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Downloaded from
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Official YIFY movies site:
YTS.MX

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"History tends to demystify.

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The risk would be
that scientific progress,

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as is often the case,

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might contribute to fossilize the past
and strip it of its emotional weight."

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They say that in the field

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If you lie down, you can still feel
The rumbling of horses

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The shepherds say the herds stop
When they reach its shore

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They raise their eyes
And mutter a bellow unlike any other

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They also say
That the kites surround it as they hover

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They don't cross it

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As if there were a wall

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A temple built of light
And hidden from human sight

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They swear the fog's silence is strange

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For it has fermented
Over ancient cries, bellows and chants

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About rumors that still flutter

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Among the cornfields
And the dead dovecotes

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They say all this and much more

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Shepherds and who's ever set foot there
And closed their eyes for a moment

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But I haven't seen any of that

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I can't say for sure

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What I have seen with my own eyes

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Is a flower

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A strange flower that is born in April

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With purple eyelids and a copper sigh

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A blood flower
That grows fragile and powerful

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And tames the wind when it sprouts

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At the beginning of the 16th century,

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the Crown of Castile
was one of the most powerful in Europe.

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During the first years of his reign,

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Charles I had to face an uprising
known as the War of the Communities.

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Padilla, Bravo and Maldonado
led a resistance movement

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that ended in the fields at Villalar.

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This is the Revolt of the Comuneros.

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THINGS AGREED UPON
AT THE TIME OF CASTILE'S COMMUNITIES

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Spanish history could have been different.

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The Austrias led us to Absolutism,

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the Borbones led us
to the centralized State.

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If the kingdom
had succeeded against the king,

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perhaps our history
would have evolved differently,

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and therefore our present
would be different as well.

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Padilla, Bravo and Maldonado were executed

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after Villalar's defeat.

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Who was Padilla?

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We know very little
about who he really was.

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Padilla was who he was
because he belonged to a lineage,

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one of Castile's ancient
and most influential lineages,

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he had great ascendancy
over the Castilians

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who acclaimed him wherever he went.

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And he becomes a national hero.

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Storytellers refer to him

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as the homeland's freedom fighter
or Castile's redeemer.

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Padilla was elevated
in such a way that he became,

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more than a historical character,
a true myth.

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Juan Bravo is Segovia's great leader
in the War of the Communities.

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In the year 1499 he is named continuator.

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He arrives in Segovia around 1503.

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He won't take on
such an important role as Padilla,

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but we know he's very close to him.

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The statue of Juan Bravo
is a unifying element

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of something that makes us feel Segovian,

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it makes us value our history
and what it means.

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The Casa de las Conchas
was the home of the Maldonadesque power.

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Don Pedro is the representative
for Salamanca

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at the Cortes of Santiago and La Coruña,

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but he gradually cedes the role
to his cousin Francisco.

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Francisco was the most popular man,
the one in the battlefield,

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but in fact, they both were.

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And I think they combined so well

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that history speaks of Bravo,
Padilla and Maldonado,

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when in fact they were actually two.

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The story we're about to tell
should be set about four years earlier.

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In 1516,

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a young man who had already turned 16,
because he was born in the year 1500,

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had received a very large inheritance
through his two family lines,

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the Habsburgs and the Trastámara.

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It stretched over territories
in several continents.

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And the sole heir to all those territories
was Charles of Ghent,

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who would become Charles I of Spain,

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and later crowned as V of Germany.

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He arrives here and he is proclaimed king.

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Saint Paul's bells
Have stopped ringing

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The representatives stand up
To look at the king

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Down on his knees
To the left of the altar

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You are mercenaries of the kingdom
You shall never forget it

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If you serve the people
The people will repay you

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He's European, born in Flanders.

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He doesn't know
Castile's nor Spain's idiosyncrasy.

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Castile falls into his inheritance.

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A person who was destined
to rule in Castile

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is a person
who doesn't know his territory.

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This announcement
has generated controversy

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among the Castilians
and a rejection of his person.

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First, because there's a queen

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who is the owner of Castile,
Juana I, his mother.

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Therefore, it's a bit strange
that there are two kings.

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And both, let's say, legally established.

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It's also related
to the level of corruption in Castile

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between the arrival of Charles
in 1517 and 1520.

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We're talking about the sale
and illegitimate attribution of positions,

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the sale and attribution
of slave trade contracts,

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of territories in the Indies…

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And this man is also eager to make money.

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His grandfather dies soon after

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and he wants to be emperor.
Imperial election must be bought,

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imperial electors must be paid.

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Of course, he needs money,
and Castile was a rich territory then.

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That trip was not only not cheap,

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but he also had to pay
for the imperial election.

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King Charles is going to compromise
Castilian finances

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in his nomination as emperor
for the Holy Roman-Germanic Empire.

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There were three contenders
for the imperial crown:

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Charles, Francis I King of France
and Henry VIII.

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This gives us an idea of the magnitude
of the cost for imperial election.

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"Castile's integration into the empire
was seen as a national catastrophe.

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The kingdom's interests
had to be protected,

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even against the king if necessary."

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History is vast
and there are very few simple things,

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everything has multiple causes.

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But basically it was a revolt
with two coordinated aspects:

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first, to demonstrate

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against the increase in royal power
towards absolutism,

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and to this end
the Cortes' assembly would be essential,

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since what was being decided

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was the cities' ability

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to limit the royal power

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tending towards absolutism.
That's the first aspect.

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The second aspect
is an unrest within the cities

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that seeks to broaden
political representation.

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Broadening political representation

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of the common people,
hence the term "comuneros".

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The community.

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Community refers to the unprivileged.

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MARCH 1520

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In 1520 another Cortes were convened,

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in Santiago,

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a strange,

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remote place where it was
difficult to get to at that time.

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That was a strategy
to try to prevent the representatives

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from being influenced
by the cities they represented

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and to isolate them.

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The representatives became hostile

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and, faced with this situation,
they decided to adjourn

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and convene
on 22nd April in La Coruña.

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It's very significant for the Cortes
to move from Santiago to La Coruña

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because time was running out
for them to set sail

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for Germany
to receive the imperial dignity.

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This is when
the first insurrection arose,

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the first uprising in Toledo.

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That's when the first problems begin,
the first Community.

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MAY 1520

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I believe it was the fifth ballot,
and with great opposition,

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the service necessary
to be crowned emperor is obtained.

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On 20th May 1520, Charles sets sail.

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What does he leave behind?

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He leaves behind a divided,
unsettled and unruly kingdom.

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He promises to appoint a Castilian regent,

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and as soon as he leaves,
out of anger at the vote,

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he appoints Adrian of Utrecht.

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Meanwhile in Castile
The hillsides turned green

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The poplars trembled
The beehives swarmed

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The representatives regretfully
Returned to their land

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And some feared the people
Would hold them accountable

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For before leaving they swore
Never to give the king service

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Aristotle said
that when there is no justice,

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society is in
a legitimate position to rise up,

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revolt and stage a revolution.

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Forced, they're not only entitled
but obliged to rise up.

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They see themselves legitimized.

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If a ruler doesn't rule
for the good of all, for the common good,

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his subjects, or in this case the citizens
would be legitimized to rise up.

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The paths are the world's throats

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This path that comes from Santiago

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This stone boat that rocks in the rain

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Carries a dryness that was not there

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The path lengthens
Like the shadow of the evening songs

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The throat cracks and becomes enraptured

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Betrayal fertilizes the purple sun

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And the violet legions
Now rot in the sunset

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After the Cortes of La Coruña,
the representatives returned.

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Many of them were met with discontent
for approving the service.

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Segovia is where
some of the most dramatic events

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of the beginning
of the War of the Communities took place.

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One of the representatives
who had gone to La Coruña

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went to the city to explain his actions

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and why he had approved the service.

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The people surrounded him
and dragged him off to prison.

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Along the way, amidst beatings
and insults, they strangled him.

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The governor sent Mayor Ronquillo

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to punish the crime
committed by the Segovians,

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and then Toledo sides
with the city of Segovia

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and sent militias
led by Juan de Padilla himself.

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00:13:33,120 --> 00:13:36,720
They justify the attacks
on the representatives

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by saying that they had betrayed
the will of the city.

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This idea of the city's will
is very powerful

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because it enunciates
a politically binding principle.

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The government should be
for the common good of the city,

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00:13:50,560 --> 00:13:51,560
good governance.

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00:13:51,640 --> 00:13:56,080
And this involves not taxing to death
the people who live there.

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It's exactly what the cities,
as a whole, are telling Charles V,

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00:14:01,120 --> 00:14:05,200
"Okay, you rule, but there are limits
to the exercise of your power."

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00:14:05,280 --> 00:14:06,400
JUNE 1520

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00:14:06,480 --> 00:14:10,560
After Toledo's uprising
and with Segovia also in arms,

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00:14:10,640 --> 00:14:14,240
there were 18 cities and towns
with seats in the Cortes.

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00:14:14,320 --> 00:14:18,160
A meeting was held in Ávila,
which was attended by four of them:

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00:14:18,240 --> 00:14:20,720
Toledo, Segovia, Salamanca and Toro.

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00:14:26,800 --> 00:14:29,360
They met in the cathedral sacristy,
in Ávila,

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00:14:29,440 --> 00:14:32,400
and the Holy Comunero Council
was formed there.

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00:14:32,480 --> 00:14:35,720
Toledo sends letters
to various Castilian cities

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00:14:35,800 --> 00:14:37,480
asking them to meet in Ávila.

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00:14:37,560 --> 00:14:39,520
At first very few reply.

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00:14:39,600 --> 00:14:41,960
The main problem was, some thought

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00:14:42,040 --> 00:14:45,920
the requests to the king were just,
but they had to be pleaded to the king,

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00:14:46,000 --> 00:14:47,280
not imposed.

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00:14:47,360 --> 00:14:51,400
They always talked about returning
to order, that is, restoring order.

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00:14:51,480 --> 00:14:55,160
In no way did they think
they were doing anything wrong,

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00:14:55,240 --> 00:14:56,440
so to speak.

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00:14:56,520 --> 00:15:00,240
So, to declare oneself a comunero
was like being part of a community.

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00:15:00,320 --> 00:15:02,160
An initial meaning of community

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00:15:02,680 --> 00:15:05,960
refers to the whole
political body of the city,

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00:15:06,040 --> 00:15:08,920
implying the idea of citizenship,

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00:15:09,440 --> 00:15:12,680
the inhabitants, those who
make up the political body of the city.

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00:15:12,760 --> 00:15:15,360
There is a second meaning
which is more restricted,

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00:15:15,840 --> 00:15:18,640
which refers to a certain part
of this political body:

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00:15:18,720 --> 00:15:20,600
the so-called "commons".

227
00:15:20,680 --> 00:15:23,120
The non-privileged social groups.

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00:15:23,840 --> 00:15:25,200
The third meaning: community,

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00:15:25,280 --> 00:15:27,520
and this has a very old tradition,

230
00:15:27,600 --> 00:15:31,680
is a term used to define a revolt.

231
00:15:36,360 --> 00:15:39,000
And this goes hand in hand
with the birth of expressions

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00:15:39,080 --> 00:15:41,160
in the context of the comunero conflict

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00:15:41,240 --> 00:15:44,760
saying the source of its legitimacy
is the people's collective agreement.

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00:15:44,840 --> 00:15:48,000
In the language of the time
concordia means: agreement,

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00:15:48,080 --> 00:15:49,800
harmony, hearts together.

236
00:15:54,520 --> 00:15:56,000
The flame dances

237
00:15:56,840 --> 00:15:59,760
Raising her arms
Like a dancer from the East

238
00:16:03,400 --> 00:16:05,480
She shows her long legs

239
00:16:06,160 --> 00:16:08,200
Red-hot tongues of saliva

240
00:16:09,160 --> 00:16:11,600
The medina and the patience ignite

241
00:16:11,680 --> 00:16:13,920
The tongue and the ember dance

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00:16:14,000 --> 00:16:16,400
Whistle, scorch, raze

243
00:16:17,400 --> 00:16:19,560
The dance has no harp or hurdy-gurdy

244
00:16:20,880 --> 00:16:22,120
But it doesn't stop

245
00:16:23,160 --> 00:16:24,800
It chews up the houses

246
00:16:25,480 --> 00:16:28,040
Already ashes and smoke
It swirls them up

247
00:16:28,120 --> 00:16:29,920
Into the moorland blue sky

248
00:16:31,080 --> 00:16:35,800
And these shreds of white soot
Grow bigger and bigger

249
00:16:37,440 --> 00:16:40,080
Until fully transformed

250
00:16:40,760 --> 00:16:41,920
Into a flag

251
00:16:43,080 --> 00:16:45,840
A banner of ash and rage

252
00:16:46,440 --> 00:16:50,560
That can now be seen
From the other side of the earth

253
00:16:54,040 --> 00:16:58,480
Medina del Campo is undoubtedly
the most important economic hub,

254
00:16:58,560 --> 00:17:00,640
with Seville, in the whole Crown.

