Estêvão Peres Froião
Trovador medieval


Nationality: Portuguesa

Biographical Note:

Portuguese troubadour from the Pereira lineage, probably a native of the village of Froião, in the Paredes de Coura region, at Alto Minho. He was the son of Pero Peres Homem, a knight present at the conquest of Seville (1248). Although there aren’t any documents stating it, it’s nevertheless possible that Estevão Peres, at a very young age, accompanied his father, since his path is mostly accounted for in Castile, where he is documented by the final years of Alfonso X’s rule (1283), but more thoroughly in that of his son Sancho IV and yet in the following one of Fernando IV. In fact, having taken the side of Prince Sancho in the conflicts the heir held with his father Alfonso X, we find him a judge in Salamanca, chief-bailiff for the same prince in Leon and Asturias (1283) and, after the ascent of the prince to the throne, again chief-bailiff of Leon and Asturias (1287-1289). Between 1290 and 1293 he performs important political and diplomatic missions1 on behalf of Sancho IV, and from that year on he also bears the title of adelantado of Leon, a position he maintained until the end of 1296, after the death of Sancho IV (1295). He nevertheless continues to play a relevant role in the court of his successor, Fernando IV, leading some diplomatic missions1 (namely to King Denis of Portugal) and signing several documents. Having vanished from the royal Castilian chancellery from February 1305 on, he must have died shortly thereafter2. He was twice married, first with the Portuguese Teresa Aires Queixada, and then with the Leonese Maria Ramires de Cifontes, widow of Pero Pais de Asturias. It should be added that he was the brother of the bishop of Oporto, Dom Sancho Peres, who leaves him a considerable sum of money in his will (1300), apparently the result of a loan that the troubadour would have made to the Portuguese King (most probably King Denis). It should also be added that on his mother’s side (Teresa Anes Redondo), he was a nephew of the troubadour Rodrigo Anes Redondo.


References

1 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, p. 333.

2 Arbor Aldea, Mariña (2008), "Estevan Perez, merino maor por el Infante don Sancho en terra de Leon e de Asturias... Edición e anotación da súa cantiga 'Senhor, se o outro mundo pasar' (B 923, V 511)", in Revista Galega de Filoloxía, 9 .

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Senhor, se o outro mundo passar
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