamberlain. I found the payroll record of my potential ancestors at the Spanish archives located at the Castle of Simancas, which happens to be within a 45 minute drive of the battle site. It is entirely possible that they may have been somehow involved in the battle at Peleagonzalo in 1476.

Painting showing Queen Isabel and the military field hospital during the campaign to recover the city of Toro from the Portuguese. According to legend, this hospital was set up personally by her outside of Toro during the battle of 1476, and again at Santa Fe, Granada in 1481. The hospital was named Hospital de la Reina, since she personally raised the funds and helped to manage it. However, there is historical evidence that she was not at the battle in March of 1776, as depicted in the paining..

Museo del Ejército, Madrid Intrigue around the monarchy continued under Enrique IV, who succeeded his father as King of León and Castilla. One of the new assistants to Enrique IV was Beltrán de la Cueva, Duque of Albuquerque (1440 (?)-1492). According to contemporary rumors, he was also the queen’s lover. Enrique IV was rumored to be a practicing homosexual. A princess born to Enrique IV and his wife was nicknamed Juana la Beltraneja, by the population, as they figured that her real father was not the monarch but his wife’s lover. Enrique IV has been described as sui generis, or one of a kind. He is said to have enjoyed fowl smells while rejecting perfumes. For whatever it is worth, some historians claim that Alvaro de Luna had encouraged Enrique IV, when he was an aspiring prince to have homosexual experiences. Others claim that he suffered physical abnormalities that affected his sexual performance.

One of the reasons for the intrigue in the court was the question of succession to the crown. A group of courtesans favored Juana la Beltraneja, and another group favored Isabel, half sister to Enrique IV, born to the second marriage of John II with the princess of Portugal.

Isabel married without permission the prince of Aragón, don Fernando, son of John II of Aragón, in Valladolid at the end of 1469. According to a treaty signed the previous year, Isabel was to have obtained prior authorization from Enrique IV before she could marry. The king wanted to marry her to the Alfonso V, King of Portugal as a way of avoiding a military confrontation. Enrique IV and John II of Aragón had an ongoing dispute for years. The Castilian monarch fomented rebellion in Aragon, and from Aragón they enticed the nobility in Castile against the monarchy. Isabel’s marriage to Aragón’s future king was not well received by her half-brother.

Weapons of the Middle Ages Museo Militar, Alcazar de Toledo When Enrique IV learned that his half-sister had married without permission, he dishonored Isabel and proclaimed Princess Juana as his successor. Members of the nobility were enraged and in turn staged a coup d’état and named prince Alfonso, the King’s half-brother, who was only 14 years old, as the new King of Castile. Enrique IV’s forces defeated the nobles involved in the attempted coup at Olmedo in 1467, and kept on governing. The following year, Alfonso died. Upon the prince’s death, the nobles who had supported his candidacy for the monarchy offered it to Isabel. She refused to take power while his half-brother was alive and running Castile.

At the end of 1474, Enrique IV died. Isabel was only 23 years old at the time, and was residing in Segovia. When she learned that her half-brother had died, she named herself Queen of Castile. Her husband was at the time fighting in support of his own father in a civil war in Aragón. Princess Juana at the time was only 14 years old, but her uncle, King Alfonso V of Portugal, wanted the crown of Castile, and had arranged to marry his nice. Isabel’s action led the way to military confrontation.

War was inevitable. The King of France backed the King of Portugal. The King of Aragón backed his own son and Queen Isabel. The feudal lords and the monarchy, as well as the growing bourgeoisie and the nobility clashed. The King of Portugal invaded Castilla, taking Zamora, Toro and Plasencia, as well as other smaller towns. Fernando organized the Castilian forces, while Isabel raised the funds to pay the soldiers. The Church for the most part sided with Isabel. She also obtained financial support from the Jewish moneylenders and the Jewish power structure in Castile. (She paid them back by spelling them from her lands within a few years!)

Human bones on the side of a small ravine, on a hill overlooking the battlefield and the village of Peleagonzalo. Mayor Malmierca has his back to the camera. As the Castilian forces grew in number, the King of Portugal asked his son to enter Spain with another Portuguese Army corps of about 20,000 men. The additional Portuguese soldiers crossed into Spain around the region of Sayago, near the town of Fermoselle in Zamora. They pillaged and raped as they moved north east, towards Toro to meet in battle the forces under King Alfonso V, which had been surrounded at Toro by the Castellanos.

The battle

In the afternoon of March 1st, 1476, the Portuguese forces clashed with the Castilian forces under don Fernando at Peleagonzalo, a small town between Toro and Zamora, in a plane next to the river Duero.

