strawberrychoux:

The Mouth is the Front Gate to all Misfortune: Inês De Castro

Queen Inês De Castro of Portugal.

 

Inês  is possibly one of the most interesting Queens in all of history because she was already dead before she was crowned. Lover of Dom Pedro, heir to the Portugal throne, they met when she served as Lady-in-waiting to his first wife Dona Constança, the daughter of a high class Spaniard. It is said that Dom Pedro fell in love with her the first time he laid eyes on her. Dom Pedro’s father King Alfonso IV (who has been believed to have never fathered an illegitimate child) was infuriated and exiled Inês until the death of Constança. Happy for a time Inês bore four children to Dom Pedro, Alfonso (who died as an infant), Beatrix, Joâo and Dinis. They remained deeply in love and very public about their relationship, something that was never accepted by King Alfonso who felt their relationship could only lead to war between Portugal and Spain.

King Alfonso turned to his advisors, looking for a solution. And the only one that seemed likely to prevent any future wars was possibly the cruelest solution of all, to murder Inês. The date was set for a time when Dom Pedro was away on business. Alfonso sent three men; Diogo Lopes, Pacheco Álvaro Gonçalves, and Pêro Coelho to take Inês’ life. She was said to have pled for mercy but her cries went unheeded.

The moment the news of Inês’ death reached Dom Pedro, he flew into an uncontrollable rage. Pedro had the backing of Inês brothers and together, with their army, they stormed across Portugal, eventually arriving at Porto, where they sieged the city. After a meeting with his father Pedro vowed to forgive his father and his accomplices for the heinous act that they’d committed against him. However, Pedro’s promise lasted only as long as his father remained alive.

Two years later, after the death of his father, Dom Pedro succeeded the throne of Portugal. Once he was King, he exacted a terrible revenge on those that had taken his beloved Inês from him. King Pedro’s revenge was as swift as it was cruel. He only managed to capture two of the assassins. The man who escaped Pedro’s wrath had already fled to the safety of France long before. The two men that Pedro did capture suffered an unusually torturous death, if not a symbolic one. Pedro had both men killed in a way that resembled his own grief at the death of his beloved.

Whilst sat observing, to the front of the Palace, Pedro had the hearts of the two men ripped out, one through the chest, the other through the back. On the 12^th June 1361, King Pedro declared that he’d lawfully married Inês, in secret in Bragança, prior to her death. Pedro then had Inês exhumed and reburied as befits a Queen of the realm.

Inês de Castro became a Queen after her death and was finally laid to rest in the Monastery of Alcobaça on the 2^ndApril 1361