Study guide
The Poem of the Cid
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Overview
- Original title
- Cantar de mio Cid or Poema de mio Cid ('the song of my lord Cid'); the manuscript gives the poem no title
- Manuscript
- One copy, Madrid, Biblioteca Nacional de España, MS Vitr. 7-17, written in the fourteenth century; the first leaf and two others are lost. The colophon names a 'Per Abbat' and the year 1207
- Composed
- Disputed: about 1140 according to Ramón Menéndez Pidal; about 1200, or 1207 itself, according to Colin Smith, Antonio Ubieto and most recent scholars
- Author
- Unknown. 'Per Abbat' may be the copyist of an earlier text or, as some argue, the author
- Language and metre
- Old Castilian; long lines of irregular length (anisosyllabic), each divided by a caesura into two half-lines, grouped in laisses (tiradas) held together by a single assonance
- Length
- About 3,730 lines in 152 laisses, divided into three cantares
- Hero
- Rodrigo Díaz de Vivar (c. 1043–1099), the Cid ('lord', from Arabic sayyid) and Campeador ('battler'), who took Valencia in 1094
- Setting
- Castile, the Muslim kingdoms of the Ebro and the Levant, and Valencia, in the reign of Alfonso VI of León and Castile (1065–1109)
- Structure
- Cantar I: the exile; Cantar II: the conquest of Valencia and the first marriages; Cantar III: the affront of Corpes and its redress
- Quoted from
- The verse translation by R. Selden Rose and Leonard Bacon, The Lay of the Cid (1919), which keeps the laisse numbers of the Spanish
Context
The Poem of the Cid survives in a single manuscript, now in the Biblioteca Nacional in Madrid. It is a modest book of 74 leaves, copied in the fourteenth century, and it has lost its first leaf and two others in the middle, so that the poem now opens with its hero already looking back at his empty house. Modern editions usually fill the gaps with prose from the chronicles, which retold the poem. At the end the copy has a colophon: 'Per Abbat le escrivió en el mes de mayo, en era de mill e .CC.XL.v años'. The Spanish era ran thirty-eight years ahead of the Christian reckoning, so the date is May 1207. Whether 'escrivió' means that Per Abbat copied the poem or composed it is one of the oldest questions about the text (Menéndez Pidal 1911) (Smith 1973) (Michael 1976).
The hero was a real man. Rodrigo Díaz, born about 1043 at Vivar near Burgos, served Sancho II of Castile and then his brother Alfonso VI, who exiled him in 1081 and again in 1089. In exile he fought for the Muslim king of Zaragoza, defeated the count of Barcelona, and in June 1094 took Valencia, which he ruled until his death in 1099; his widow Jimena held it until 1102. His Arabic title sayyid, 'lord', became 'Cid', and his Latin and Castilian title Campeador means 'battler' or 'champion'. Contemporary Latin and Arabic sources, notably the Historia Roderici, allow historians to compare the poem with the man (Menéndez Pidal 1929) (Fletcher 1989) (Barton 2000).
The poet keeps close to history in some things and freely invents in others. The Cid's exile, his campaigns in the east, the capture of Valencia, Bishop Jerome and the Almoravid armies from North Africa are historical, though compressed and simplified. The marriage of his daughters to the Infantes of Carrión, their abandonment in the oak wood of Corpes and the duels that avenge them have no support in any record; the Cid's real daughters, Cristina and María, married a prince of Navarre and the count of Barcelona. The poem's daughters are called Elvira and Sol. Its account of a second, royal marriage is a poetic version of these real alliances (Menéndez Pidal 1929) (Smith 1983).
The poem is written in long, irregular lines. Each line falls into two half-lines separated by a strong pause, and the lines are grouped into laisses or tiradas of any length, each bound by one assonance, a rhyme of the vowels only. A new laisse often marks a new turn of the story or repeats the last moment from a different angle. The poet uses formulaic epithets for the hero, above all 'el que en buen ora nasco', 'he who was born in a good hour', and 'el que en buen ora cinxo espada', 'he who girded on his sword in a good hour', and addresses a listening audience directly ('you would have seen ...'), as a juglar or professional performer would (Chasca 1972) (Duggan 1989).
The poem is the only Castilian epic that survives nearly complete, and it has been read since the nineteenth century as a founding text of Spanish literature and even of Spanish national character. Its tone differs from that of the French Chanson de Roland: there are no supernatural wonders apart from a dream of the archangel Gabriel, the hero is a married man worrying about money and his daughters' futures, and the battles are fought for bread and booty as much as for faith. Robert Southey's Chronicle of the Cid (1808), also on this site, is not a translation of the poem but a prose compilation from the medieval chronicles, mainly the Crónica del famoso cavallero Cid Ruy Díez printed at Burgos in 1512, with additions from the poem and the ballads (Southey 1808) (Deyermond 1977).
Plot overview
King Alfonso VI, believing the Cid's enemies, sends him into exile. The Cid leaves Vivar in tears; in Burgos no one dares to shelter him, and a girl of nine tells him why. With his loyal vassal Martín Antolínez he raises money by pawning two chests, said to be full of gold but filled with sand, to the moneylenders Raquel and Vidas. At the monastery of San Pedro de Cardeña he leaves his wife Jimena and his little daughters in the care of the abbot and rides into the lands of the Moors.
Living, as he says, by the lance and the sword, the Cid takes Castejón and Alcocer, defeats the Moorish kings sent against him, and sends a share of his booty to the king through his lieutenant Álvar Fáñez Minaya. He defeats and captures the count of Barcelona, wins the sword Colada, and lets the count go free. In the second cantar he moves east towards the sea and, after a siege of nine months, takes Valencia. Each victory brings a gift to Alfonso, and with each gift the king's anger softens: he releases the Cid's family, who join him in Valencia, and the Cid beats back the king of Morocco.
The Infantes of Carrión, two young noblemen of high birth and little courage, see the Cid's wealth and ask for his daughters. The king proposes the match; the Cid, though uneasy, accepts it as part of his reconciliation with Alfonso, who pardons him at a solemn meeting on the Tagus. In the third cantar the Infantes are shamed when a lion escapes in the Cid's palace, and again in the battle against King Búcar. To avenge their humiliation they set out for Carrión with their wives, and in the oak wood of Corpes they strip the women, beat them with saddle-girths and spurs, and leave them for dead.
