Autobiography - The Galindo Group

Ram Galindo THE MAKING OF AN AMERICAN Page 199
However, the Eastern territories in the Pyrenees were more influenced by their Frankish
neighbors who did not practice primogeniture and were desired by the Saracens who
lusted for France’s riches. These were determining factors in prolonging the Moors
presence in the Iberian Peninsula. The social effects caused by consolidation of power
under one king followed by disintegration among his heirs upon his death, coupled to
able Moslem diplomacy and armed intervention, conspired to keep a hodge-podge of
smaller kingdoms battling each other for almost four centuries. The process known as
“Reconquista” took an additional almost four centuries of warfare.
With all certainty, Spain’s northern territories were led by counts or overlords related by
their descent from just a few noble families. With less certainty, although with ever
growing information, I have been able to stitch together lines of descent of the earlier
Spanish noblemen who carried genes emanating from the first known Galindo counts.
Considering that the personages I discuss lived 1200 to 900 years ago at a time when
written records were not very abundant and their storage and preservation even more
limited, the possibilities for error in genealogic lines is immense, but the results are
worth the try.
By the year 860, one of Galindo Count of Cerdagne’s relatives named Galindo I
Aznarez (?-867) was Count of Aragon. The Galindo name appears generation after
generation among the noblemen of Cerdagne, Aragon, Ribagorza, Navarre and Castille
until Galindo II Aznarez (863-922) Count of Aragon, who seems to have had only two
daughters. The bloodline expands into French Aquitaine through his oldest daughter,
Tota Galindona who married Bernard Unifred, heir to the Count of Pallars-Ribagorza. It
goes into the houses of Aragon and Castile through his youngest daughter Endregoto
Galindo of Aragon. It appears that later descendents of Tota Galindona returned the
genes to the line of the kings of Aragon and Castile. Endregoto was the mother of
Sancho Abarca (the Sandal) II of Navarre (935-994), who picked up the name because
he was the first overlord in the Pyrenees to provide his foot soldiers with leather-soled
shoes. As I mentioned, Galindo II Aznarez didn’t have any sons, which caused the
disappearance of the Galindo name from the chain of future kings of Aragon, Navarre
and Castile.
Sancho Abarca’s grandson, Sancho III “The Great” of Navarre (991-1035), completed
the consolidation, for the first time since the Moor invasion, of the counties of
Ribagorza, Sobrarbe, Aragon, Pamplona, Navarre and Castile under the authority of
just one man – himself. He was called the King of all the Spains. His young nephew and
ally, Alfonso V, was the king of Leon. Had Reconquista been the unifying force that it
became two centuries later, this could have been a momentous occasion to engage in a
propitious war against the Moors. But at the time it appears that the Moors were, in
some cases, allies, and the enemies more often were Franks, Basques and other
neighboring Christian lords, frequently sons, brothers or cousins.
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