Battle of Bairén 1097

[scrivs]

This evening James, Tom, Steve and myself refought the Battle of Bairén using Hail Caesar.



The Moors held the high ground while El Cid and the Christians advanced along the coastline harassed by fire from the Berber fleet. 



I took quite a few pictures of the game and these along with a short report are over on the Scrivsland blog over on the Scrivsland blog

[Engel]

Great looking game Paul.

[MerlintheMad]

I'm so confused. Is the Cid dead or merely unhorsed? You two need to get your details in harmony! As I said, great looking BIG game....

[janner]

Looking good 

[TWD]

I'm so confused. Is the Cid dead or merely unhorsed? You two need to get your details in harmony! As I said, great looking BIG game....

The rules said dead, but history says he lived another couple of years.
Unless he was strapped to his horse for ALL that time ( he'd probably be a bit smelly if that were the case).

Tom

[H.M.Stanley]

Good stuff gentlemen

[MerlintheMad]

The rules said dead, but history says he lived another couple of years.
Unless he was strapped to his horse for ALL that time ( he'd probably be a bit smelly if that were the case).

Tom

Thanks for clearing that up, now go clear it up on TMP! (Oh, I see you already did.)

"Strapped to his horse", yeah, that one, again. As a kid I noticed that Chuck Heston's head moved, so that meant he was "mostly dead", but not all the way dead. So I insisted. Then years later I read that he was lord of Valencia for some years after taking the city, SO! he wasn't dead after all, just too weak to ride without falling off. And there you have it, the real history version....

[huevans]

IIRC, the Cid was a mercenary warlord who sold his sword to both Christian and Muslim employers. The image of him as an anti Muslim crusader was a Hollywood creation.

[henryv]

Looks an interesting battle my friends.

[archiduque]

Excellent!!

[scrivs]

Thanks chaps

[James Morris]

IIRC, the Cid was a mercenary warlord who sold his sword to both Christian and Muslim employers. The image of him as an anti Muslim crusader was a Hollywood creation.

You're absolutely right.  We had him fighting the Almoravids in this battle because, historically, he did fight the Almoravids in this battle.  He was cut off from riding up to safety in Valencia by a nifty Moorish forced march and had to fight his way through (with more success than myself and Steve, it has to be said.)

The vagary about him being dead is pretty accurate for this period, though I think in this case we can say we have two chroniclers with different versions of events!