Battle of Valdevez

The Battle of Valdevez (Torneio de Arcos de Valdevez) took place at Arcos de Valdevez on the banks of the river Vez between the Kingdom of León and the Kingdom of Portugal in the summer of 1140 or 1141. It is one of only two pitched battles that Alfonso VII of León is known to have fought, and the only of the two not coincident with a siege. His opponent at Valdevez was his cousin Afonso I of Portugal. An armistice signed after the battle eventually became the Treaty of Zamora (1143), and ended Portugal's first war of independence. The area of the battle became known as the Veiga or Campo da Matança, the "field of killing".

Course of the conflict
At the start of Alfonso VII's reign, Afonso of Portugal was his heir presumptive. The subsequent birth of two sons to Alfonso, the future kings Sancho III and Ferdinand II, and the geographic distance between Afonso's Portuguese power base and the Crown's, probably convinced Afonso to rebel in contravention of the Treaty of Tui (1137) and invade Galicia. He crossed the Minho and entered the area of Valdevez ("valley of the Vez"). Upon hearing this, Alfonso VII rushed troops from León into Galicia, destroying fortifications that could be used by Afonso as they went, and camping in the Sierra de Suajo north of the river Lima, of which the Vez is a tributary.

At Valdevez, the primary combatants on both sides were mounted knights. It is unclear how the battle developed, but it is believed that in order to eliminate the possibility of a mêlée, each monarch selected knights for individual jousting matches, and the battle descended into a hastilude. The need to deal with an Almoravid invasion of the south of his territory may have forced Afonso of Portugal to accept a tournament. Valdevez exemplifies the tendency, noted by Philippe Contamine, of medieval battles between knights to descend "into a sort of great tourney, half serious, half frivolous." At Arcos de Valdevez many prisoners were taken but few lives lost. Besides Ramiro Fróilaz, who is the only nobleman taken at Valdevez mentioned by name in the contemporary Chronica Adefonsi imperatoris, the Portuguese may have captured Ponce Giraldo de Cabrera and the Traba brothers Fernando Pérez and Vermudo Pérez. The Portuguese succeeded in gaining the advantage, by the laws of chivalry of the time, and defeated the Leonese knights. Under these circumstances a peace was concluded and prisoners exchanged. An armistice was signed after the battle that eventually became the Treaty of Zamora.

Memorials
There is a commemorative azulejo mural of the battle in the São Bento Train Station. In Arcos de Valdevez a monument by sculpture José Rodrigues commemorates the battle as a joust. In the Museu de Arcos de Valdevez an artefact from the so-called Torneio de Cavaleiros is permanently on display.