Martim Soares
Trovador medieval

Biographical Note:

Portuguese troubadour, documented in the period between 1220 and 1260. Natural of Riba de Lima, as stated in the rubric accompanying one of his compositions, region where he would have been born in the early 13th century, and where he bears witness to a document in the aforementioned date, Martim Soares certainly belonged to a gentry family, possibly the Ribeiro, as José Augusto Pizarro suggests1. Although there aren’t any solid data regarding his life, one Martim Soares, “trobador”, certainly our author, appears as witness in a document from 1241, a sale made by one Martim Garcia and his wife to the Santa Cruz monastery. Based on this document, Resende de Oliveira2 believes that Martim Soares would have been a vassal of Martim Garcia de Parada, an important character of the court of Sancho II, whose side he takes during the civil war that led to his deposition (1245-1247). The troubadour may, then, have left with him to Castilla, together with the deposed King, and should have stayed there for a few years, as his connections to the troubadours and minstrels from the circle of Alfonso X testify.
Actually, if the stay of Martim Soares in Castilla seems indisputable, it should however be said that one of his songs, clearly composed before the christian conquest of Jaén (1246), seems to indicate that the departure of the troubadour to the neighboring kingdom would have happened even before the portuguese civil war. Nevertheless, in an undetermined date, maybe around 1256, he returned to Portugal where, before 1262, he made an important donation of assets in Rio Maior to the monastery of Alcobaça. It’s possible that he passed away also before this date, maybe even in the final years of the previous decade.
He was married to Maria Soares, a lady from Santarém, region where he seems to have settled. The Books of Lineages, although his name is absent, mention that João Martins, his son, and equally documented in the region, was also a troubadour (LL30G4), Barring any confusion with his father, João Martins’s compositions have not reached us. It should be added, however, that João Martins seems to have been close with the magnate and troubadour Dom João Peres de Aboim (as shown by some documents mentioned by Azevedo3), a circunstance thah may indicate that Martim Soares may also have been.
It should also be added that the attributive rubric of the troubadour Garcia Soares mentions him as brother of Martim Soares, a kinship contested by Resende de Oliveira2 (by the position occupied by the songs of Garcia Soares in the italian aphographs). Pizarro, however, in the aforementioned note, believes this kinship to be possible, if they both were part of the Ribeiro lineage.

References

1 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. 76, nota 48.
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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 Azevedo, Pedro de (1898), "O trovador Martim Soárez e seu filho João Martinz", in Revista Lusitana, V , Lisboa.
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