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For the purposes of the new edition, every poem has been assigned a unique short title. The original short titles, taken eclectically from a number of sources, are retained as alternative short titles.
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CSM Number : 205
Short name: The Muslim Woman who Survived a Siege Alternative: Muslim woman survives siege
Incipit: Oraçon con piadade
Refrain: Oraçon con piadade/ oe a Virgen de grado/ e guard’ á  de mal por ela/ o que ll’ é encomendado.
Summary of narrative
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Setting: unspecified; mention of Uclés and Calatrava Protagonist(s): don Gonzalo Eanes of Calatrava, don Alfonso Téllez

A Moorish castle on the frontier was being attacked by Christian troops from Uclés and Calatrava. Don Alfonso Téllez went there with a great company of fine knights, crossbowmen, and foot soldiers. These good warriors soon took the castle.

The people in the castle, seeing they were being attacked from all sides, took refuge in a strong tower. The attackers made big holes in the tower’s sides and set it alight. To escape the fire, the Moors threw themselves headlong from the battlements and many were killed.

A Mooress, who was in the tower with her beloved son, carried him to the top so that he would not suffocate. She sat down between two merlons with the child clutched in her arms. Although the flames encircled her, she was not burned and neither was her baby. Don Gonzalo Eanes of Calatrava and don Alfonso Téllez ordered the tower to be stormed.

As the tower was being destroyed, they caught sight of the Mooress, seated between the merlons. To them, she looked like an image of the Virgin, holding the Child in her arms. When all of the Christians saw her, they took pity on her and raising their hands toward God, they prayed that she be spared.

Then the side of the tower on which the pair sat, gently collapsed and slid onto an open plain. Neither the mother nor her child were harmed or shaken, because the Virgin, to whom the Christians prayed, set them down in a meadow.

Everyone praised the Virgin for the miracle. The woman became a Christian and her son was baptised.

Metrical data
Stanza: 15' 15' 15' 15' Refrain: 15' 15'
No. of Stanzas: 13
Rhyme scheme: AA | bbba Zejel: Yes
MS locations:
F5, E205
Poncelet reference
None
Keywords
castle, children, conversion, fall (from building), fire, military order, Muslims/Moors, siege, tower (collapse of)
Discography
Click HERE for a list of recordings of this poem
BITAGAP ID
3958
Bibliography
Elementos de Reconquista: Moras y judías en las ’Cantigas’ de Alfonso V
Benito de Pedro, Ana
Cantiga 205 (e 205; f, fol. 5-7): las Órdenes de Caballería de Santiago y Calatrava y un folio miniado perdido
Corti, Francisco
’Atal allur a catade’: recuperación figural de la Antigüedad pagana en las ’Cantigas de Santa María’ de Alfonso X
Disalvo, Santiago
A Peninsula in Flames: War and Emotions in the Cantigas de Santa María
Doubleday, Simon R.
Da épica na Galicia medieval: Discurso de ingreso na Real Academia Gallega e resposta de Ramón Otero Pedrayo
Filgueira Valverde, José and Ramón Otero Pedrayo
La poesía de las Cantigas
Márquez Villanueva, Francisco
A Selected and Annotated Discography of Recordings of Music from the Middle Ages in Spain
Tinnell, Roger D.
Randglossen zum altportugiesischen Liederbuch
Vasconcelos, Carolina Michaëlis de
Glosas Marginais ao Cancioneiro Medieval Português de Carolina Michaëlis de Vasconcelos
Vieira, Yara Frateschi, ed., et al.