255
00:17:00,720 --> 00:17:03,400
Medina del Campo is the great market town,

256
00:17:03,480 --> 00:17:09,440
the place where an international
exchange of goods takes place

257
00:17:09,520 --> 00:17:12,599
and which was promoted
by the Catholic Kings, by Isabel.

258
00:17:13,560 --> 00:17:15,359
There are two main products,

259
00:17:15,440 --> 00:17:17,760
wool on the one hand
and money on the other.

260
00:17:17,839 --> 00:17:20,040
It's a major financial center.

261
00:17:20,119 --> 00:17:21,599
This explains why

262
00:17:21,680 --> 00:17:23,280
an artillery park

263
00:17:23,880 --> 00:17:26,720
was eventually established
in Medina del Campo.

264
00:17:28,440 --> 00:17:33,880
Following the uprising in Segovia,
Mayor Rodrigo Ronquillo laid siege on it,

265
00:17:34,480 --> 00:17:37,880
and Adrian of Utrecht
decides that Antonio de Fonseca

266
00:17:37,960 --> 00:17:41,600
should obtain artillery
to reinforce the siege on Segovia.

267
00:17:41,680 --> 00:17:43,360
AUGUST 1520

268
00:17:43,440 --> 00:17:47,280
Segovia was one of the towns
that produced the most wool,

269
00:17:47,360 --> 00:17:49,600
taken to the markets in Medina.

270
00:17:49,680 --> 00:17:52,080
The relationship
and ties between Medina del Campo

271
00:17:52,160 --> 00:17:55,080
and Segovia were very close.

272
00:17:55,160 --> 00:17:58,280
Therefore, on 21st August 1520,

273
00:17:58,360 --> 00:18:02,440
knowing that their artillery
would be used to take Segovia,

274
00:18:02,520 --> 00:18:04,320
they refused to hand it over.

275
00:18:05,600 --> 00:18:09,880
Medina had received a letter
from Segovia four days earlier,

276
00:18:09,960 --> 00:18:11,880
so they resist.

277
00:18:13,280 --> 00:18:16,880
Fonseca decides to go in,
and they do so by force.

278
00:18:17,440 --> 00:18:21,440
And to make their entry easier,
they use fire as a weapon,

279
00:18:22,280 --> 00:18:24,520
thinking the Medinese will run
to put out the fire,

280
00:18:24,600 --> 00:18:26,280
and leave the artillery undefended,

281
00:18:26,360 --> 00:18:29,240
and thus they'll be able
to take the royal artillery.

282
00:18:29,800 --> 00:18:34,480
The Medinese had moved
all their artillery to the market square

283
00:18:34,560 --> 00:18:37,600
and they remained guarding the artillery.

284
00:18:38,520 --> 00:18:42,160
The flames spread,
the main building material was wood,

285
00:18:42,240 --> 00:18:44,600
the Royalist troops plundered,

286
00:18:45,680 --> 00:18:48,360
and Fonseca and Ronquillo
were forced to retreat.

287
00:18:48,440 --> 00:18:52,240
It spiraled out of control
and it was a huge disaster for Medina.

288
00:18:52,800 --> 00:18:56,680
Two days later, on the 23rd,
when the Comunero troops arrived,

289
00:18:56,760 --> 00:18:59,800
they handed over the artillery
to the Comuneros.

290
00:19:03,560 --> 00:19:05,520
The flames that set fire to Medina

291
00:19:05,600 --> 00:19:10,560
and caused all that destruction and loss,
lit the Comuneros' fuse.

292
00:19:10,640 --> 00:19:15,280
It spread to many other towns,
cities and villages that joined in.

293
00:19:17,720 --> 00:19:21,320
The comunero rebellion
Is already spreading throughout Castile

294
00:19:21,960 --> 00:19:26,200
The sun and the wind belong to all
The land must belong to all

295
00:19:26,800 --> 00:19:30,960
Let what has come from the people
Return to the people

296
00:19:35,120 --> 00:19:37,920
In the absence of understanding,
what we have is violence.

297
00:19:38,000 --> 00:19:40,960
So when there is war,
it is the end of dialogue

298
00:19:41,040 --> 00:19:42,320
and also the end of reason.

299
00:19:42,800 --> 00:19:45,200
So I don't think either side

300
00:19:45,280 --> 00:19:47,040
wanted to reach an agreement.

301
00:19:47,120 --> 00:19:53,080
"If the political system, identified
as the defender of the status quo,

302
00:19:53,160 --> 00:19:57,440
has lost its ability
to mobilize the people's support,

303
00:19:57,520 --> 00:20:01,520
then revolution is at hand."

304
00:20:01,600 --> 00:20:02,800
There are three words:

305
00:20:02,880 --> 00:20:04,960
revolt, revolution and rebellion,

306
00:20:05,040 --> 00:20:06,360
and they are spelled differently.

307
00:20:06,440 --> 00:20:08,480
Revolution: profound,
usually violent, change

308
00:20:08,560 --> 00:20:11,560
in the political and socio-economic
structures of a national community.

309
00:20:11,640 --> 00:20:16,640
Revolution has always been understood
as a movement that changes history.

310
00:20:24,880 --> 00:20:26,600
Revolt: uproar, disturbance, sedition.

311
00:20:26,680 --> 00:20:29,240
Revolt does not bring about
historical change.

312
00:20:32,000 --> 00:20:34,800
Rebellion: offense
against public order, punishable by law,

313
00:20:34,880 --> 00:20:37,600
consists of public uprising
against the State powers,

314
00:20:37,680 --> 00:20:38,920
aiming to overthrow them.

315
00:20:39,000 --> 00:20:43,200
And rebellion,
any kind of rebellion, any kind of revolt.

316
00:20:48,440 --> 00:20:52,120
If we follow this outline,
it wasn't a revolution

317
00:20:52,200 --> 00:20:55,120
because it didn't change history.

318
00:20:55,200 --> 00:20:58,080
But it's also been called a revolution

319
00:20:58,160 --> 00:21:02,240
for its political implications,

320
00:21:02,320 --> 00:21:05,440
the intellectual implications it had.

321
00:21:05,520 --> 00:21:07,400
It all starts with a revolt,

322
00:21:07,480 --> 00:21:10,560
hardly ever do a few people
sit around a table,

323
00:21:10,640 --> 00:21:12,800
sometimes it has happened but very rarely,

324
00:21:12,880 --> 00:21:15,480
and say, "We're starting
a revolution tomorrow." No,

325
00:21:15,560 --> 00:21:18,720
things start with a demonstration
against a specific abuse.

326
00:21:19,320 --> 00:21:21,880
But this demonstration grows

327
00:21:22,760 --> 00:21:24,320
and becomes louder and louder,

328
00:21:24,400 --> 00:21:26,000
and the very concept

329
00:21:26,080 --> 00:21:28,680
of the legitimacy of authority
is called into question.

330
00:21:28,760 --> 00:21:33,720
This is what happened with the comuneros.
They protested against specific abuses,

331
00:21:33,800 --> 00:21:35,960
and they began to limit the king's power

332
00:21:36,040 --> 00:21:39,920
and to draw up
a constitutional outlook for the future.

333
00:21:40,000 --> 00:21:43,120
There are a number of issues
that were discussed back then

334
00:21:43,920 --> 00:21:46,880
and which, in perspective,

335
00:21:46,960 --> 00:21:51,320
seem to have been
ahead of their time, such as sovereignty,

336
00:21:51,400 --> 00:21:56,920
representation, things we tend
to relate to our political systems,

337
00:21:57,000 --> 00:21:59,160
but which were being discussed
at that time.

338
00:21:59,240 --> 00:22:02,680
The key issue was the relationship
between king and kingdom.

339
00:22:03,200 --> 00:22:04,680
Who is the kingdom? The king?

340
00:22:05,960 --> 00:22:08,960
Or is the kingdom the community?

341
00:22:09,040 --> 00:22:12,520
Charles had a concept
of a patrimonial king,

342
00:22:13,440 --> 00:22:18,120
but Castilians had
a concept of patrimony

343
00:22:18,200 --> 00:22:20,680
as belonging to Castile.

344
00:22:21,480 --> 00:22:24,920
The name given to the executive
institution of the Comuneros

345
00:22:25,000 --> 00:22:28,320
is the Holy Council.
What does Holy mean? Universal.

346
00:22:28,400 --> 00:22:33,480
It doesn't just mean sacred,
but above all universal.

347
00:22:34,600 --> 00:22:37,360
In other words,
it embraces the common people, everyone.

348
00:22:37,440 --> 00:22:40,560
A Council that meets
without the king's approval,

349
00:22:40,640 --> 00:22:47,360
which was already a breach
of Castile's current legal system.

350
00:22:47,960 --> 00:22:50,120
It's a revolt. Why?

351
00:22:50,200 --> 00:22:54,240
Because there aren't any radical proposals

352
00:22:54,320 --> 00:22:56,840
suggesting the system should change.

353
00:22:56,920 --> 00:22:59,360
Because there's nothing new,

354
00:22:59,440 --> 00:23:02,840
what the Comuneros are doing
has been done before,

355
00:23:02,920 --> 00:23:04,760
it's being done elsewhere,

356
00:23:04,840 --> 00:23:08,880
there's nothing truly revolutionary here.

357
00:23:08,960 --> 00:23:12,400
I believe the Comuneros
brought about this revolution

358
00:23:12,480 --> 00:23:14,680
because they changed the basis

359
00:23:15,480 --> 00:23:18,880
for people's participation
in political decision-making.

360
00:23:19,960 --> 00:23:23,880
They were no longer people
totally subject to the will of a king,

361
00:23:23,960 --> 00:23:28,200
but people with a will
who could express it to the King

362
00:23:28,280 --> 00:23:31,120
through the institution
of the General Council.

363
00:23:31,800 --> 00:23:36,280
This attempt at proto-parliamentarianism
seems to me to be radical enough,

364
00:23:36,360 --> 00:23:37,560
appealing to the roots.

365
00:23:37,640 --> 00:23:41,560
I do think
it can be understood as a revolution.

366
00:23:41,640 --> 00:23:43,720
I understand it to be a revolution

367
00:23:43,800 --> 00:23:46,640
because first of all,
there are well-known,

368
00:23:46,720 --> 00:23:49,880
very distinct and respected leaders.

369
00:23:49,960 --> 00:23:53,320
They have an institution
that constitutes a political body,

370
00:23:53,840 --> 00:23:55,880
which is the Comunero Council.

371
00:23:55,960 --> 00:23:59,280
Their aim is to subject
the King to the Cortes,

372
00:23:59,360 --> 00:24:01,640
and therefore
it's a revolutionary principle,

373
00:24:01,720 --> 00:24:04,520
to subvert
the established order in Castile.

374
00:24:04,600 --> 00:24:07,400
That is, that whatever
was approved at the Cortes,

375
00:24:07,480 --> 00:24:11,000
the King could not revoke it
without the Cortes' agreement.

376
00:24:11,080 --> 00:24:13,000
And then they have a political agenda,

377
00:24:13,080 --> 00:24:15,040
so they know what they want,

378
00:24:15,120 --> 00:24:17,360
they state it politically

379
00:24:17,440 --> 00:24:19,840
in what they call the Perpetual Law,

380
00:24:19,920 --> 00:24:23,640
precisely because the King
couldn't remove it whenever he wanted,

381
00:24:23,720 --> 00:24:26,640
but rather, he would have to have
the support of the Cortes,

382
00:24:26,720 --> 00:24:30,640
because it's a law
intended for continuity.

383
00:24:32,200 --> 00:24:36,040
The relationship's troubled history
between king and kingdom isn't new,

384
00:24:36,120 --> 00:24:38,360
nor an invention of the comuneros.

385
00:24:38,440 --> 00:24:42,240
What's new and relevant
is that they put it down in writing,

386
00:24:42,320 --> 00:24:45,160
and that they point out
"this is the silent contract.

387
00:24:45,240 --> 00:24:48,960
The king's power isn't absolute,
it has limits,

388
00:24:49,040 --> 00:24:52,560
this is the bond you have with us."

389
00:24:53,080 --> 00:24:55,200
This will be the king's Perpetual Law.

