Ximena (1046-1116) was the ruler of Valencia from 1099 to 1102 after the death of her husband Rodrigo Diaz de Vivar, better known as "El Cid". She was the daughter of Count Gormaz of Oviedo, the champion of King Fernando I of Leon, and she was betrothed to marry Rodrigo, who was the son of court official Diego Lainez. She loved him deeply, but she hated him after he killed her father in a duel after her father accused him of being a traitor; in 1074, she married El Cid on the orders of King Fernando, but she retired to a convent to keep away from her husband. For years, she plotted with Count Garcia Ordonez to kill El Cid, using Ordonez's love for her as a weapon. However, she eventually saw the good in him when he gave water to a leper and fought for her love, and she decided to return to him. Their life together did not last long, as El Cid was slain in battle in 1099, and Ximena ruled Valencia until she had it burned to the ground in 1102 to prevent the Moors from taking it. She died in a convent in 1116.
Biography[]
Ximena in 1063
Ximena was born in 1046, the daughter of Diego Fernandez de Oviedo and his wife Cristina. She married Rodrigo Diaz de Vivar (better known by his Arabic nickname "El Cid") in 1074, and there were periods of separation between them, as El Cid was an exile at many times due to his support of some Moorish emirs in battle. In 1089, King Alfonso VI of Castile had Ximena and her children imprisoned during El Cid's second exile, but in 1094 she was released and was allowed to reunite with her husband. In 1099, El Cid was mortally wounded while defending Valencia from Yusuf ibn Tashfin's army, and he insisted that Ximena not remove the arrow from him, accepting his death. Ximena ruled over Valencia for three years after El Cid's death, and the razed the city rather than let the Almoravids have it. She died in a convent in 1116.