Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 19.djvu/566

Rh 544 PORTUGAL [HISTORY. help, while Dom John was proclaimed defender of Portugal, Jofio das Regras being appointed chancellor and Nuno Alvares Pereira constable. Dom John sent to England for assistance, which was promised him, and put the capital in a state of defence. In 1384 John of Castile entered Portugal and formed the siege of Lisbon. The resistance was worthy of the cause ; the archbishop of Braga fought like a knight ; but a pestilence in the besiegers camp did them more mischief than even the bravery of the besieged, and John I. had to retire defeated. Before doing so he discovered that Donna Leonora had plotted to poison him, so he seized her and imprisoned her in the convent of Tordesillas, where she died in 1386. But it availed little to have repulsed one Castilian army ; the relative sizes of Portugal and Castile made it obvious that the struggle would be a severe one ; the independence of Portugal was at stake, and the Portuguese fought as men fight for their existence as a nation. The heroic constable, who won the surname of the &quot;Holy Constable,&quot; defeated the Castilians at Atoleiro and Trancoso. On 6th April 1385 a cortes assembled at Coimbra, and declared the crown of Portugal to be elective, choosing, at the instance of the chancellor, John I. Dom John to be king of Portugal. King John then called a}l his chivalry together, with the freemen of his cities, and, with the help of 500 English archers, utterly defeated a superior Castilian army at Aljubarrota on 14th August, and in the following October the Holy Constable destroyed another army at Valverde. These blows greatly weakened the prestige of Castile and increased that of Portugal, and when John of Gaunt arrived the following year with 2000 lances and 3000 archers the king of Castile sued for peace. King John of Portugal perceived the advantage of the friendship and alliance of England, and on 9th May 1386 was signed the treaty of Windsor, by which the two countries were to be allies for ever in every transaction. He drew the alliance still closer in 1387 by marrying Philippa of Lancaster, a daughter of John of Gaunt by his second marriage ; and a truce was made between Portugal and Castile, and renewed at intervals until a final peace was signed in 1411. The only attempt made to disturb King John I. was an incursion by the eldest son of Ines de Castro, Dom Diniz, in 1398, assisted by Henry III. of Castile, but the legitimate claims of the prince carried no weight against the conqueror of Aljubarrota, and he retired discomfited. The long reign of John I. was, like that of King Diniz, a reign of peaceful development : Diniz had settled and united the country after the Moorish wars; John did the same after the obstinate war with Castile, and at the end of his reign saw Portugal beginning to ex pand beyond the sea. The keynotes of his foreign policy were friendship with England and peace with Castile. Henry IV., Henry V., and Henry VI. of England all suc cessively ratified the treaty of Windsor ; Richard II. sent troops to help King John against Dom Diniz in 1398; Henry IV. made him a knight of the Garter in 1400 ; and Henry V. sent him help in the expedition to Ceuta in 1415. John s internal government was not so happy, for, though personally a clever administrator, he had had, in order to maintain himself when he claimed the crown, to grant vast privileges and estates to the nobles, who became more and more powerful, and, by their exercise of full feudal rights, almost independent. It was at the earnest request of his three elder sons, Dom Duarte or Edward, Dom Pedro, and Dom Henry, that he consented to invade Africa in 1415. The young princes desired to win their knightly spurs ; there were no enemies at home ; and what could be more proper than to attack the old hereditary foes of Portugal, the Moors, in Morocco itself ? The queen from her death bed sent her blessing; the princes proved themselves worthy sons of their father ; and by the occupation of Ceuta the Portuguese made their first conquest beyond the limits of their country. The expedition over, the elder princes each followed his own bent : Dom Edward assisted his father in the labours of government ; Dom Pedro, who was made duke of Coimbra, travelled throughout Europe, and showed himself everywhere a learned and accomplished as well as brave knight ; and Dom Henry, who was master of the Order of Christ, governor of Algarves, and duke of Viseu, established himself at Sagres, and devoted his life to the encouragement of maritime exploration, for an account of which see vol. x. pp. 179, 180. Portuguese discoveries thus made illustrious the closing years of the reign of King John, who died in 1433. Contrary to expectation, the reign of King Edward (so Edwan called after Edward III. of England) proved, in spite of his own great qualities, but short, and was marked by one signal disaster. On ascending the throne he summoned a full cortes at Evora and secured the passing of the Lei Mental, or the provision which was supposed to be in the mind of King John when he gave his extensive grants to the nobility, namely, that they could only descend in the direct male line and on failure should revert to the crown. By this means Edward hoped to check the excessive power of the nobles, many of whom fled to Castile. He supported his father s policy, married a princess of Aragon, and, after confirming the treaty of Windsor, was made a knight of the Garter in his father s room. He also encouraged the explorations of Dom Henry; but the king s life was shortened and Dom Henry s explorations were checked for a time by the fatal expedition to Tangiers in 1436. At the earnest request of his youngest brother Dom Ferdinand and of Dom Henry himself, and in spite of the remon strances of the pope and Dom Pedro, the king sent a fleet to attack Tangiers ; the army was cut off, and it was only by sacrificing Dom Ferdinand as a hostage that the troops were allowed to retire to their ships. The imprisonment of his brother preyed on King Edward s mind, and he died in 1438, while Dom Ferdinand, after a long and cruel captivity at Fez, borne with such exemplary piety as to win him the title of &quot;the Constant Prince,&quot; died from ill- treatment in 1443. The new king, Affonso V., was a minor, and his reign Affons began with a struggle for the regency between his mother, v - Donna Leonora, and his uncle, Dom Pedro, duke of Coimbra. The people of Lisbon supported the latter, who was re cognized as regent ; and his conduct justified the choice. He pursued his brother s policy of curbing the pretensions of the nobles, and encouraged Dom Henry s work of dis covery, which advanced every year. Dom Pedro s power was seemingly at its height in 1 447 when Affonso V. was declared of age and at the same time married his cousin Leonora, daughter of Dom Pedro ; but the duke of Bra- ganza poisoned the king s mind against his uncle, and schemed his dismissal from court. Then, not satisfied with this, he marched against him with a royal army, largely recruited by the nobility, who hated the duke of Coimbra. The two forces met at Alfarrobeira on 20th May 1449, when the regent was slain, to the great regret of the Portuguese people. The young king fell more and more under the influence of the duke of Braganza and his sons, who humoured his desire for knightly fame and his dream of sitting on the throne of Castile, and who secured to themselves vast grants of royal property. This knightly idea appears in Affonso s three expeditions to Africa, which won him the surname of &quot; the African &quot; : in 1458 he took Alcacer Seguier ; in 1461 he failed; and in 1471 he took Arzilla and Tangiers. Meanwhile maritime exploration went on apace; but in 1460 Dom Henry the Navigator, the heart and soul of these mari time enterprises, died. The &quot; Re Cavalleiro &quot; or knightly