Rodrigo Anes de Vasconcelos
Trovador medieval


Nationality: Portuguesa

Biographical Note:

Portuguese troubadour, active in the second half of the 13th century. Coming from a lineage established in Santa Maria dos Ferreiros (Amares), the place where he was raised, he was son of João Pires de Vasconcelos, the “Tenreiro”, and Maria Soares Coelha, sister of the troubadour João Soares Coelho. About his father, the Book of lineages of Count Dom Pedro (36E9) extends a detailed narrative regarding his repeated failure to appear before a murder charge, to be handled by the King Sancho II (that eventually finds him guilty). This story seems, in fact, to confirm the suggestion by Carolina de Michäelis1 that the troubadour’s father would equally be the bezerro tenreiro to whom Afonso Mendes de Besteiro addresses a satirical song, where he alludes to his cowardice in the Andalucian battlefields. The family seems, moreover, somewhat turbulent: one of his brothers, Pero Anes, after his marriage, takes as concubine a first cousin, and the troubadour himself, together with the same Pero Anes, are accused of abuses on lands belonging to college of Braga’s cathedral in a letter by Afonso III, dated 12772. Another of his brothers, however, is the Bishop of Lisbon, Estêvão Anes (1284-1289). And two of the troubadour’s sons, among the ten which would have resulted from his marriage with Mecia Rodrigues de Penela, will occupy relevant roles in the court of King Denis. One of them, Mem Rodrigues de Vasconcelos, as Meirinho-mor of the kingdom, and the other, Nuno Rodrigues, as mordomo for Dom Afonso Sanches, the King’s favorite bastard son. As Dona Mecia is already documented as a widow in March 12973, Rodrigo Anes should have died shortly before this date.


References

1 Vasconcelos, Carolina Michaëlis de (1990), Cancioneiro da Ajuda, vol. II, Lisboa, Imprensa nacional - Casa da Moeda (reimpressão da edição de Halle, 1904), p. 562, nota 2.

2 Oliveira, António Resende de (1994), Depois do espectáculo trovadoresco. A estrutura dos cancioneiros peninsulares e as recolhas dos séculos XIII e XIV, Lisboa, Edições Colibri.

3 Pizarro, José Augusto (1999), Linhagens medievais portuguesas: genealogias e estratégias 1279-1325, vol. II, Porto, Centro de Estudos de Genealogia, Heráldica e História da Família da Universidade Moderna, p. 832.
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