WEAVING CROSS-BORDER NETWORKS IN EARLY MODERN IBERIA: THE GIFT-GIVING OF MARIA OF ARAGON AND CASTILE, QUEEN OF PORTUGAL (1482-1517)[1]

TEJIENDO REDES TRANSFRONTERIZAS EN LA IBERIA DE LA EDAD MODERNA: EL INTERCAMBIO DE REGALOS DE MARÍA DE ARAGÓN Y CASTILLA, REINA DE PORTUGAL (1482-1517)

INÊS OLAIA

University of Lisbon
https://orcid.org/0000-0003-0528-4666

ANA MARIA S. A. RODRIGUES

University of Lisbon
https://orcid.org/0000-0002-6539-8801

POTESTAS, N.º 28, enero 2026 | pp. 139-158
ISSN: 1888-9867 | e-ISSN 2340-499X | https://doi.org/10.6035/potestas.9101
Recibido: 12/08/2025 Evaluado: 11/11/2025 Aprobado: 06/12/2026

ABSTRACT: The act of giving rewards and gifts creates connections between individuals. Through the analysis of Queen Maria of Castile and Aragon’s gift-giving, we aim to understand how she constructed networks around her, reflecting on changes that reveal the strengthening of her position at court. The queen used her economic power to connect with the nobility, encompassing her birth and marriage territories, while stretching her reach to her natal family’s attendants. Maria further utilised her gifts to portray an image of a merciful and pious ruler who assisted members of the political community in her new realm in various circumstances. Keywords: Gift-giving; Networks; Queenship; Iberia; Portugal. RESUMEN: El acto de dar recompensas y regalos crea conexiones entre individuos. A través del análisis de la entrega de obsequios por parte de la reina María de Castilla y Aragón, buscamos entender cómo construyó redes a su alrededor, reflejando cambios que revelan el fortalecimiento de su posición en la corte. La reina usó su poder económico para conectarse con la nobleza, abarcando territorios de nacimiento y matrimonio, y extendiendo su influencia hacia los servidores de su familia natal. Además, María utilizó sus regalos para proyectar la imagen de una gobernante piadosa y misericordiosa, que ayudaba a miembros de la comunidad política en distintas circunstancias. Palabras clave: Regalos; Redes; Reginalidad; Iberia; Portugal

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INTRODUCTION

The sideboard of our lady queen was arranged very elegantly, although the silver was tightly spaced. Despite having plenty for three shelves, they placed it on two; yet it appeared ample, high-quality, and dazzling to all those who came to see it. And the queen needed to have it displayed: because, since she had not displayed it any time after she arrived in this city, some were already saying that our lady queen did not have any silver, and that what was displayed in Alcácer do Sal, when she got married, was from Your Highnesses, and that they had brought it there to showcase, and from there they had returned it to Castile.[2]

These words belong to a letter that Ochoa de Isasaga, treasurer to Maria of Castile and Aragon,[3] wrote to the queen’s parents, Isabel of Castile (r. 1474-1504) and Fernando of Aragon (r. 1479-1516), telling them how the first Christmas celebration of the new queen of Portugal was conducted. Maria had entered Portugal via Moura on October 20, 1500, and married King Manuel I (r. 1495-1521) ten days later. In November, the couple travelled to Lisbon, where they celebrated Christmas.[4] Over these two months, part of the entourage that had accompanied the new queen to meet her husband had returned to Castile. As the silver displayed at the wedding had not been seen again, rumours began to circulate that it did not belong to the bride and had been taken back to its original owners, her parents. This episode illustrates how critical and unwelcoming courtiers could be towards the royal women who came from other kingdoms to marry their sovereigns, despite the power, wealth, and prestige of their families. Thus, it was of utmost importance for newly arrived queens to be surrounded by individuals from their native realms to help them navigate such challenging moments.[5] However, even more crucial was their ability to swiftly gain the sympathy and cooperation of their courtiers, as well as the admiration and affection of their subjects. Although establishing a favourable relationship with their husbands was essential for queens attaining power and wealth, their agency and reputation also depended on the strength of the ties they established with the nobility, the clergy, and even the people of their adopted realm.

