King Pedro I 'The Cruel' of Castile and Maria Padilla, Queen Blanca, Queen Juana

[Marengo]

Pedro I, King of Castile and Leon (Burgos, 30 August 1334 – Montiel, 23 March 1369); married 1stly in 1353 Maria Padilla (Sevilla, 1334 – Sevilla, August 1361); married 2ndly in Valladolid on 3 June 1353 Princess Blanca of Bourbon (Vincennes, 1339 — Medina de Sidonia 1361); married 3rdly in 1354 Juana de Castro (?,?)

Reign: 1350 - 1366 and 1367 - 1369

Dynasty: Burgundy

Predecessor: King Alfonso XI of Castile & Leon

Successor: King Enrique II of Castile & Leon

Children Pedro & Maria: Beatriz of Castile, Duchess Constanca of Lancaster, Duchess Isabel of York and Alfonso of Castile

Children Pedro & Blanche: None

Children Pedro & Juana: None

Parents Pedro: King Alfonso XI of Castille and Leon and Princess Maria of Portugal

Parents Maria: Juan García de Padilla, 1st Lord of Villagera and María Fernández de Henestrosa

Parents Blanche: Duke Pierre of Bourbon and Countess Isabelle de Valois

Parents Juana: Pedro Fernández de Castro, Count of Lemos, Trastámara and Sarria and Doña Isabel Ponce de León

Half Siblings Pedro: Pedro Alfonso, Lord of Aguilar; Juana Alfonso, Lady of Trastámara; Sancho Alfonso, Lord of Ledesma; King Enrique II of Castile & Leon; Fadrique Alfonso, Duke of Medina de Rioseco (Enriquez); Fernando Alfonso, Lord of Ledesma; Tello Alfonso, Marques of Aguilar and Campo; Juan Alfonso, Lord of Badajoz and Jerez de la Frontera; Sancho Alfonso, Count of Alburquerque and Pedro Alfonso

Siblings Maria: ?

Siblings Blanche: Queen Jeanne of France, Countess Bonne of Savoy, Countess Catherine of Harcourt, Viscountess Marguerite of Tartas, Duchess Isabelle and Duchess Marie de Bourbon

Brother Juana: Fernán Ruiz de Castro

Half Siblings Juana: Milia Pérez de Castro; Queen Ines of Portugal and Alvar Pérez de Castro

[Marengo]

Peter (or Pedro; August 30, 1334 – March 23, 1369), sometimes called the Cruel (el Cruel) or the Lawful (el Justiciero), was the king of Castile from 1350 to 1369. He was the son of Alfonso XI and Maria of Portugal, daughter of Alphonso IV of Portugal. He was the last ruler of the main branch of the House of Burgundy.
Popular memory generally views Pedro as vicious monster. Much of Pedro's reputation comes from the works of the chronicler López de Ayala who served Pedro's usurper. After time passed, there was a reaction in Pedro's favour, and an alternative name was found for him. It became a fashion to speak of him as El Justiciero, the executor of justice (the Lawful). Apologists were found to say that he had only killed men who themselves would not submit to the law or respect the rights of others. Pedro did have his supporters. Even Ayalla confessed that the king's fall was regretted by the merchants and traders, who enjoyed security under his rule. The English, who backed Pedro, also remembered the king positively. Geoffrey Chaucer visited Spain during Pedro's reign and lamented the monarch's death in The Monk's Tale, part of The Canterbury Tales. (Chaucer's patron, John of Gaunt, 1st Duke of Lancaster, fought on Pedro's side in his struggle to reclaim the throne.)

