Individual Details
Teresa of Castilla and León
(1080 - 1 Nov 1130)
Teresa was born about 1080, the illegitimate daughter of Alfonso VI 'the Brave', king of Castile and León, and his mistress Jimena Munoz. In 1094 her father married her to Henri de Bourgogne, son of Henri de Bourgogne and a daughter, possibly called Sybille, of Berenguer Ramon VI 'el Curvo', conde de Barcelona. The bridegroom was nephew to Alfonso's queen Constance de Bourgogne, a brother of Eudes I, duc de Bourgogne, and a descendant of the kings of France in the male line. Henri was providing military assistance to his father-in-law against the Muslims on the Portuguese march. The county of Portugal, the southern part of the realm of Alfonso's assassinated brother Garcia, king of Galicia, was Teresa's dowry, establishing Henri as regent in the county of Portugal, her personal fief, until her coming of age. They had four children of whom Afonso, the future Afonso I 'o Conquistador', king of Portugal, would have progeny.
At first Henri was a vassal of his father-in-law, but when Alfonso VI died in 1109 leaving everything to his daughter Urraca of Castile and León, Henri invaded León, hoping to add it to his lands. When he died in 1112, Teresa was a young widow, and left to deal with the military and political situation. She took on the responsibility of government, and occupied herself at first mainly with her southern lands, that had only recently been reconquered from the Moors as far as the Mondego River. In recognising her victory in defending Coimbra, she was called 'Queen' by Pope Paschal II, and in light of this recognition she appears in her documents as 'Daughter of Alfonso and elected by God', explicitly being called Queen in a document from 1117, leading some to refer to her as the first monarch of Portugal. In 1116, in an effort to expand her power, Teresa fought her half-sister and queen, Urraca of Castile and León. They fought again in 1120, as she continued to pursue a larger share in the Leónese inheritance, and to that end she allied herself as a widow to the most powerful Galician nobleman Fernando Peres de Trava, who had rejected his first wife for her and served Teresa on her southern border of the Mondego. In 1121 she was besieged and captured at Lanhoso, on her northern border with Galicia, fighting her sister Urraca. A peace was negotiated with the help of the archbishops of Santiago de Compostela and Braga. The terms included that Teresa would go free and hold the county of Portugal as a fief of León, as she had first received it.
By 1128 the archbishop of Braga and the main Portuguese feudal nobles had had enough of Teresa's persistent Galician alliance, which the archbishop of Braga feared could favour the ecclesiastical pretensions of his new rival, the Galician archbishop of Santiago de Compostela, Diego Gelmirez, who had just started to assert his pretensions to an alleged discovery of relics of Saint James (Santiago) in his town, as his way to gain power and riches over the other cathedrals in the Iberian Peninsula.
The Portuguese lords rebelled, and Teresa was deposed after a short civil war. Teresa's son and heir Afonso defeated her troops near Guimaraes and led her, along with the count of Trava and their children, into exile in the kingdom of Galicia, near the Portuguese border, where the Trava family had founded the monastery of Toxas Altas. Teresa died soon afterwards on 11 November 1130, and was succeeded by Afonso.
Source: Leo van de Pas
At first Henri was a vassal of his father-in-law, but when Alfonso VI died in 1109 leaving everything to his daughter Urraca of Castile and León, Henri invaded León, hoping to add it to his lands. When he died in 1112, Teresa was a young widow, and left to deal with the military and political situation. She took on the responsibility of government, and occupied herself at first mainly with her southern lands, that had only recently been reconquered from the Moors as far as the Mondego River. In recognising her victory in defending Coimbra, she was called 'Queen' by Pope Paschal II, and in light of this recognition she appears in her documents as 'Daughter of Alfonso and elected by God', explicitly being called Queen in a document from 1117, leading some to refer to her as the first monarch of Portugal. In 1116, in an effort to expand her power, Teresa fought her half-sister and queen, Urraca of Castile and León. They fought again in 1120, as she continued to pursue a larger share in the Leónese inheritance, and to that end she allied herself as a widow to the most powerful Galician nobleman Fernando Peres de Trava, who had rejected his first wife for her and served Teresa on her southern border of the Mondego. In 1121 she was besieged and captured at Lanhoso, on her northern border with Galicia, fighting her sister Urraca. A peace was negotiated with the help of the archbishops of Santiago de Compostela and Braga. The terms included that Teresa would go free and hold the county of Portugal as a fief of León, as she had first received it.
By 1128 the archbishop of Braga and the main Portuguese feudal nobles had had enough of Teresa's persistent Galician alliance, which the archbishop of Braga feared could favour the ecclesiastical pretensions of his new rival, the Galician archbishop of Santiago de Compostela, Diego Gelmirez, who had just started to assert his pretensions to an alleged discovery of relics of Saint James (Santiago) in his town, as his way to gain power and riches over the other cathedrals in the Iberian Peninsula.
The Portuguese lords rebelled, and Teresa was deposed after a short civil war. Teresa's son and heir Afonso defeated her troops near Guimaraes and led her, along with the count of Trava and their children, into exile in the kingdom of Galicia, near the Portuguese border, where the Trava family had founded the monastery of Toxas Altas. Teresa died soon afterwards on 11 November 1130, and was succeeded by Afonso.
Source: Leo van de Pas
Events
| Birth | 1080 | ||||
| Marriage | 1093 | Henri de Bourgogne, Count of Portugal | |||
| Death | 1 Nov 1130 |
Families
| Spouse | Henri de Bourgogne, Count of Portugal (1069 - 1112) |
| Child | Alfonso I (Henriques) King of Portugal (1109 - 1185) |
| Father | Alfonso VI King of Castilla (1039 - 1109) |
| Mother | Ximena Munoz (1060 - 1128) |