The Cid seeks redress not by blood-feud but at law. The king summons a court at Toledo, where the Cid recovers his swords and the dowry, and then accuses the Infantes of treachery. His champions Pero Vermúez, Martín Antolínez and Muño Gustioz defeat the Infantes and their brother in judicial duels. Meanwhile envoys arrive from Navarre and Aragon to ask for the daughters for their princes, and the poem ends with marriages far more honourable than the first and the brief notice of the Cid's death at Pentecost.
Part by part
Part 1: The Exile: Vivar, Burgos, and the Chests of Sand
Cantar I, first part (laisses 1–14)
Summary
The surviving text opens in the middle of the scene: the Cid, weeping, looks back at his house at Vivar, its doors open, its pegs empty of cloaks and its perches empty of hawks. He thanks God and blames his enemies. As he rides out, a crow on the right and one on the left give omens, and he tells Álvar Fáñez to take heart: they are banished, but they will return to Castile with honour.
In Burgos the people weep at their windows and say that he would be a fine vassal if he had a good lord; but the king has forbidden anyone to give him shelter or sell him food, on pain of losing goods, eyes and life. At his lodging the door is barred, and only a girl of nine comes out to explain the king's order. The Cid prays at the church of Santa María and camps on the sandy bank of the Arlanzón.
Martín Antolínez, a citizen of Burgos, brings him bread and wine at the risk of his own property. Since the Cid has no money, the two contrive a trick: they fill two chests with sand, cover them with red leather and gilded nails, and pawn them to the moneylenders Raquel and Vidas as if they held gold that the Cid cannot carry. The lenders, sworn not to open them for a year, advance six hundred marks, and the Cid rides off towards the monastery of Cardeña.
Analysis
The opening is famous for its restraint. The hero's grief is shown through things, an empty house and missing hawks, and through tears rather than speeches, and his first words are a prayer that refuses to curse the king. The omen of the crows and the promise of an honourable return set out the shape of the whole poem: the loss of honra, standing in society, and its slow recovery (Smith 1972).
The scenes in Burgos introduce the poem's central political problem. The townspeople's verdict, that the Cid is a good vassal without a good lord, praises the hero without denying the king's authority, and the Cid never resists Alfonso. The nine-year-old girl, who speaks for a whole frightened city, is one of the poem's most memorable inventions.
The episode of Raquel and Vidas has troubled modern readers. The moneylenders, who were probably meant as Jews, are deceived with chests of sand, and the poem never says that they are repaid; later they appear in Valencia complaining. Some critics see crude anti-Jewish comedy, others a joke about greed on both sides, and others a sign of the poem's frank interest in money: the exiled hero must finance his war before he can fight it (Duggan 1989) (Michael 1976).
He turned and looked upon them, and he wept very sore As he saw the yawning gateway and the hasps wrenched off the door,
The poem's first surviving lines: the hero weeps and his loss is shown through the empty house.
God, what a noble vassal, an he had a worthy lord.
The citizens of Burgos praise the Cid without condemning the king, a balance the whole poem keeps.
With the sand let us fill them, to lift a burden sore, And cover them with stamped leather with nails well studded o'er.
The trick of the chests: the exile's first exploit is a piece of financial cunning.
Part 2: Farewell at San Pedro de Cardeña and the Road into Exile
Cantar I, second part (laisses 15–26)
Summary
At the monastery of San Pedro de Cardeña Abbot Sancho welcomes the Cid by torchlight. The Cid pays for the keep of Jimena, her ladies and his two little daughters, and Jimena kneels to ask his help. He takes the girls in his arms and hopes that he will live to marry them well with his own hand. Meanwhile 115 knights, hearing that the Cid is banished, leave their homes to join him.
With three days of his term of grace left, the Cid hears mass at dawn. Jimena prays a long prayer, a credo in narrative form running from the Creation through the miracles of Christ to the Harrowing of Hell, asking God to protect her husband. They part 'as the nail from the flesh'. The Cid crosses the frontier of Castile, and at night the archangel Gabriel appears to him in a dream and promises him good fortune while he lives.
Crossing the mountains by night, the Cid's company, now three hundred lances, lays an ambush and takes the Moorish town of Castejón on the Henares while Álvar Fáñez raids the country around. The booty is divided by written shares. Not wishing to fight King Alfonso, whose ally the town is, the Cid sells his fifth to the Moors, frees his captives and moves on.
Analysis
This section shows the Cid as husband and father. The scene with Jimena and the daughters, the prayer and the parting turn an exile into a family drama, and his wish to give the girls in marriage himself prepares for the plot of the second and third cantares. Jimena's prayer, the oración narrativa, is a set piece found in other medieval epics and shows the poet's knowledge of liturgical and learned material (Smith 1983).
Gabriel's appearance is the poem's only supernatural moment, and it is a dream, not a miracle in battle. The hero's success thereafter comes from planning, ambush and good counsel. Colin Smith noticed that the ruse at Castejón and later at Alcocer resembles the stratagems of the Roman writer Frontinus and used such parallels to argue for a learned author (Smith 1983).
The release of the captives at Castejón introduces the poem's practical attitude to the Moors. They are enemies to be defeated and taxed, but also neighbours with whom one can bargain, and the Cid wants them to 'speak well' of him (Fletcher 1989).
As the nail from the flesh parteth, from each other did they part.
The poem's most famous simile: the parting of husband, wife and daughters is like tearing a nail from the flesh.
Ride, Cid, most noble Campeador, for never yet did knight Ride forth upon an hour whose aspect was so bright.
Gabriel's promise in a dream, the only supernatural intervention in the poem.
For against my lord AIfonso the strife I would not stir.
Even in exile the Cid refuses to fight his king. ('AIfonso' is the translation's misprint.)
Part 3: Alcocer, the First Gifts and the Count of Barcelona
Cantar I, third part (laisses 27–63)
Summary
The Cid fortifies a hill near Alcocer on the river Jalón and lays the district under tribute. After fifteen weeks he takes the town by a feigned retreat, and Pero Vermúez raises his banner on the citadel. The king of Valencia sends two kings, Fáriz and Galve, who besiege the Cid and cut off his water. On Álvar Fáñez's advice the Cid sallies out; Pero Vermúez, unable to wait, charges into the enemy line with the banner, and the Cid's men follow and win a great victory.
