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Gutierre (or Guter) Fernández (''
floruit
''Floruit'' (; abbreviated fl. or occasionally flor.; from Latin for "they flourished") denotes a date or period during which a person was known to have been alive or active. In English, the unabbreviated word may also be used as a noun indicatin ...
'' 1084–1117) was a
Leonese nobleman who served as the
majordomo
A majordomo is a person who speaks, makes arrangements, or takes charge for another. Typically, this is the highest (''major'') person of a household (''domūs'' or ''domicile'') staff, a head servant who acts on behalf of the owner of a large ...
(1110–17) of
Queen Urraca
Queen or QUEEN may refer to:
Monarchy
* Queen regnant, a female monarch of a Kingdom
** List of queens regnant
* Queen consort, the wife of a reigning king
* Queen dowager, the widow of a king
* Queen mother, a queen dowager who is the mothe ...
until he was removed after imprisoning the queen's lover.
Early years
Gutierre was the son of Fernando Ermíldez, lord of
Val de Trigueros, and Juliana. Gutierre's family had lands in the valley of the
Pisuerga
The Pisuerga is a river in northern Spain, the Duero's second largest tributary. It rises in the Cantabrian Mountains in the province of Palencia, autonomous region of Castile and León.
Its traditional source is called Fuente Cobre, but it has b ...
, and they were closely allied with Count
Pedro Ansúrez
Pedro Ansúrez (''floruit'' 1065–1117; died probably 9 September 1118) was a Kingdom of Castile, Castilian nobleman, count of Liébana, Saldaña, Palencia, Saldaña and Carrión de los Condes, Carrión in the closing decades of the eleventh cent ...
and his family, contributing to Pedro's foundation of
Valladolid
Valladolid () is a Municipalities of Spain, municipality in Spain and the primary seat of government and de facto capital of the Autonomous communities of Spain, autonomous community of Castile and León. It is also the capital of the province o ...
, and in 1112 he witnessed two donations of Pedro Ansúrez to the monastery of
San Isidoro de Dueñas. Gutierre's date of birth is unknown. His parents name him in an act of 1084, and he was an adult in 1086, when he signed as a witness to a royal
charter
A charter is the grant of authority or rights, stating that the granter formally recognizes the prerogative of the recipient to exercise the rights specified. It is implicit that the granter retains superiority (or sovereignty), and that the rec ...
. He visited the court of Alfonso VI in 1089, where he subscribed to a royal charter. His brother, Ermeíldo Fernández, had a palace in Val de Trigueros in 1095. They had four sisters: Urraca (an abbess), Mayor, María and Munia. All six siblings gathered in 1101 to make a donation to the
Abbey of Sahagún.
Majordomo
Gutierre is first mentioned as "court administrator" (''villicus curie'') in a document of 15 October 1110. In subsequent documents of that year he is called ''villicus palacii'' (26 December) and ''pallicu vilicus'' (30 December), both meaning "palace administrator". The first charter in which he bears the title majordomo (''maiordomus palacii'') dates to 18 January 1111. Throughout 1111 he is usually titled this way: "majordomo in the
oyalcourt". In a royal charter of 19 September 1111 he uses the unusual sobriquet ''Miennaia'' before his name. This name, popularised by the ''
Cantar de Mio Cid'' for
Álvar Fáñez ''Minaya'', is a mix of Romance and Basque parts meaning "my brother". It might have been chosen as an exoticism to demonstrate the culture and prestige of the queen's court. One royal charter of 13 March 1115 refers to Gutierre as simply the steward (''dapifer'').
Between 1112 and 1114 three surviving documents all explicitly describe Gutierre as majordomo "of the queen" or "in the queen's court". As the queen's majordomo, Gutierre was usually at court and is often found in the centre of the kingdom, as on 15 October 1116, when he witnessed a donation to the important monastery of
Sahagún
Sahagún () is a town and municipality of Spain, part of the autonomous community of Castile and León and the province of León. It is the main populated place in the Leonese part of the Tierra de Campos natural region.
Sahagún contains some ...
. He then travelled to the eastern border of the kingdom, to witness a donation to
Santa María de Nájera on 22 January 1117. There is no further record of him in contemporary documents after this, and he was replaced as majordomo by Jimeno López. The reason for his downfall is described in the ''
Historia Compostellana
The (fully titled in la, De rebus gestis D. Didaci Gelmirez, primi Compostellani Archiepiscopi) is an anonymously-written historical chronicle based on the relation of events by a writer in the immediate circle of Diego Gelmírez, second bisho ...
'' ("History of
he Diocese ofCompostela"):
At that time Gutierre Fernández captured Count Pedro González, and held him prisoner in the castle Mansilla. This Count Pedro, it was said, was bound by the strongest chain of love to Queen Urraca, from whom he held Castile and no small part of Campaña. Because of this, his capture produced sorrow and sadness in the queen.[ Canal Sánchez-Pagín 2003, p. 60: ''Eodem tempore Guterrus Fredenandiz comitem Petrum Gundisalviz ceperat, et in castello Massell e eum captum tenebat. Comes iste Petrus, ut rumor aiebat, firmissima amoris catena Urracae reginae obsequi solitus erat, et ab ea Castellam et non modicam partem Campaniae tenebat. Ob hoc eius captio moerorum atque tristitiam Reginae generaverat.'']
