But, as Nora Berend shows in her enthralling study, “El Cid: The Life and Afterlife of a Medieval Mercenary,” this hasn’t prevented an outlaw, freebooter and warlord — as differing ...

Elsewhere, Ms. Berend wrings her hands over the lack of “agency” accorded by the old poets and playwrights to Jimena, El Cid’s wife. The author complains of the portrayal of women in the sto ...

Kennedy did of “El Cid” (1961). As Nora Berend tells us in her own “El Cid,” a biography of the man she calls a “medieval mercenary,” a person who was notably instrumental in the ...