Monarchy on the move
Alfonso VIII of Castile: Historical study

One of the Lab’s areas of study and activity is technology, and within that field, one area of interest is the Digital Humanities, which could be defined as the application of computational analysis to the phenomena studied by the Humanities.

Royal itinerancy is precisely one such phenomenon, as in times past the monarchs of various European kingdoms traveled with their courts throughout their territories to assert their authority and perform a variety of functions. Since kings issued documents during these constant travels, we can trace their routes and analyze certain spatial patterns that allow for a better understanding of the nature of the monarchy, its relationship with the territory and its inhabitants, as well as the political and cultural circumstances that explain this itinerancy.

The Laboratory has launched a research project to better understand the travels of King Alfonso VIII of Castile (1158–1214), with a team comprising José Manuel Cerda (medieval historian), Sebastián Caro (digital humanist), and Francisca Díaz (research assistant). José Manuel Cerda holds a Ph.D. in Medieval History and a certificate in Digital Humanities. Sebastián Caro is a philosopher, programmer, holds a Master’s degree in Classical Studies, and a Ph.D. in Education. Francisca Díaz is a historian and is completing a Master’s degree in Cultural Heritage.

Project team: José Manuel Cerca (left), Sebastián Caro (center), Francisca Díaz (right)

What motivates royal travel, what are its characteristics, and what patterns can be observed in these movements? Which places are frequented by the court, and what explains the absence of a royal presence in other regions? What seasonal, climatic, practical, or functional considerations determine the monarchy’s itinerancy? What do these patterns of movement reveal about core aspects of the monarchy and political history?

These are all questions that historians have addressed using the methodologies typical of scientific research, although, in reality, not as much has been published on the subject as its historical significance warrants. However, this project provides a georeferenced foundation for the analysis of the phenomenon through computational processing that verifies—or refutes—the intuition behind human labor and has the potential to open up new lines of research and perspectives.

Professor Cerda has been responsible for laying the groundwork for the project and establishing the parameters for analyzing historical sources, while Professor Caro has handled the programming for the computational analysis and visualization of the data. Francisca Díaz has compiled and organized the databases based on medieval records.

A charter issued by Alfonso VIII granting Toledo an annual income of 200 maravedís (Lagunilla, March 29, 1196)

A systematic and comprehensive approach was used to create the database on the movements of King Alfonso VIII of Castile. The primary source was the collection of royal charters compiled by Julio González, which includes a total of 826 documents issued between 1145 and 1217, among them a group corresponding to the reign of Alfonso VIII (1158–1214). A geographic analysis allowed for the geolocation of 816 of these documents, with 4 being ruled out as undoubtedly false and 6 as suspicious, due to inconsistencies in itineraries, discrepancies among signatories, or the impossibility of the grants awarded. Dr. Félix Martínez Llorente (University of Valladolid) provided invaluable assistance to this project, both in identifying uninhabited settlements and towns of uncertain location and in discarding spurious or forged diplomatic documents.

In addition, 55 additional documents compiled by Carlos Estepa Díez, Ignacio Álvarez Borge, and José María Santamarta Luengos were included in their work Royal Power and Society: Studies on the Reign of Alfonso VIII (1158–1214). Finally, four dates corresponding to the last year of Alfonso VIII’s life (1214) were added, based on the research of Gonzalo Martínez Diez in Alfonso VIII: King of Castile and Toledo (1158–1214). This resulted in a total of 885 dated locations, allowing for as accurate a reconstruction as possible of the royal itinerary. This compilation not only contributed new locations but also enriched and updated the database, which has been fundamental to the project’s development. the locations in the diplomatary.

Throughout the process, a variety of narrative sources were examined which, although they did not provide new locations, were essential for establishing the historical context. These include the Latin Chronicle of the Kings of Castile, as well as The Annals of Toledo I and II, and The History of the Deeds of Spain by Rodrigo Jiménez de Rada. Although these works were written after the reign of Alfonso VIII, they provide geographical information consistent with the locations in the diplomatary. These sources have made it possible to pinpoint the king’s whereabouts during his military campaigns when no documents were issued, such as the Castilian defeat at Alarcos (1195), his incursions into the neighboring Kingdom of León in 1196 and 1197, the crossing of the Pyrenees in 1205 toward Gascony to claim the supposed dowry of his consort Eleanor of Plantagenet, and the best-known of his battles, the Battle of Las Navas de Tolosa in 1212. The itinerary also includes the king’s presence at weddings, ceremonies, and assemblies, based on information provided by the chronicles that is not found in the diplomatary.

