Rodrigo Díaz de Vivar

Moorish history, wrote Izanagi Aoi, "is the story of a small city's depraved dictator, and a wandering warlord, and their rocky relationship in the ashes of that kingdom. It is also the story of how the one paid the other to redraw lines on maps and kill people."

This is the story of that wandering warlord.

Rodrigo Diaz before 1081

Alfonso VI has Rodrigo Diaz exiled in 1081, and judging by the romances about him, he takes a number of loyal retainers with him. What he isn't allowed to take with him is any of his assets.

His first stop is to spend the winter in Barcelona, where he apparently offers his services to Ramon Berenguer and Berenguer Ramon, the confusingly named children of Ramon Berenguer I, who jointly share the comital title. It doesn't go over well; they fall out hard, and after Berenguer Ramon becomes the Fratricide they wind up facing each other in battle a few times. As soon as the snow thaws in 1082, therefore, Rodrigo and friends turn south, arriving in Saraqusta. And IRL, that's the end of this story; for reasons lost to time, he's hired by al-Musta'in, securing Zaragoza for the next five years and throwing a wrench into the power dynamics of the north.

But Andalusada isn't IRL, and in Andalusada that's where things start diverging. Because Rodrigo isn't hired by al-Musta'in, and (running out of cash, and with a certain number of retainers with him) he turns south, there to find employment in Seville.

People of 11th-century Iberia

Andalusada is a long and complicated world, and it starts in 11th-century Iberia, which is particularly notable for a few reasons:

• There are so many factions, and all of them need to be accounted for from the start.
• So many of them - far more, understandably, than the rest of the TL combined - are actual historic personalities, who'll need rewriting.

This, therefore, is a one-stop list for keeping track of who's who, and from where.

Alfonso VI of Castile

Before the beginning, Rodrigo Diaz was in the employ of Alfonso VI, at that point King of Leon and Castile. In the beginning, he's predictably banished.

Once that beginning gets underway, Alfonso VI has only a few years left to live. But he doesn't know that. This is his story.

Alfonso VI up to the point of divergence

Alfonso VI was the second son of Ferdinand the Great, sandwiched between Sancho (king of Leon) and Garcia (king of Galicia.) He was also the first to seriously ignore the division of territories between the sons, extorting money from Badajoz.

And starting from about 1072 (which, admittedly, gets off to a bad start when his brother Sancho kicks his ass at Golpejera and sends him fleeing to Toledo), the ten years prior to the POD had actually been pretty good for him. Sancho gets killed later that same year, allowing Alfonso to claim the coveted title of "King of Leon"; and when García is recalled from exile, he's forced to take monastic vows and gets banished to a monastery, never to fuck or fight again. By 1077, Alfonso VI is in a position to start styling himself Imperator Totus Hispaniae: "Emperor of All the Spains."

In 1079, he marries Constance of Burgundy, who bears him a daughter, Urraca. (She's going to be important one day, as soon as I figure out how.)

Urraca of León and Castille

Once things start getting different, I run into one of the first big divergence in history: the last Castillian monarch common to both timelines. Her name is Urraca, and she's something I've tried to ignore for awhile because so much is changed that I have no certain idea how her life plays out. This is her blog post.

Urraca's recognizable life

The only reason that I'm sure about Urraca's existence at all is because she's born in 1079. This means that she's two years old as of the POD.

Where it all begins

While I've discussed the origins of Andalusada in outline before, I haven't actually typed it out explicitly, and certainly not here. Now that it's hyperlinked, I have no excuse. So let's take this from the top. Andalusada starts in the year 1081.

In 1081, some politics comes up. We're not totally sure about what it was; there's some legends and such but it's not nearly as well-documented as we'd like. What matters is that Alfonso VI has been remarried to one Constance of Burgundy, who brings with her a lot of Cluniac ties, papal opposition, and personal drama. A fair number of people apparently got exiled because of them this, including one Rodrigo Díaz de Vivar, who leaves with no money and a fair number of retainers to feed.

With no loyalties owed to Alfonso, Díaz has to find a new employer. The first place he turns to is Barcelona, where he winters with the Counts. They hate each other. Passionately. Still unemployed at the end of the winter, Rodrigo is forced to look elsewhere to feed his cohorts.

This is the point of divergence. This is the point of departure. This is where Andalusada stops being IRL.