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The King of Castilla and Leon Alfonso X the Learned (Alfonso X el Sabio, 1223-1284) – is one of the most famous Spanish kings of the 13th century. The only king who might have outgone him in his fame was his father, St. Ferdinand, a great warrior who defeated the mauvres and a wise politician who united Castilla and Leon.
However, the contemporaries of Alfonso X didn’t consider him wise, if compared with his father. Marian, the Spanish historian of the 17th cent., said: “He knocked on heaven’s door, but he had lost the earth under his feet.” Instead of war and politics he was interested in science and arts, that is why the nickname El Sabio (the Wise) is adequately rendered by the word “the Learned”.
Cantigas de Santa Maria is not the only one of his works. He also wrote law codes, historical chronicles, papers on astronomy, translated scientific works from Arabian and a lot more…Nevertheless, the book of 430 cantigas which describe Saint Mary’s miracles, laboriously rewritten and ingeniously illustrated, takes up a special place amidst the works of Alfonso X. It is a poetic masterpiece, a priceless “dictionary” of medieval musical language, an important iconographic document, that not only permits the study of old instruments, but also the ways of the court and the everyday life of the various regions of Iberia, different regional dialects, including those of Arabian and Hebrew.
However, having got the title of the Emperor of the Saint Roman Empire, he still couldn’t help losing the trust of his people and was dethroned by his own son. He had to flee to Sevilla, where he spent the rest of his life. On his deathbed he ordered to sing cantigas to Saint Mary instead of the orderly mourning, in the main cathedral of Sevilla.
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