Sebastián Caro notes that his “experience leading this Digital Humanities project has been both enriching and challenging. On the one hand, the Monarquía en Movimiento project has allowed me to combine my interests in classical philology and educational statistics in an innovative way.” For Francisca Díaz, participating in this project has also been a wonderful experience. “It has allowed me to combine the rigor of historical research with new technologies, facilitating access to and understanding of history. It has been a privilege to collaborate on a project that expands the frontiers of knowledge and opens up new and fascinating possibilities.”

After establishing the sources of information regarding the locations from which Alfonso VIII’s chancellery issued diplomas, the data was entered into a spreadsheet. Each location was geolocated based on its latitude, longitude, and altitude, identified by its original name in the texts (usually in Latin), and its level of authenticity was determined.

Tabulation of the chronological and geographical data from the information gathered from the sources

The first challenge involved geolocating the sites. Generally speaking, this task drew on modern maps as well as medieval atlases and maps of the Iberian Peninsula (Monsalvo (2010). Historical Atlas of Medieval Spain]. Likewise, historical geographical dictionaries of Spain were consulted, primarily Madoz’s Geographical-Statistical-Historical Dictionary of Spain and the Geographical-Historical Dictionary of Spain by the Royal Academy of History. Only a geolocation corroborated by at least three of these sources was considered definitive. During this process, difficulties arose in geolocating some places due to changes in place names or the disappearance of certain localities over time. In this regard, in the few critical cases where the available information did not allow for the location of a locality to be established with certainty, Spanish specialists in the field were consulted. Finally, the average altitude was determined using data from Spain’s National Geographic Institute, as well as various topographic platforms.

Second, the original names of the places visited by the king were determined based on the original texts of the charters in Julio González’s work El Reino de Castilla en la época de Alfonso VIII. Interpreting the Latin names added a second layer of complexity to the study. Medieval scribes often recorded names according to their phonetic or regional understanding, generating multiple variants for the same locality. Thus, Valladolid, for example, is referred to by the names Valladolit, Valadolid, Vallemoletus or Vallesoletus, among others, which required careful cross-referencing with bibliographic sources to ensure their correct identification. In many cases, the ablative form in which the place names appear in the texts required establishing a hypothetical nominative form in accordance with the declension rules of Classical Latin; thus, for example, the place name Huete corresponded in the text to the Latin Opte, whose most reliable nominative, according to the third Latin declension, would be Ops. In many cases, the use of the original nomenclature made it possible to resolve ambiguities arising from the current names of certain places.

Hispaniae Descriptio [Description of Spain] by Vincentius Luchini (Rome, 1559)

Thirdly, the authenticity of the documents was another critical aspect. Each document was classified into one of three categories: “authentic,” “suspicious,” or “forged.” The reliability status assigned to each diploma was determined based on the notes and comments in the primary source for the research, The Kingdom of Castile in the Time of Alfonso VIII by Julio González. Additionally, subsequent monographic studies were considered, primarily Alfonso VIII, King of Castile and Toledo (1158–1214) by Gonzalo Martínez Diez (2007) and Royal Power and Society: Studies on the Reign of Alfonso VIII by Carlos Estepa Diez (2011). Determining authenticity requires in-depth analysis of paleography, linguistic structure, and the diplomatic conventions of the period, which exceeds the initial objectives of the project.

The final version of the database, which compiles locations along with geographic, toponymic, and reliability metadata, contains 887 entries. Of these, two were removed, either because their location was unknown (Solana, visited only once on December 9, 1212), or because researchers deemed a visit entirely improbable, as in the case of a charter issued in the German town of Seligenstadt on April 23, 1188, the year King Frederick I Barbarossa established his court in the city. Given the exceptional nature of such a visit outside the territory of the Kingdom of Castile, the enormous distance separating them—further corroborated by the stays immediately before and after (on April 16 and 25 in Toledo), which would have entailed a journey of over 1,700 kilometers in a few days—as well as the confirmation of the document by Chancellor Juan, the king’s presence at this location is untenable.