One of the most effective means of forging such bonds and establishing networks of service, loyalty, and mutual support was through the granting of rewards and gifts. Prodigality was an essential act of majesty that no sovereign could escape without tarnishing their reputation.[6] Recent scholarship has argued that queens used gift-giving to attract people to their service, reward loyal servants, and demonstrate political favour, while reinforcing – but sometimes also subverting – social hierarchies.[7]

In this article, we analyse Queen Maria’s strategies of awarding gifts throughout her lifetime to understand how she built the networks she could rely on to exercise her queenly functions and wield power. We argue that she consistently privileged her household members in this matter. However, while at the beginning of her reign her household was mainly composed of Castilians, by the end of her life, many of them had been replaced by Portuguese. She never stopped rewarding those who came with her from her homeland, not even when they left her service to return to Castile. Yet she strengthened her position as Queen of Portugal by attracting local nobles and clerics to her service, whom she favoured with gifts, while also demonstrating generosity towards petitioners of all social strata.

To develop our argument, we will start by contextualising Queen Maria and discussing the sources used to examine her network-building through gift-giving. We shall subsequently examine each of the three circles of relationships she established around herself through the bestowal of gifts: her household, individuals connected to her natal or allied family, and other individuals who sought her assistance in times of need or rendered various forms of service. This will enable us to draw certain conclusions.

QUEEN MARIA

Queen Maria of Castile and Aragon is likely to be one of the least studied queens of Late Medieval Portugal.[8] Born in 1482 as the fourth child of the Catholic Monarchs, she married her eldest sister’s widower, King Manuel I of Portugal, in 1500. The match appears to have been heavily supported by her parents, as they took on the responsibility of obtaining the necessary papal dispensation for it. They also sent her to Portugal not only with a dowry of 200,000 gold Castilian doblas but also with a lavish and expensive trousseau. They further compromised themselves to support her throughout her married life. The marriage contract stipulated that Queen Maria would receive from Castile an annuity of four and a half million (4,500,000) maravedis to sustain herself and her household. King Manuel would supply her with further income, even though the matrimonial contract only obliged him to pass the queen’s lands to her once the Dowager Queen Leonor (1458-1525) died, which did not happen during Maria’s lifetime.[9]

Throughout her reign, Queen Maria bore ten children, eight of whom reached adulthood. Yet research has shown that she was much more than the dedicated mother of the king’s offspring: different sources credit her with an important influence over the sovereign, being able to intercede on behalf of both common people and the nobility. She was also a patron of the church and the arts, either by herself or through convincing King Manuel to act.[10] The existence of a few documents written in her hand also offers some degree of reassurance to the researcher to analyse at least some of her opinions and decisions. Queen Maria seems to have been acutely aware of the recent history of her marital kingdom.[11] Her demise, following the birth of their tenth child in 1517, led King Manuel to isolate himself in two successive monasteries and send the courtiers home for a couple of weeks, a move never attempted before. At least one of his agents in the papal court, in Rome, expressed concern over the king’s sadness via a letter to one of his secretaries a few months after his wife’s passing.[12]

THE SOURCES

To study Queen Maria’s gift-giving practices, we have four sets of main sources: one account book from 1501 to 1508,[13] her two testaments – from 1502 and 1516 –,[14] the list of the members of her household at the time of her death in 1517,[15] and a small number of letters and charters from various people.[16]

The said account book is not traditional: it was likely intended as the personal record of expenses made by order of the queen by her second treasurer, Ochoa de Isasaga. The volume contains, in a large first section, a record of Queen Maria’s household expenses and copies of the letters of acquittal that freed the treasurer from any later inquiry. It then contains copies of letters the queen’s parents sent him and other information. The fact that Isasaga took the book with him when he left Portugal is another indicator of how personal it was.[17] As to the testaments, they follow the usual form, with the only particularity that the last one was written by the queen’s hand.[18]

The list of household members from 1517 enumerates the queen’s servants and entourage, their origins (in Castile or Portugal), and the yearly payments they received. The list is divided by function and department of the household (the chaplains appear first, followed by the chapel attendants, for example). In some cases, it mentions the style of payment instead of the origin: in some areas, someone is said to have been taken into service in Castile or Portugal; in others, the list states if they are paid in «Castilian style» or «Portuguese style» and notes if it includes cereal or any other payment types. The amounts the queen bequeathed to her servants in her second will are also included. A second list follows, containing gracious donations (tenças) from Queen Maria to some of her attendants.