390
00:24:56,400 --> 00:24:59,000
Until then, there was no such rule,

391
00:24:59,080 --> 00:25:02,080
approved by an assembly
of the cities' representatives

392
00:25:02,160 --> 00:25:04,240
outside the king's authority,

393
00:25:04,840 --> 00:25:07,360
and it was intended to be permanent,

394
00:25:07,920 --> 00:25:12,320
which can neither be modified
by the king nor by ordinary Cortes,

395
00:25:12,400 --> 00:25:14,520
it would have to be reconvened
in a meeting,

396
00:25:14,600 --> 00:25:16,560
an extraordinary assembly,
in order to modify it.

397
00:25:16,640 --> 00:25:20,120
This is the closest thing
to the exercise of constituent power.

398
00:25:20,720 --> 00:25:23,560
What concerns everyone
must be decided by everyone.

399
00:25:23,640 --> 00:25:26,920
To guarantee the common good,
all representatives

400
00:25:27,000 --> 00:25:29,000
of the different social orders

401
00:25:29,080 --> 00:25:32,080
must be present
in local government bodies.

402
00:25:32,160 --> 00:25:35,560
This theory, which is in the making
since those late medieval centuries,

403
00:25:35,640 --> 00:25:39,120
was practiced by the Comuneros
during the War of the Communities,

404
00:25:39,200 --> 00:25:42,320
this government for all,
in which all would be represented.

405
00:25:43,560 --> 00:25:46,520
The Comunero side gathered

406
00:25:46,600 --> 00:25:51,160
the will and interests
of very diverse social classes.

407
00:25:51,240 --> 00:25:55,320
The core is the townspeople who revolt,

408
00:25:55,400 --> 00:25:58,320
and then,
when it becomes anti-lordly, it expands.

409
00:25:58,400 --> 00:26:02,600
But alongside them
are members of the local oligarchy.

410
00:26:02,680 --> 00:26:06,000
There were also noblemen:
Pedro Girón, for example.

411
00:26:06,080 --> 00:26:08,320
Let us not forget
that the communities were led

412
00:26:08,400 --> 00:26:13,320
by knights of the kingdom,
noblemen like Padilla, Bravo, Maldonado…

413
00:26:13,400 --> 00:26:15,720
all very committed to their cities.

414
00:26:15,800 --> 00:26:18,000
Until then, Castilian cities,

415
00:26:18,720 --> 00:26:23,160
with a few exceptions,
had had a very oligarchical regime.

416
00:26:23,240 --> 00:26:26,760
The Holy Comunero Council is a novelty,

417
00:26:26,840 --> 00:26:29,880
there's an important representation

418
00:26:29,960 --> 00:26:33,640
of university graduates
among the comuneros.

419
00:26:33,720 --> 00:26:37,120
We find them
among the seculars and among the clerics.

420
00:26:37,760 --> 00:26:40,720
Churchmen were very important
in the communities.

421
00:26:40,800 --> 00:26:45,280
They even provided a political ideology,

422
00:26:45,360 --> 00:26:48,160
often based on religious assumptions,

423
00:26:48,240 --> 00:26:49,880
to their demands,

424
00:26:49,960 --> 00:26:53,680
and this often stirred up the masses.

425
00:26:53,760 --> 00:26:57,120
The comunero conflict,
I insist, is a multifaceted conflict,

426
00:26:57,200 --> 00:27:01,760
and this means that sometimes
we see very strange alliances

427
00:27:01,840 --> 00:27:04,760
between social groups
that could be considered antagonistic

428
00:27:04,840 --> 00:27:08,240
and yet, at a given moment, join forces.

429
00:27:08,320 --> 00:27:10,840
"When power wanted to understand,
and knowledge was able to get through."

430
00:27:10,920 --> 00:27:12,880
How, in the end, they all sat down

431
00:27:12,960 --> 00:27:16,040
and understood that we had to fight
for the common good.

432
00:27:16,120 --> 00:27:20,520
Given current events,
how could it not be a revolution?

433
00:27:20,600 --> 00:27:24,120
That is, everyone wants
the common good of all.

434
00:27:24,200 --> 00:27:26,640
"I fight for mine,
but I also fight for everyone else's."

435
00:27:26,720 --> 00:27:28,640
It's a great revolution,

436
00:27:28,720 --> 00:27:31,560
and it's also a modern revolution,
as several authors say,

437
00:27:31,640 --> 00:27:34,880
many years ahead of the French revolution.

438
00:27:38,000 --> 00:27:40,400
We tend to think that ordinary people

439
00:27:40,480 --> 00:27:43,080
rebelled only when they had no choice,

440
00:27:43,160 --> 00:27:46,280
when they were desperate,
or couldn't take it anymore.

441
00:27:46,360 --> 00:27:47,920
But this isn't really the case:

442
00:27:48,000 --> 00:27:52,200
you only risk so much if you have
some sort of expectation of success.

443
00:27:52,280 --> 00:27:56,720
The Comuneros tried to reach a pact
with the king, not to leave him aside,

444
00:27:56,800 --> 00:28:00,600
but in which the kingdom
would be above him,

445
00:28:00,680 --> 00:28:04,960
and not subject to the will,
whim and interests of the king.

446
00:28:18,360 --> 00:28:20,480
There are uprisings
in almost every part of Spain:

447
00:28:20,560 --> 00:28:23,320
Plasencia, Soria, Murcia,
both Castillas, of course…

448
00:28:23,400 --> 00:28:24,600
Navarra.

449
00:28:24,680 --> 00:28:27,520
Practically the whole of Spain
is up in arms.

450
00:28:29,040 --> 00:28:30,760
Like old adobe

451
00:28:30,840 --> 00:28:34,080
Like mud and straw
We will build this new world

452
00:28:35,520 --> 00:28:39,800
With the weight of the earth
And the maddening breeze of dead leaves

453
00:28:40,680 --> 00:28:43,960
With the humble water
That sweeps away fortresses

454
00:28:44,040 --> 00:28:46,280
With the gentle lordship of the sun

455
00:28:47,200 --> 00:28:49,920
We'll build it as if it were a dovecote

456
00:28:50,000 --> 00:28:52,480
Round and full of wings inside

457
00:28:53,440 --> 00:28:57,200
A swarm of wills
That take flight at the same time

458
00:28:58,120 --> 00:29:02,160
And turn and change direction
As one single body

459
00:29:03,160 --> 00:29:06,480
Even if it carries
A thousand different sighs

460
00:29:06,560 --> 00:29:09,640
A thousand anguishes
And a thousand dreams

461
00:29:23,320 --> 00:29:24,520
SEPTEMBER 1520

462
00:29:24,600 --> 00:29:29,120
Padilla managed to free Segovia
from all the threats that hung over it,

463
00:29:29,200 --> 00:29:31,040
he went into Medina del Campo,

464
00:29:31,120 --> 00:29:33,720
still traumatized
by the fire it had suffered

465
00:29:33,800 --> 00:29:36,480
at the hands of the royalist armies,

466
00:29:36,560 --> 00:29:41,080
and he obtained the benevolence, at least,

467
00:29:41,160 --> 00:29:44,520
of Queen Juana, who was in Tordesillas.

468
00:29:45,240 --> 00:29:51,160
The Comunero Council, which begun
in Ávila, will be established here.

469
00:29:51,240 --> 00:29:56,120
Tordesillas was thus to be
the communities' second capital.

470
00:29:56,200 --> 00:29:58,520
From that point onwards,
the Holy Council of Ávila

471
00:29:59,080 --> 00:30:02,360
could now be constituted
as a representative body

472
00:30:02,440 --> 00:30:04,560
and as the Kingdom's Corte General,

473
00:30:04,640 --> 00:30:06,040
since it is presided over,

474
00:30:06,120 --> 00:30:10,280
not by that foreign king
who had come to power before his time,

475
00:30:10,360 --> 00:30:12,760
being a minor, but by the true Queen,

476
00:30:12,840 --> 00:30:16,240
whom many Castilians
considered to be Doña Juana.

477
00:30:17,440 --> 00:30:23,960
We can't subject Juana
to a modern-day psychiatric evaluation,

478
00:30:24,040 --> 00:30:26,360
for neither the sources

479
00:30:26,440 --> 00:30:30,080
nor the reality of her historical moment
would allow us to do so.

480
00:30:30,160 --> 00:30:33,760
Now, what we can assure
from the historical sources

481
00:30:33,840 --> 00:30:38,120
is that she is the legitimate Queen.

482
00:30:38,200 --> 00:30:42,120
The locals welcome them with great joy

483
00:30:42,200 --> 00:30:46,280
The streets are crowded
The porches are full

484
00:30:46,360 --> 00:30:49,640
They even brought out
Old purple banners to the square

485
00:30:49,720 --> 00:30:52,680
The young women
Have pinned the Comunero purple

486
00:30:53,320 --> 00:30:57,240
On their white shawls
On their new corsages

487
00:30:57,800 --> 00:31:01,720
Watch the bells fly
As the comuneros walk in!

488
00:31:02,240 --> 00:31:06,200
It was unthinkable then
to go against monarchy as an institution.

489
00:31:06,280 --> 00:31:09,960
They have something against Charles,
but quickly go looking for Juana.

490
00:31:10,040 --> 00:31:12,960
But they get disappointed

491
00:31:13,440 --> 00:31:16,640
because the Queen's whole game is to talk,

492
00:31:17,320 --> 00:31:21,440
and they want specific support.

493
00:31:21,520 --> 00:31:25,440
What they want specifically
is her royal signature

494
00:31:25,520 --> 00:31:27,280
to authorize their documents.

495
00:31:27,360 --> 00:31:32,360
It becomes an obsession for the Comuneros,

496
00:31:32,440 --> 00:31:37,760
and not only for them,
but also for the regent Adrian of Utrecht,

497
00:31:37,840 --> 00:31:41,400
Charles' former preceptor and future Pope.

498
00:31:41,480 --> 00:31:45,840
He wrote to Charles
on four or five occasions:

499
00:31:45,920 --> 00:31:50,960
if the Queen were to sign
one single document for the Comuneros,

500
00:31:51,040 --> 00:31:55,440
Charles would undoubtedly
lose all the realms

501
00:31:55,520 --> 00:31:57,160
until the death of his mother.

502
00:31:57,720 --> 00:32:01,000
This was her power legitimacy.

503
00:32:01,080 --> 00:32:02,720
That's what the comuneros wanted,

504
00:32:02,800 --> 00:32:07,080
for three months,
the matter was in her hands.

505
00:32:07,160 --> 00:32:08,400
She had the power.

506
00:32:10,160 --> 00:32:13,120
If Juana doesn't sign the Perpetual Law

507
00:32:13,200 --> 00:32:18,040
it's mainly because she realizes
that if she sides with the comuneros

508
00:32:18,120 --> 00:32:21,440
she harms her son, her dynastic line.

509
00:32:21,520 --> 00:32:25,520
She's defending her son's inheritance,
her own dynasty.

510
00:34:23,280 --> 00:34:25,480
NOVEMBER 1520

511
00:34:25,560 --> 00:34:28,639
Throughout the comunero conflict
there are several turning points:

512
00:34:28,719 --> 00:34:31,159
one is the burning of Medina del Campo,

513
00:34:31,239 --> 00:34:33,800
which led other towns
to join the movement,

514
00:34:33,880 --> 00:34:35,199
but another turning point

515
00:34:35,280 --> 00:34:39,719
is Tordesillas General Council's order
to suppress the Royal Council.

516
00:34:39,800 --> 00:34:41,280
Not only this,

517
00:34:41,360 --> 00:34:46,159
but to transfer its functions
to the Kingdom's General Council.

518
00:34:46,239 --> 00:34:50,000
That's one of the most radical aspects
of the comunero movement

519
00:34:50,080 --> 00:34:53,280
and it also greatly frightens

520
00:34:53,360 --> 00:34:55,480
those towns that had joined the movement

521
00:34:55,560 --> 00:34:58,920
but didn't want its radicalization,
such as Burgos.

522
00:34:59,000 --> 00:35:01,200
And in fact,
the Royal Council's suppression

523
00:35:01,280 --> 00:35:04,320
is the last straw for Burgos

524
00:35:04,400 --> 00:35:07,480
and will finally push them
to abandon the movement.

525
00:35:07,560 --> 00:35:09,840
Burgos was part of the comuneros.
What happened?

526
00:35:09,920 --> 00:35:14,640
The commander managed to bring
the royalist forces back to Burgos.

527
00:35:14,720 --> 00:35:16,080
How?