The Cid sends Álvar Fáñez to Castile with thirty horses for the king. Alfonso accepts the gift, since it is Moorish plunder, and pardons Minaya, but says nothing yet of the Cid. Having sold Alcocer back to its Moors, the Cid moves on and raids widely from a hill near Monreal, and lays the lands of Zaragoza under tribute.
Count Ramón Berenguer of Barcelona, angered that the Cid is raiding lands under his protection, pursues him and catches him in the pine wood of Tévar. The Cid's men, with heavy saddles and boots, defeat the count's lightly equipped Franks; the count is captured and the Cid wins the sword Colada. The count refuses to eat for three days, until the Cid promises to free him; then he eats with such appetite that the scene becomes comedy. The Cid releases him, keeping the booty, and the first cantar ends.
Analysis
Alcocer is the poem's first great battle, and the poet tells it with formulaic grandeur: the lowering of lances, the pierced shields, the riderless horses. Yet the battle also characterises the hero's men. Pero Vermúez's rash charge shows the loyal vassal's eagerness for honour, and the Cid's anxious cry to help him shows a lord who cares for his men (Chasca 1972).
The gift of horses to Alfonso begins a pattern that will run through the first two cantares: each victory is followed by a larger gift, and each gift brings a measured concession from the king. The Cid's restoration is a matter of negotiation, not of open defiance, and Alfonso's careful reply to Minaya shows a king who must protect his authority while being won over (Harney 1993).
The count of Barcelona is the first of the poem's arrogant nobles. He calls the Cid's men 'tattered louts', and his hunger strike and greedy meal make a vain man ridiculous. The Cid's courtesy and his refusal to break his word show mesura, the restraint and sense of proportion that the poem prizes. Historically it was Berenguer Ramón II whom the Cid defeated in 1090; the poet seems to have confused him with his nephew (Menéndez Pidal 1929).
Through the line of battle yonder thy standard I will take; I shall see how you bring succor, who must for honor's sake.
Pero Vermúez's rash charge with the banner at Alcocer: loyalty and the hunger for honour in one gesture.
But to thee I say nothing of the Cid Campeador.
Alfonso accepts the gift and pardons Minaya, but keeps silence about the Cid: reconciliation will be slow.
Since beaten in the battle by such tattered louts was I.
The count of Barcelona's contempt for the Cid's men, the first sign of the class pride the poem mocks.
Part 4: The Conquest of Valencia
Cantar II, first part (laisses 64–80)
Summary
The second cantar begins with a new announcement of the song. The Cid turns east towards the sea and takes Jérica, Onda, Almenara and Murviedro, defeating the Moorish armies sent to relieve them. He spends three years conquering the country around Valencia, sends out a call through Aragon and Navarre for men who want booty, and besieges the city for nine months. In the tenth it surrenders.
The Cid's men, who had come on foot, become knights, and he takes a fifth of the spoil. He defeats the king of Seville, who comes to recover the city. His beard, which he has vowed not to cut for love of King Alfonso, grows long. He counts his men and forbids anyone to leave without his permission, then sends Álvar Fáñez to Castile with a hundred horses to ask that Jimena and his daughters be allowed to join him.
A warlike cleric, Jerome, arrives 'from the East' eager to fight Moors, and the Cid makes him bishop of Valencia. Minaya sets out for the king.
Analysis
The fall of Valencia, the climax of the historical Cid's career, is told briefly and without the sack and slaughter recorded by Arabic historians. The poem is interested in what the conquest means: wealth for all, social advancement for men who were once foot-soldiers, and a lordship of the Cid's own. Critics have seen in it the values of a frontier society in which a lesser noble, an infanzón, could rise by his own effort (Duggan 1989) (Harney 1993).
The beard, now growing long, becomes one of the poem's central symbols. It marks the Cid's mourning and his vow, and it becomes a sign of his dignity; in the last cantar no one will have touched it. Bishop Jerome is a historical figure, Jérôme of Périgord, and the founding of a bishopric shows the Cid's conquest as a restoration of Christian order (Fletcher 1989).
Here of my lord Cid of Bivár begins anew the Song.
The opening of the second cantar, marked in the manuscript by the poet's own announcement.
And nine full months together he sat down before the place, And when the tenth was coming, to yield it were they fain.
The siege of Valencia, told in two lines.
That the shears should not shear it, nor a single hair dispart, That so the Moors and Christians might ponder it at heart.
The Cid's vow not to cut his beard, made for love of the king who banished him.
Part 5: The Family in Valencia and the Defeat of Yúsuf
Cantar II, second part (laisses 81–98)
Summary
At Carrión Minaya kneels before Alfonso, lists the Cid's conquests and presents the horses. The king agrees to release Jimena and her daughters, gives them an escort and restores the lands of the Cid's vassals. García Ordóñez, the Cid's enemy at court, resents it. The Infantes of Carrión, Diego and Fernando González, privately begin to think that marriage to the Cid's daughters would make their fortune, though they consider him beneath them.
Minaya takes the ladies from Cardeña. At Medinaceli they are met by the Cid's men and by Avengalvón, the Moorish lord of Molina and the Cid's friend, who entertains them lavishly. The Cid rides out on his new horse Babieca to welcome them, and from the citadel Jimena and the girls look out over the city, the fertile huerta and the sea.
In spring King Yúsuf of Morocco lands with a huge army. The Cid takes his wife and daughters to the citadel to watch him fight, calling the enemy tents their dowry. He defeats Yúsuf, wins great booty, among it the king of Morocco's rich tent, and sends two hundred horses to the king.
Analysis
This section joins the Cid's public and private aims. He fights in front of his wife and daughters to show them 'how a livelihood is won', and his joke about the enemy tents as their marriage portion shows the link in his mind between conquest, wealth and the daughters' future. The view from the citadel is one of the poem's few moments of landscape and of pure delight (Smith 1972).
The Infantes' first scheme is introduced at the moment of the king's generosity. Their remark that the Cid is from Vivar while they are counts of Carrión states the social conflict on which the last cantar turns: inherited rank against honour won by deeds. Avengalvón's hospitality, by contrast, shows that loyalty and courtesy can cross the religious frontier (Harney 1993) (Lacarra 1980).