QUEEN MARIA’S HOUSEHOLD

The first network established around the queen is one we can reconstruct through all these sources: her entourage. As we shall see, these individuals constitute the closer circle of people around Queen Maria. Foreign brides usually brought a large suite of men and women from their home countries to accompany them on their journey and hand them over to their husbands. Yet most of these people left after the wedding. The new queen would keep with her only a few of her closest female companions and some officials provided by her family. Her husband would then provide her with more ladies-in-waiting and officials, chosen among the local nobility, whose loyalty she would have to earn by giving gifts, granting benefits, and other gestures of magnanimity.[19]

Maria’s household is an intriguing case because the sources show it mostly as Castilian-made in its beginning: we have letters from her mother instructing on how the people who stayed in Portugal with the infanta should be treated and what roles they should perform. There are indications that even payments should be made according to the Castilian tradition. Queen Isabel the Catholic stipulates in one letter that the payments made to the Castilian household members should be the same as those made to the Portuguese ones, albeit complemented by expense allowances (ayudas de costa). These allowances would cover the difference between Portuguese salaries, which were lower, and Castilian salaries, which were higher.[20]

In her first testament and throughout the account book, which covers the first half of her tenure, Maria’s household appears to be composed mainly of Castilians. The exceptions are a few major offices (the Senior Chaplain, the Overseer of the Household, the Chancellor) and some ladies.[21] By not imposing Castilian head offices, Maria’s household is ready to adapt to Portuguese customs and respects the local higher nobility’s expectations.

As for the ladies, in her last will, Queen Maria specifies that among the twenty-two ladies listed, six had come with her from Castile, roughly a third.[22] Some functions are also very Castilian in name and probably in practice: Queen Maria has a contino at her service (someone who performs continuous service), something unheard of in Portugal previously.[23] In other cases, some offices were a specialisation brought from Castile, which disappeared after a while – for example, the master of ceremonies (mestre-sala) and the ladies’ meat carver (trinchante das damas).[24]

When we get to the list of officials in the queen’s service drafted after her death, the difference is clear. People are still being paid either in «Castilian style» or «Portuguese style». Yet there is a much bigger number of Portuguese officials – some replacing Castilians in higher offices – and some functions disappeared, as previously said.[25] This is a curious process since it seems to be different from what other queens have done before. Tendentially, queens had brought with them some of the head officials of their households instead of the entire structure and the lower officials.[26] Some queens even had cooks and tailors from their natal kingdoms,[27] but to go as far as having the washers and a sweeper from Castile was new.

CREATING NETWORKS THROUGH GIFT-GIVING

As mentioned before, the surviving economic record is a useful source to understand how Queen Maria created networks around her through gift-giving. While studying this ledger, we have considered «Gifts» any expense recorded as merced, even if the explanation given by the treasurer could relate this gift to alms or remuneration of household members (i.e., salaries), two other categories of expenses.[28] We respected the wording of the treasurer, and if he qualified it as a merced, we included it in the gifts. On the other hand, although kings and queens awarded and received all manner of gifts, from food to silverware to jewels,[29] the gifts recorded in Queen Maria’s account book were invariably made in money.

