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In August 1212, the major Andalusian city of Úbeda was besieged and captured by an army of crusaders led by Alfonso VIII of Castile. The conquest came as an aftermath of the crusader victory at the Battle of Las Navas de Tolosa. The Muslim inhabitants of the town negotiated a peaceful surrender of the town to which Alphonso initially agreed. However, the other leaders of the crusade persuaded him to abandon the agreement and sack the city, leading to a violent massacre and mass enslavement of the inhabitants.

Aftermath

The Crusaders managed to capture a huge amount of booty from the city's fall. The 13th-century Moroccan historian Abd al-Wahid al-Marrakushi wrote;

Alfonso -- God curse him! -- ... then descended on Úbeda, where many of the defeated Muslims, and the people of Baeza, as well as the town's own population, had collected. He invested it for thirteen days, and then took it by force, killing and capturing and plundering. He and his men set aside as prisoners enough women and children to fill all the Christian territories. This was a greater blow to the Muslims than the defeat in battle.

References

1. ^ Smith, Damian J. (2010). Crusade, Heresy, and Inquisition in the Lands of the Crown of Aragon (c. 1167-1276). Netherlands: Brill. p. 16.
2. Martín Alvira Cabrer: Las Navas de Tolosa, 1212: idea, liturgia y memoria de la batalla. Madrid 2012, p. 332
3. ^ Charles Lea, Henry (2017). A History of the Inquisition of Spain - Volume I. U.S.: Devoted Publishing. p. 27.
4. Lea, H. C. (1901). The Moriscos of Spain: Their Conversion and Expulsion. United Kingdom: B. Quaritch. p. 4.
5. Crusade and Christendom: Annotated Documents in Translation from Innocent III to the Fall of Acre, 1187-1291. U.S.: University of Pennsylvania Press. 2013. p. 89.