Egica

From Hispanopedia
Egica
King of the Visigoths
Reign687 - 702/703
PredecessorErwig
SuccessorWittiza
Born650?
Died[15 November 702] 702/703
[Toledo]
SpouseCixilo

Égica or Egica (? – 702/703)[1] was King of the Visigoths (from the year 687 – 702). According to the Chronicle of Alfonso III, he was the nephew of King Wamba.[2] Egica was married to Cixilo, daughter of his predecessor, Erwig.

Succession of Erwig

King Erwig, in order to avoid reprisals against his family, at some point during his reign[3] married his daughter Cixilo to Egica, a magnate related to Wamba who headed a hostile noble clan.[4] In 687 Erwig, feeling himself mortally ill, proclaimed Egica as his successor on 14 November, and on the 15th he received penance and released the magnates from their obedience to him so that they could go to accompany the new King to Toledo.[5] On 24 November he was anointed in the church of the Holy Apostles Peter and Paul in Toledo.[6]

The new King sought to weaken the position of his in-laws in order to prevent them from presenting themselves as his rivals.[7] But he also wanted to win over the sector of the nobility that had been opposed by Erwig, and to do so he had to return to them the properties that Erwig had confiscated from them and distributed among his children.[8] On 11 May 688 the King opened the Fifteenth Council of Toledo in order to free himself from the oath he had made to Erwig to protect the royal family. The King presented the bishops with the dilemma between the oath sworn to Erwig to protect Erwig's family and the oath he had had to make to Erwig before becoming King concerning the dispensing of justice to the people. Egica argued that the two oaths were incompatible, and this implied that Erwig had unjustly condemned people and had taken their property in order to grant it to his own family, but reversing such injustices meant harming Erwig's family; for this reason he asked to be released from one of them.[9] He also proposed to them the revocation of the measures agreed at the Thirteenth Council of Toledo regarding the protection of Erwig's family.

At the Fifteenth Council Egica did not have the expected success in harming his wife's family, for although the bishops judged that the public interest stood above that of a family, this did not imply that the family of the preceding King should be left unprotected.[7] Regarding the revocation of the protection of Erwig's family approved at the Thirteenth Council, the bishops indicated that such protection could not prevent justice from being done if there were guilt in crimes.[10] In connection with this, the Rotensis version of the Chronicle of Alfonso III states that Egica, at the urging of the former King Wamba, his relative, repudiated his wife Cixilo; however, this would have meant that she was an adulteress, an accusation considered so serious that it makes no sense that at the Seventeenth Council of Toledo of 694 the Queen should have been mentioned in such an honorable manner, so that this claim must be considered a way of linking his son Wittiza with Erwig's family and thus with the decline of the kingdom.[11]

Egica waited for the death of the metropolitan of Toledo, Julian II, to continue harming Erwig's family, and at the Third Provincial Council of Tarraconensis held in Zaragoza in November 691, Erwig's widow was confined in a convent, which partially revoked what had been agreed at the Thirteenth Council, which had forbidden the widowed Queen to remarry but had guaranteed that she would not be forced to enter monastic life.[12][13] In this way the reigning Monarch ensured the stability of power by preventing the aggrandizement of another noble faction in the event that the widowed Queen might marry again.[14]

The measures against Erwig's family may have brought him into confrontation with a powerful sector of the nobility and the clergy. It was in this context that Egica had to face a conspiracy to replace him on the throne and murder him.[15] A coin in the name of Suniefred has survived, showing that the conspirators held control of Toledo for a time. In May 693 the King convened the Sixteenth Council of Toledo to sanction the measures against the metropolitan of Toledo, Sisbert—who would have anointed Suniefred king in Toledo—since his removal had to be sanctioned by a canonical procedure.[16] The records of the signatories to the Council reveal the renewal of the palatine personnel as a result of the conspiracy.[17] Among the conspirators appeared relatives of King Erwig[4] such as Queen Liuvigoto, but it seems that this was a ruse by Egica to do away with Erwig's family;[18][19] although on the other hand E. A. Thompson indicates the very opposite, that the conspiracy was also directed against Queen Liuvigoto.[20]