Throughout the period recorded in Isasaga’s ledger, from 1501 to 1508, the expense in «Gifts» ranges from the third highest to the fifth highest in a total of nine categories, even though it never surpasses 10,5% of the total expense in any single year. In the highest expenditure year, the queen spent over 758,000 maravedis on gifts, while she spent only around 190,000 maravedis on alms.[30] Yet this was a fluctuating expense since Queen Maria could also spend as little as around 158,500 maravedis (c. 3%) on gifts.[31] However, we also need to consider that the amount of «Undetermined» expenses increases throughout the period, probably due to less meticulous record-keeping. In the year that followed the one she spent the most on gifts – 1507 – the expenditure in this domain fell by half, but the «Undetermined» expenditure rose by 7%.[32]

We have subdivided all gift-giving actions recorded in the account book into three groups, according to repetition of gift-receivers and amounts spent. The household members appear to be the most significant group, followed by family-related individuals and, as a third group, other people in what we refer to as «outer-reach» actions. The first two groups are mainly composed of individuals who had direct ties to Queen Maria or her family; the latter is composed of people of all walks of society to whom Queen Maria made gifts, generally once or, at most, a couple of times. This corresponds easily with an image of the people around the monarch as distributed into circles of service and gift-giving.[33] The closer the circle is to the queen on the scheme, the tighter the connection.

Trying to establish the network of people around the queen takes the form of an egocentric network.[34] Queen Maria is the sole centre of this web since we are trying to understand proximity and connection to her, not between her entourage members. If we connect the queen to her entourage via the economic recompense these individuals receive, we obtain a visual representation of who ranks higher and is likely closest to her.

Figure 1. Queen Maria’s circles of gift-giving and service

BENEFITING THE HOUSEHOLD: ASSISTANCE AND MARRIAGE

The household group is the easiest to grasp: all gift recipients in this group were connected to Queen Maria because they were actively in her service. They received salaries and appeared on the records as attendants to the queen. Their ties with her were much stronger than the simple acts of gift-giving recorded here; however, these gifts separated them from most servants who only received their common stipends.

The highest recurringly recorded gifts are monetary sums given to household members that seem to be departing the queen’s service: 100,000 maravedis to Alonso Patiño, the queen’s first treasurer, after finishing his tenure,[35] and the same sum to Ochoa de Isasaga, her second treasurer, when he excused himself from her service for a brief period before returning and then leaving for good.[36] Rodrigo Dávalos was also absent with authorisation and received the same sum;[37] Lope de Valdevieso, the queen’s mordomo-mor, received a similar amount when he likely departed.[38] The donation of monetary sums was recurring when people left the queen’s service, even among lower-level officials.[39] A few extra officials seem to have accompanied Maria to Portugal in 1500 and immediately left. In November 1500, a letter to the Catholic Monarchs notes that these «added officials» (ofiçiales acreçentados) had already been paid and sent back to Castile: these are mainly musicians and transport personnel, along with one reposteiro and a man who had his clothing stolen.[40] Only one gift superseded all of these economically, to be mentioned shortly.

Queen Maria also appears to have used the act of gift-giving to aid her household members in specific circumstances: to secure releases from prison, purchase mounts, go on journeys, help attain the cure of illnesses or lesions, and repay debts between household members.[41] She also took care of unexpected losses: she donated money to her chief chambermaid (camareira-mor) to replace objects lost in a palace fire and to another person in her entourage to replace clothing stolen from them on the same occasion.[42]

Repeatedly, Queen Maria gifted money to her attendants for «marriage» (casamento).[43] As Gomes stated, both the king and the queen were expected to choose the matrimonial partners of the young people raised by them at court (criados) and pay for their dowries.[44] Maria de Montoro, a queen’s criada, received 50,000 maravedis as a marriage gift. [45] The highest recorded gift in the entire ledger has the same reason noted: Maria de la Costana, servant of the chamber (moça de câmara), received 200,000 maravedis for marriage.[46] Yet we ignore whether she had been raised by the queen, too. These amounts do not seem to be stable, though. The marriage gift of Inês de Albornoz, both a servant of the chamber and a criada, was conceded in 1512, after the closing date of our account ledger, but other sources quote that she received 480,000 maravedis (4,000 doblas); the money was considered part of Inês’s dower.[47] We do not know if a lady-in-waiting (dama) would receive more than Maria de la Costana did, but the presumed answer is yes. It is surprising, though, that no marriage gifts for these ladies are recorded in the account book.

