Royal Family of Portugal 3: December 2007-


If you have answers, please help by responding to the unanswered posts.
Isabel Nogueira, attending a Fashion Show.

(scanned by me, Caras magazine)

If someone is interested on Isabel Nogueira's life, please read her blog - IN PARTIES...

In her blog, she writes about the many social events she attends all over the country.

On her profile she says her interests are Parties, Fashion, Travelling, Sports, Reading.

I can understand why D. Henrique enjoys her company: she is a funny, outgoing and elegant person(IMO).
But I guess why D. Duarte and Dª Isabel dislike the close relationship she has (had) with Henrique. Apart from being divorced, she seems to be a superficial person, who likes parties, but specifically ones in which she can find famous people.
 
Isabel has been described as a social alpinist - social climber.
I understand she works (and appears quite often) in a society magazine.
I am not sure but I think it is at "Eles e Elas" magazine who is run by Maria da Luz ... de Bragança (Lafões)
 
Who is Maria da Luz de Braganca? I remember a D. Isabel de Braganca in Point de Vue or Caras at the Cadaval wedding too, and they also refer to the duke of Lafoes, however I can not find these names in the online Gotha.
 
Maria da Luz de Bragança is the Director of "Eles & Elas" high society magazine. Some years ago it was more high society than it is now, since now the magazine interviews common people like tv presentors (Fatima Lopes just to give an example) and football players.

Maria da Luz de Castro Costa Pereira is married with Duarte de Bragança, the son of D. Afonso de Bragança the 5th Duke of Lafões.

JSP, in her blog Isabel says she worked for two society magazines (she doesn't tell which), but not anymore. I guess the two magazines were "Eles & Elas" and "OQ".
 
:whistling:
Who is Maria da Luz de Braganca? I remember a D. Isabel de Braganca in Point de Vue or Caras at the Cadaval wedding too, and they also refer to the duke of Lafoes, however I can not find these names in the online Gotha.


A link to the Lafões family.

GeneAll.net - Duques de Lafões

They are issued from an illegitimate son of King D.Pedro II and wear the name Bragança.

Isabel de Bragança, actually is Isabel Soares, but as you must know, here in Portugal women usually adopt their husband's names .
Isabel is a sister-in-law of Maria da Luz de Bragança, both being married to two Lafões brothers.
Isabel's husband, D.Pedro is the youngest son of the 5th Duke.

I might be wrong :whistling: but I think she is "very close" to Pr.Michel d'Orléans.
She often appears with him at every Parisian party.
If you have bought "Caras" you will note that she is photographed with Pr.Michel, not with her husband who appears with other guests.

Maybe coincidence :D ?

D.Pedro was the family dandy and playboy, opposite to his low-profile brothers.
In 1975 he was victim of a bomb blast at his home.
Thankfully he completely recovered.
 
Maria da Luz de Bragança is the Director of "Eles & Elas" high society magazine.

JSP, in her blog Isabel says she worked for two society magazines (she doesn't tell which), but not anymore. I guess the two magazines were "Eles & Elas" and "OQ".
Yesterday, there was a birthday party organized by this magazine and we can see both Maria da Luz de Bragança (pics nr 3 and 20) and Isabel Nogueira (pic nr 9) on this slideshow:

Sapo - Portal Fama
 
---
Though great contrast does exists between the terms Royalty and Monarchy in Portugal. Part of the population still reffers to Monarchy with great hope on this form of non-political representation of the state - and do not relate it directly with the Royality too often... quite strange. On some discussions, when there's the smaller connotation of Monarchy with Royalty/Nobility it tends to get... even stranger = bad.
There's also a great part of dictatorial-born elderly ones for whom the "ghost" of monarchy is the mother of all evils, greatly affected by the missing of real/royal national values and from what was teached in schools under the 40+ years of dictatorial regime. Unfortunately portuguese schools today still instructs some wrong info on what was and is the monarchic regime and the royality itself. Too many misconceptions and an huge amount of 'small innocent' mistakes written by the Republican regime on history books are still beeing teached and passed over generations of well-formed students these days.
Results are those of that by the ocasion of the Centennarium of the Regicide (the killing of the head of state) recently a town called Castro Verde - by the will of its elected Mayor, honoured the King D. Carlos assassins as patriotic heroes (at least hometown heroes). That is to say Liberté, Egalité, Fraternité, using mayor's words.

Miguel,
The issue of history and misconceptions about monarchy that you raise are also very prevelant in the US. If you would mention that there are advantages to having a monarchy involved in government, people, here, would stare at you as if you were speaking in some ancient Mayan dialect or that you just recently arrived from Saturn. :lol: Even though many Americans follow the news about British royalty, the whole notion of monarchy is nowhere near being on their radar screens. :lol: Of course, I suppose, there is no big surprise in that for Americans, since our last experience with a monarch was during our colonial period with George III.