For the purposes of visualization on the interactive map developed in the next phase, an additional 122 locations were excluded because they lacked complete geographic or temporal data. Consequently, the interactive map for visualization and search was implemented using the 883 locations that provided all the data required for the geolocation and temporal sequencing process.

In the case of diplomas that specify the location and month but lack a specific date of issuance or grant, a tentative date has been assigned based on the court’s location in relation to other diplomas. This estimation is not intended to pinpoint the exact date of the diploma for historiographical purposes, but rather to enter locations into the database whose absence would distort the visualization of the royal itinerary.

Web application showing the interactive visualization of early 13th-century Spain, developed as part of the project

The time frame of the maps illustrating Alfonso VIII’s movements in this project spans from November 1159 to October 1214. Unlike the end date of this project’s time frame, determining the start date is a more complex matter. Gonzalo Martínez Díez notes that Alfonso VIII’s reign was the longest in the history of Castile: “For no less than 56 years, from 1158 to 1214, he would hold the title of king…” (p. 23). However, for the purposes of our research on royal itinerancy, these dates require some clarification. Following the death of Sancho III on August 31, 1158, in Toledo, the Kingdom of Castile fell into the hands of Alfonso, a child barely two years and nine months old. Although Sancho III’s wish was for his son to be placed under the guardianship and education of a regent until he reached the age of fifteen, the first document we can definitively attribute to Alfonso VIII is number 51 in Julio González’s collection, dated November 1159 in Burgos.

This charter marks the starting point of our database, as it is the first document that allows us to pinpoint the whereabouts of Alfonso VIII, who was already holding the title of king. Despite being a minor, between 1159 and 1169 Alfonso signed important charters that form part of his itinerary, even though he was still under the guardianship of various nobles. Alfonso came of age in 1169, and his reign lasted until his death on October 5, 1214, in Gutierre Muñoz, the last location recorded with certainty and which marks the end of our database.

The computational deployment phase of the project involved an application developed on the R platform using the Shiny package, designed to explore and visualize geospatial data interactively. The application loads information from the database established in the previous phase, performs transformations to ensure that data types are correct, and adjusts formats in accordance with the structure of geographic coordinates and dates. The user interface includes filters for year and location, allowing the user to refine the displayed data. The filtered data is presented in an interactive table created with the Reactable package, which offers features such as search, pagination, and row selection. At the same time, an interactive map is displayed using Leaflet, where locations are marked, and selecting a marker displays detailed information and an image if available. Additionally, it includes a heat map to visualize the density of the king’s visits.

Section of the R programming code for the project to visualize the routes of Alfonso VIII

The server-side logic ensures that both the table and the map are dynamically updated in response to filters and user interaction. When a row is selected in the table, the map zooms in on the corresponding location, enhancing the interactivity between the two components. The application uses Shiny reactive programming to respond in real time to user input, offering a smooth and efficient data exploration experience. Overall, this application is a powerful tool for the analysis and visualization of geospatial data, integrating data manipulation, interactive visualization, and a user-friendly interface into a single environment.

The multidisciplinary approach to research on the history of the monarchy views the practical application of the emerging discipline of Digital Humanities as an invaluable tool for analyzing the phenomenon of royal itinerancy. It has been a very challenging project, as Professor Caro explains, because it has involved “the search for and integration of scattered and sometimes contradictory historical data, which have been reconciled through a combination of historical, philological, and geographical research methods. Ensuring the clarity and usefulness of the visualizations has also required iterative testing processes.”

The project is in its initial phase, which involves the launch of a website featuring an interactive map visualization with search fields for date and location. The second phase will focus on improving the information provided by the platform based on user feedback, as well as formulating initial historiographical observations regarding the travel patterns of Alfonso VIII that may emerge from the interpretation of the maps. The final stage of the project includes an academic publication and the application of this map visualization to other reigns.

We invite users of this project to explore the maps and use the contact form on this page to ask questions, suggest corrections, and propose improvements.

In this initial phase, the project is presented on this website in three sections: a brief Historical Study by way of introduction; the Database on the king, featuring dates, locations, and references; and finally, the interactive visualization of the Interactive Maps. The buttons to access each of these sections are images of a round seal, a wax seal, and a coin of Alfonso VIII, respectively.