By means of Nicolás de Cárdenas
Denver Newsroom, Aug 9, 2022 / 04:00 am
On Aug. 6 within the 12 months 953, 200 priests residing on the monastery of San Pedro de Cardeña in Burgos, Spain, have been put to loss of life, martyred by way of Muslim troops. From that point till the top of the fifteenth century, the floor at their position of martyrdom became crimson with blood annually.
The prodigious tournament was once repeated till a couple of years ahead of the Reconquista (Reconquest) in 1492 with the overall give up of the Muslims protecting out in Granada and the consolidation of Spanish territory underneath King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella, referred to as the Catholic Monarchs. 
In accordance to a couple mavens, the historical past of the monastery dates again to the 5th century, even supposing the present citizens of the convent lately state that there is not any historic proof of it till the top of the 9th century.
Finally, San Pedro de Cardeña was once the most important Christian heart for hundreds of years and relics of St. Peter, St. Paul, and St. John the Evangelist — amongst others — have been commemorated there.
Like all the space of Burgos, for many years the environment of the monastery have been contested borderlands, the place the struggles between the Christian and Muslim kingdoms happened. To mount their assaults, the Saracens additionally took benefit of the preventing between monarchs and Christian feudal lords.
The primary Umayyad caliph of Córdoba, Abderramán III, took benefit of the disagreements between Ordoño III, the king of León, and Fernán González, the depend of Castile, and introduced the incursion that resulted in the martyrdom of the 200 Benedictine priests of San Pedro de Cardeña.
The looting of the monastery and killing of the priests out of hatred for the religion was once recorded within the Normal Chronicle of Alfonso X the Sensible, the primary large-format historical past of Spain written immediately in Castilian Spanish on the finish of the thirteenth century.
García Fernández, the son of Fernán González, restored the monastery after it was once looted. It was once within the cloister the place the priests have been beheaded, recognized since then because the cloister of the martyrs, the place the blood of the martyrs flowed annually till the reign of Henry IV, who died on the finish of the fifteenth century.
His sister, Queen Isabella of Castile, was once one of the vital famend pilgrims who got here to San Pedro de Cardeña to honor the reminiscence of the martyrs, as did the monarchs Felipe II, Felipe III, and Carlos II.
Common devotion was once such that during 1603, Pope Clement VIII approved the cult via a pontifical transient, dated 1603.
The relationship between the monastery of San Pedro de Cardeña and one of the vital outstanding figures of the Spanish Reconquista additionally offers where a distinct air of secrecy.
In step with the Cantar de Mio Cid, (The Tune of My Lord), an epic poem in regards to the famed warrior Rodrigo Díaz de Vivar (El Cid), it was once the San Pedro de Cardeña monastery the place El Cid left his spouse Doña Jimena and his daughters when he had to enter exile in the second one part of the eleventh century. The abbot on the time was once St. Sisebuto.
El Cid died in Valencia in 1099. His spouse remained accountable for town, however the onslaught of the Muslims made it important for her to escape in 1102. She due to this fact made up our minds to have the corpse of the legendary warrior moved from the Valencia cathedral to San Pedro de Cardeña.
El Cid’s tomb was once desecrated in 1808 by way of Napoleon’s troops, however Normal Thiébault made up our minds to position the stays of the knight in a mausoleum situated on a major road within the town of Burgos. The stays have been introduced again to the monastery in 1826.
After the Spanish confiscation, by which the federal government nationalized the homes of the spiritual orders, together with the convents, the stays of El Cid have been transferred to the Burgos The town Corridor chapel in 1842.
It was once now not till 1921 that the stays of El Cid  have been laid to leisure subsequent to his spouse within the Burgos cathedral.
On the monastery, alternatively, there’s a monolith memorializing Babieca, the devoted horse of El Cid, the place custom says the animal was once buried.
Because of the confiscation, the monastery of San Pedro de Cardeña was once disadvantaged of priests for 106 years. The Benedictine Order attempted to revive monastic lifestyles there on the finish of the nineteenth century with out luck, as they have been not able to get using land to improve the neighborhood.
In short, the Piarist Fathers occupied the monastery between 1888 and 1901. 4 years later, some French Capuchin friars expelled from Toulouse arrived and remained there till 1921.
In 1933, a Cistercian neighborhood arrived on the position from San Isidro de Dueñas, in Palencia. The outbreak of the Spanish Civil Warfare avoided their definitive agreement there till 1942, for the reason that website was once transformed into a jail camp all over the warfare. In 1948, the abbey acquired the name to the valuables.
At this time, a neighborhood of Trappist priests lives within the monastery, and every August they commemorate the martyrdom in their predecessors.
This tale was once first revealed by way of ACI Prensa, CNA’s Spanish-language information spouse. It’s been translated and tailored by way of CNA.
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