XIII. On the third day after the coming of King Don Alfonso, they would
have interred the body of the Cid, but when the King heard what Doña
Ximena had said, that while it was so fair and comely it should not be
laid in a coffin, he held that what she said was good. And he sent for
the ivory chair which had been carried to the Cortes of Toledo, and
gave order that it should be placed on the right of the altar of St.
Peter; and he laid a cloth of gold upon it, and upon that placed a
cushion covered with a right noble _tartarí_, and he ordered a graven
tabernacle to be made over the chair, richly wrought with azure and
gold, having thereon the blazonry of the Kings of Castille and Leon,
and the King of Navarre, and the Infante of Aragon, and of the Cid
Ruydiez the Campeador. And he himself, and the King of Navarre and the
Infante of Aragon, and the Bishop Don Hieronymo, to do honour to the
Cid, helped to take his body from between the two boards, in which it
had been fastened at Valencia. And when they had taken it out, the body
was so firm that it bent not on either side, and the flesh so firm and
comely, that it seemed as if he were yet alive. And the King thought
that what they purported to do and had thus begun, might full well be
effected. And they clad the body in a full noble _tartari_, and in
cloth of purple, which the Soldan of Persia had sent him, and put him
on hose of the same, and set him in his ivory chair; and in his left
hand they placed his sword Tizona in its scabbard, and the strings of
his mantle in his right. And in this fashion the body of the Cid
remained there ten years and more, till it was taken thence, as the
history will relate anon. And when his garments waxed old, other good
ones were put on.
XIV. King Don Alfonso, and the sons-in-law of the Cid, King Don Ramiro
of Navarre, and the Infante Don Sancho of Aragon, with all their
companies, and all the other honourable men, abode three weeks in St.
Pedro de Cardeña, doing honour to the Cid. And the Bishop Don
Hieronymo, and the other Bishops who came with King Don Alfonso, said
every day their masses, and accompanied the body of the Cid there where
it was placed, and sprinkled holy water upon it, and incensed it, as is
the custom to do over a grave. And after three weeks they who were
there assembled began to break up, and depart to their own houses. And
of the company of the Cid, some went with the King of Navarre, and
other some with the Infante of Aragon; but the greater number, and the
most honourable among them, betook themselves to King Don Alfonso,
whose natural subjects they were. And Doña Ximena and her companions
abode in San Pedro de Cardeña, and Gil Diaz with her, as the Cid had
commanded in his testament. And the Bishop Don Hieronymo, and Alvar
Fañez Minaya, and Pero Bermudez, remained there also till they had
fulfilled all that the Cid Ruydiez had commanded in his testament to be
done.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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