Author: Anonimous
- Poetry / Essay
- Austral
- ISBN: 9788467034059
- Release Date: 01-01-1970
-Reviewed by: Eduardo de Lamadrid

The great medieval Spanish epic, composed by an unknown Castilian juglar (minstrel) in about 1140, but which is preserved in a single copy of 1307 transcribed by one Per Abbat, of whom nothing is known. The reconstructed epic known as the Cantar de Mío Cid (Song of My Cid) is based on other historical materials and is of much later date. The plot of the Poem of the Cid is divided into three parts: the banishment of Rodrigo Díaz (El Cid) by his sovereign; the Cid's victory over the Moors at Valencia, reconciliation with the king, and marriage of his daughters into royalty; and the desertion and cruel treatment of his daughters and trial by combat of the sons-in-law, resulting in the vindication of the Cid's honor. The oldest monument of Castilian literature, the Poem of the Cid is admirable for its realism, its comparative historical fidelity, its fusion of various themes into a unified whole, and as the first and best example of the Spanish "cantar de gesta".