Legislation

Owing to the unstable situation, the King intervened politically to place loyal men in the bishoprics of Toledo, Seville and Braga, which was approved at the Sixteenth Council.[21] Because of the conspiracy, the King focused on strengthening his authority through the repression of the hostile nobility, the favoring of his allies and the reinforcement of the theocratic character of the Monarch.[22] To this end he requested the confirmation of measures to be adopted against anyone who conspired against the King: future conspirators would be barred from holding palatine office, which also applied to their descendants; they would become slaves of the Treasury and their property would be confiscated and placed at the King's disposal,[23] and the bishops anathematized whoever should conspire against the King.[21][24] In addition, the King issued a law to reinforce his royal power, by which any oath not sworn to the King or to the courts of justice was prohibited,[23][25] the aim being to prevent the bonds among nobles from standing on the same level as those with the King.[26] In addition to these measures, Egica obtained the protection of his descendants—but no mention was made of Queen Cixilo—which shows that the kingdom was not yet pacified.[27]

In view of the situation of royal weakness, he requested the revision of the law in force, with the exception of the laws of Recceswinth and Wamba, as a result of which some of Erwig's laws were suppressed and other laws suppressed by Erwig were reintroduced, but it was not a systematic revision like the one Erwig had carried out.[23][25]

Finally, anti-Jewish policy was hardened, prohibiting Jews from foreign trade and from trade with Christians.[4] and those who converted would be exempted from their taxes, and that amount would have to be borne by the Jews who did not convert.[28] At the Seventeenth Council of Toledo in the year 694, the King did not denounce a Jewish conspiracy of the Spanish Jews with those of North Africa to destroy the Christian Visigothic kingdom. For this reason the bishops decreed the dissolution of the Jewish aljamas, the enslavement of all Jews and the prohibition on practicing their religion, and the obligation to hand over their children at the age of seven to be raised by Christians. These measures were not applied in Narbonensis given its precarious demographic situation, although they nonetheless had to surrender their properties.[29] However, these measures were not effective, because the aljamas still existed when the Muslims invaded the Iberian Peninsula in the year 711.[24] Given that these measures had been inspired by a supposed Jewish conspiracy, for in exchange for having saved the Church from the Jewish conspiracy the King received from the bishops the declaration of anathema against those who, once the King was dead, should offend his children or Queen Cixilo, a measure that had proven ineffective, as had been the case with Egica and Erwig's family.[30]

Marriage and issue

Egica married Cixilo, daughter of King Erwig, as part of the compromise to reconcile the interests of Erwig's family and Egica's. But such a compromise would only be valid if there were issue from the marriage.[8] Wittiza was Egica's son, and the fact that he was anointed at the end of the year 700 may have been because he had to be over fourteen years of age; it may therefore be feasible that Wittiza was the son of Egica's marriage to Cixilo.[31]

However, according to the literal description set out in canon 7 of the Seventeenth Council, by which Egica's descendants were protected, it seems to follow that Queen Cixilo still had no children in the year 694, so that Wittiza was not the son of Cixilo but of an earlier marriage.[32] The fact that a Count Egica appears signing as an attendee at the Thirteenth Council in 683, generally accepted to have been the later king, shows that he could then have been at least thirty years old and therefore, on acceding to the throne in the 680s, could have had children from a marriage prior to that with Cixilo.[33] But this position has also been called into question, since at the Sixteenth Council—where the queen is not mentioned—the King's children and their spouses were placed under protection once the King was dead, and although those married children could not, by age, be children of Egica and Cixilo, there is no record of such an earlier marriage nor that he had children already married at the time of the Sixteenth Council; for this reason there are historians who deduce that the conciliar canons protecting Egica's family were generic.[34] Even so, there are scholars who have deduced that the absence of any mention of Cixilo at the Sixteenth Council is because she still had no children, that the balance between the families of Erwig and Egica would not yet have been achieved, and that the children of Egica mentioned would therefore come from an earlier marriage, for whom Egica sought protection even against Erwig's children.[35] Following this hypothesis, the return to the question of the protection of Egica's descendants the following year at the Seventeenth Council would not be of the same kind, for in this case it refers to Queen Cixilo and to her future descendants, a protection necessary against their half-siblings born of Egica's hypothetical first marriage.[36] Therefore, if Wittiza had not been Cixilo's son, the measures taken by Egica follow a logic: at the Third Council of Zaragoza (691) he had the widowed queen enter a monastery so that, once Egica had died, his widow Cixilo would in due course enter one, to prevent her from using her power and influence against the children born of the first marriage; and at the Sixteenth Council (693) Egica placed the children of the first marriage under protection, but at the Seventeenth Council (694) he had the children born with Cixilo protected—in view of the future situation in which she would be left a widow and would have to enter a monastery—from their half-siblings once the King was dead.[37]