The Cid is of Bivár, and we are Counts of Carrión.
The Infantes' first scheme, and the class pride that will doom their marriages.
And forth in all directions they turn their lovely eyes, And they behold Valencia and how the city lies, And in another quarter they might perceive the sea.
Jimena and her daughters view Valencia from the citadel.
They shall see how men build houses here in a foreign land, And how a livelihood is won their eyes shall see it well.
The Cid fights before his family: conquest as earning a living and building a home.
Part 6: The Pardon and the Marriages to the Infantes of Carrión
Cantar II, third part (laisses 99–111)
Summary
Alfonso rejoices at the gift of horses, while García Ordóñez complains that the Cid's honour shames them all. The Infantes ask the king to arrange their marriage to the Cid's daughters. Alfonso sends Minaya and Pero Vermúez to propose it, together with a meeting at which the Cid will be pardoned. The Cid, thinking the matter over at length, distrusts the Infantes but will not refuse his lord.
The two parties meet on the banks of the Tagus. The Cid throws himself on the ground before Alfonso and takes the grass of the meadow in his teeth; the king tells him to rise and grants his pardon before all. Alfonso then asks for the daughters for the Infantes, and the Cid places them in the king's hands, saying that the king, not he, is giving them away. Álvar Fáñez acts for the king at the wedding.
In Valencia the Cid tells Jimena and the girls that the match was the king's doing. The weddings are celebrated with fifteen days of feasting, and the Infantes stay in Valencia for two years. The second cantar ends with the poet's wish that the marriages may bring joy.
Analysis
The meeting on the Tagus is the turning point of the poem: the Cid recovers the king's favour and his public honour. His gesture of eating grass, an extravagant sign of submission, shows a man who will humble himself to his lord in a way his proud enemies never would. The king's embarrassment shows how far the relation between them has changed (Smith 1972).
The poem takes great care to show that the Cid does not choose the Infantes. He repeats that the king gave his daughters away, and has a proxy act at the wedding instead of handing them over himself. This prepares the legal ground for the third cantar: when the marriages end in outrage, the dishonour falls on the king as well, and the king must give redress (Lacarra 1980) (Duggan 1989).
The end of the second cantar is a false ending. The poet has given his hero everything he wanted at the start, family, wealth and royal favour, and the audience already suspects that the marriages are a mistake.
And the grass of the meadow with his very teeth he rent, And wept exceeding sorely so great was his content.
The Cid's submission to Alfonso on the Tagus, the extravagant gesture of a loyal vassal.
Know that he giveth you to wed, and that I am not the man.
The Cid insists that the king, not he, has made the marriages.
Now by the honor that he hath we shall be put to shame.
García Ordóñez's envy: in the poem's world one man's rise is felt as another's loss of honour.
Part 7: The Lion and the Battle with Búcar
Cantar III, first part (laisses 112–126)
Summary
While the Cid sleeps in his palace in Valencia, his lion escapes from its cage. His men gather round his couch, but Fernando hides under the bench and Diego runs out and hides behind a winepress beam, ruining his clothes. The Cid wakes, walks up to the lion, which bows its head before him, and leads it back to its cage by the neck. The court laughs at the Infantes until the Cid forbids it.
King Búcar of Morocco besieges Valencia. The Infantes are afraid of the battle; Fernando flees from a Moor, and Pero Vermúez kills the Moor and gives him the horse to keep his secret. The Cid kills Búcar with Colada after a long pursuit to the sea and wins the sword Tizón. The Infantes, who boast of their part, are mocked by the Cid's men.
Humiliated, the brothers plan to take their wives to Carrión and abuse them on the way. They ask the Cid's leave; he gives them three thousand marks, rich gifts and the swords Colada and Tizón. The daughters take a tearful farewell, and the Cid, uneasy, sends his nephew Félez Muñoz with them. At Molina Avengalvón receives them honourably, and the Infantes plot to kill him for his wealth.
Analysis
The lion scene is the poem's clearest test of nobility. The Cid's calm command over the beast contrasts with the Infantes' undignified panic, and the lion seems to recognise true authority. The episode turns the conflict between the Cid and the Infantes into a question of courage and worth, which they then try to answer with violence against women (Smith 1983).
The Infantes feel the mockery as a loss of honour, and the poem explores the sour logic of injured pride. Their plan is to recover honra by shaming their wives, so proving their lineage superior to the Cid's, which is the opposite of the Cid's way of earning honour. Many scholars have seen the third cantar as a moral debate on what nobility really is (Harney 1993) (Deyermond 1977).
The Cid's foreboding as the couple leave, and his decision to send Félez Muñoz, keep him sympathetic: he is deceived not through stupidity but through loyalty to the king's arrangement.
The lion when he saw him, so sorely was afraid That before the Cid, low cowering, to earth his head he bent.
The lion bows to the Cid: the beast recognises the authority the Infantes lack.
Beneath the seat he crouched him so mighty was his dread.
Fernando hides from the lion, the cowardice that the court never forgets.
He who in good hour belted brand in signs had seen it plain That these marriages in no way should stand without a stain.
The Cid's foreboding as his daughters leave Valencia.
Part 8: The Affront in the Oak Wood of Corpes
Cantar III, second part (laisses 127–135)
Summary
Avengalvón overhears the Infantes' plot against his life and rebukes them, sparing them only for the Cid's sake. The party rides on into the high and wild oak wood of Corpes. There the Infantes send their servants ahead, strip their wives to their shifts, beat them with saddle-girths and spurs until they bleed, and leave them for dead. Sol begs them in vain to cut off their heads instead and warns that the deed will be judged.
Félez Muñoz, suspicious, turns back and finds his cousins unconscious. He revives them, brings water in his hat and takes them to San Esteban de Gormaz, where the townspeople look after them. Minaya and others come to bring them home to Valencia.
The Cid, hearing the news, grips his beard and swears that the Infantes will gain nothing from their deed. He sends Muño Gustioz to Alfonso to ask for justice, reminding the king that he arranged the marriages. Alfonso announces a court at Toledo and refuses to excuse the Infantes from attending.