528
00:35:16,160 --> 00:35:18,240
Precisely with those promises,

529
00:35:18,320 --> 00:35:21,960
with the king's concessions,

530
00:35:22,040 --> 00:35:24,600
after all, it's a commercial city,

531
00:35:24,680 --> 00:35:30,040
it's essential for its commerce
to be able to trade with the Netherlands.

532
00:35:30,120 --> 00:35:33,160
Burgos had more options, undoubtedly,

533
00:35:33,240 --> 00:35:35,600
with the royalist side
than with the comunero side.

534
00:35:35,680 --> 00:35:39,200
The fact is, Burgos's desertion
was one of the first steps

535
00:35:39,280 --> 00:35:42,240
that led to the decay of the communities

536
00:35:42,320 --> 00:35:47,040
as the moderates
gained strength in the Council,

537
00:35:47,120 --> 00:35:50,280
and Padilla was left
somewhat out of the picture.

538
00:35:50,360 --> 00:35:54,040
He was in favor of the struggle

539
00:35:54,120 --> 00:35:56,640
and was considered,
even in the city of Toledo itself,

540
00:35:56,720 --> 00:36:00,040
as a radical,
and he was removed from power.

541
00:36:00,120 --> 00:36:01,720
DECEMBER 1520

542
00:36:01,800 --> 00:36:04,880
We are at the end of the year 1520.

543
00:36:04,960 --> 00:36:08,200
The comuneros
led at that time by Pedro Girón

544
00:36:08,280 --> 00:36:12,800
have established their headquarters
in Villabrágima and in Tordesillas,

545
00:36:12,880 --> 00:36:17,040
and are trying by all means
to convince Queen Juana

546
00:36:17,120 --> 00:36:21,520
to take the reins of the Kingdom
against her son.

547
00:36:22,960 --> 00:36:27,040
The imperial forces are really desperate,

548
00:36:27,120 --> 00:36:32,200
in fact Cardinal Adrian prioritizes
the takeover of Tordesillas,

549
00:36:32,280 --> 00:36:36,280
precisely to stop them
from pressuring the Queen.

550
00:36:37,120 --> 00:36:41,080
We know that Pedro Girón
was besieging Medina de Rioseco,

551
00:36:41,160 --> 00:36:44,120
the royalist capital

552
00:36:44,200 --> 00:36:47,480
and had his army around Villabrágima,

553
00:36:47,560 --> 00:36:51,640
and at one point
decides to go and occupy Villalpando,

554
00:36:51,720 --> 00:36:54,920
a town that belongs
to the Constable of Castile.

555
00:36:55,000 --> 00:36:58,880
This move left the road

556
00:36:58,960 --> 00:37:02,040
between Medina de Rioseco
and Tordesillas free,

557
00:37:02,120 --> 00:37:04,520
and so the royalists took advantage of it.

558
00:37:04,600 --> 00:37:11,160
On 4th December 1520, the royalist
troops set out for Tordesillas

559
00:37:11,240 --> 00:37:14,960
and on the night of 5th December,

560
00:37:15,040 --> 00:37:18,400
they managed to take Tordesillas
and the royal palace.

561
00:37:19,080 --> 00:37:22,600
The comuneros lost Tordesillas,
which was their capital,

562
00:37:22,680 --> 00:37:24,640
the comunero's headquarters,

563
00:37:24,720 --> 00:37:29,040
they were losing Queen Juana,
who was one of their greatest assets

564
00:37:29,120 --> 00:37:34,240
in their attempt to take the reins
of power and government,

565
00:37:34,320 --> 00:37:36,400
and to a degree
they were in a state of disarray.

566
00:37:36,480 --> 00:37:39,480
The battle of Tordesillas
must also be linked

567
00:37:39,560 --> 00:37:41,160
to an earlier event,

568
00:37:41,240 --> 00:37:44,280
the so-called Concordia de Villabrágima,

569
00:37:44,360 --> 00:37:47,120
or the attempt
by imperialists and comuneros

570
00:37:47,200 --> 00:37:49,520
to reach an agreement at Villabrágima.

571
00:37:49,600 --> 00:37:52,640
This is where some people place

572
00:37:53,160 --> 00:37:56,840
Pedro Girón's supposed betrayal
of the comunero forces.

573
00:37:58,520 --> 00:38:02,720
With Girón
The Junta lost the general it appointed

574
00:38:03,800 --> 00:38:07,600
Yet if Girón betrayed
Another will give battle

575
00:38:07,680 --> 00:38:10,160
The fall of Tordesillas
into imperial hands

576
00:38:10,240 --> 00:38:13,920
is what triggers
the flight of Girón on the one hand,

577
00:38:14,000 --> 00:38:17,720
and Juan de Padilla's reinstatement
as captain of the comunero troops.

578
00:38:17,800 --> 00:38:21,600
They're going to move
the Comunero Council to Valladolid.

579
00:38:22,120 --> 00:38:27,440
Therefore, Valladolid is going to become
the third capital of this whole uprising.

580
00:38:32,760 --> 00:38:34,520
Eagles don't catch flies

581
00:38:35,160 --> 00:38:38,760
Whispers a peasant
With tender eyes and leathery hands

582
00:38:39,640 --> 00:38:41,520
Eagles don't catch flies

583
00:38:41,600 --> 00:38:43,680
He says again, looking up at the sky

584
00:38:43,760 --> 00:38:47,040
And the muttering of shepherds
And horsemen stops

585
00:38:47,120 --> 00:38:49,640
Suddenly, silence

586
00:38:50,160 --> 00:38:54,680
A thick silence has sprung up
A silence of flint and iron

587
00:38:55,200 --> 00:38:59,720
And now you can hear
The hearts like beating drums

588
00:39:00,400 --> 00:39:02,760
Pumping the blood
That will water the soil

589
00:39:04,160 --> 00:39:08,360
When the field rises
The sleeping furrows tremble

590
00:39:08,440 --> 00:39:11,960
The backs of the oaks
And the trembling itself trembles

591
00:39:12,040 --> 00:39:16,480
Eagles don't catch flies
Sings the peasant voice

592
00:39:16,560 --> 00:39:20,960
The eagles are getting weary
The spark has already been lit

593
00:39:23,480 --> 00:39:27,640
Tired of the abuse of their lords,
they revolt against their masters.

594
00:39:28,400 --> 00:39:31,040
The communities were a political movement,

595
00:39:31,120 --> 00:39:33,120
but they were also a social movement.

596
00:39:33,200 --> 00:39:35,280
The chroniclers mention two sides:

597
00:39:35,760 --> 00:39:38,080
the nobility and the comuneros.

598
00:39:38,160 --> 00:39:40,960
In the Perpetual Law or other chapters,

599
00:39:41,040 --> 00:39:45,160
there's without doubt the clear desire
to subject the nobility to the law,

600
00:39:45,240 --> 00:39:48,760
they should return jurisdictions, income,
etc., that had been misappropriated,

601
00:39:48,840 --> 00:39:53,640
or that had been granted
through influence peddling.

602
00:39:54,160 --> 00:39:56,600
What we see
are very important changes in the cities

603
00:39:56,680 --> 00:39:59,480
that are driven
by a sort of democratic impulse.

604
00:39:59,560 --> 00:40:02,080
They are trying
to transform the political order.

605
00:40:02,160 --> 00:40:06,240
Representatives
of the city's social classes

606
00:40:06,920 --> 00:40:09,920
were given access
to local government bodies,

607
00:40:10,000 --> 00:40:13,560
which in some cases

608
00:40:13,640 --> 00:40:18,840
gave a radical bias
to the decisions that were taken.

609
00:40:19,880 --> 00:40:21,760
This was very unpleasant for the nobility.

610
00:40:25,280 --> 00:40:30,400
Castilian nobility were always
more driven by their own interests

611
00:40:30,480 --> 00:40:32,720
than by their loyalty to the emperor.

612
00:40:33,560 --> 00:40:36,600
The appointment of two governors
from the high nobility,

613
00:40:36,680 --> 00:40:39,720
the anti-nobility uprisings,
the dismissal of the royal council,

614
00:40:39,800 --> 00:40:42,280
all of this upset them and they began

615
00:40:42,360 --> 00:40:44,400
to turn in favor of Charles V.

616
00:40:44,480 --> 00:40:46,360
They were never against,
they were waiting.

617
00:40:46,440 --> 00:40:47,720
Waiting and watching.

618
00:40:48,680 --> 00:40:50,200
It'll be very important for Charles V.

619
00:40:50,280 --> 00:40:52,160
THE END OF 1520

620
00:40:52,240 --> 00:40:54,960
Some of these uprisings
begin to take place

621
00:40:55,040 --> 00:40:56,880
on the estates of the great lords,

622
00:40:56,960 --> 00:41:01,560
and at first the General Council
isn't going to condemn them,

623
00:41:01,640 --> 00:41:05,520
and this is precisely what frightens
Castile's great lords enormously

624
00:41:05,600 --> 00:41:07,920
and makes them join the royalist side.

625
00:41:08,000 --> 00:41:10,880
People on the lower rungs of the ladder

626
00:41:10,960 --> 00:41:14,440
felt like the main characters
and took the initiative.

627
00:41:14,520 --> 00:41:18,480
"The Revolution, which had
originally been purely political,

628
00:41:18,560 --> 00:41:21,360
now led to social demands

629
00:41:21,440 --> 00:41:25,400
that challenged
the inherited structures of the past."

630
00:41:25,480 --> 00:41:28,280
On 31st January 1521

631
00:41:28,360 --> 00:41:30,440
a letter arrived at the government

632
00:41:30,520 --> 00:41:33,360
in Valladolid from the Admiral
of Castile and other noblemen

633
00:41:33,440 --> 00:41:36,120
encouraging them to abandon
the comunero movement.

634
00:41:36,200 --> 00:41:38,600
Valladolid replies
to the Admiral of Castile:

635
00:41:38,680 --> 00:41:41,040
you are the ones
who have occupied Castile,

636
00:41:41,120 --> 00:41:43,840
who have undermined the authority
and power of the King,

637
00:41:43,920 --> 00:41:44,920
not the people.

638
00:41:45,000 --> 00:41:48,760
It's the noblemen who attacked
and undermined the power of the King.

639
00:41:49,360 --> 00:41:52,640
The nobility's support
for the imperial side

640
00:41:52,720 --> 00:41:57,480
came about as a result of
a fierce defense of their interests

641
00:41:57,560 --> 00:42:03,840
and a fear of the anti-kingly revolt

642
00:42:03,920 --> 00:42:09,800
the comuneros were carrying out
as a result of their actions.

643
00:42:09,880 --> 00:42:11,320
The idea behind it is as follows:

644
00:42:11,400 --> 00:42:14,280
cities guarantee
the freedom of the kingdom,

645
00:42:14,360 --> 00:42:16,400
but also the king's own freedom.

646
00:42:16,480 --> 00:42:18,000
So, we have to go to war,

647
00:42:18,080 --> 00:42:20,200
the rest would be to go back
to what was before:

648
00:42:20,280 --> 00:42:24,320
to be in dependence
and servitude to these great ones

649
00:42:24,400 --> 00:42:27,280
who try to impose
their will on the King.

650
00:42:29,440 --> 00:42:32,280
It leads to something
like a war between the community,

651
00:42:32,360 --> 00:42:35,120
that is, the rebels, and the knights.

652
00:42:38,280 --> 00:42:41,520
The areas surrounding
Valladolid and Palencia

653
00:42:41,600 --> 00:42:43,960
were controlled
by these powerful people of Castile,

654
00:42:44,040 --> 00:42:47,520
who also had fortresses
threatening the comunero movement itself

655
00:42:47,600 --> 00:42:50,200
because from those fortresses
they could carry out attacks

656
00:42:50,280 --> 00:42:52,800
against the comuneros
stationed in Valladolid.

657
00:42:55,600 --> 00:42:58,040
Bishop Acuña goes to these regions

658
00:42:58,120 --> 00:43:02,400
and from there stirs up the people
encouraging them to take the fortresses.

659
00:43:03,080 --> 00:43:06,920
The royalist army conquers Ampudia,
this is on 16th January.

660
00:43:07,440 --> 00:43:10,760
Upon learning of this,
from Valladolid, Padilla's army

661
00:43:10,840 --> 00:43:13,280
meets with Bishop Acuña's troops.

662
00:43:13,360 --> 00:43:14,840
They reconquer Ampudia.

663
00:43:15,400 --> 00:43:19,600
The royalist side takes refuge
in the neighboring town of Torremormojón.

664
00:43:19,680 --> 00:43:23,640
Padilla and Acuña put siege
to Torremormojón's castle

665
00:43:23,720 --> 00:43:25,320
and finally on 18th January

666
00:43:25,400 --> 00:43:30,200
achieve the surrender
of Torremormojón's castle itself.