The Chronicle of 754 indicates that Egica had a son named Oppas, who had fled Toledo when the Arab invasion took place, from which it can be deduced that he might have been a rival to Roderic.[38] But on the other hand, the name Oppas appears as Bishop of Tuy and Seville, who has been assumed to be a Bishop of the royal family placed according to the interests of the King; however, such transfers between dioceses went against canon law, and the only ones known are those applied in connection with the rebellion of Suniefred at the Sixteenth Council.[39]

Co-regency of Egica and Wittiza

Tremissis of Egica and Wittiza minted in Córdoba in the year 700 during their co-reign (Archaeological Museum of Palencia).

The Chronicle of 754, closest to the events, states that Wittiza was associated with the throne in the year 698; however, there is a contemporary document indicating that Wittiza was associated with the throne at the end of 693 or in 694, which is corroborated by the total number of coins minted in relation to other reigns of the 7th century. Thus, this would have been a consequence of the rebellion of Suniefred, in order to secure and monopolize the throne for his family against other candidates.

In this sense, the very association of Wittiza can be seen as proof that he was not Cixilo's son, for if Wittiza had been Cixilo's son there would have been no opposition between the two families over the succession, and the anointing of Wittiza was presented as the way to guarantee the support of the clergy in the face of any eventual opposition to that succession. The claim of the Chronicle of Alfonso III linking Wittiza as the son of Cixilo, and thus grandson of Erwig, could be seen in this sense as a way of establishing a wicked royal family that would have brought about the ruin of Spain in the face of the Arab invasion.[40] However, there is the opposite position, that Wittiza was Cixilo's son and that, given the complicated circumstances of Suniefred's uprising, the association would have been imposed on him, which would be illustrated in the coin types with facing busts, which illustrate a form of compromise between opposing factions.[41]

The Ovetense version of the Chronicle of Alfonso III states that Egica left Wittiza in charge of the government of the former Suebic Kingdom, establishing his royal residence in Tuy.[42] The Chronica regum Visigothorum states that Wittiza was anointed on 15 November of the year 700, from which it seems to follow that it was in that year that he reached the age at which he was no longer subject to guardianship, that is, around fourteen years of age,[31] although on the other hand there are authors such as Julia Montenegro and Arcadio del Castillo who hold that Wittiza would have been fourteen at the beginning of the co-regency around 694,[43] in which case the anointing would have produced a true co-government.[44][45]