Pedro González de Lara
Pedro González de Lara (died 16 October 1130) was a Castilian magnate. He served Alfonso VI as a young man, and later became the lover of Alfonso's heiress, Queen Urraca. He may have joined the First Crusade in the following of Raymond IV of Tou ...
was reputed to be the queen's lover, and his influence on her aroused opposition to their relationship among the high nobility. The period of his imprisonment at
Mansilla de las Mulas
Mansilla de las Mulas (), ''Mansiella'' in Leonese language, is a municipality located in the province of León, Castile and León, Spain. According to the 2010 census (INE), the municipality has a population of 1,913 inhabitants.
The town is on ...
was short, but there is disagreement as to the year. In context, the ''Historia'' places it in 1119, but if the reference to "that time" (''eodem tempore'') is read more loosely, then the events fit much better in 1117, when Gutierre disappears from the record for a time. If it occurred in 1119, it must have been between 26 March and 30 June, the only period when Pedro is absent from the queen's charters. Gutierre's final recorded act was to witness another donation by Pedro Ansúrez to San Isidoro de Dueñas on 4 July 1117, which was probably after Pedro González's release. The proximity of Mansilla to León (it is twenty miles to the south) and the close relationship between Gutierre and the powerful Ansúrez family both before and after indicate that the ephemeral ''coup'' had substantial support in the kingdom. The historian Bernard Reilly, believe the episode to have taken place in 1119, associates the fighting in León (recorded in the ''
Annales Complutenses
The ''Anales castellanos segundos'' are a set of Latin annals compiled in the mid or late twelfth century in Castile, covering the period from the nativity of Jesus to the death of Queen Urraca in 1126 (in the edition of Flórez) or to 1110 (in t ...
'') on 18 July that year, when the queen was briefly besieged in her palace, with its final defeat.
Confusion
There is confusion in later sources between Gutierre Fernández, majordomo of Urraca, and
Gutierre Fernández de Castro
Gutierre Fernández de Castro ( flourished 1124–66) was a nobleman and military commander from the Kingdom of Castile. His career in royal service corresponds exactly with the reigns of Alfonso VII (1126–57) and his son Sancho III (1157–58). ...
, later majordomo of
Alfonso VII
Alphons (Latinized ''Alphonsus'', ''Adelphonsus'', or ''Adefonsus'') is a male given name recorded from the 8th century (Alfonso I of Asturias, r. 739–757) in the Christian successor states of the Visigothic kingdom in the Iberian peninsula. ...
. In the thirteenth century,
Lucas of Tuy
Lucas or LUCAS may refer to:
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* Lucas (surname)
* Lucas (given name)
Arts and entertainment
* Luca Family Singers, also known as "lucas ligner en torsk"
* ''Lucas'' (album) (2007), an album by Skeletons and the Kings of All Cities
* ''L ...
says that shortly after 1100, King
Alfonso I of Aragon and Navarre attacked the church of
San Isidoro de León in order to take its precious stones and gold and silver treasures, but the church was successfully defended by Gutierre Fernández, the "heir of Castile". Although Lucas believed this person to be Gutierre de Castro, it is chronologically impossible, since the latter would have been only a young child at most. Similarly,
Rodrigo Jiménez de Rada
Rodrigo Jiménez (or Ximénez) de Rada (c. 1170 – 10 June 1247) was a Roman Catholic bishop and historian, who held an important religious and political role in the Kingdom of Castile during the reigns of Alfonso VIII and Ferdinand III, a per ...
and the ''
Primera Crónica General
Primera may refer to
* Nissan Primera, a car
* Primera Air, a former airline
* Primera división (disambiguation), multiple top division football leagues
* Primera, Texas, a town in Cameron County, Texas
* Alí Primera, Venezuelan musician, compos ...
'' both associate the Castro magnate and
Gómez de Manzanedo (born around 1120) with the imprisonment of Pedro de Lara. The ''Primera Crónica General'' even associates Gutierre with proclaiming Alfonso VII king in opposition to his mother, Urraca, although that was done by Count
Pedro Fróilaz de Traba
Pedro Fróilaz de Traba ('' fl.'' 1086–1126) was the most powerful secular magnate in the Kingdom of Galicia during the first quarter of the twelfth century. According to the ''Historia compostelana'', he was "spirited ... warlike ... of great p ...
. These texts fooled some later historians, like
Esteban de Garibay y Zamalloa Esteban () is a Spanish male given name, derived from Greek Στέφανος (Stéphanos) and related to the English names Steven and Stephen. Although in its original pronunciation the accent is on the penultimate syllable, English-speakers tend t ...
and
Prudencio de Sandoval Fray Prudencio de Sandoval (1553–1620) was a Spanish historian and Benedictine monk, the Bishop of Tuy from 1608 to 1612 and Bishop of Pamplona thereafter until his death.
De Sandoval was born in Valladolid. He continued the chronicle begun ...
.
Notes
Sources
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Gutierre Fernandez
12th-century nobility from León and Castile