Alfonso VII (Spanish king of Castile and León)

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Alfonso VII (Alfonso the Emperor), 1104–57, Spanish king of Castile and León (1126–57), son and successor of Urraca. He recovered the places in Castile that his stepfather, Alfonso I of Aragón, had occupied and soon gained supremacy over the other Christian states in Spain. In 1135 he had himself crowned emperor in León. His many victories over the Moors had no permanent results; his most famous conquests, Córdoba (1146) and Almería (1147), were soon lost again. Alfonso left Castile to his son Sancho III (reigned 1157–58) and León to his son Ferdinand II.