Queen Maria also gifted money for «marriage» to members of her male entourage. Since there are more men than women at her service, it is possible to devise a scale that the queen might be following for this purpose, with higher-ranking officials receiving higher amounts while lower-ranking officials and artisans receive less.[48] The preoccupation with giving certain sums to marrying elements of her household surfaces also in the queen’s two testaments. In her second will, Maria gives detailed instructions on how her officials should receive marriage gifts. For the ones with Portuguese-style payments, their yearly stipends should be paid (too?); the ones with Castilian-style payments, to whom the queen was not obliged to give money for marriage, 30,000 reais should be given. This includes all her criados that travelled with her from Castile, even if they were already married.[49]

If we take a closer look at Queen Maria’s two testaments to see who benefited from her legacies beyond marriage gifts, again, her entourage comes first.[50] In the first testament, she names every household member by their names, men first, then women, making them individualised money bequests that varied according to their rank and likely proximity to her person. Maria further ordered in both testaments that once her burial expenses were paid, the sums bequeathed should immediately be handed over to her attendants, starting with the Castilians, because they needed to return to their homes. She adds an explanation in her second will: her goods and property are in Portugal, so the officials and attendants staying in the kingdom will have their payments in an easier manner than the foreigners wishing to leave.[51]

One substantial change is evident between the two testaments: the queen is more meticulous in her bequests to her entourage in the first one. The list of people receiving these bequests is not only more extensive but also evidences a stronger sense of hierarchy. It might be worth noticing that the first testament was handwritten by the queen’s treasurer and secretary at the time, Ochoa de Isasaga, who had access and knowledge of all her household staff. Besides, the act of dictating the testament, since the queen did not write it herself, might have been public to some degree. Isasaga had to be writing following Queen Maria’s wishes, and it seems logical that she had to approve the final text. When the list gets to Isasaga’s bequest, it was noted in the margin (since the extant text is a copy) that the queen wrote it herself, distancing the scribe from the gifting act. These points highlight the ritualistic aspect of producing the document. Who else was aware of its contents? How much did Ochoa de Isasaga interfere with it? If we assume that, to some degree, the contents of the document were of knowledge to the queen’s entourage, we can assume that the act of dictating the will is as much an expression of her networks at the time as it is an act of building them.

The second will tells a very different story: Queen Maria wrote it herself, and if the handwriting and spelling were not evidence enough, she wrote at the end of the text: «written in my hand and signed with my name and sealed with my seal» (escryto de minha mao e fyrmado de meu nonbre e selado con meu sello). The queen was not alone when she did so: the Prior of Berlengas was present, but he is the only witness accounted for.[52] The prior was likely her confessor, and the monastery was her foundation.

If we take the chapel as an example – the household department with the most systematic donations in the second will –, the changes also emerge evidently. The head chaplain (Oporto’s bishop) is missing on the second will. However, she does give a specific and higher amount of money to the almoner, followed by a differentiation of legacies between a few chaplains, and leaves bequests to all other chaplains and chapel servants (moços da capela), specifying a higher amount if the latter want to become clerics. Besides the missing people in the chapel department, other areas evidence a higher degree of selectivity.

In some departments, Queen Maria selected only a handful of people for bequests. For the large number of ladies of her household, the selection seems strict. If in her first testament Queen Maria made specific bequests to all the ladies (seemingly categorising them as either Portuguese or Spanish) and assigned to the king the responsibility of arranging their marriages, in her second will, no bequests were made for that purpose. The queen also explains that the king has the duty of marrying the ladies, so she excuses herself from bequeathing them anything. Her head chamber lady, Elvira de Mendonça, received 500,000 maravedis, while Aldonça Soares, a simple chamber lady, received 300,000 maravedis. Other women, without mention of specific services, received hefty sums. Francisca de Torres and Joana do Taco got 100,000 and 150,000 maravedis. As to why they received such donations, there is only a brief mention of the «many works with our children» that Francisca performed. Joana might have been one of the queen’s criadas.[53] The queen also seems to have selected some of her moças de câmara for bequests; the same happened to their male counterparts. The 1517 list of household members confirms this impression.[54]

