Rodrigo Díaz de Vivar, called El Cid, was the most celebrated warrior of eleventh-century Iberia, a Castilian commander who served both Christian and Muslim lords and carved out his own principality by conquering Valencia in 1094.
Rodrigo Díaz de Vivar, known as El Cid — from the Arabic al-sīd, "the lord" — and El Campeador, "the champion", was the outstanding soldier of eleventh-century Iberia. A Castilian noble of modest origins, he rose by pure military ability in the service of the kings of Castile and León.
Exiled by Alfonso VI, he took service where he could, including with the Muslim taifa of Zaragoza, before conquering the great city of Valencia in 1094 and ruling it as his own until his death in 1099. In legend he became the ideal Christian knight; in history he was something more complicated.
Rodrigo won his reputation young, as armiger and commander under Sancho II of Castile, and continued to serve Sancho's brother and successor Alfonso VI. But relations soured, and around 1081 Alfonso exiled him. Cut loose, El Cid did what a landless warrior of the age did: he sold his sword, and for years he fought for the Muslim rulers of Zaragoza against their Christian and Muslim rivals alike.
This is the point the later legend suppresses. The historical Cid was not a crusader but a professional man of war in a world where Christian and Muslim princes allied and fought across the religious line as interest dictated. His career only makes sense in that fragmented taifa world.
From the late 1080s El Cid operated increasingly on his own account in the east of the peninsula, and after a long blockade he took the rich city of Valencia in 1094. Later that year he beat off a large Almoravid army sent to retake it, one of the first serious checks to Almoravid arms in Iberia.
He ruled Valencia as an independent lord until his death in 1099. His widow Jimena held the city for a further three years, but in 1102, unable to resist the Almoravids, the Christians withdrew and burned it. Valencia would not be permanently retaken until James I of Aragon in 1238.
The Rodrigo of the sources is above all a supremely effective and self-reliant soldier, loyal to his men and his own advancement rather than to any single crown — a man who could be wronged by his king and simply take his talents elsewhere, even across the religious frontier. Both Arabic and Christian writers respected his skill in war.
The Cantar de Mio Cid and later tradition reshaped him into a paragon of restraint, piety and vassal loyalty, the perfect Christian knight unjustly exiled. That literary Cid is a moral portrait; the historical one was a harder, more opportunistic figure whose greatness lay in war and in seizing his own chance at Valencia.