Sancho III of Navarre

Sancho Garcés III ( 992–996 – 18 October 1035), also known as Sancho the Great, was the King of Pamplona from 1004 until his death in 1035. He also ruled the County of Aragon and by marriage the counties of Castile, Álava and Monzón. He later added the counties of Sobrarbe (1015), Ribagorza (1018) and Cea (1030), and would intervene in the Kingdom of León, taking its eponymous capital city in 1034. He was the eldest son of García Sánchez II and his wife Jimena Fernández. Biography Birth and succession The year of Sancho's birth is not known, but it is no earlier than 992 and no later than 996. His parents were García Sánchez II the Tremulous and Jimena Fernández, daughter of Fernando Bermúdez, count of Cea on the Leonese frontier. García and Jimena are first recorded as married in 992, but there is no record of their son Sancho until 996. The first record of the future king is a diploma of his father's granting the village of Terrero to the monastery of San Millán de la Cogolla. The king describes Sancho merely as "my son" (filius meus). The same diploma also shows the future duke of Gascony, Sancho VI, at the court of Pamplona.