Constanza Manuel – a pawn to her daddy’s ambitions

Constanza Manuel was born a pawn. That’s what happens when your mother is an Aragonese princess and your father, Juan Manuel, is a scion of the House of Ivrea, the ruling dynasty in Castile. Don Juan Manuel was the nephew of Alfonso X and the much younger cousin of Sancho IV.

From his father, Infante Manuel, this very learned man inherited the dukedom (soon to be principality) of Villena. From his royal uncle, Don Juan seems to have inherited a passion for knowledge and the written word. He wrote several books during his lifetime in Castilian rather than Latin, thereby being credited for laying the groundwork for the magnificent Spanish prose of, for example, Miguel Cervantes.

Despite all this scholarism,  Don Juan had plenty of time left over to further his political ambitions. Being a grandson of the great Fernando III, he aspired to be someone to be reckoned with in Castile, a mover and shaker. He achieved a position of power when he was appointed one of the tutors and counsellors of the infant king Alfonso XI (grandson of Sancho IV) but the moment Alfonso turned fourteen he claimed the reins of his kingdom, proceeding not only to rule but also to reclaim benefits and lands his tutors had settled on themselves during the king’s minority. In brief, Alfonso was something of a force of nature, and Don Juan quickly realised he’d have little true influence (or power) over this strong-willed and capable young man.

Somewhat irritating that – at least to Don Juan. Especially when one considered that Sancho IV had usurped the throne from his two young nephews and, to make matters worse, married a woman under doubtful circumstances. As Sancho was pre-contracted with another woman prior to falling heads-over-heels for Maria, their marriage was potentially invalid. Even more so as Sancho and Maria were within the prohibited degree and therefore required a papal dispensation, which they never got. One could argue, therefore, that Alfonso’s claim to the Castilian throne was tainted, seeing as his father was borderline illegitimate. I am thinking Don Juan would have been careful in voicing these arguments, seeing as his sainted grandfather, Fernando III, was also branded illegitimate by the church, but that doesn’t mean he didn’t find it all rather annoying.

Anyway: when God closes a door he opens a window, and now that Juan Manuel realised he would not be Alfonso’s counsellor he decided that the best thing to do was to set himself up as a rival centre of power, a counterbalance to the young king. All for Castile’s best of course. Or not -Don Juan seems to have been more interested in what was best for him.

Don Juan, therefore, began intriguing.  He found a willing fellow-conspirator in his namesake Juan de Haro y Castilla, known in Spanish as Juan el Tuerto (One-eyed John).  This gent was the grandson of Alfonso X and was, through his mother, the very powerful Lord of Biscay. His father, Infante Juan, had ever been a thorn in the side of first his brother, Sancho IV, then of  Dowager Queen Maria when she held the regency for Sancho’s young son. As always, intrigues and alliances were best boosted by a marriage. Juan Manuel had a little daughter, Constanza Manuel, and he proposed to wed her to widower Juan de Haro, thereby forging an alliance so powerful it could threaten the king. Alfonso was not having it, which is how little Constanza instead ended up married to Alfonso—after the king had Juan de Haro assassinated. You know, just in case.

Constanza was somewhere between seven and ten when she wed the king in 1325, and obviously this meant no consummation. And some years later, Alfonso decided he was better served by marrying Maria of Portugal, so the marriage was annulled and Constanza Manuel was free to go. Umm . . . not quite. Alfonso had an interest in controlling just who she wed—rather who her father wed her to.  After all, he didn’t want a repeat on Don Juan’s attempts to build an oppositional power base using his daughter.

Don Juan was incensed. Not only had the king humiliated his daughter, but he had also successfully curbed Don Juan’s power. “Ha! Just you wait,” Don Juan may have muttered, sitting back to do just that: wait.

By the time Alfonso married Maria of Portugal, the king was in love. Unfortunately, not with his wife, but with the vibrant Leonor de Guzmán.  Soon enough, word reached the Portuguese king that his daughter was very, very unhappy—Alfonso made no attempts to hide where his true affections lay, and poor Maria spent a lot of time in a convent, never welcome at the court where Leonor ruled.

Our Portuguese king, Afonso IV, was incensed. (Pls note: Afonso, not another Alfonso, although Afonso and Alfonso ae also quite confusing… those Iberian kings tended to be very uncreative when it came to names) Which was why he reached out to Juan Manel and suggested an alliance—yet again to be sealed with a marriage. Constanza, until recently Queen of Castile, was now to wed Afonso’s heir, thereby becoming an Infanta of Portugal. Should she have a son, that son would one day become king. Not of Castile (and I think Juan Manuel resented that) but at least of Portugal.

Before there could be any pitter-patter of small feet, there had to be consummation. Hard to achieve when Constanza’s ex hubby promptly imprisoned her in Alcazar del Toro. I think he was especially incensed by the provision in the wedding contracts stating that should Juan Manuel not have any surviving male heirs, all his lands were to go to Constanza’s Portuguese hubby, Pedro. “Over my dead body,” I imagine Alfonso growling. “Those lands lie at the heart of my kingdom!”

It wasn’t until 1340 that Alfonso finally allowed Constanza—by then happily wed by proxy since years back—to ride off to her ever after sunset in Portugal. Except it wasn’t much of a sunset, because among her ladies in waiting was one Inés de Castro  and no sooner had Constanza’s new hubby laid eyes on her but he fell in love. Oh, woe!

Despite his passions for Inés, Pedro did his duty. Constanza did hers. There was a son, and yes, Juan Manuel’s grandson would one day wear a crown. Constanza died relatively young, leaving Pedro to openly acknowledge the woman he loved more than life itself—Inés. Not that that love story ended happily either, what with Inés being assassinated before her children on the orders of Pedro’s father.

By the time of Inés’s death, Constanza had faded to a memory for her young son, Fernando. What Constanza liked or disliked, what she thought of the choices made on her behalf by her father, we do not know. In this, she had much in common with many high-born medieval women—their value lay in cementing the alliances that would help their families thrive. In some cases, those arranged marriages were a success. Quite often, they were perfectly bearable. But now and then, they left the woman open to humiliation and pain—like in the case of Constanza Manuel and her sister-in-law, Maria of Portugal.