Berenguela, daughter of Alfonso VIII of Castile, had married Alfonso IX (1188-1230) of León, by whom she had a son, Ferdinand. Pope Innocent III brought about an annulment of the marriage on the ground of consanguinity, though he recognized the legitimacy of Ferdinand. On the death of Henry I of Castile in 1217 Berenguela was proclaimed queen, but granted the throne to her son, who as Ferdinand III, later Saint Ferdinand (San Fernando), was to prove an even greater monarch than his grandfather, Alfonso VIII. Wars with his father and with his nobles occupied the early years of his reign, but by 1225, having overcome his Christian enemies, he was able to renew the campaigns against the Moslems. City after city fell into his power; Cordova was taken in 1236; Murcia became tributary in 1241; and the culminating blow came with the siege of Seville, which surrendered to Ferdinand in 1248. Despite the fact that not a little crusading zeal entered into these campaigns and that Ferdinand himself was an ardent Christian, religious enthusiasm, even yet, was not as uncompromising as it later became. Ferdinand was an ally at one time of the Almohade emperor, whom he restored to his throne in Africa; he also accepted the alliance of the Moslem prince of Granada in the campaign against Seville; and other similar instances of his freedom from fanatical intolerance might be adduced. Nevertheless, he planned to overwhelm the Moslem authority, and would almost certainly have invaded Africa if he had lived a few years longer. His Christian spirit, however, was along practical and national lines. When Louis IX of France invited him to join in a crusade in the orient Ferdinand is said to have replied: “There is no lack of Moors in _my_ land.” Not only by conquests but also by internal reforms he assisted in the development of Castilian unity. One external event of capital importance was the incorporation into Castile of the kingdom of León in 1230 on the death of Alfonso IX, despite the latter’s attempt to deliver his dominions to two daughters by a marriage previous to that with Berenguela. With Ferdinand’s death in 1252 the era of the Castilian crusades came to an end. _Catalonia, 1035 to 1164_ [Sidenote: The extension of the authority of the counts of Barcelona.]