Nuño González I de Lara (died 8 September 1275),ñoGonzá nicknamed el Bueno ("the Good"), was a Castilian nobleman, royal counsellor and military leader. He was the head of the House of Lara and a close personal friend of Alfonso X. The king's policies often stymied his efforts to increase the power and wealth of his house, and in 1272 he led many prominent noblemen into open rebellion. Restored to favour the next year, he died defending the castle of Écija from a Moroccan invasion.
Early life and family
Nuño was the younger son of Gonzalo Núñez II de Lara and María Díaz, daughter of Count Diego López II of the House of Haro. His older brother was Diego González, who died around 1239. Nuño was raised on the Lara estates near Villaldemiro and Celada. He became the closest friend of the future Alfonso X during the prince's childhood (1223–31), when King Ferdinand III sent him to be raised away from the royal court. Nuño did not receive a large inheritance, and had little or no political influence within the kingdom prior to Diego's death. In 1240, Ferdinand III gave Prince Alfonso a house and an income. Nuño was a frequent visitor to the prince's court, along with other childhood friends, like the children of Alfonso's erstwhile guardian, García Fernández de Villamayor.
Nuño rose to prominence as a military commander under King Ferdinand in the 1240s. After Alfonso became king in 1252, Nuño became a regular attendee of the royal court. He was a frequent signatory of royal charters between 1252 and 1256. As an indication of his closeness to the king, he usually signed first after the prelates and members of the royal family, in the highest position possible for a lay non-royal lord. He married Teresa Alfonso, illegitimate daughter of King Alfonso IX of León, and they had two sons: Juan Núñez I and Nuño González II.
Tenancies and properties
In 1255, Nuño led the royal army that defeated Alfonso's rebellious brother Henry near Lebrija, forcing him into exile. Three times he put down Mudéjar rebellions: at Jerez de la Frontera in 1255, at Écija in 1262–63 and at Matrera in 1263. He was granted the relatively safe tenancies of Bureba, La Rioja and Castilla la Vieja in northern Castile, and also the more active tenancies of the fortresses of Écija, Jerez and Seville on the frontier, in areas where Christians Spaniards were only beginning to settle in large numbers.
Given the large number of estates that came into the crown's possession in the mid-thirteenth century, Alfonso X was not particularly generous with Nuño. The nobleman received only one large estate, Corixad Albat, which formed the kernel of the municipality of Herrera. He also received some land at Aznalcázar, some houses in Seville in 1258 and some windmills in Alcalá de Guadaira. This was the extent of royal grants of land he received. He and his wife possessed some windmills at Alcalá acquired by other means and sold them to the Order of Santiago in exchange for a house in San Miguel de Bobadilla in December 1259. During the period when he was tenant of Écija, he bought some bodegas there as well. In all, Nuño's properties seem to have supported a retinue of about 300 knights.
In 1260, Nuño arranged his son Juan's marriage to Teresa Álvarez de Azagra, heiress of the lordship of Albarracín. This was a large, autonomous lordship lying between the Castile, Aragon and Valencia.
Jerez (1261–64) In the spring or summer of 1261, Alfonso X conquered Jerez. He appointed Nuño as the first Christian alcaide (castellan) of the alcázar (citadel) of Jerez de la Frontera. Nuño appointed the knight García Gómez Carrillo as his commander on the spot. By 1264 the Muslim townspeople had constructed a wall between the town and the citadel. That year, with support from the Marinids of Morocco, they rebelled and attacked the citadel, where Nuño was in command with only a few knights. He immediately appealed to the king at Seville and demanded that he come in person to relieve him. When no help was forthcoming, Nuño abandoned his post, leaving only a small garrison behind. A small relief force from Seville arrived too late. The citadel fell and the garrison was massacred on 8 August.
Nuño was reprimanded for his failure to defend the citadel. Alfonso, in Cantiga 345, refers to Nuño's flight as something that "by law and custom ought not to be". The law in question is found in the Siete Partidas (2, 18), which lists the obligations of an alcaide. Despite the dishonour he had brought upon himself, Nuño was compensated for the loss of revenue from Jerez.