Analysis
The scene in the wood of Corpes is the emotional climax of the poem. The poet sets it in a wild, sunless place and draws out the cruelty in detail, and the narrator's exclamation that it would be good fortune if the Cid appeared now shows how the audience is meant to feel. Sol's speech, which predicts judgment in court, turns the victims into the voice of law (Smith 1972).
The Cid's response is remarkable for its restraint. Instead of pursuing the Infantes for vengeance, as a hero in a blood-feud might, he appeals to the king. His argument is legal: since the king gave his daughters in marriage, the insult is the king's too. María Eugenia Lacarra and others have related this to legal reforms of the late twelfth century, when private vengeance was giving way to royal justice (Lacarra 1980).
The Corpes episode has no historical basis. Its invention gives the poem a second plot, with a second loss of honour, more personal than the first, and a second restoration.
And high the hills are wooded, to the clouds the branches sweep, And savage are the creatures that roundabout them creep;
The oak wood of Corpes, the poem's wild and lawless setting for the outrage.
Strike off our heads together, and martyrs we shall die.
Sol asks for death rather than dishonour and warns that the deed will be judged.
He gave to wed my daughters, therein I had no part.
The Cid's legal argument: the king arranged the marriages, so the king must give justice.
Part 9: The Court at Toledo, the Duels and the Royal Marriages
Cantar III, third part (laisses 136–152)
Summary
The Cid arrives at Toledo with a hundred men armed under their robes, his beard tied up with a cord so that no one can insult it. Alfonso appoints judges. The Cid first asks for the swords Colada and Tizón, which the Infantes return, thinking that this will end the matter; he gives them to Pero Vermúez and Martín Antolínez. He then asks for the dowry money, which the Infantes have to pay in goods. Finally he accuses them of treachery and demands satisfaction for the dishonour.
García Ordóñez mocks the Cid's beard, and the Cid replies that he once plucked García's own beard at Cabra. The Infantes declare that they were too noble for the Cid's daughters. Pero Vermúez, nicknamed Pero Mudo for his stammer, reveals Fernando's cowardice in battle and at the lion and challenges him; Martín Antolínez challenges Diego, and Muño Gustioz the drunken Asur González. In the middle of the court envoys of Navarre and Aragon arrive to ask for the daughters for their princes, and the king approves.
The duels are fought on the plain at Carrión before the king. Pero Vermúez defeats Fernando, Martín Antolínez makes Diego flee from the field, and Muño Gustioz overcomes Asur. The Infantes are declared traitors. The daughters marry the princes of Navarre and Aragon, and the poet notes that the kings of Spain are now the Cid's kin. He reports that the Cid died at Pentecost and closes the book.
Analysis
The court scene is the longest episode of the poem and its most original. It shows a precise grasp of legal procedure: the Cid makes three claims in turn, each opening the way for the next, and he wins redress not by force but at law. The judicial duel was a legal form, not a private fight, and the Infantes' defeat proves their guilt. Scholars have compared the scene with Castilian legal practice and documents of the period (Russell 1952) (Lacarra 1980).
The court is also the poem's comic theatre. The insults about beards and millstones, Pero Mudo's stammering speech, which ends in perfect eloquence, and Asur González arriving red-faced from his dinner show the poet's skill in characterisation. The challenges repeat the story of the Infantes' cowardice, so that the case is proved before the duels.
The ending is a full restoration of honour: the Cid's daughters, once rejected as too lowly, become queens, and the poem claims a link between the hero and the royal families of its own day. That remark has been used to date the poem, since the Cid's descendants reached the thrones of Navarre and Castile in the twelfth century (Smith 1983) (Duggan 1989).
No man born of woman has ever plucked that beard.
The Cid answers García Ordóñez: the unplucked beard is the sign of an honour never violated.
Ye are men to all appearance, tender women are those two; Yet in every way whatever they are worthier than you.
Pero Vermúez's challenge reverses the Infantes' claim to superior worth.
Since o'er Navarre and Aragon as queens his daughters reign; Today are they kinswomen unto the kings of Spain.
The final restoration: the rejected daughters become queens and the Cid kin to kings.
Characters
The Cid's household and vassals
- The Cid (Rodrigo Díaz de Vivar)
- A Castilian nobleman of the rank of infanzón, called Campeador ('battler') and, by his men, 'he who was born in a good hour'. Exiled by his king, he wins wealth, lands and Valencia by war, sends gifts to the king and wins his pardon, and later obtains legal redress for the outrage done to his daughters. He is brave, practical and devout, a loving husband and father, and above all a model of mesura, self-control and sense of proportion. His long beard is his emblem.
- Jimena (Ximena)
- The Cid's wife. Left at the monastery of Cardeña during the exile, she prays for him in a long prayer and parts from him in tears. Later she joins him in Valencia and watches his battle against Yúsuf from the citadel. She speaks little but is always a figure of devotion and dignity.
- Elvira and Sol
- The Cid's daughters, children at the start. Married to the Infantes of Carrión, they are beaten and abandoned in the wood of Corpes; Sol's plea to be killed rather than dishonoured is one of the poem's most moving speeches. They are finally married to the princes of Navarre and Aragon. The real daughters were called Cristina and María.
- Álvar Fáñez Minaya
- The Cid's lieutenant and closest adviser. He leads raids, gives counsel and goes three times as the Cid's envoy to King Alfonso. 'Minaya' probably means 'my brother'. The historical Álvar Fáñez served the king, not the Cid in exile.
- Martín Antolínez
- A citizen of Burgos who supplies the Cid with food against the king's order and arranges the trick of the chests of sand. He follows the Cid into exile, receives the sword Colada at the court and defeats Diego González in the duel.
- Pero Vermúez
- The Cid's nephew and standard-bearer, whose rash charge with the banner begins the victory at Alcocer. Called Pero Mudo for his stammer, he covers up Fernando's cowardice until the court at Toledo, where he exposes it and defeats him in the duel with the sword Tizón.
- Muño Gustioz
- A vassal raised in the Cid's household. He carries the Cid's appeal for justice to King Alfonso and defeats Asur González in the final duel.
- Félez Muñoz
- The Cid's nephew, sent to escort his cousins to Carrión. Suspicious of the Infantes, he turns back and saves the women in the wood of Corpes.