The co-regency was a turbulent period;[45] thus, the Chronicle of 754 indicates that the Visigothic kingdom suffered an epidemic of plague, because of which the kings had to leave Toledo around 701.[46] And around the year 700 there were campaigns by the Aquitanians against Narbonensis that possibly captured Carcassonne.[47] The Cronicon Pacense states that during the reigns of Egica and Wittiza there were armed confrontations between Visigoths and Byzantines,[48] which took place against the background of the weakness of the emperors Leontios and Tiberios III in the defense of Africa.[49] During this joint reign it is known that a Byzantine fleet attacked the coasts of southern Hispania and was repelled by a nobleman named Theodemir,[50] who can be deduced to be the same man who in 713 made a pact with the Muslims in the Treaty of Theodemir.[51][52][53] The date of this event is doubtful: Roger Collins indicates that it may have happened during the expedition sent by Emperor Leontios in 697-698 to recover Carthage from the Arabs;[54] or perhaps at the end of Wittiza's reign.[55] As E. A. Thompson states, the context of this event is not known, although it may be linked to surveillance actions over the Byzantine enclaves of Tangier and Ceuta, as Collins holds,[54] or even, as Fernando López Sánchez holds, that Cartagena remained in Byzantine hands and that Theodemir's position before the Arab invasion was aimed at besieging a still-Byzantine Cartagena.[56]

There is no record of Egica's death; the last mention appears in a law promulgated at the end of 702, but it may perhaps have occurred in 703.[57] His son Wittiza remained as sole King.

