Conquest at the end of the 11th century, with the
Lordship of
El Cid Towards the beginning of November 1092, the Campeador besieged the fortress, currently in the municipality of
El Puig, fourteen kilometres from Valencia, surrendering it in mid-1093. Using it as a centre of operations, that summer he began to besiege the city. In September 1093, he changed camp and settled in La Roqueta. Valencia, in a situation of extreme danger, requested an Almoravid relief army, which was sent under the command of al-Latmuni and advanced from the south of the capital of the Turia to
Almussafes, twenty-three kilometres from Valencia, and then retreated again due to a storm. The tight siege would last for almost a whole year, after which Valencia was forced to surrender on 17 June 1094. El Cid took possession of the city, calling himself "Prince Rodrigo el Campeador" and settling in the city.
Consolidation and expansion , signed by
Rodrigo Díaz The Almoravid pressure did not relent and in mid-September of that same year an army under the command of Muhammad ibn Tashfin, nephew of Emir
Yusuf, reached
Quart de Poblet, five kilometers from the capital, and besieged it, but was defeated after the
Battle of Cuarte, which took place on October 21, 1094 between the towns of
Mislata and
Quart de Poblet, near the city. In order to secure the northern routes of the new lordship, Rodrigo managed to ally himself with the new king of Aragon,
Peter I, who had been enthroned shortly before the fall of
Valencia during the siege of
Huesca, and took the Castle of Serra and the Castle of Real, at that time called
Alucad in 1095. In 1097, a new
Almoravid incursion led again by Muhammad ibn Tashfin attempted to recover
Valencia, but he was defeated again by
El Cid with the collaboration of the army of
Peter I of Aragon at the
battle of Bairén, near
Gandia. At the end of that same year he took
Almenara, thus closing the routes to the north of
Valencia and in 1098 he finally conquered the imposing fortified city of
Sagunto, thus consolidating his dominion over what had previously been the
Taifa of Valencia. Also in 1098 he consecrated the new
Cathedral of Santa María, reforming the one that had been main mosque. He had placed a Frenchman,
Jerome of Perigord, at the head of the new episcopal see to the detriment of the old
Mozarabic metropolitan or
sayyid almaṭran. In the diploma of endowment of the cathedral of the end of 1098 Rodrigo presents himself as «princeps Rodericus Campidoctor», considering himself an autonomous sovereign despite not having royal ancestry, and the
Battle of Cuarte is referred to as "a victory achieved quickly and without casualties over an enormous number of Muslims". Already established in
Valencia, he also allied himself with
Ramon Berenguer III with the aim of stopping the
Almoravid advance. Military alliances were reinforced with marriages. The year of his death (1099) he had married his daughters to high dignitaries: Cristina with the infant
Ramiro Sánchez of Pamplona and
María with the
Count of Barcelona Ramon Berenguer III.
Dissolution After his death on 10 June 1099, his wife
Jimena became Lady of Valencia. The Almoravids
started a siege on the city and she managed to defend it with the help of
Ramon Berenguer III of Barcelona until May 1102, when
Alfonso VI of León and Castile, considering the difficulties of defending
Valencia, on 4 May 1102 ordered the evacuation of the city of Christians, subsequently setting it on fire. The next day, on 5 May 1102, Valencia fell into the hands of the Almoravids. ==References==