- Bishop Jerome (Jerónimo)
- A warlike cleric who comes to Valencia eager to fight the Moors and is made its bishop. Historically Jérôme of Périgord, a Frenchman and bishop of Valencia from about 1098.
The king and court
- Alfonso VI
- King of León and Castile. He exiles the Cid at the start, is gradually won over by his gifts, pardons him on the Tagus, arranges the marriages to the Infantes and finally gives the Cid justice at the court of Toledo. He is a dignified and largely just figure, misled but not wicked.
- García Ordóñez
- Count of Nájera and the Cid's enemy at court. He resents the Cid's rising fame and supports the Infantes at Toledo, where he mocks the Cid's beard and is reminded that the Cid once plucked his own.
The Infantes and their party
- Diego and Fernando González
- The Infantes (heirs) of Carrión, young noblemen of the Beni-Gómez family. Greedy for the Cid's wealth, they marry his daughters, disgrace themselves at the lion and in battle, and avenge their humiliation by beating and abandoning their wives. They are defeated in the judicial duels and declared traitors. The marriages have no historical basis.
- Asur González
- The Infantes' elder brother, who enters the court red-faced from dinner and sneers at the Cid as a miller. Muño Gustioz defeats him in the duel.
Moors and others
- Raquel and Vidas
- Moneylenders of Burgos, probably meant as Jews, who lend the Cid six hundred marks on chests of sand. Their treatment and lack of repayment are among the most debated features of the poem.
- Avengalvón
- The Moorish lord of Molina and the Cid's friend and ally. He entertains the Cid's family generously, and discovers and rebukes the Infantes' plan to murder him.
- Count Ramón Berenguer of Barcelona
- The proud count who attacks the Cid at Tévar, loses the sword Colada and refuses to eat in captivity until he is promised his freedom. Historically the Cid's opponent was Count Berenguer Ramón II.
- Yúsuf and Búcar
- Kings of Morocco who come with great armies to recover Valencia. The Cid defeats Yúsuf, and kills Búcar in pursuit, winning the sword Tizón. Yúsuf recalls the Almoravid ruler Yūsuf ibn Tāshufīn, whose armies fought the Cid in the 1090s.
Themes
Honour lost and restored
The poem turns on honra, honour as public standing, which can be lost by an act of the king or an insult and must be visibly restored. In the first two cantares the Cid regains his place with the king through victory, loyalty and gifts; in the third he restores the honour of his family through law and the judicial duel. Each restoration is greater than the loss: he ends richer than he began, his daughters become queens, and his enemies are disgraced.
Honour in the poem is earned by deeds, not inherited. The Infantes rely on their birth and believe that they can increase their honour by shaming those beneath them; the Cid and his men, of lesser rank, gain honour by courage and good conduct. Michael Harney reads this as a conflict between kinship and lineage on one side and personal merit and loyalty on the other (Harney 1993).
Loyalty, vassalage and the good lord
The Cid is the perfect vassal. Even in exile he refuses to fight the king, sends him a share of every victory and accepts his choices, including the disastrous marriages. The poem never blames Alfonso openly, but the Burgos citizens' remark about a good vassal without a good lord leaves a question in the reader's mind.
The Cid is also a good lord to his own men. He pays them well, cares for their lives in battle, takes their counsel and rewards their service. The bond between lord and vassal, built on mutual obligation, is the poem's model of a just society, and its betrayal by the Infantes is treated as treason (Harney 1993) (Lacarra 1980).
Mesura: restraint and proportion
Mesura, a sense of measure, is the Cid's leading quality. He weeps but does not rage, prays but does not curse, laughs at the count of Barcelona but releases him, and responds to the outrage at Corpes with a legal case instead of a massacre. His enemies, from the boastful count to García Ordóñez and the Infantes, are marked by desmesura: arrogance, excess and lack of self-control.
This restraint shapes the poem's style too. Critics have often noted its realism and sobriety compared with the French chansons de geste: there is little exaggeration, the geography is exact and the hero's motives are human (Chasca 1972) (Deyermond 1977).
Wealth, work and social mobility
Money is everywhere in the poem. The Cid starts with nothing, borrows on chests of sand, and wins his way back by booty, tribute and the sale of captured towns; the shares are written down and the sums of marks are carefully recorded. In the Cid's words, he must earn his bread with the lance and the sword.
Joseph Duggan has argued that the poem's interest in gifts and wealth reflects the economic and social conditions of Castile around 1200, when a frontier warrior could rise through war, and the giving of gifts created bonds between lord and vassal (Duggan 1989).
Family, marriage and fatherhood
Unlike most epic heroes, the Cid is a husband and father whose deepest concern is the future of his daughters. The poem begins with a family parting and ends with family marriages, and the Cid's wish to marry his daughters 'with his own hand' frames the plot. The two sets of marriages, the first arranged for the Infantes' greed and the second sought by kings, show the gap between false and true honour.
Motifs
Epithets of the hero
The Cid is repeatedly called 'he who was born in a good hour' and 'he who girded on his sword in a good hour', as well as Campeador and 'the one with the long beard'. These formulas recall the poem's oral style and create a constant sense of the hero's destiny (Chasca 1972) (Duggan 1989).
Gifts to the king
Three times the Cid sends Minaya to Alfonso with horses, thirty, then a hundred, then two hundred. The growing gifts measure his rising fortune and lead step by step to his pardon.
Tears and prayer
The poem begins in tears, and men weep at partings, at reunions and even at the moment of the pardon. Prayer marks every turn of the Cid's fortune, from Santa María in Burgos to Jimena's long prayer at Cardeña.
Repetition and parallel scenes
Episodes echo one another: the two marriages, the three embassies, the two battles against Moroccan kings, the three challenges and three duels. Consecutive laisses often repeat the same moment with variation, a device that Edmund de Chasca and others associated with performance before an audience (Chasca 1972).
Symbols
The beard
The Cid's long beard grows during his exile as a sign of mourning and of his vow, and becomes the emblem of his honour. He swears by it and grips it in anger. At the court of Toledo he ties it with a cord to protect it from insult, and he reminds García Ordóñez that no one has ever plucked it, while he once plucked García's.
