Juana Manuel (1339 – 27 March 1381) was Queen of Castile from 1369 until 1379 by marriage to king

Henry II of Castile Henry II (13 January 1334 – 29 May 1379), called Henry of Trastámara or the Fratricidal (''el Fratricida''), was the first King of Castile and León from the House of Trastámara. He became king in 1369 by defeating his half-brother Peter th ...

. She was also the heiress of Escalona, Villena, Peñafiel and Lara, as well as Lady of Biscay.

Family

She was the daughter of

Juan Manuel, Prince of Villena Don Juan Manuel (5 May 128213 June 1348) was a Spanish medieval writer, nephew of Alfonso X of Castile, son of Manuel of Castile and Beatrice of Savoy. He inherited from his father the great Lordship of Villena, receiving the titles of Lord, D ...

(1282–1348) and his second wife Blanca Núñez de Lara de La Cerda. Her mother Blanca (d. 1347) was a descendant of the lords of Biscay and of Lara and of Alfonso X's eldest son, Fernando de la Cerda. She was the last legitimate member of the

House of Ivrea The Anscarids ( la, Anscarii) or the House of Ivrea were a medieval dynasty of Frankish origin which rose to prominence in Northern Italy in the tenth century, even briefly holding the Italian throne. The main branch ruled the County of Burgu ...

Marriage

Her father had been for five years a serious enemy of King Alfonso XI of Castile, his former protégé, and the king wished to neutralize or absorb the might of the Peñafiel family. Although Juana was not yet the heiress (yet), already in her youth she had to go along with royal wishes. The king's influential mistress, Leonor de Guzmán, wanted to obtain some high prestige and property to her eldest son. On 27 July 1350 her brother and guardian, Fernando Manuel of Peñafiel, had to marry his young sister to Henry (1333–1379), eldest of the illegitimate sons of Alfonso XI. This brought Henry certain lands. However it was later that Juana's relatives' deaths made Juana the great heiress she turned out to be, while her husband became a threat to the royal power.

Inheritance and queenship

In 1361 (at the death of her teenage niece Blanca, daughter of her brother Fernando Manuel who himself had died in c 1350 without other children) she inherited Villena, Escalona and Peñafiel. Because Juana was a maternal granddaughter of La Palomilla (

Juana Núñez de Lara Juana Núñez de Lara (1286 – 1351) was a daughter of Juan Núñez de Lara ''the Fat'' and his wife Teresa Díaz II de Haro of the lordship of Biscay. Juana is also known as la Palomilla or Lady of Lara. Life Juana was first married to Infan ...

), from her another cousin, Isabel de Lara who was murdered in 1361 and her young daughter Florentina (d after 1365), she also inherited

Lara Lara may refer to: Places * Lara (state), a state in Venezuela *Electoral district of Lara, an electoral district in Victoria, Australia * Lara, Antalya, an urban district in Turkey * Lara, Victoria, a township in Australia * Lara de los In ...

and Biscay. In 1369, her husband became King

, after he deposed and murdered his half-brother to take the throne, and she became queen of Castile and León. When in 1381 she died and left her inheritance to her son, Biscay finally was united with Castile, and ultimately Spain.

Issue

*King

John I of Castile John I ( es, Juan I; 24 August 1358 – 9 October 1390) was King of Castile and León from 1379 until 1390. He was the son of Henry II and of his wife Juana Manuel of Castile. Biography His first marriage, to Eleanor of Aragon on 18 June 137 ...

(1358–1390) *

Eleanor Eleanor () is a feminine given name, originally from an Old French adaptation of the Old Provençal name ''Aliénor''. It is the name of a number of women of royalty and nobility in western Europe during the High Middle Ages. The name was introd ...

(died 1416) *Joanna

Family tree

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Castile, Juana Manuel Of 1339 births 1381 deaths Castilian queen consorts Leonese queen consorts Galician queens consort Juama Manuel Juana Manuel 14th-century Castilians Castilian infantas 14th-century Spanish women Queen mothers