667
00:43:32,000 --> 00:43:36,480
Bishop Acuña,
at the end of 1520, early 1521,

668
00:43:37,200 --> 00:43:42,360
at the age of 60 or more,
carried out a radicalization campaign.

669
00:43:42,440 --> 00:43:45,960
Acuña is undoubtedly
an interesting character.

670
00:43:46,040 --> 00:43:49,120
He has a very singular personality

671
00:43:49,200 --> 00:43:53,080
that, given his own origins
and his own condition,

672
00:43:53,160 --> 00:43:56,120
will become a legendary figure.

673
00:43:56,200 --> 00:43:59,720
He had the ability to summon
through the pulpit,

674
00:43:59,800 --> 00:44:02,160
and he also had the ability
to call the troops.

675
00:44:02,240 --> 00:44:06,200
And he succeeded in organizing
and leading armies,

676
00:44:06,280 --> 00:44:09,760
including clerical armies,
which proved to be very effective.

677
00:44:09,840 --> 00:44:13,120
This also makes the war
of the communities become a war

678
00:44:13,200 --> 00:44:15,600
of the subjects against the lords,

679
00:44:15,680 --> 00:44:18,840
meaning an anti-lordly revolt
that will scandalize

680
00:44:18,920 --> 00:44:21,320
and frighten the lords even more.

681
00:44:21,400 --> 00:44:23,720
JANUARY 1521

682
00:44:23,800 --> 00:44:29,440
After losing Tordesillas, the Comunero
Council was already in Valladolid.

683
00:44:30,320 --> 00:44:33,680
There began to be internal debates
about what the strategy should be.

684
00:44:34,480 --> 00:44:35,680
On the one hand Pedro Laso,

685
00:44:35,760 --> 00:44:37,920
proposed a moderate approach.

686
00:44:38,000 --> 00:44:41,000
On the other hand
is the other leader, Juan de Padilla.

687
00:44:41,080 --> 00:44:45,040
His approach was far more radical,
he wanted to defeat the royalist side,

688
00:44:45,120 --> 00:44:46,320
the comuneros' triumph.

689
00:44:46,400 --> 00:44:48,520
For this he proposed
the takeover of Burgos.

690
00:44:49,640 --> 00:44:52,720
Along with Bishop Acuña,
he headed for Burgos,

691
00:44:52,800 --> 00:44:55,280
but the Constable of Castile
ruined these plans,

692
00:44:55,880 --> 00:44:59,120
and it was then that the idea
of taking Torrelobatón came up.

693
00:44:59,200 --> 00:45:01,120
FEBRUARY 1521

694
00:45:01,800 --> 00:45:04,960
Early in the morning
On 22nd February

695
00:45:05,040 --> 00:45:08,160
Padilla arrives at Torrelobatón
With his army

696
00:45:08,240 --> 00:45:12,600
He has 7,000 soldiers
Followed by 500 lances

697
00:45:14,240 --> 00:45:17,520
Padilla begins
the takeover of Torrelobatón.

698
00:45:18,160 --> 00:45:24,200
It was walled, they begin an attempt
with their artillery to open a breach.

699
00:45:24,280 --> 00:45:27,760
It took them four days
to overcome the wall.

700
00:45:28,640 --> 00:45:31,200
February goes by, March goes by…

701
00:45:32,200 --> 00:45:36,120
The comuneros' inaction,
mostly due to internal disagreements,

702
00:45:36,200 --> 00:45:38,480
finally turned it into a mousetrap.

703
00:45:38,560 --> 00:45:41,360
It was threatened
by Medina de Rioseco to the north,

704
00:45:41,440 --> 00:45:45,600
in the southeast by Simancas
and to the south by Tordesillas.

705
00:45:45,680 --> 00:45:47,640
Padilla realized he had to run.

706
00:45:47,720 --> 00:45:50,520
Simancas prevented him
from going to Valladolid,

707
00:45:50,600 --> 00:45:52,800
and the only way left

708
00:45:52,880 --> 00:45:57,400
was to go west, trying to take refuge
in Toro, a friendly city.

709
00:45:57,960 --> 00:45:59,640
And that's what he did on 23rd April.

710
00:45:59,720 --> 00:46:03,800
APRIL 1521

711
00:46:10,160 --> 00:46:14,440
Leaning out of a battlement
He sees the cliffs whiten

712
00:46:16,320 --> 00:46:21,280
And in the hollows
The ditches with greater depth

713
00:46:24,400 --> 00:46:28,520
A tree in the ravine
Has grown horizontally

714
00:46:30,000 --> 00:46:34,640
On its bare branches the rooks are still

715
00:46:38,080 --> 00:46:41,680
Who could see the comuneros
Go down the gullies…

716
00:46:43,480 --> 00:46:47,840
On the horizon, Villalar now appears

717
00:46:54,880 --> 00:46:58,520
The next move on the part of the royalists

718
00:46:58,600 --> 00:47:03,200
will be to gather their troops
in Peñaflor de Hornija,

719
00:47:03,280 --> 00:47:07,160
about 9 km away from the comunero hub

720
00:47:07,240 --> 00:47:09,280
which Torrelobatón had become.

721
00:47:13,360 --> 00:47:19,280
The armies see each other,
they feel each other.

722
00:47:20,280 --> 00:47:22,720
They have no choice
but to get out of there.

723
00:47:22,800 --> 00:47:25,000
That's the decision Padilla takes,

724
00:47:25,080 --> 00:47:28,680
and at dawn of Tuesday, 23rd April,

725
00:47:28,760 --> 00:47:33,640
they quickly leave Torrelobatón
along the Hornija valley.

726
00:47:34,520 --> 00:47:38,520
Then the Constable said,
"Get all the cavalry out quickly,

727
00:47:38,600 --> 00:47:42,640
send them after, have them take
some field artillery with them."

728
00:47:43,880 --> 00:47:47,320
The imperial army,
which had meanwhile recovered

729
00:47:47,400 --> 00:47:49,560
thanks to support from the high nobility,

730
00:47:49,640 --> 00:47:54,360
surprised them in their retreat
on a rainy day.

731
00:47:58,040 --> 00:48:03,720
It's rained a lot, they're wet,
the ground is muddy, the gunpowder is wet,

732
00:48:03,800 --> 00:48:06,520
the order of marching
is somewhat scattered,

733
00:48:06,600 --> 00:48:09,400
and the comunero army
keeps moving forward…

734
00:48:10,160 --> 00:48:15,200
Near the Fierro bridge,
after crossing the Molinos stream,

735
00:48:15,280 --> 00:48:19,840
they come across a tremendous field,
a great stretch of land.

736
00:48:21,640 --> 00:48:25,080
The royalist cavalry
with the Count of Haro in the center,

737
00:48:25,160 --> 00:48:27,360
to the left the Count of Benavente,

738
00:48:27,440 --> 00:48:31,680
to the right the Constable
and the Admiral of Castile,

739
00:48:31,760 --> 00:48:34,560
begin their cavalry charges

740
00:48:35,320 --> 00:48:39,920
which, more than a battle,
will turn it into a hunt.

741
00:48:58,960 --> 00:49:02,640
The comunero commander
Is left bleeding all over

742
00:49:02,720 --> 00:49:06,240
His hot blood
Drinks in the cold Villalar

743
00:49:06,920 --> 00:49:08,960
Night falls in the fields

744
00:49:09,040 --> 00:49:14,560
Only wounded comuneros' cries are heard
After receiving their deathblow

745
00:49:16,880 --> 00:49:21,000
The imperial army managed
to completely disrupt the comunero army

746
00:49:21,080 --> 00:49:25,120
and imprison its leaders,
among them Juan de Padilla himself.

747
00:49:25,200 --> 00:49:30,400
In the space of only 24 hours,
the trial, conviction

748
00:49:30,480 --> 00:49:32,960
and execution
of the comuneros took place,

749
00:49:33,040 --> 00:49:35,880
because their crimes
were considered notorious crimes,

750
00:49:36,480 --> 00:49:38,680
serious crimes against the crown.

751
00:49:38,760 --> 00:49:41,280
Thus, on 24th April 1521,

752
00:49:41,360 --> 00:49:44,440
in Villalar de los Comuneros,
the scaffold is set up,

753
00:49:45,040 --> 00:49:46,800
the stands are installed

754
00:49:46,880 --> 00:49:52,000
so that royal representatives
can attend the event

755
00:49:52,680 --> 00:49:55,280
and the comunero leaders
are brought to justice.

756
00:49:56,200 --> 00:50:00,320
Pedro Maldonado is fortunate
to have influence on the royalist side,

757
00:50:00,400 --> 00:50:02,120
the Count of Benavente for instance,

758
00:50:02,200 --> 00:50:05,480
and this is what saves him
from being executed right then

759
00:50:05,560 --> 00:50:07,000
in Villalar de los Comuneros.

760
00:50:07,080 --> 00:50:09,400
Francisco Maldonado will be executed.

761
00:50:09,480 --> 00:50:13,280
Pedro Maldonado, however,
will also be executed the following year.

762
00:50:14,400 --> 00:50:17,840
They were going to have
their throats slit the next day.

763
00:50:17,920 --> 00:50:22,880
Someone was shouting,
"Here come the traitors,"

764
00:50:23,640 --> 00:50:28,800
Juan Bravo turned and said, "You lie
and the one who told you to say it too."

765
00:50:29,480 --> 00:50:33,800
The council judge
gave Juan Bravo a blow on the back

766
00:50:33,880 --> 00:50:35,600
and he revolted

767
00:50:35,680 --> 00:50:39,840
and Padilla said something like,

768
00:50:39,920 --> 00:50:46,280
"Yesterday we fought like knights
and today we die like Christians."

769
00:50:51,440 --> 00:50:57,200
"In Villalar on the 24th day
of the month of April 1521:

770
00:50:57,280 --> 00:51:02,600
this day the mayors Cornejo,
Salmerón and Alcalá

771
00:51:02,680 --> 00:51:05,520
stated and declared

772
00:51:05,600 --> 00:51:10,600
Juan de Padilla and Juan Bravo
and Francisco Maldonado guilty

773
00:51:10,680 --> 00:51:15,320
of having been traitors
to the Royal Crown of these Kingdoms

774
00:51:15,400 --> 00:51:19,040
in punishment for their evil deed,
they stated

775
00:51:19,120 --> 00:51:22,200
and condemned them
to the penalty of natural death."

776
00:51:26,080 --> 00:51:29,200
I have summoned
The four horizons of Castile

777
00:51:30,200 --> 00:51:33,200
The violet flowers
That rot in the sunset

778
00:51:33,880 --> 00:51:36,920
The swifts that drank
The blood off the ground

779
00:51:37,000 --> 00:51:39,000
Without stopping their flight

780
00:51:39,760 --> 00:51:41,720
The sweat of the horses

781
00:51:43,680 --> 00:51:45,240
Let no men or women come

782
00:51:45,760 --> 00:51:49,640
They could not bear on their bones
What I've come to tell you

783
00:51:56,960 --> 00:51:59,400
Hope is already mortally wounded

784
00:52:00,080 --> 00:52:01,920
We'll have to wait again

785
00:52:03,800 --> 00:52:06,240
As they wait, in silence,

786
00:52:06,320 --> 00:52:11,280
But with fire in their eyelids
The stars in the moors

787
00:52:14,800 --> 00:52:19,200
In 1521, and in April
To be more precise

788
00:52:20,120 --> 00:52:21,800
Justice was served in Villalar

789
00:52:22,480 --> 00:52:24,560
To those who called for justice

790
00:52:25,320 --> 00:52:29,080
Cursed be those
Who handed down the sentence

791
00:52:36,200 --> 00:52:39,400
Villalar represents
the great symbolic blow,

792
00:52:39,480 --> 00:52:42,640
the great moral blow to the Castilian
communities, but not the end,

793
00:52:42,720 --> 00:52:45,600
because the flame
is still burning in Toledo.

794
00:52:45,680 --> 00:52:47,920
It was Juan de Padilla's wife,
María de Pacheco,

795
00:52:48,000 --> 00:52:50,320
who kept the flame burning in Toledo.

796
00:52:50,400 --> 00:52:55,120
With the support
of someone very important, bishop Acuña.

797
00:52:56,560 --> 00:52:59,240
She grew up as a very educated,
Renaissance woman.

