Teresa Fernández de Traba (died 6 February 1180 in León) was the Queen consort of León (1178–1180) during the reign of Ferdinand II.

Family

Teresa was the illegitimate daughter of Theresa, Countess of Portugal, and Fernando Pérez de Traba, Lord of Trastamara. She was already married to Count

Nuño Pérez de Lara Nuño Pérez de Lara (died 3 August 1177) was a Castilian nobleman, politician and military leader. He began his career at the court of the Emperor Alfonso VII, during whose reign he took part in the ''repoblación'' of the Extremadura and the d ...

in 1152 when both ceded Castronuño to its inhabitants and established its borders, maintaining certain rights over the village after King

Alfonso VII of León and Castile Alfonso VII (1 March 110521 August 1157), called the Emperor (''el Emperador''), became the King of Galicia in 1111 and King of León and Castile in 1126. Alfonso, born Alfonso Raimúndez, first used the title Emperor of All Spain, alongside hi ...

donated it in 1156 or 1157 to the

Knights Hospitaller The Order of Knights of the Hospital of Saint John of Jerusalem ( la, Ordo Fratrum Hospitalis Sancti Ioannis Hierosolymitani), commonly known as the Knights Hospitaller (), was a medieval and early modern Catholic Church, Catholic Military ord ...

. On 29 January 1160 Teresa and husband Nuño founded the

Cistercian The Cistercians, () officially the Order of Cistercians ( la, (Sacer) Ordo Cisterciensis, abbreviated as OCist or SOCist), are a Catholic religious order of monks and nuns that branched off from the Benedictines and follow the Rule of Saint ...

convent of Santa María at Perales, donating to Ozenda, the first abbess, all their properties in Perales and Zorita. In 1174, they gave the bishop of Burgos the village of Barchilona in exchange for all the rights and properties of the hospital in Puente de Fitero which they had founded and donated to the

. Following the death of Nuño in 1177, Teresa went to the Leonese court, and there, before 7 October 1178, she married King Ferdinand II of León (1137–1188). Thanks to this marriage, her children lived at the court and boasted of being the offspring of a queen of León as attested by a charter where her son Álvaro making a donation to the

Monastery of Sobrado Sobrado Abbey, ( es, Monasterio de Santa María de Sobrado de los Monjes or gl, Mosteiro de Santa María de Sobrado dos Monxes) is a Cistercian monastery in the province of La Coruña, Galicia, Spain. It is situated in the municipality of Sobr ...

called himself ''filius comitis domni Nunonis et regine domne Tarasie''.

Death and Burial

She died as a result of childbirth two years later, on 6 February 1180 and was buried at the Royal Pantheon in the Basilica of San Isidoro in León. Her remains were placed in a stone coffin the cover of which bore a half-length effigy of the late queen wearing a dress with tight gem-studded cuffs and neckline. Her hair was loose and a royal crown was placed around her forehead and the following Latin inscription was carved around the edges of the cover of her tomb:

LARGA MANUS MISERIS, ET DIGNIS DIGNA REPENDENS CONSTANS, ET PRUDENS PIETATIS MUNERE SPLENDENS, HIC REGINA JACET CONJUX TARESIA REGIS FERNANDI SUMMI SIBI DENTUR GAUDIA REGIS. ERA MCCXVIII. ET QTT. VII. ID. FEBRUARII.

Issue

She had children by both husbands, by Nuño Pérez de Lara having: # Álvaro (d. Uclés, 1218) married Urraca Díaz de Haro, without issue. Once widowed, she became a nun and was the abbess at the Monastery of Cañas. Álvaro had several children by his mistress Teresa Gil de Osorno. #

Fernando Fernando is a Spanish and Portuguese given name and a surname common in Spain, Portugal, Italy, France, Switzerland, former Spanish or Portuguese colonies in Latin America, Africa, the Philippines, India, and Sri Lanka. It is equivalent to the G ...

# Gonzalo (d. 1225), married firstly Jimena Meléndez, without issue. He then married María Díaz de Haro, daughter of Diego López II de Haro, parents of Leonor, Nuño, Teresa, Diego, and Fernando González de Lara. After Gonzalo's death, María became a nun and succeeded her aunt Mencía López de Haro as the abbess at Monastery of San Andrés de Arroyo. # Sancha Núñez wife of

Sancho, Count of Provence Sancho (died 1223), also spelled Sanç or Sanche, was a Catalano-Aragonese nobleman and statesman, the youngest son of Queen Petronilla of Aragon and Count Raymond Berengar IV of Barcelona. He was at different times the count of Cerdanya (c.11 ...

# María, abbess of Perales # Elvira, countess, married

Ermengol VIII, Count of Urgell Ermengol (or Armengol) VIII (1158 – 1208), known as ''el de Sant Hilari'', was the Count of Urgell from 1184 to his death. He was a son of Ermengol VII and Dulce, daughter of Roger III of Foix. In 1178, he married Elvira of Subirats, with whom h ...

around 1176. The couple had strong disagreements and in 1203 promised to treat each other with love and not to hurt the other. After the count's death, Elvira married Guillén de Cervera. By Ferdinand II of León, she had two sons: # Ferdinand, Infante of León (1179–1187). # Sancho, Infante of León (1180).

References

Sources

*Barton, Simon. ''The Aristocracy in Twelfth-century León and Castile''. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997. * *Sánchez de Mora, Antonio
"La Nobleza Castellana en la Plena Edad Media: El Linaje de Lara (ss. XI-XIII)"
Doctoral Thesis, Universidad de Sevilla, 2003. *Yáñez Neira, María Damián
"El monasterio cisterciense de Perales, cuna de la recolección."
''Publicaciones de la Institución Tello Téllez de Meneses'', 59 (1988), 387–414. {{DEFAULTSORT:Traba, Teresa Fernandez de 1180 deaths Leonese queen consorts Galician queens consort Year of birth unknown Burials in the Royal Pantheon at the Basilica of San Isidoro 12th-century Spanish women Deaths in childbirth