Wamba (king)

Wamba (c. 630-688) was king of the Visigoths between 672 and 680, successor to King Recesvintus.

Biography

Despite initially rejecting the appointment due to his advanced age, Wamba (whose birthplace is not documented, and of course the legend that attributes him as a native of Pujerra is not true, since according to the Royal Academy of History, “Already in the year 655 he held a very prominent position in the so-called “palatine office”, which included the highest representatives of the hegemonic noble group”) he was forced to by the nobility to accept the throne on September 1, 672 in the town of Gertici or Gérticos, later it was called Wamba in his honor (Valladolid), where his predecessor Recesvinto had died. On his own initiative, so that his election was not considered a usurpation, he demanded to be crowned in Toledo, where he was anointed on September 20 by Bishop Quirico in the Praetorian church of San Pedro and San Pablo.

He was the last king who gave splendor to the Visigoths. With his death began the decline. His reign was not easy, as he spent almost entirely quelling the internal struggles of the nobility against the monarchy, the nobles among themselves, the Catholics against the Arians, and the Hispano-Roman population against the Visigoths. In addition, he had to put down successive rebellions of Astures and Vascones and in 672 he had to face a new and unknown danger: the invasion of North Africans or Arabs, who tried to cross into the Peninsula through Algeciras, an attempt that was rejected by the Visigoths and Hispano-Romans.

In the region of Septimania in Gaul (in the southeast of present-day France) in the year 673 there was a revolt of some noble Visigoths led by Ilderico who had proclaimed himself king. Wamba sent Duke Paulo to put it down, but he started his own rebellion in Narbonne. Paulo replaced Ilderico and proclaimed himself king in Gerona. Given the situation, Wamba, who was fighting the Basques who were invading Cantabria, carried out a lightning operation and defeated them. Immediately afterwards he went to the place of the events and took Tarragona, Barcelona and Narbonne to arms, finally dominating the uprising and capturing Paulo, who had to parade through the streets of Toledo with a fish bone on his head. These events gave rise to Wamba reorganizing his army by proclaiming a law that forced nobles and ecclesiastics (under pain of death, confiscation of property and exile) to go with the troops in case of invasion or rebellion. It was the so-called Military Law, which would soften his successor Ervigio a lot.

According to tradition, King Wamba, after defeating the Narbonne rebellion, brought from there the relics of the martyr Saint Antolin, a Visigothic prince executed in Toulouse at the end of the 5th century. They were deposited in what later became the crypt of San Antolin of the cathedral of Palencia.

Wamba also convened the XI Council of Toledo in the year 675, in which measures were issued to correct ecclesiastical abuses and vices.

It is believed that the Metropolitan of Toledo, Julián II, was involved in the conspiracy that ended the power of King Wamba. The king was deceived and drugged and once in that state, they tonsured him, dressed him in a monk's habit and forced him to renounce the crown.

Commemorative cross of the tomb of King Wamba, in the place where there existed the Monastery of Black Monks of Saint Vincent de Pampliega, Burgos; where he died and was buried in the year 688 said Visigoth monarch.

Death and burial

King Wamba retired to the monastery of Monjes Negros de San Vicente in Pampliega, Burgos, currently disappeared, and there he died in the year 688. His corpse was buried before the door of the church of the monastery of San Vicente, and there He remained buried until, in the 13th century, Alfonso X the Wise ordered that his mortal remains be transferred to the church of Santa Leocadia, located next to the Alcazar of Toledo, where the remains of his predecessor Recesvinto had also been transferred, and that it should be confused with the other church of Santa Leocadia in Toledo. During the Spanish War of Independence, the tombs where the remains of both monarchs rested were desecrated by French troops.

In 1845, the remains of both monarchs, placed in a wooden chest lined with crimson velvet, were transferred to Toledo Cathedral by order of Isabel II, where they were deposited in the main hall of the cathedral sacristy, where they currently remain.

In 2014, the Pampliega city council requested the return of the remains of King Wamba to the cathedral chapter of the Toledo Cathedral, the temple where they are currently found.

The figure of King Wamba is an important symbol in the town, where there is a monolith with his effigy, a street and a square in his honor, a seal with his anagram, a rural house, a winery, a recreational club; until a catholic circle of workers in 1893 was baptized with his name.