798
00:52:59,760 --> 00:53:02,840
She knew Latin, she read,
it seems that she also wrote,

799
00:53:02,920 --> 00:53:05,960
she was very good at maths and astronomy,

800
00:53:06,040 --> 00:53:08,320
and she inherited all the symbolic legacy

801
00:53:08,400 --> 00:53:11,440
that her husband had been creating

802
00:53:11,520 --> 00:53:14,640
and which would turn her
into the Comunero rebellion's icon

803
00:53:14,720 --> 00:53:18,960
over the resistance
that Toledo was the only one to maintain

804
00:53:19,040 --> 00:53:20,560
after the defeat at Villalar.

805
00:53:20,640 --> 00:53:23,760
All we know about her
is in the third person,

806
00:53:23,840 --> 00:53:27,240
what they said about her.
And what did they say about her?

807
00:53:27,320 --> 00:53:32,920
Very few admired her,
and many considered her manly,

808
00:53:33,000 --> 00:53:37,800
a rebellious woman
who had overstepped the feminine role

809
00:53:37,880 --> 00:53:43,280
entrusted to her
and that led her husband to ruin.

810
00:53:43,360 --> 00:53:48,400
They speak of her as a new Eve
who seduces Adam and leads him to sin.

811
00:53:48,920 --> 00:53:52,160
That was the image of Doña María Pacheco

812
00:53:52,240 --> 00:53:54,160
until the end of the 18th century:

813
00:53:54,240 --> 00:53:58,840
a traitor to her sex,
her social class and her king.

814
00:54:01,600 --> 00:54:07,280
If she wanted to resist, she had to rely
on the support of the working classes,

815
00:54:08,040 --> 00:54:11,040
who were on the other side,
who had other demands.

816
00:54:11,680 --> 00:54:15,160
Enjoying this symbolic inheritance
from her husband,

817
00:54:15,240 --> 00:54:19,000
she seized all the power,
absolute power in the city,

818
00:54:19,680 --> 00:54:22,120
and clashed
with Bishop Acuña's aspirations,

819
00:54:22,200 --> 00:54:25,400
who finally, realizing his cause was lost,
left the city

820
00:54:25,480 --> 00:54:29,800
and, as we know, was arrested
when he tried to go to France.

821
00:54:32,480 --> 00:54:35,320
In fact, the execution of Bishop Acuña

822
00:54:35,400 --> 00:54:38,080
won't be a quiet one for the Emperor,

823
00:54:38,160 --> 00:54:44,080
because the Pope will excommunicate,
if only for a few months, Charles V.

824
00:55:23,880 --> 00:55:29,560
OCTOBER 1521

825
00:55:29,640 --> 00:55:34,760
That October, after a siege of the city
that lasted all summer,

826
00:55:34,840 --> 00:55:36,440
agreements were signed,

827
00:55:36,520 --> 00:55:39,560
but they were aborted
because they remained up in arms.

828
00:55:40,160 --> 00:55:43,680
This led to the final battle
between royalists and comuneros

829
00:55:43,760 --> 00:55:45,160
in Toledo on 3rd February

830
00:55:45,240 --> 00:55:49,360
of the following year,
the famous day of San Blas,

831
00:55:49,440 --> 00:55:52,880
which put an end to the movement

832
00:55:52,960 --> 00:55:56,200
with the total collapse of the comuneros

833
00:55:56,280 --> 00:55:59,200
and Doña María Pacheco's
departure from Toledo,

834
00:55:59,280 --> 00:56:02,040
who went into exile in Portugal
because she was sentenced to death.

835
00:56:04,640 --> 00:56:08,680
On Charles's return to Spain
He signs the imperial sentence

836
00:56:09,880 --> 00:56:14,240
Doña María is to be killed
And her house razed to the ground

837
00:56:14,320 --> 00:56:17,720
And having razed it to the ground
The plough shall pass over it

838
00:56:18,520 --> 00:56:22,520
And having passed over it
They shall sow the land with salt

839
00:56:22,600 --> 00:56:25,760
"If we consider the energy with which
the repression was carried out,

840
00:56:25,840 --> 00:56:28,600
we can understand that the people
saw in these changes

841
00:56:28,680 --> 00:56:31,640
something different,
something more radically threatening."

842
00:56:31,720 --> 00:56:34,240
Women are involved
in the comunero movement.

843
00:56:34,320 --> 00:56:36,520
The problem we have are the sources.

844
00:56:36,600 --> 00:56:38,560
For a long time
history has been written by men,

845
00:56:38,640 --> 00:56:40,080
it's a masculine history.

846
00:56:40,160 --> 00:56:43,280
Women don't participate
in the governing bodies,

847
00:56:43,360 --> 00:56:46,040
and women don't participate
in leading the comunero troops.

848
00:56:46,120 --> 00:56:48,920
It's in these lawsuits
after the defeat of the comuneros

849
00:56:49,000 --> 00:56:52,680
where we obtain much more
on women's participation,

850
00:56:52,760 --> 00:56:55,160
both from the point of view
of the comunero women

851
00:56:55,240 --> 00:56:58,840
and the women on the royal side
who defended their families' patrimony.

852
00:56:58,920 --> 00:57:01,600
In all these uprisings
that culminate in repression,

853
00:57:01,680 --> 00:57:06,200
women are the ones who manage everything,
absolutely everything: the network,

854
00:57:06,280 --> 00:57:08,440
the family, the money, the property…

855
00:57:08,520 --> 00:57:10,600
and it's exactly the same here.

856
00:57:13,400 --> 00:57:14,680
A great number of comuneros

857
00:57:14,760 --> 00:57:16,760
Are being taken
To have their throats slit

858
00:57:17,400 --> 00:57:20,760
The prisons of the kingdom
Can no longer hold any more

859
00:57:20,840 --> 00:57:25,400
And those to be banished
Are counted by the thousands

860
00:57:26,760 --> 00:57:30,200
There was intense
repressive activity with imprisonments

861
00:57:30,280 --> 00:57:31,800
and executions,

862
00:57:32,320 --> 00:57:35,320
until October 1522,

863
00:57:35,400 --> 00:57:38,000
when the emperor issued
what was called the General Pardon.

864
00:57:39,200 --> 00:57:40,960
Many people took part in the revolt,

865
00:57:41,800 --> 00:57:43,840
and you can't punish everyone.

866
00:57:45,080 --> 00:57:50,680
So a general pardon is issued,
from which 293 people are exempted.

867
00:57:52,840 --> 00:57:57,040
Not only are there criminal consequences,
there are also civil ones.

868
00:57:58,000 --> 00:58:01,040
The main civil consequences
are financial compensation,

869
00:58:01,800 --> 00:58:03,640
confiscation of property,

870
00:58:03,720 --> 00:58:05,480
money to be paid.

871
00:58:05,560 --> 00:58:07,600
The houses, the manor houses,

872
00:58:07,680 --> 00:58:09,360
suffered a lot from this repression,

873
00:58:09,440 --> 00:58:12,680
they were forced to remove the towers
and scrape the coats of arms.

874
00:58:12,760 --> 00:58:14,960
In the case of Casa de las Conchas,

875
00:58:15,040 --> 00:58:18,880
the coat of arms was saved
because it meant touching high nobility,

876
00:58:18,960 --> 00:58:20,240
the fleur de lis,

877
00:58:20,320 --> 00:58:23,960
but the tower was removed
to the extent that the documents describe

878
00:58:24,040 --> 00:58:26,840
what Casa de las Conchas
was like at that time,

879
00:58:26,920 --> 00:58:28,440
how far it reached.

880
00:58:28,520 --> 00:58:33,240
Padilla's houses were torn down
and sown with salt,

881
00:58:33,320 --> 00:58:36,000
which symbolically meant

882
00:58:36,080 --> 00:58:39,960
that where such traitors
of lèse-majesté had lived,

883
00:58:40,040 --> 00:58:42,680
not even plants should ever grow.

884
00:58:43,920 --> 00:58:46,160
After the war of the communities,

885
00:58:46,240 --> 00:58:50,320
there was certainly a very strong
anti-comunero sentiment,

886
00:58:50,400 --> 00:58:54,120
and Philip II will take this into account,
as it's one of his father's legacies.

887
00:58:54,200 --> 00:58:57,320
The descendants of the comuneria
should be kept in mind,

888
00:58:57,400 --> 00:59:01,360
and they will continue to be regarded
as outcasts for a long time to come.

889
00:59:42,840 --> 00:59:45,480
There are examples that highlight

890
00:59:45,560 --> 00:59:49,480
the viciousness and cruelty
with which the emperor sometimes operated,

891
00:59:49,560 --> 00:59:50,640
for example María Pacheco.

892
00:59:50,720 --> 00:59:53,720
María Pacheco had to flee to Oporto,

893
00:59:54,520 --> 00:59:58,560
and although she had
a lot of influence at the Cortes,

894
00:59:58,640 --> 01:00:00,160
she was never able to return.

895
01:00:00,240 --> 01:00:04,000
Moreover, she always lived
under the threat

896
01:00:04,080 --> 01:00:07,880
that she could be executed
if she returned to this kingdom.

897
01:00:07,960 --> 01:00:12,000
When she expressed
her wish for her remains to be laid

898
01:00:12,080 --> 01:00:14,360
to rest in Toledo when she died,

899
01:00:15,280 --> 01:00:19,320
Charles refused, even after death,

900
01:00:20,120 --> 01:00:24,560
and so Maria Pacheco
is buried in Portugal.

901
01:00:25,280 --> 01:00:29,520
There's a repression
that lasts beyond death.

902
01:00:29,600 --> 01:00:35,680
"What disappeared at Villalar
was not Castilian liberties,

903
01:00:35,760 --> 01:00:41,040
but perhaps political freedom
and the possibility of imagining

904
01:00:41,120 --> 01:00:46,320
a destiny other than
that of imperial Spain."

905
01:00:47,560 --> 01:00:51,560
On the edge of the field
Green waves of barley break

906
01:00:51,640 --> 01:00:55,040
Opening the scar
Through which time still bleeds

907
01:00:55,120 --> 01:00:58,480
Thread of embroidered blood
And chest of stars

908
01:00:58,560 --> 01:01:02,840
Through which the past flows
And dyes the threshing floors red

909
01:01:02,920 --> 01:01:06,840
Fountain of burning furrows, oxen forged

910
01:01:07,440 --> 01:01:11,320
With the blood and sweat
Of a people, must not be bent

911
01:01:11,920 --> 01:01:14,360
There are still rumors in the fields

912
01:01:14,440 --> 01:01:16,200
You can still feel the footsteps

913
01:01:16,280 --> 01:01:18,360
Centuries of silence

914
01:01:18,960 --> 01:01:21,520
That speak, shout, sing and roar

915
01:01:21,600 --> 01:01:25,240
17TH-18TH CENTURY

916
01:01:25,320 --> 01:01:29,760
The idea of absolute monarchy as a form
of government won out in the end,

917
01:01:29,840 --> 01:01:32,440
but not only in Spain, throughout Europe.

918
01:01:32,520 --> 01:01:35,040
And the Cortes, which will be
the kingdom's representative body,

919
01:01:35,120 --> 01:01:38,400
is something that bothers
the monarch's government.

920
01:01:38,480 --> 01:01:39,880
Obviously.

921
01:01:39,960 --> 01:01:41,280
Absolutism took hold.

922
01:01:41,840 --> 01:01:43,920
It did not originate with Charles V,

923
01:01:44,000 --> 01:01:46,200
it had been there for a long time,
and it took hold.

924
01:01:46,840 --> 01:01:48,080
And it will continue.

925
01:01:48,160 --> 01:01:52,160
Absolutism means
the king has no limits set by law,

926
01:01:52,240 --> 01:01:54,880
that is, a citizen
is prevented by law from killing,

927
01:01:54,960 --> 01:01:56,680
the king isn't responsible.

928
01:01:56,760 --> 01:02:00,920
The king is not prevented at all,
he can skip it or be excused.

929
01:02:01,000 --> 01:02:04,760
This was the beginning
of a political breakdown of the kingdom

930
01:02:04,840 --> 01:02:06,880
that would continue
in the reign of Philip II,

931
01:02:06,960 --> 01:02:09,000
when the Cortes continued to be summoned,

932
01:02:09,560 --> 01:02:12,600
but they were heavily intervened.

933
01:02:13,720 --> 01:02:15,840
Fiscal pressure was much greater,

934
01:02:15,920 --> 01:02:20,640
there was hardly any opposition
from representatives, an urban oligarchy,

935
01:02:20,720 --> 01:02:22,960
the role of the Cortes gradually declined…

936
01:02:23,680 --> 01:02:25,600
This went even further
in the 18th century,

937
01:02:25,680 --> 01:02:29,200
the century of despotism
as a form of government,

938
01:02:29,280 --> 01:02:31,440
when the Cortes were not even convened.

