Alfonso Téllez de Meneses

Coat of arms of the Téllez de Meneses family

Alfonso Téllez de Meneses (* around 1161, † 1230) belonged to the uppermost nobility of Castile ( ricohombre ). His sphere of influence extended mainly over the fertile area of ​​the Tierra de Campos - due to his family inheritance or through royal fiefs and donations, he was landlord ( señor ) of Meneses , Cea , Grajal , Cabezón, Villalba , Montalbán , Tudela and others , he shared with Gonzalo Rodríguez Girón rule over Carrión ; At times he also ruled over Madrid, which was then still insignificant . Due to his second wife's dowry, he was also the landlord of the Portuguese-Spanish border town of Alburquerque .

origin

The surname "Meneses" possibly suggests an origin from the Valle de Mena in the far northeast of Castile. As part of the reconquest ( reconquista ) and repopulation ( repoblación ) of the areas north of the Duero , the ancestors came to the fertile land of the Tierra de Campos in the 10th century . Alfonso's parents were Tello Pérez de Meneses and Teresa Pérez, who jointly donated property and money to the Cistercian Order for the construction of the Santa María monastery near Gradefes , whose first abbess was the sister-in-law of Alfonso Téllez de Meneses.

Life

In 1209, King Alfonso VIII of Castile ceded the city of Montalbán to Alfonso Téllez; a year later, more lands were added. Together with the Order of Calatrava , he devoted himself to the resettlement of a large area on the Río Guadiana . Around the year 1213 he married Teresa Sánchez, a natural daughter of King Sanchos I of Portugal , as a second marriage , which also made him landlord of what is now the border town of Alburquerque . After the battle of Las Navas de Tolosa (1212), which was victorious for the Christians , he received the estate ( villa ) Palazuelos from Alfonso VIII on July 28, 1213 , which he and his wife transferred to the Cistercian monastery of Valbuena three days later . In February 1216 he attended a meeting in Valladolid that opposed the reign of Álvaro Núñez de Lara . Around 1218 he began building a border fortress ( castillo ) in Alburquerque. Alfonso Téllez founded a hospital for the poor in the city of Talavera in 1226. In 1230 he accompanied Ferdinand III. on the occasion of his coronation to Toro ; he died on the way.

His grave, that of his second wife and several of his children is in the Cistercian monastery of Palazuelos, which he and his wife founded . However, the most beautiful sarcophagi are now in the Diocesan and Cathedral Museum of Valladolid .

literature

• Modesto Salcedo Tapia: La familia Téllez de Meneses en los tronos de Castilla y Portugal. Institución Tello Téllez de Meneses CECEL-CSIC, y Diputación de Palencia, Departamento de Cultura, Palencia 1999, ISBN 848173-070-X .
• Andrés Barón Faraldo: Grupos y dominios aristocráticos en la Tierra de Campos oriental, Siglos X-XIII. Monografías, Palencia 2006, ISBN 84-8173-122-6 .