The swords Colada and Tizón
Won from the count of Barcelona and King Búcar, the swords are signs of victory and noble worth. The Cid gives them to the Infantes, who are unworthy of them, takes them back in court and gives them to Pero Vermúez and Martín Antolínez, who use them to defeat the Infantes.
The lion
The escaped lion that bows before the Cid but terrifies the Infantes is a test of true nobility, revealing the hero's authority and the cowards' worthlessness.
The chests of sand
The pawned chests, heavy with sand and covered with gilded leather, stand for the gap between appearance and reality and for the hero's poverty at the start, from which all his wealth must be won.
Critical debates
Neo-traditionalism and individualism
Ramón Menéndez Pidal, the founder of modern Cid studies, saw the poem as the product of a living tradition. Epic poems, he argued, were composed by juglares soon after the events they describe, kept close to history, and were constantly reworked in performance, so that the surviving text is one stage in a long tradition. This view, called neo-traditionalism, was set out in his edition and fully argued against the individualist theories of French scholars in his book on the Chanson de Roland (Menéndez Pidal 1911) (Menéndez Pidal 1959).
Colin Smith argued instead that the poem was the work of one learned author, probably a man trained in law, writing around 1207 near Burgos, who used Latin and French models and created a new genre of Castilian epic. In The Making of the Poema de mio Cid he traced echoes of French chansons de geste, Roman authors and legal documents (Smith 1983). Most scholars now accept a single gifted author, but many still allow for an oral tradition behind him (Deyermond 1977).
Date and the meaning of 'Per Abbat'
Menéndez Pidal dated the poem about 1140, close enough to the Cid's life for the audience to remember him. He later proposed two poets: an early one from San Esteban de Gormaz, who stayed close to history, and a later one from Medinaceli, who added the fictional third cantar (Menéndez Pidal 1961).
Historians and philologists have since found evidence for a later date. P. E. Russell showed that the poem's legal and documentary language reflects the practice of the late twelfth or early thirteenth century, and Antonio Ubieto argued on historical grounds for about 1207 (Russell 1952) (Ubieto Arteta 1973). Colin Smith argued that the 'Per Abbat' of the colophon was the author, not merely the copyist, of a poem written in 1207 (Smith 1973). Others hold that 'escrivió' simply means 'wrote out', and that Per Abbat copied an older text.
History and invention
Menéndez Pidal admired the poem's historical accuracy, its precise geography and its many historical names, and used it as a source for his history of the Cid's Spain (Menéndez Pidal 1929). Later historians such as Richard Fletcher have shown how much it alters: the Cid's two exiles become one, his service to the Muslim kings of Zaragoza disappears, and the marriages to the Infantes, the affront of Corpes and the duels are fiction (Fletcher 1989).
The question is now less whether the poem is accurate than why it changes history as it does. The fictional third cantar, for example, gives the poem a second plot about honour and justice that the history of the conquest could not provide (Smith 1983) (Barton 2000).
Oral or written composition
The theory of oral-formulaic composition, developed from the study of Homer and Yugoslav singers by Milman Parry and Albert Lord, has been applied to the Cid. Edmund de Chasca studied the poem's juglaresque art, its formulas, epithets and direct addresses to the audience (Chasca 1972) (Lord 1960).
Joseph Duggan measured the density of formulas in the poem and argued that it was composed orally and dictated to a scribe about 1200, and he related it to the economic and social concerns of its time (Duggan 1989). Critics who favour a learned author reply that formulas can be used by literate poets imitating an oral style, and that the poem's legal knowledge and structure point to writing (Smith 1983).
Law and the court at Toledo
The court scene shows close knowledge of legal procedure: the formal summons, the judges, the order of the claims, the riepto or accusation of treachery and the judicial duel. María Eugenia Lacarra related the poem to legal reforms and to the politics of the late twelfth century, reading it partly as propaganda against the powerful kin group to which the Infantes belong, and stressing that the Cid's choice of royal justice over private vengeance reflects the interests of the crown (Lacarra 1980).
Russell's study of the poem's legal and diplomatic language and Smith's suggestion that the author was a lawyer point in the same direction (Russell 1952) (Smith 1983). Others have seen the scene as a broader celebration of law and order over the violence of the feud (Harney 1993).
Kinship, class and the poem's social vision
Is the poem a celebration of the lesser nobility against the great lords? The Cid is an infanzón who rises by merit, and his enemies are counts of high lineage. Michael Harney has read the poem in anthropological terms as a study of kinship, alliance and the formation of a new political order, in which the Cid's household replaces kinship by blood with loyalty and service (Harney 1993).
Others warn against reading the poem as simply anti-aristocratic. The Cid seeks royal favour and the best possible marriages for his daughters, and the poem ends by joining his line to kings (Duggan 1989) (Lacarra 1980).
The Cid and Spanish national identity
From the nineteenth century the poem was read as the national epic of Spain and the Cid as the embodiment of the Castilian character: sober, loyal, Christian and realistic. Menéndez Pidal's work gave this view scholarly authority, and in the twentieth century, especially under Franco, the Cid was used as a symbol of Spanish unity and the Reconquest (Menéndez Pidal 1929) (Fletcher 1989).
Modern scholars have questioned this reading. The poem shows a frontier in which Christians and Moors trade, ally and live side by side, and its hero fights more for wealth and honour than for a crusade (Fletcher 1989) (Barton 2000).
Realism and restraint
Critics have long described the poem as more realistic and restrained than other medieval epics. Its geography is exact, its hero is human in scale, its battles are fought for practical ends and there is almost nothing supernatural. Comparisons with the Chanson de Roland, with its giant enemies, miracles and heroic excess, underline the difference (Smith 1972) (Michael 1976).
Some recent readers suspect that the 'realism' is itself an art. The poem compresses and rearranges history freely, uses formulas and parallel scenes, and builds a symbolic world of beards, swords and lions; its sobriety is a choice of style rather than a plain record (Chasca 1972) (Montaner 1993).
Key passages
He turned and looked upon them, and he wept very sore As he saw the yawning gateway and the hasps wrenched off the door,
The poem's surviving opening shows the exiled hero looking back at his empty house in tears. Grief is expressed through objects and gesture rather than lament, which sets the restrained tone of the whole poem.
Good tidings, Alvar Fañez. We are banished from our weal, But on a day with honor shall we come unto Castile.
