Fernão Rodrigues Redondo
Trovador medieval

Biographical Note:

Portuguese troubadour, active during the reign of King Denis, to whom he was chief-bailiff between 1317 and 1318. Son of the troubadour Rodrigo Anes Redondo and Mor Fernandes de Curutelo, he may have been born in Castile, where his father lived for many years following the deposition of Sancho II, of whom the Redondos were supporters. Of that period in the late 13th century we don’t have, however, any references. The first time that Fernão Rodrigues appears documented is in 1294, in the will of Dom Sancho Peres Froião, bishop of Oporto1. Meanwhile, he marries in the Beira, the region where his family originates, with Marinha Afonso de Arganil, therefore adding the lordship of Arganil to the paternal heritage and also that of Pombeiro da Beira, making him one of the most powerful lords of the region. It is in São Pedro de Arganil that Dom Fernão and his wife have a funerary chapel built, which indicates that they may have planned to stay in the region. But the death of his father in Santarém (probably in 1314) and the assets he inherits in that town, together with the role of mordomo-mor that he would perform shortly thereafter, must have altered their plans, since, from that date on, we find him settled in Santarém, where he eventually died and where he is buried, together with his wife, in the church of São Nicolau. As the couple had no children, Fernão Rodrigues, at the time of his death, leaves the lordships of Arganil and Pombeiro to Prince João Afonso, bastard son of King Denis2, to whose house he must have belonged. Like his father at the end of his life, Fernão Rodrigues Redondo must have had a very close relationship to the monarch and even with his family, judging from the fact that Queen Isabel of Aragon was one of the executors of his wife’s will. Frei Francisco Brandão also recounts an episode occurring a few years after his death, in 1324, and whereby King Denis, traveling to Santarém and finding his palace occupied by his heir, Prince Afonso, with whom at the time he was in serious dispute, stays in the house of the Redondos (whose loyalty to the monarch seems to be, in fact, constant).

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. 345.

2 Pizarro, José Augusto (1999), Linhagens medievais portuguesas: genealogias e estratégias 1279-1325, vol. I, Porto, Centro de Estudos de Genealogia, Heráldica e História da Família da Universidade Moderna, p. 365.
      Go to web page