In a few cases, the queen made special arrangements for the future of her household members. These are also more evident in the second will. In her first will, Queen Maria only had a special thought for her confessor, Friar Garcia de Padilla: she asked her mother, Isabel the Catholic, to take him under her care so he would not be abandoned.[55] In her last will, Queen Maria expressed a particular sympathy for other attendants: her almoner, Juan Bravo, her chief chamber lady, Elvira de Mendonça, and the previously mentioned chamber lady, Aldonça Soares. They should not be pressured to be accountable for the money and objects received in her name, beyond what they wished to declare.[56] Furthermore, in the second testament, Queen Maria specially requested the king to take care of Elvira.[57]

All gifting practices and bequests call our attention to how much these people depended on their lady, and how economic power represented a way to secure the bonds between the queen and her attendants beyond salary payments. These attendants were bound to the queen by duty. They were with her daily, and she could strengthen this position by rewarding them regularly and acting as a safety net for them. Many of these people were uprooted from their natal kingdoms, something also likely to increase their dependency on the queen.

The differences between the two wills might reflect the changes that occurred during Queen Maria’s lifetime. On the one hand, the first will was probably produced more publicly and attests to her need to secure her newly formed household. Every member is referred to and secures something to assist their future. The second, produced in a more intimate manner and after over fifteen years of queenship, seems to reflect more personal ties, highlighting only a few people. It also reflects a higher trust in her husband’s willingness to secure the future of her household.

GIFTS TO FAMILY-RELATED INDIVIDUALS

A second string of gifts made by Queen Maria concerned people who did not have a permanent tie with her. They appeared sporadically and were connected to her for family reasons: they were usually directly dependent on other family members and were acting on their behalf when Maria rewarded them. A few selected individuals included here assisted Maria with her family duties without being active household members.

Two groups seem to surface: on one side, the midwives who helped her deliver her children[58] and the wetnurse of her eldest daughter,[59] on the other, the couriers who brought her good news from her homeland.[60] Among the latter, two men were rewarded for bringing news of the safe delivery of a baby by Juana, Queen Maria’s elder sister and the heir to the Castilian throne, and another for announcing the conquest of Goreta by the queen’s father, Fernando the Catholic.[61] The gifting of money to couriers might also be connected to how they interact with the queen. Ochoa de Isasaga reports in one letter to the Catholic Monarchs that when a courier arrived with letters from her parents, Queen Maria not only exhibited happiness, but also called the courier back and commanded him to report on what else he knew from the Castilian court.[62] Since Isasaga feels the need to report it to her parents, we might speculate that this was not common behaviour and highlights Maria’s care for her family and willingness to learn more about her relatives.

Queen Maria’s family connections are present still in other ways in the account book, especially her bond with Catherine of Aragon, at the time Princess of Wales: she commissioned paintings from herself and her sister, paid for when Catherine had just arrived in England;[63] Maria also paid for people to visit her sister, shortly after the Prince of Wales died.[64] It is also possible to view the extensive expenses in mourning clothing as a different marker of the family bond. In 1505, the account ledger notes expenses for mourning related to the ladies and household officials, probably signalling the death of Queen Isabel the Catholic.[65] In 1506, the same ledger records mourning for the deaths of Infanta Beatriz, King Manuel’s mother and Philippe of Burgundy, husband of her sister Juana.[66] The common practice of dressing for mourning the entire household can easily be seen, from our perspective, as a way of connecting Queen Maria’s losses to her entourage and expressing these same losses collectively. The appearance of the king’s mother among the honoured dead is an indicator of her clear belonging in the dynastic family she married into.