The Cid's first words after the omens look ahead to the plot of the whole poem: the loss of honour and its recovery. His good cheer in the face of disaster is an early example of his mesura.
God, what a noble vassal, an he had a worthy lord.
The most famous line of the poem praises the Cid and implies a criticism of King Alfonso without stating it. The poem will test this verdict as the king is gradually won over.
As the nail from the flesh parteth, from each other did they part.
The parting of the Cid from his wife and daughters at Cardeña is compared to tearing a nail from the flesh. The homely simile makes the exile a family wound.
For we must gain our daily bread with the lance and with the brand,
The Cid explains to Minaya why they must keep moving: the exiles live by war. The poem treats warfare frankly as a living, which critics link to the frontier society of its time.
That the shears should not shear it, nor a single hair dispart, That so the Moors and Christians might ponder it at heart.
The vow not to cut his beard for love of the king who banished him makes the beard a public sign of loyalty and grief, and later of honour.
And the grass of the meadow with his very teeth he rent, And wept exceeding sorely so great was his content.
At the meeting on the Tagus the Cid shows extravagant submission to his king. His humility contrasts with the pride of his enemies and marks the moment of his reconciliation.
Of the daughters of the Campeador we two shall make our mock.
The Infantes plan to avenge their humiliation by shaming their wives. They believe that their lineage entitles them to dishonour the Cid's family, and the plan reveals their cowardice.
What a fair fortune were it, if God's will it might be, Had then appeared before them the Cid the Campeador.
In the middle of the outrage at Corpes the narrator speaks for the audience's longing for rescue, one of several moments where the poet comments openly on the action.
No man born of woman has ever plucked that beard.
At the court the Cid answers mockery with a reminder of his past victory over García. The unplucked beard sums up the Cid's honour, which has been threatened but never violated.
Questions for study
Why does the poem begin, as it now survives, with the Cid weeping at his empty house rather than with the cause of his exile?
Consider the lost first leaf, but also the effect of opening with loss, the empty house and the omens, and the promise to return with honour.
How does the poem present the relationship between the Cid and King Alfonso?
Look at the line spoken by the Burgos citizens, the three gifts, the meeting on the Tagus and the court at Toledo. Is the king ever criticised directly?
What is mesura, and how does the Cid show it? Which characters lack it?
Compare the Cid with the count of Barcelona, García Ordóñez and the Infantes, and think about his reaction to Corpes.
How should we read the episode of Raquel and Vidas?
Think about the poem's interest in money, the identity of the lenders, the fact that they are not shown being repaid, and how modern readers respond.
What does the lion scene reveal about the Infantes and the Cid?
Consider courage, nobility and authority, and how the scene is remembered at the court in Toledo.
Why does the Cid seek justice at law instead of taking vengeance on the Infantes himself?
Think about the king's role in the marriages, the legal procedure at Toledo and the debate about the poem's date and legal background.
How does the poem treat Moors? Compare Avengalvón with Yúsuf and Búcar.
Think about tribute, alliance and friendship as well as war, and about the historical frontier.
What do the Cid's beard and his swords symbolise, and how do these symbols function in the final cantar?
Trace the beard from the vow in Valencia to the cord at Toledo, and the swords from their winning to their return.
Is the Poem of the Cid the work of a tradition or of an individual author?
Weigh Menéndez Pidal's neo-traditionalism against Smith's learned author and Duggan's oral dictation theory.
How do the second marriages at the end complete the poem's theme of honour?
Compare the two sets of marriages: who arranges them, why, and what they show about lineage and merit.
Further reading
- Barton, Simon, and Richard Fletcher, trans. The World of El Cid: Chronicles of the Spanish Reconquest. Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2000.
- Chasca, Edmund de. El arte juglaresco en el 'Cantar de mio Cid'. Madrid: Gredos, 1967; 2nd ed. 1972.
- Deyermond, A. D., ed. 'Mio Cid' Studies. London: Tamesis, 1977.
- Duggan, Joseph J. The Cantar de mio Cid: Poetic Creation in Its Economic and Social Contexts. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1989.
- Fletcher, Richard. The Quest for El Cid. London: Hutchinson, 1989.
- Hamilton, Rita, and Janet Perry, trans. The Poem of the Cid. Ed. Ian Michael. Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1975; reprinted Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1984.
- Harney, Michael. Kinship and Polity in the Poema de mio Cid. West Lafayette, IN: Purdue University Press, 1993.
- Lacarra, María Eugenia. El Poema de mio Cid: realidad histórica e ideología. Madrid: José Porrúa Turanzas, 1980.
- Lord, Albert B. The Singer of Tales. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1960.
- Menéndez Pidal, Ramón. Cantar de mio Cid: texto, gramática y vocabulario. 3 vols. Madrid: Bailly-Baillière, 1908–1911.
- Menéndez Pidal, Ramón. La España del Cid. 2 vols. Madrid: Plutarco, 1929.
- Menéndez Pidal, Ramón. La Chanson de Roland y el neotradicionalismo: orígenes de la épica románica. Madrid: Espasa-Calpe, 1959.
- Menéndez Pidal, Ramón. 'Dos poetas en el Cantar de mio Cid.' Romania 82 (1961): 145–200.
- Michael, Ian, ed. Poema de mio Cid. Clásicos Castalia 75. Madrid: Castalia, 1976.
- Montaner, Alberto, ed. Cantar de mio Cid. Biblioteca Clásica 1. Barcelona: Crítica, 1993.
- Rose, R. Selden, and Leonard Bacon, trans. The Lay of the Cid. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1919.
- Russell, P. E. 'Some Problems of Diplomatic in the Cantar de mio Cid and Their Implications.' Modern Language Review 47 (1952): 340–349.
- Smith, Colin, ed. Poema de mio Cid. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1972.
- Smith, Colin. 'Per Abbat and the Poema de mio Cid.' Medium Ævum 42 (1973): 1–17.
- Smith, Colin. The Making of the Poema de mio Cid. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1983.
- Southey, Robert, trans. Chronicle of the Cid. London: Longman, Hurst, Rees, and Orme, 1808.
- Ubieto Arteta, Antonio. El 'Cantar de mio Cid' y algunos problemas históricos. Valencia: Anubar, 1973.
Written by the Poetry Codex editors. Updated 2026-10-19.