939
01:02:31,520 --> 01:02:35,200
Indeed, they were not abolished,
but they were left there as…

940
01:02:35,280 --> 01:02:37,440
they were convened
to proclaim the new king…

941
01:02:38,400 --> 01:02:39,520
as witnesses.

942
01:02:39,600 --> 01:02:42,720
At the expense
of that proto-parliamentarist theory

943
01:02:42,800 --> 01:02:45,320
that could have emerged
with the comunero's triumph.

944
01:02:45,400 --> 01:02:49,760
"The 19th century militant liberalism
rediscovered the comuneros,

945
01:02:49,840 --> 01:02:52,280
turned their leaders into martyrs

946
01:02:52,360 --> 01:02:58,080
and raised the banner of its name
to fight against absolutism."

947
01:02:58,160 --> 01:03:01,680
History is a weapon
loaded with present and future.

948
01:03:01,760 --> 01:03:06,280
One of the key elements
for building freedom.

949
01:03:08,200 --> 01:03:10,680
And then, when it is all over

950
01:03:11,400 --> 01:03:13,960
When there are no longer
Any flowers with purple eyelids

951
01:03:14,040 --> 01:03:16,920
When spring is completely cut off

952
01:03:18,000 --> 01:03:22,000
We will melt the stirrups and swords
In a furnace made of earth

953
01:03:22,560 --> 01:03:24,520
And forge a ploughshare

954
01:03:24,600 --> 01:03:27,600
That will gleam brightly
In memory's night

955
01:03:28,600 --> 01:03:32,640
Those flowers will bloom
And continue to grow

956
01:03:33,120 --> 01:03:34,720
And we'll do it

957
01:03:35,360 --> 01:03:37,280
All over again every spring

958
01:03:40,520 --> 01:03:44,560
The legend of Villalar
begins in that very place,

959
01:03:44,640 --> 01:03:46,400
if it hadn't begun before.

960
01:03:47,520 --> 01:03:51,000
The example of the comuneros
as freedom fighters

961
01:03:51,640 --> 01:03:55,400
will also be an example to be followed

962
01:03:55,920 --> 01:04:00,120
by other politicians and citizens

963
01:04:00,680 --> 01:04:04,960
who wanted to form a revolutionary
movement against the monarchy.

964
01:04:08,840 --> 01:04:12,520
"The Comuneros of Castile
are an essential point of reference

965
01:04:12,600 --> 01:04:15,240
for all the movements
in contemporary Spain

966
01:04:15,320 --> 01:04:18,760
whose primary purpose
was the conquest of freedom."

967
01:04:18,840 --> 01:04:24,480
The Comuneros are
the central historical imaginary,

968
01:04:24,560 --> 01:04:28,240
the main historical reference point
for all democratic struggles

969
01:04:28,320 --> 01:04:29,880
in modern and contemporary Spain.

970
01:04:31,160 --> 01:04:36,200
It's in the interests of those in power
to use history as a key instrument

971
01:04:36,280 --> 01:04:40,080
to create an awareness
of nationhood and national identity,

972
01:04:40,160 --> 01:04:42,920
and to create national myths with it.

973
01:04:43,720 --> 01:04:46,360
Historical episodes have two sides:

974
01:04:46,440 --> 01:04:48,000
one, what they were,

975
01:04:48,080 --> 01:04:50,520
and two,
how they are interpreted afterwards

976
01:04:50,600 --> 01:04:51,600
and how they're used.

977
01:04:51,680 --> 01:04:55,240
On this second aspect,
identity, the construction

978
01:04:55,320 --> 01:04:58,080
of a collective identity,
is of utmost importance.

979
01:04:58,160 --> 01:05:00,720
In the modern world, national identity.

980
01:05:00,800 --> 01:05:04,320
Myths usually serve
to reinforce national identity,

981
01:05:04,920 --> 01:05:06,360
in one sense or another.

982
01:05:06,440 --> 01:05:11,040
They can be negative myths
that recall disasters,

983
01:05:11,120 --> 01:05:14,640
so what is that myth for?
To encourage grief,

984
01:05:15,200 --> 01:05:17,320
what a number of hardships,
of disasters…

985
01:05:17,400 --> 01:05:19,360
How should we rebel against that?

986
01:05:19,440 --> 01:05:21,000
How should we build our identity?

987
01:05:21,080 --> 01:05:22,720
How should we defend ourselves?

988
01:05:23,560 --> 01:05:25,080
Yet, there are positive myths,

989
01:05:25,880 --> 01:05:28,560
how good we are, how we ruled the world.

990
01:05:28,640 --> 01:05:30,560
They serve their function as well.

991
01:05:32,120 --> 01:05:34,320
"There's been no serious
revolution in Spain

992
01:05:34,400 --> 01:05:36,320
until the present century (19th century),

993
01:05:36,400 --> 01:05:38,760
with the exception
of the war of the Holy Council

994
01:05:38,840 --> 01:05:40,720
in the time of Charles I, or Charles V,

995
01:05:40,800 --> 01:05:42,000
as the Germans call him."

996
01:05:42,080 --> 01:05:43,760
NINETEENTH CENTURY

997
01:05:43,840 --> 01:05:48,080
Remember the liberals were acting
at the beginning of the 19th century.

998
01:05:48,160 --> 01:05:50,640
At that time they had lived
through the French invasion,

999
01:05:51,200 --> 01:05:53,880
Fernando VII's absolutism…

1000
01:05:53,960 --> 01:05:58,120
In this sense, the comunero movement
became in the 19th century,

1001
01:05:58,200 --> 01:06:02,200
thanks to the liberals,
a liberating movement.

1002
01:06:02,280 --> 01:06:06,200
Heroes of freedom in the face of tyranny.

1003
01:06:06,280 --> 01:06:08,800
Therefore, all its main characters

1004
01:06:08,880 --> 01:06:13,800
are surrounded by an aura of heroism
and martyrdom at the same time.

1005
01:06:14,680 --> 01:06:16,200
So we look back.

1006
01:06:16,280 --> 01:06:19,240
The comunero movement
is seen as an ideal movement

1007
01:06:19,320 --> 01:06:22,720
in which we find this urban uprising

1008
01:06:22,800 --> 01:06:24,560
against the idea of the tyrant king.

1009
01:06:24,640 --> 01:06:29,520
This was also the movement
in which El Empecinado in 1821,

1010
01:06:29,600 --> 01:06:30,920
during the Liberal Triennium,

1011
01:06:31,000 --> 01:06:36,600
carried out this tribute
to the comuneros at Villalar.

1012
01:06:36,680 --> 01:06:39,400
DEFENDERS OF CASTILE'S FREEDOMS

1013
01:06:50,320 --> 01:06:53,920
Streets dedicated to Padilla, Bravo,
Maldonado, statues of the Comuneros,

1014
01:06:54,000 --> 01:06:57,600
poetic compositions emerged in every city…

1015
01:06:57,680 --> 01:07:01,560
Thus, the Comuneros
began to enter a new territory.

1016
01:07:01,640 --> 01:07:04,520
It's not a historical one,
but the mythical territory.

1017
01:07:09,960 --> 01:07:13,160
A myth is a narrative structure
that has three phases,

1018
01:07:13,640 --> 01:07:15,440
very simple each time:

1019
01:07:15,520 --> 01:07:18,440
paradise, fall, redemption.

1020
01:07:19,720 --> 01:07:25,600
The comuneros become a reference
for the departure from paradise,

1021
01:07:26,760 --> 01:07:28,240
the moment of the fall.

1022
01:07:29,120 --> 01:07:32,480
We Spaniards had been free and happy

1023
01:07:32,560 --> 01:07:38,200
until a certain point in time
when a foreign cause, naturally,

1024
01:07:38,280 --> 01:07:43,160
a foreign dynasty, the Habsburgs,
arrived and imposed absolutism on us.

1025
01:07:43,240 --> 01:07:47,040
And that's when disgrace began,
and that's when decadence began.

1026
01:07:47,120 --> 01:07:50,880
"Tactically a revolutionary
may have an interest,

1027
01:07:50,960 --> 01:07:54,760
not in hiding his intentions,
but in presenting them

1028
01:07:54,840 --> 01:07:57,280
as the mere extension of the past."

1029
01:07:57,360 --> 01:07:59,560
Myth makes things much easier.

1030
01:08:00,600 --> 01:08:02,960
If I introduce you to an innovation:

1031
01:08:03,800 --> 01:08:07,280
"You're eating in a way
that is contrary to your health,

1032
01:08:07,360 --> 01:08:10,360
and what you have to do
is to stop taking such and such

1033
01:08:10,440 --> 01:08:12,360
and eat in a completely different way,"

1034
01:08:12,440 --> 01:08:14,160
I'm proposing something very difficult.

1035
01:08:14,240 --> 01:08:16,120
But if what I say is:

1036
01:08:16,200 --> 01:08:19,279
"What you have to do is to go back
to your natural way of being,

1037
01:08:19,359 --> 01:08:21,439
to stop doing a series of absurd things

1038
01:08:21,520 --> 01:08:26,520
that are not like you,
that a foreign friend has taught you."

1039
01:08:26,600 --> 01:08:30,240
I'm selling you the product
in a much simpler way

1040
01:08:30,319 --> 01:08:31,359
rather than telling you,

1041
01:08:31,439 --> 01:08:33,800
"What you must do is
have a revolution in your life."

1042
01:08:33,880 --> 01:08:36,720
And that's what the liberals in Spain do.

1043
01:08:36,800 --> 01:08:40,399
At the Cortes of Cadiz
they draw up a completely modern,

1044
01:08:40,479 --> 01:08:43,560
totally revolutionary
and innovative constitution,

1045
01:08:43,640 --> 01:08:46,760
and yet they present it as,
"There's nothing new here,"

1046
01:08:47,359 --> 01:08:49,840
says Argüelles presenting
the Constitution to the Cortes.

1047
01:08:49,920 --> 01:08:53,439
What we do is to bring back
our old Spanish Constitution.

1048
01:08:53,520 --> 01:08:57,080
It's a way of presenting a revolution

1049
01:08:57,800 --> 01:09:00,439
as a return to our natural way of being.

1050
01:09:00,520 --> 01:09:03,840
TWENTIETH CENTURY

1051
01:09:03,920 --> 01:09:05,439
And not only the liberals.

1052
01:09:05,520 --> 01:09:10,240
If we read Azaña or the deputies
of the II Republic at the Cortes,

1053
01:09:10,319 --> 01:09:14,680
we see they also perceived
the comuneros as their forerunners,

1054
01:09:15,279 --> 01:09:18,800
and they saw themselves
as the ones who were finally fulfilling

1055
01:09:18,880 --> 01:09:21,479
the dream that the comuneros had tried

1056
01:09:22,160 --> 01:09:23,560
but failed to fulfill.

1057
01:09:23,640 --> 01:09:27,279
"(The Comuneros) Yes,
they wanted to be freedom fighters.

1058
01:09:27,359 --> 01:09:30,479
They wanted freedom
from Caesars' despotism,

1059
01:09:30,560 --> 01:09:34,520
from rule by favorites,
from the supremacy of one class."

1060
01:09:34,600 --> 01:09:35,960
Madrid's mayor, for example,

1061
01:09:36,040 --> 01:09:41,120
is the one who proposed
adding purple to the republican flag,

1062
01:09:41,680 --> 01:09:44,120
claiming that purple
was the color of Castile

1063
01:09:44,200 --> 01:09:45,600
and of the Castilian communards.

1064
01:09:46,560 --> 01:09:48,960
All evidence suggests
the comunero color was not purple,

1065
01:09:49,040 --> 01:09:51,600
but Castile's crimson red.

1066
01:09:51,680 --> 01:09:55,120
This myth of the communards
as freedom fighters

1067
01:09:55,200 --> 01:10:01,120
will be used by certain intellectuals
and politicians of Franco's regime,

1068
01:10:01,200 --> 01:10:03,800
especially Falangists, to denigrate

1069
01:10:03,880 --> 01:10:07,040
the War of the Communities
and the comunero movement.

1070
01:10:07,120 --> 01:10:11,400
Those intellectuals
who were questioning Franco's regime

1071
01:10:11,480 --> 01:10:14,280
will once again find in the comuneros

1072
01:10:14,360 --> 01:10:20,400
a historical example
of what they want Spain to be.

1073
01:10:20,480 --> 01:10:24,040
A modern Spain, a democratic Spain,

1074
01:10:24,760 --> 01:10:27,400
a Spain opposed
to the prevailing dictatorship.