GIFTS TO OTHER INDIVIDUALS

Lastly, we grouped the queen’s gifting practices into «outer reach» gifts. In general, the recipients of these were not directly connected by bonds of kinship or duty to Queen Maria; they might have performed a sporadic service or belonged to someone else’s network and appeared as gift recipients because they had access to the queen. It was within this group that the monarch formed new connections with the people around her and exercised some of her queenly duties, taking care of her kingdom’s people and serving as a generous patron. This is the wider circle in her networks, as it represents looser, more varied ties. Instead of a closed circle, it should be viewed as surrounded by a dotted line, forming a permeable area in which people could come and go.

One woman from Olivença received money to release her son from jail; a Lady Cecília also received a hefty sum to ransom her son, even though neither mother nor son are accounted as household members; a Greek Countess named Helena Escarina appears repeatedly on the accounts, at one point receiving money to ransom her children from the Turks; a Gonçalo de Morais was also ransomed directly by the Queen, without further explanation.[67] Aiding the redemption of captives is a Christian act of mercy, but in this case, the money was given as a gift instead of alms. By helping people in these situations, the monarch was fulfilling her role and representing herself as a protector of her people. The same can be said for the circumstances when Queen Maria gifted money to people who requested her help: an «adventurer» (aventurero) named João de Ternyllo received 1,000 maravedis simply because he asked, without any further explanation.[68]

Yet not all of Queen Maria’s gifts were intended to help people in difficult circumstances. There are a few donations to medical staff that might make us wonder if they performed a service to the queen: a male nurse and a surgeon, at least, appear among the recipients of gifts.[69] A set of dancers from a town without relation to the queen – Sardoal – received 20 gold coins.[70] We can presume they performed for her, and she decided to reward them. Other gifts might also have strengthened Maria’s ties with people outside her direct connections, but important in court: Justa Pereira, King Manuel’s wetnurse, was another case of gift-giving to somebody outside the monarch’s immediate circle. Queen Maria aided her more than once by gifting money to help her with the construction works of the monastery she founded.[71] Other people, like the son of the Countess of Penamacor, received gifts in money, without further explanation.[72]

All these gifts extend Queen Maria’s reach beyond her household, and, in many cases, beyond the walls of the royal palace. How, in some cases, the gift recipient reached the queen is a different question. It could be that she had designated times to see people, like Christine de Pizan suggested.[73] It could also be that the itinerance still present at the time in the Portuguese court helped extend these gifts beyond the court. Sardoal, for example, is close to Abrantes, where the queen remained for an extended period and gave birth to one child.[74] Regardless of the problem of access, Queen Maria could undoubtedly present herself as a pious and merciful ruler, empathetic with her people, creating a positive self-image through acts that seem small in comparison to her immense wealth.

CONCLUSION

In conclusion, Queen Maria’s networks reflected her changing identity and the roles she performed for her new kingdom. She arrived in Portugal with a mainly Castilian household organised by her mother. Yet that instrument changed slowly through time, adjusting to her functions as Queen of Portugal: new people came into the household, functions changed or disappeared. The formal aspect surrounding the first circle of people around her shapeshifted to adapt to her new reality.

Queen Maria can also be seen as a safety net for her entourage to rely on in times of difficulty. This capacity showcased her as generous and trustworthy, implying characteristics of a good monarch and strengthening, in turn, her position at court by multiplying the trust of her attendants. Nonetheless, as time went by, the queen might have felt more comfortable choosing who to gratify, instead of building a large and hierarchical network, as shown by the shifts in her last testament.

The gifts she bestowed on people around her reflect the consecutive circles of service and patronage she was the centre of. If the household members seem to be the most rewarded in any circumstance, either in gifts or in bequests in her last testament, they are not the only ones. People serving her family members were also duly rewarded during her lifetime, signalling her belonging to a dynastic network surpassing the kingdom’s frontiers. Individuals from other service networks, notably the king’s, could equally be drawn to Queen Maria via her gift-giving.

Lastly, Queen Maria was able to reach further with her gifts: she could create the aura of a pious and generous ruler, rewarding small acts of service or aiding people in need, regardless of their social position. Gift-giving was thus a tool the monarch used to present herself as the protector, supporter, and patron of her marital kingdom’s people.

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