Following the Christian conquest of Toledo in 1085, the ensuing unsuccessful attempts by North-African Almoravids and Almohads to take the city turned the territory of the inner plateau south of the Tagus subject to extreme warfare for about a century and a half. The military insecurity south of the Tagus constrained the colonisation process undertaken by the new Castilian rulers, underpinning as overarching features the scantiness of population, a ranching-oriented economy, and the leading role of the military orders in the process. The latter controlled over 20,000 km2 in the region of "La Mancha", managed from just 25 castles. The weak Christian grip over the territory collapsed after their crushing defeat to the Almohads in Alarcos (1195). Christian control south of the Tagus could only start to consolidate after the 1212 battle of Las Navas. The weak settlement and insecurity also allowed for a case of countryside banditry (the so-called "golfines") in the area of the Montes de Toledo until its progressive quelling, already effective by the late 13th century.