1075
01:10:27,480 --> 01:10:29,800
AFTER...
CECILIA AND JOSÉ BARTOLOMÉ, 1983

1076
01:10:29,880 --> 01:10:32,440
Villalar, all political parties

1077
01:10:32,520 --> 01:10:34,920
celebrate a festival
in honor of the comuneros

1078
01:10:35,000 --> 01:10:38,560
who revolted against Charles V
450 years ago.

1079
01:10:40,040 --> 01:10:42,960
People who at Villalar
once again reclaimed

1080
01:10:43,040 --> 01:10:47,920
the comunero memory
as a sign or as a symbolic place

1081
01:10:48,000 --> 01:10:51,240
to demand more autonomy,
democracy and social justice.

1082
01:10:54,600 --> 01:10:56,960
They can simply be valid as a symbol,

1083
01:10:57,040 --> 01:10:59,320
without going into
further content or depth.

1084
01:11:00,800 --> 01:11:01,960
There goes the police.

1085
01:11:03,800 --> 01:11:06,480
They're coming now,
you can't get into the square now.

1086
01:11:07,360 --> 01:11:11,040
The myth of the comuneros was transformed

1087
01:11:11,120 --> 01:11:12,640
during the transition.

1088
01:11:12,720 --> 01:11:16,000
They introduced
the idea of decentralization.

1089
01:11:16,080 --> 01:11:21,240
It was also given a regionalist,
Castilianist component,

1090
01:11:21,320 --> 01:11:25,960
as it had a particular impact

1091
01:11:26,040 --> 01:11:29,080
on the territory that nowadays is

1092
01:11:29,160 --> 01:11:31,960
the Autonomous Community
of Castile and León.

1093
01:11:37,560 --> 01:11:39,560
Do you know who the comuneros were?

1094
01:11:39,640 --> 01:11:41,400
Do you know who the comuneros were?

1095
01:11:42,080 --> 01:11:45,120
Four men who fought
for the autonomy of Castile.

1096
01:11:45,200 --> 01:11:47,640
Neither historians
nor anyone else has yet agreed

1097
01:11:47,720 --> 01:11:50,680
on whether they were
really people who opposed progress

1098
01:11:50,760 --> 01:11:54,600
or whether they were progressive people,

1099
01:11:54,680 --> 01:11:58,320
but what matters is that at Villalar
an important symbol has emerged,

1100
01:11:58,400 --> 01:12:00,440
it's very interesting for it to continue

1101
01:12:00,520 --> 01:12:03,000
for the sake of boosting

1102
01:12:03,080 --> 01:12:06,600
Castile and Leon,
a region that's really in trouble.

1103
01:12:06,680 --> 01:12:09,120
From some ideological positions,

1104
01:12:09,200 --> 01:12:11,280
some people today

1105
01:12:12,160 --> 01:12:15,760
feel that these comuneros
are also their own predecessors.

1106
01:12:16,400 --> 01:12:17,920
TWENTY-FIRST CENTURY

1107
01:12:18,000 --> 01:12:21,840
Neither the silence was just
nor the praise was appropriate.

1108
01:12:21,920 --> 01:12:26,200
What is true is to see them
as people who fought

1109
01:12:26,280 --> 01:12:31,560
for modern ideas, ahead of their time,

1110
01:12:31,640 --> 01:12:35,080
political ideals
that they wanted to translate

1111
01:12:35,160 --> 01:12:38,680
into concrete political
and social projects.

1112
01:12:38,760 --> 01:12:43,160
When the current Constitution
was adopted in 1978,

1113
01:12:43,240 --> 01:12:48,560
the four core values of the Constitution:

1114
01:12:48,640 --> 01:12:51,800
freedom, equality, justice and pluralism,

1115
01:12:51,880 --> 01:12:56,040
these four values were the pillars
that upheld the comunero movement.

1116
01:12:56,720 --> 01:13:01,200
I honestly believe it has nothing
to envy the French Revolution,

1117
01:13:02,040 --> 01:13:06,040
the thing is that France always builds
extraordinary stories,

1118
01:13:06,120 --> 01:13:09,840
and I don't understand
why we haven't done it

1119
01:13:09,920 --> 01:13:12,080
having the intellectuals we've had.

1120
01:13:12,160 --> 01:13:15,640
I think it's time to start writing

1121
01:13:15,720 --> 01:13:18,760
the true story of what happened,

1122
01:13:18,840 --> 01:13:22,840
and then we'll understand
why we celebrate the 23rd.

1123
01:13:22,920 --> 01:13:29,560
The defeat is the excuse to celebrate
the spirit that inspired that revolution,

1124
01:13:29,640 --> 01:13:32,080
which is a spirit of struggle for freedom.

1125
01:13:32,160 --> 01:13:37,960
Above all, it was a vindication
of the political role of citizens

1126
01:13:38,040 --> 01:13:39,280
in their daily work.

1127
01:13:39,800 --> 01:13:42,040
Castile did not rise up again.

1128
01:13:42,120 --> 01:13:44,360
At least it didn't rise up again

1129
01:13:44,440 --> 01:13:48,080
with the strength with which
the comunero movement had done.

1130
01:13:49,320 --> 01:13:51,200
What if it had triumphed?

1131
01:13:53,680 --> 01:13:57,320
Since then Castile has not risen again

1132
01:13:58,200 --> 01:14:02,360
In the hands of a bastard king
Or a deceitful regent

1133
01:14:02,440 --> 01:14:07,360
Always longing for a Council
Or waiting for a captain

1134
01:14:08,520 --> 01:14:11,280
History, historical knowledge,

1135
01:14:11,360 --> 01:14:13,280
is a complex way of thinking.

1136
01:14:14,040 --> 01:14:17,560
Being able to exercise
that complex thinking

1137
01:14:17,640 --> 01:14:20,040
favors critical thinking,

1138
01:14:20,120 --> 01:14:24,560
and I believe critical thinking
is crucial for any society.

1139
01:14:24,640 --> 01:14:28,960
Some try to denigrate
or discredit the communities

1140
01:14:29,040 --> 01:14:31,520
by denying their revolutionary nature,

1141
01:14:32,080 --> 01:14:34,160
or stripping them
of their political substance…

1142
01:14:34,240 --> 01:14:36,360
These are not new strategies.

1143
01:14:36,440 --> 01:14:40,960
The communities have been
an ideological device

1144
01:14:41,040 --> 01:14:43,160
for interpreting not only the movement

1145
01:14:43,240 --> 01:14:45,240
but also Spain's entire history,

1146
01:14:45,320 --> 01:14:47,080
and continue to be so.

1147
01:14:47,160 --> 01:14:49,680
The comuneros argued
for the kingdom over the king,

1148
01:14:49,760 --> 01:14:52,360
because the king passes
and the kingdom remains.

1149
01:14:53,240 --> 01:14:55,880
That's a major political change.

1150
01:14:56,760 --> 01:15:00,560
We take off from a great lack
of knowledge of our political history.

1151
01:15:00,640 --> 01:15:04,160
Antonio Machado said
that when we think about the past

1152
01:15:04,240 --> 01:15:06,000
we find piles of hopes.

1153
01:15:06,080 --> 01:15:09,000
And those hopes may not have been
achieved, but they aren't failed.

1154
01:15:09,080 --> 01:15:13,600
A history without a record
of the vanquished hopes of our ancestors

1155
01:15:13,680 --> 01:15:17,320
is a history that will always be
in favor of the victors,

1156
01:15:17,400 --> 01:15:19,640
and therefore
of the current state of affairs

1157
01:15:19,720 --> 01:15:22,440
and therefore of the present dominations.

1158
01:15:22,520 --> 01:15:25,880
I have always been fascinated
by the subversive power of history.

1159
01:15:25,960 --> 01:15:28,800
Things happened one way
but could've happened differently,

1160
01:15:28,880 --> 01:15:34,200
there are always alternatives.
Hence the present can also be changed.

1161
01:15:34,880 --> 01:15:37,240
It could be positive to use this myth

1162
01:15:37,320 --> 01:15:41,040
to reinforce Spanish nationalism
in a liberal sense.

1163
01:15:41,120 --> 01:15:45,280
Whereas today, Spanish nationalism
is a myth that belongs to the right,

1164
01:15:45,360 --> 01:15:46,840
counter-revolutionary.

1165
01:15:46,920 --> 01:15:50,480
It could also be a positive thing
in the interest of freedom,

1166
01:15:50,560 --> 01:15:54,720
that is, Spain is a country
made up of free individuals,

1167
01:15:55,280 --> 01:15:57,880
who don't want to live
under an absolute monarchy,

1168
01:15:57,960 --> 01:16:00,880
who want to live
in a regime of controlled power.

1169
01:16:00,960 --> 01:16:04,920
Divided powers with a parliament
controlling the executive,

1170
01:16:05,000 --> 01:16:09,200
with citizens who have individual freedoms
and respect each other.

1171
01:16:09,280 --> 01:16:14,920
It has incredibly
revolutionary connotations

1172
01:16:15,000 --> 01:16:16,480
then and now.

1173
01:16:19,440 --> 01:16:25,040
"All men should eat,
but all men should also know.

1174
01:16:25,120 --> 01:16:30,920
Otherwise they become
machines at the service of the State,

1175
01:16:31,000 --> 01:16:35,080
they become slaves
of a terrible social organization."

1176
01:16:35,160 --> 01:16:37,680
Five hundred years ago there were people

1177
01:16:38,360 --> 01:16:42,080
who developed
ground-breaking projects for their time,

1178
01:16:42,640 --> 01:16:46,200
which centuries later came to prevail.

1179
01:16:46,280 --> 01:16:48,840
We can learn from the communities' war

1180
01:16:48,920 --> 01:16:52,480
that not only the great names
in history are important,

1181
01:16:52,560 --> 01:16:55,040
that we as citizens, the working class,

1182
01:16:55,120 --> 01:16:57,240
also have a historical responsibility,

1183
01:16:57,320 --> 01:16:59,920
and our unity can achieve great things.

1184
01:17:00,000 --> 01:17:03,560
They may be achieved or not,
but we can propose and fight for them.

1185
01:17:04,280 --> 01:17:06,280
Therefore, to speak of community

1186
01:17:06,360 --> 01:17:11,200
is to speak of the need to fight
for a better social outlook.

1187
01:17:11,280 --> 01:17:15,000
That of the common creation
of a better future

1188
01:17:15,080 --> 01:17:17,080
for all citizens,

1189
01:17:17,160 --> 01:17:19,640
even with greater control over power.

1190
01:17:21,240 --> 01:17:24,800
They tried to make a better world,
if we understand a better world

1191
01:17:24,880 --> 01:17:27,000
as one in which individuals

1192
01:17:27,080 --> 01:17:32,000
are not subject
to the arbitrary rule of the powerful.

1193
01:17:38,240 --> 01:17:40,720
They say if you lie down in the fields

1194
01:17:41,360 --> 01:17:43,880
You can still hear
The rumbling of horses

1195
01:17:45,240 --> 01:17:48,280
They say that the fields
Howl and blaspheme

1196
01:17:48,840 --> 01:17:51,120
That the sleeping gods
Bleed in the ruins

1197
01:17:51,800 --> 01:17:53,920
A violet syrup that glistens

1198
01:17:55,160 --> 01:17:57,640
That shines along roads and paths

1199
01:17:57,720 --> 01:18:00,200
That blinds the eagles in the clouds

1200
01:18:01,160 --> 01:18:03,680
They say the frost glows tenderly

1201
01:18:03,760 --> 01:18:06,960
Because it still remembers
The warm trembling of bodies

1202
01:18:08,120 --> 01:18:12,200
That the flint sings
And recites a poem of flame and future

1203
01:18:12,760 --> 01:18:15,160
That the tinder smiles and muses

1204
01:18:15,240 --> 01:18:18,800
Its tune of freedom, of fire and smoke

1205
01:18:19,600 --> 01:18:23,200
The shepherds say that a storm of seeds

1206
01:18:23,280 --> 01:18:26,000
Can already be glimpsed in January

1207
01:18:26,600 --> 01:18:29,800
A storm of kisses and fists

1208
01:18:30,680 --> 01:18:35,200
A fraternal and communal thunder

1209
01:18:39,360 --> 01:18:43,200
Who knows if the storks
Will return for San Blas

1210
01:18:44,040 --> 01:18:48,200
If the March frosts
Will carry away the buds

1211
01:18:48,880 --> 01:18:52,720
If the comunero flames
Will crackle again

1212
01:18:54,320 --> 01:18:58,200
The older the tinder
The easier it will ignite

1213
01:18:58,880 --> 01:19:02,720
The older the tinder
And the harder the flint

1214
01:19:03,880 --> 01:19:08,760
Even if the pine groves burned
We'd still have the holm oak grove