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Ramiro Mendoza sat on the
side of the bridge, waiting for the next travelers to past. He worked
for the mayor of Burgos and was in charge of collecting tolls from
the pilgrims who crossed the Arlanzon river using the bridge on the
Way of Saint James. The Way of Saint James was a famous pilgrimage
path to Santiago del Compostelo, where according to legend the body
of Saint James was buried. Every year millions of pilgrims and
noblemen from all across Europe traveled to the city; in fact, other
than Jerusalem and Rome, no other site in the western world received
as many pilgrims. Burgos was a city in Spain, directly on the way to
the pilgrim shrine and Mayor Delgado had every intention of making as
much of a profit from this as possible. Most pilgrims had no problem
paying the toll, but sometimes it was necessary for Ramiro to show a
little muscle and so he had hired five archers from the town to hide
in the woodline, ready to pop out on command.
One spring day Ramiro
and his archers were sitting and waiting for the next group of
pilgrims when they saw a lone knight riding towards them. As he
approached they could tell he was a wealthy man by the quality of his
armor, but couldn't see any crest to distinguish who he was.
"Hello there sir
knight!" Ramiro shouted. "Welcome to Burgos, Mayor Delgado
sends you his warmest welcome and asks that you, an obviously
God-fearing man, help us out by making a small contribution to
keeping the bridge in good repair."
The knight seemed
motionless as his horses' tail swished back and forth. Soon Ramiro
began to think it was time to call the archers out for his visual
encouragement. "Archers!" Ramiro shouted. Then five men at
arms came out of the woods with bows and got in position for firing.
"Sir knight, let me remind you that while we welcome you, it is
impossible to use this bridge without paying"Ramiro called out.
Suddenly the knight cracked the reigns of his charger and took off
towards the bridge. Before Ramiro could think straight the knight had
whipped his sword out and was bearing down on him. As if by second
nature he jumped off the bridge into the cold waters of the Arlanzon.
The archers meanwhile
had begun firing, but only a couple of their shots landed and those
bounced off his shield and armor. When the knight had crossed the
bridge he steered his steed towards the archers, but a second later
he reversed and headed on down the road with no intention of actually
fighting. The archers realized they had been duped, but it was too
late to stop him now. The knight was gone. When Ramiro pulled
himself out of the river he decided he needed to improve the bridges
defenses in case this sort of thing happened in the future. "Senor
Torres, can you find me some rope?" he asked.
"Yes sir, but
what do you intend to do with it?" Torres inquired.
"Well, we don't
want that to happen again, so I thought we could make a tripwire to
stop a horse if needed." Ramiro responded.
"While that would
work Captain Mendoza, may I make an alternative suggestion? What if
we found a jousting quintain and you could rotate one side and have
a sandbag tied to the other? Then when the knight got close enough
you could rotate it and knock the horseman off with the sandbag."
expained Torres.
"Yes! Good idea
Torres, go and ask the mayor." the Captain commanded.
About a week past,
and the quintain was set up and covered with a large piece of cloth
and placed on the bridge. It was a little odd, but not enough for
anyone to ask about it. Sometime around dusk Torres shouted from the
woodlines "A lone knight is headed this way!" Sure enough
the same knight was headed back to France and both he and the men of
Borges knew this was not going to be a civil encounter. As he
approached Ramiro called out to him.
"Maybe you have
seen a change of fortune since last we met Sir Knight, and you are
now ready to pay the toll for your two passes through the lovely town
of Burgos." The gray armored knight however was not in the mood
to talk and had soon pulled his sword out of the scabbard and was
charging towards Ramiro once again. The wily captain was ready this
time and pulled the cloth off of the quintain and spun it around
knocking the knight to the ground with the sandbag. The archers had
ran quickly and made it to the bridge to help Ramiro strip the armor
off of the knight and they began to beat him until he submitted.
"Enough,
enough!" The French accent commanded. "I will pay you! Just
let me go!"
"Oh no senor!"
Ramiro laughed "I can't wait to show the mayor his new set of
French armor!" After they took every scrap of armor off the
knight, they put him back on his horse and warned him the next time
he didn't pay even more would be required of him. Then Torres slapped
the horse and it took off back to France. "Tell Saint Denis
that Saint James says hello when you get back!" Ramiro shouted
as the six men laughed and did their best French impersonations.
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| During jousting a quintain was used to simulate an opponent's attack. A knight would strike the shield and the sandbag on the other side would swing around and strike the rider. |
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