References

  1. ↑ Collins 2005, p. 125
  2. ↑ https://dbe.rah.es/biografias/6379/egica
  3. ↑ Collins 2005, p. 118
  4. ↑ 4.0 4.1 4.2 Álvarez Palenzuela, Vicente A. (2002). Historia de España de la Edad Media (in español). Ariel. p. 39. ISBN 9788434466685.
  5. ↑ Thompson 1998, p. 276
  6. ↑ Collins 2005, p. 117
  7. ↑ 7.0 7.1 Fouracre, Paul (2005). The New Cambridge Medieval History, c.500 - c.700. Vol. 1. Cambridge University Press. p. 365. ISBN 9780521853606.
  8. ↑ 8.0 8.1 Bronisch 2011, p. 53
  9. ↑ Thompson 1998, pp. 276–277
  10. ↑ Thompson 1998, p. 277
  11. ↑ Bronisch 2011, pp. 46–47
  12. ↑ Thompson 1998, pp. 274–275, 277
  13. ↑ Bronisch 2011, pp. 58–59
  14. ↑ Valverde Castro, María R. (2000). Ideología, simbolismo y ejercicio del poder real en la monarquía visigoda: un proceso de cambio (in español). Universidad de Salamanca. p. 270. ISBN 9788478009404.
  15. ↑ Sayas Abengochea & Abad Varela 2013, pp. 406–407
  16. ↑ Collins 2005, p. 120
  17. ↑ Orlandis, José (2003). Historia del reino visigodo español: los acontecimientos, las instituciones, la sociedad, los protagonistas (in español). Ediciones Rialp. p. 127. ISBN 9788432134692. Archived from the original on 28 March 2016. Retrieved 14 March 2013.
  18. ↑ Collins 2005, p. 119
  19. ↑ Sayas Abengochea & Abad Varela 2013, p. 407
  20. ↑ Thompson 1998, p. 278
  21. ↑ 21.0 21.1 Thompson 1998, p. 279
  22. ↑ Mínguez Fernández, José María (2004). España de los siglos VI al XIII: guerra, expansión y transformaciones (in español). Nerea. p. 71. ISBN 9788489569720.
  23. ↑ 23.0 23.1 23.2 Sayas Abengochea & Abad Varela 2013, p. 408
  24. ↑ 24.0 24.1 Álvarez Palenzuela, Vicente Ángel (2007). Historia de España de la Edad Media (in español). Editorial Ariel. p. 40. ISBN 9788434466685.
  25. ↑ 25.0 25.1 Thompson 1998, p. 280
  26. ↑ Díaz Martínez, Pablo C.; Martínez Maza, Clelia; Sanz Huesma, Francisco Javier (2007). Hispania Tardoantigua y Visigoda (in español). Akal. p. 604. ISBN 9788470904820.
  27. ↑ Bronisch 2011, pp. 46, 54, 56–57
  28. ↑ Orlandis, José (2003). Historia del reino visigodo español: los acontecimientos, las instituciones, la sociedad, los protagonistas (in español). Ediciones Rialp. p. 128. ISBN 9788432134692.
  29. ↑ Thompson 1998, pp. 280–283
  30. ↑ Thompson 1998, p. 283
  31. ↑ 31.0 31.1 Collins 2005, p. 121
  32. ↑ Bronisch 2011, pp. 48–49
  33. ↑ Bronisch 2011, p. 64
  34. ↑ Bronisch 2011, p. 49
  35. ↑ Bronisch 2011, pp. 54–55
  36. ↑ Bronisch 2011, p. 57
  37. ↑ Bronisch 2011, p. 57
  38. ↑ Collins 2005, p. 148
  39. ↑ Bronisch 2011, pp. 49–50
  40. ↑ Bronisch 2011, p. 62
  41. ↑ López Sánchez, Fernando (2009). "La moneda del reino visigodo en Toledo: ¿Por qué? ¿Para quién?" (PDF). Mainake (in español) (31). Centro de Ediciones de la Diputación de Málaga (CEDMA): 177. ISSN 0212-078X.
  42. ↑ Palao Vicente, Juan José (2010). Militares y Civiles En La Antigua Roma: Dos Mundos (in español). Universidad de Salamanca. p. 249. ISBN 9788478001866.
  43. ↑ Bronisch 2011, p. 62
  44. ↑ Díaz Martínez, Pablo C.; Martínez Maza, Clelia; Sanz Huesma, Francisco Javier (2007). Hispania Tardoantigua Y Visigoda (in español). Akal. p. 606. ISBN 9788470904820.
  45. ↑ 45.0 45.1 Orlandis, José (2003). Historia del reino visigodo español: los acontecimientos, las instituciones, la sociedad, los protagonistas (in español). Ediciones Rialp. p. 129. ISBN 9788432134692. Archived from the original on 5 June 2014. Retrieved 14 March 2013.
  46. ↑ Collins 2005, p. 122
  47. ↑ Isla Frez, Amancio (2010). Ejército, Sociedad y Política en la Península Ibérica entre los Siglos VII y XI (in español). CSIC-Dpto. de Publicaciones. pp. 70–71. ISBN 9788497815741.
  48. ↑ Presedo Velo, Francisco J. (2003). La España Bizantina (in español). Universidad de Sevilla. p. 87. ISBN 9788447207305.
  49. ↑ Cortés Arrese, Miguel (2002). Toledo y Bizancio (in español). Ediciones de la Universidad de Castilla La Mancha. p. 111. ISBN 9788484272311.
  50. ↑ Thompson 1998, p. 284
  51. ↑ Díaz, Pablo C. (2004). "En tierra de nadie: visigodos frente a bizantinos. Reflexiones sobre la frontera". In Inmaculada Pérez Martín, Pedro Bádenas de la Peña (ed.). Bizancio y la península ibérica de la antigüedad tardía a la edad moderna (in español). Vol. 1. Taravilla. p. 54.
  52. ↑ de la Cruz Díaz Martínez, Pablo; Martínez Maza, Celia; Sanz Huesma, Francisco Javier (2007). Hispania tardoantigua y visigoda (in español). Ediciones AKAL. p. 609. ISBN 9788470904820.
  53. ↑ Vizcaíno Sánchez, Jaime (2009). La presencia bizantina en Hispania, siglos VI-VII: la documentación arqueológica (in español). EDITUM. p. 88. ISBN 9788483719121.
  54. ↑ 54.0 54.1 Collins 2005, p. 110
  55. ↑ Bachrach, Bernard S. (February 1973). "A Reassessment of Visigothic Jewish Policy, 589-711". The American Historical Review. 78 (1). The American Historical Review, Vol. 78, No. 1: 11–34. doi:10.2307/1853939. JSTOR 1853939.
  56. ↑ Palao Vicente, Juan José (2010). Militares y civiles en la antigua Roma: dos mundos diferentes, dos mundos unidos (in español). Universidad de Salamanca. p. 247. ISBN 9788478001866.
  57. ↑ Collins 2005, pp. 124, 261

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