ABSTRACT
The images most associated with Alfonso XI (1312–50) have always been triumphant: a tough monarch who subdued the aristocracy and defeated the Muslims and was only deprived of more victories by his inopportune death of plague at Gibraltar in 1350. 1 One of Alfonso’s principal methods in asserting his will was the use of force. The Castilian navy formed a fundamental component of his military complex, especially in the south where he struggled for control of the Strait of Gibraltar with the Nasrid emirate of Granada and the Marinids, a Muslim dynasty controlling swaths of North Africa as well as some fortified ports on the Iberian southern shores. In the Strait and elsewhere, the Castilian fleets not only protected shipping and coastal areas but also gathered intelligence on enemy movements, supplied and complemented land forces, and confronted enemy forces at sea. Yet the impact of the Castilian navy reached well beyond its immediate activities. Its development stimulated the growth of the Castilian state by forcing Alfonso to make existing taxation more efficient, find new revenue streams and institute new fiscal mechanisms to exploit them.