The Spanish forces numbered around 30,000 and the Portuguese around 40,000. After several hours of battle, from about noon until sun down, the Portuguese divided their forces. Alfonso V fled, seeking the safety of the city walls of Toro with his men. His son and what was left of his forces retreated towards the Portuguese border. As the Portuguese moved through the Sayago area, as many as 350 Portuguese soldiers were captured by the local defensive militia and were castrated before they were allowed to continue moving back towards Portugal. That was pay back for the way they behave on their way into Spain. Queen Isabel chastised her husband and her soldiers for not pursuing and fighting the Portuguese until they were completely destroyed. According to tradition, one of the church officials commented that Isabel wore her pants better than the men! She had even suffered a miscarriage while riding from town to town raising money and volunteers for her army.

Three months later, King Alfonso V retreated towards Oporto. The military invasion of Castile had failed. Isabel and Fernando had won the war. The towns and villages of along the Duero, on the other hand, were left under populated by the thousands of casualties of the war and the economic damage of the plundering armies. Executions of those who had supported the Portuguese were common.

The aftermath

Peace did not last long. In 1478, King Juan II of Aragón died and his son Fernando became the new king. The monarchies of Castilla and Aragón were thus united under the Catholic monarchs Isabel and Fernando. That was the advent of modern Spain. That same year, the Inquisition was established to persecute enemies of the state and a call for a meeting of the Cortes went out for Toledo, to bless the establishment of an absolute monarchy, which supervised everything, including municipal governments through corregidores.

Alfonso V of Portugal died in 1479 and his son Juan II became the new monarch. To finish the disputes with the Spanish, a treaty was signed at Alcántara between cousins John II and Queen Isabel. The Spanish monarchs married their daughter Isabel with John II of Portugal, to solidify the peace. However, two years later, in 1481, war broke out to complete the re-conquest of Spain from the Muslims.

Military significance of the battle

Under the leadership of the Catholic Monarchs, new military tactics were introduced. They placed more reliance on the infantry and introduced artillery. The artillery required the need for engineering units to build bridges to move the heavy equipment and supplies of ammunition and powder. Queen Isabel was also concerned about treatment of the wounded in battle and organized military field hospitals. One such hospital was set up at Peleagonzalo, and is depicted in a painting preserved at the Military Museum in Madrid. The painting mistakenly shows Queen Isabel at the battle, which was not the case.

Under the leadership of Fernando and Isabel, the Muslims were driven back towards their last stronghold at Granada. Finally, on January 2, 1492, Granada fell and the re-conquest was completed. The military tactics first put into practice at Peleagonzalo were critical in the victory of the Christian forces after 800 years of struggle to push back the foreign invaders.

Remembering the soldiers

It would be fitting for the soldiers who died at the battle of Peleagonzalo in 1476 to be given proper burial and recognition. It seems that even before the battle, many bodegas (wine cellars) or caves had been into carved into the low hills on the side of the battlefield. They may be well over 800 years old. As the Riviera del Duero area picked up in reputation in the past few years as an excellent wine growing area, the interest in recovering the old caves picked up. Many were cleaned up and sold to investors in the wine industry. Others, like the Mayor of Peleagonzalo, cleaned up a small cave inherited from his elders and set it up as a picnic area, where his family and friends could hide from the summer heat in the cool underground environment. In the process of cleaning the entrance, he dug a trench that is about three or four meters long, from the side of the hill to a dirt road that leads to the cave.

Site of the battle, looking down on the battlefield from low hills on the southern edge. Off to the distance on the West Side is the city of Zamora. As the side of the trench to the entrance of the cave was worn down by the elements, bones of all sizes and shapes began to emerge from the soil. A neighbor, who owns another similar bodega a few meters away, found a couple of skulls. They did not seem to be recent, so no further attention was given to the finding.

When I requested permission to search the area, the Mayor of the village took me to see the area where the bones were coming out of the ground. It quickly became obvious to me that we had in front of us a possible site of a mass grave for soldiers killed in the 1476 battle.

I went up the hill above the caves and noticed that the ground was slightly higher around the area to the left of the Mayor’s cave. After 523 years, without the benefit of the trench, it would have been difficult to identify the site.

Is it a mass burial site or are these the bones of soldiers whose bodies were left unburied in the battlefield and have slowly been covered with soil and sediments? Anything is possible without further digging. The hill overlooking the battlefield could have been a strong point for either the Spanish or Portuguese forces. The bones could belong to soldiers who charged up the hill in an attempt to take the high ground. They could be also the bodies of the defenders of the hill. Why would the casualties be buried on the high ground instead of on the plane next to the riverbed? Was this a deliberate attempt to protect the burial site from flooding? I do not have the answer.

There is also another possibility. The area has been inhabited since the Bronze Age and perhaps for a longer period. Stone arrowheads, Roman coins and other artifacts found within a few kilometers of the site clearly show that this area has been inhabited by humans for as long as four or five thousand years. Who dug the caves? Could the bones belong to an ancient population of the area? Everything is possible, without carbon dating of the bones.