Pedro began to reign at the age of sixteen, and found himself subjected to the control of his mother and her favourites. Pedro was to be married to Joan Plantagenet, the daughter of Edward III of England, but on the way to Castille, she travelled through cities infested with plague, ignoring townspeople who had warned her not to enter the town. Joan soon contracted the disease and died.
He was unfaithful to his wife, as his father had been. But Alfonso XI did not imprison his wife, or cause her to be murdered, which Pedro did. He had not even the excuse that he was passionately in love with his mistress, María de Padilla; for, at a time when he asserted that he was married to her, and when he was undoubtedly married to Blanca of Bourbon, he went through the form of marriage with a lady of the family of Castro, who bore him a son, and then deserted her. María de Padilla was the only lady of his harem of whom he never became quite tired.
At first he was controlled by his mother, but emancipated himself with the encouragement of the minister Albuquerque and became attached to María de Padilla, marrying her in secret in 1353. María turned him against Albuquerque. In the summer of 1353 the king was practically coerced by his mother and the nobles into marrying Blanca of Bourbon, but deserted her at once. This marriage necessitated Pedro's denying that he had married María, but his relationship with her continued and she bore him four children. A period of turmoil followed in which the king was for a time overpowered and in effect imprisoned. The dissension within the party striving to coerce him enabled him to escape from Toro, where he was under observation, to Segovia.
From 1356 to 1366 he engaged in constant wars with Aragon in the "War of the Two Peters", in which he showed neither ability nor daring. It was during this period that he perpetrated the series of murders which made him notorious. In 1366 began the calamitous Castilian Civil War which would see him dethroned. He was assailed by his bastard brother Henry of Trastamara at the head of a host of soldiers of fortune, including Bertrand du Guesclin and Hugh Calveley, and abandoned the kingdom without daring to give battle, after retreating several times (first from Burgos, then from Toledo, and lastly from Seville) in the face of the oncoming armies. Peter fled, with his treasury, to Portugal, where he was coldly received by his uncle, King Pedro I of Portugal, and thence to Galicia, in northern Spain, where he ordered the murder of Suero, the archbishop of Santiago, and the dean, Peralvarez.

Read the entire wikipedia article here.

[Marengo]

María de Padilla (1334 – August 1361) was the mistress of Pedro I, King of Castile, whom she married in secret in 1353.
She was a Castilian noblewoman. Her father was Juan García de Padilla, 1st Señor de Villagera, her mother was his wife María Fernández de Henestrosa, a relative of Juan Fernández de Henestrosa, who mediated an apparent pardon to Fadrique Alfonso of Castile, a half-brother and rival of María de Padilla's lover Pedro I.
In the summer of 1353, under coercion from family and court nobles, Pedro denied the fact of his marriage to María to marry Blanca of Bourbon, but his relationship with María continued. María and Pedro I had at least four children: a daughter named Beatriz (born 1354), a daughter named Isabella (1355–1394), another daughter named Constance (1354–1394), and a son named Alfonso, crown-prince of Castile (1359 - October 19, 1362).

Read the entire wikipedia article here.

[Marengo]

Blanche de Bourbon (1339 – 1361) was daughter of Peter I, Duke of Bourbon and Isabella of Valois.
On 3 July 1353 she married King Peter of Castile.
Eventually she was imprisoned in the castle of Arevalo.

Read the entire wikipedia article here.

[CyrilVladisla]

Bishop Juan Lucero became subservient to the caprices of King Pedro I. The Bishop annulled Pedro's marriage with Blanche of Bourbon.

[CyrilVladisla]

King Pedro IV of Aragon and his court received the emissaries of King Pedro I of Castile.
http://www.alamy.com/king-pedro-iv-o...212422092.html

[Blog Real]

Biography of King Pedro I of Castile.
Pedro I de Castilla | Real Academia de la Historia

Biography of María de Padilla.
María de Padilla | Real Academia de la Historia

Biography of Queen Blanca de Borbón.
Blanca de Borbón | Real Academia de la Historia

Biography of Queen Juana de Castro.
Juana de Castro | Real Academia de la Historia

[Blog Real]

Alabaster sculpture of Peter, from 1504
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikiped...A.N.%29_01.jpg