Does the website you referenced or any other organizations provide educational material that would offer more objective, positive views of the monarchy in Portugal's history, or promote the advantages of monarchy or constitutional monarchy? I participate in another forum here in the US in which we have discussed the same issues. Our history has been written strictly from a republican point of view ( again no surprise here), and so any other form of government is viewed negatively. Also, aspects of our colonial history leading up to the Revolution are conveniently left out; such as that many of the colonists were not in favor of severing ties with England and that conditions were not as bad as the history books make them out to have been. And of course, in recent times, the socialist/progressive elites now attempt to skew our history to show how bad the republican form of government has been and portray socialist style governments as the best. Anyway, to combat these issues and the misconceptions of monarchy, we have discussed the possibility of creating educational materials. Unfortunately, there are so few of us and no one seems to have the time to really make this happen. But, it seems that a way to start overcoming the misconceptions is to provide sound educational materials and disseminate those.

As I read Portuguese history, I see a small country buffeted by larger countries attempting to manipulate and/or rule Portugal and being led by monarchs who, on the whole, did a good job of maintaining Portugal's integrity and sovereignty (except possibly for the time of the Spanish Captivity).

Anyway, I have rambled on enough. I hope you find my thoughts helpful.
Keith
 
Well, in my opinion, the problem with the Monarchy in Portugal is that the few royalists are not united. They are in minority (maybe 5 to 10% of the population) and they don't even agree about who is the right Pretender to the Throne. I think we could all start to seat and talk about this, because this is the real problem. Who is our 'King'?
Even the President of Partido Monárquico (Monarchist Party), Nuno da Câmara Pereira, is against D. Duarte!... With this strong division between royalists, we won't achieve anything, imo.

The Portuguese people love royalty from abroad, especially the Spanish Royal Family. Mathilde of Belgium is very known here too. And we love to watch royal weddings. Apart from this, I think most people in Portugal don't spend a minute thinking about Monarchy: Yes or No?

Even though I am an outsider I would like to share a few comments. Regina, I believe you are correct in calling for some sort of forum in which those interested in the monarchy could meet face-to-face and discussion the issues dispassionately. However, my guess is that there needs to be some agreement between those who have claim to throne as to who would be the recognized king and how the succession will work in the future before there can develop more popular support. I think the first question that needs to be answered is: What is our primary goal? To regain popular support for monarchy and establish a trend toward the re-establishment of the monarchy in some form? Or to come to some decision as to who will be the recognized king? Either way, serious compromises would have to be worked out. But answering that question would at least allow what issues have to be focused on and perhaps give clarity to the compromises that will need to be made.

Also, you all (Wow, now I speaking like the folks in our southern states) could come together to simply discuss how to inform others of your positions and why you hold them. Start an educational movement.

As I said, I am an outsider and feel a little uneasy sticking my nose in this issue, and I am not as emotionally tied into the issues as perhaps many of you are, but, at the same time, I feel strongly in the value of your beliefs and positions. So, I hope that the comments I offer are taken as support in your efforts, and are found to be helpful.;)
 
However, my guess is that there needs to be some agreement between those who have claim to throne as to who would be the recognized king and how the succession will work in the future before there can develop more popular support. I think the first question that needs to be answered is: What is our primary goal? To regain popular support for monarchy and establish a trend toward the re-establishment of the monarchy in some form? Or to come to some decision as to who will be the recognized king? Either way, serious compromises would have to be worked out. But answering that question would at least allow what issues have to be focused on and perhaps give clarity to the compromises that will need to be made.

As I said, I am an outsider and feel a little uneasy sticking my nose in this issue, and I am not as emotionally tied into the issues as perhaps many of you are, but, at the same time, I feel strongly in the value of your beliefs and positions. So, I hope that the comments I offer are taken as support in your efforts, and are found to be helpful.;)

I am glad you're posting here, Keith. If we had only Portuguese members talking about this topic, it would be a bit boring IMO. It's nice to see your interest. Don't worry, sometime I give my opinion about other royal families as if they were mine :D

However, my guess is that there needs to be some agreement between those who have claim to throne as to who would be the recognized king and how the succession will work in the future before there can develop more popular support. I think the first question that needs to be answered is: What is our primary goal? To regain popular support for monarchy and establish a trend toward the re-establishment of the monarchy in some form? Or to come to some decision as to who will be the recognized king? Either way, serious compromises would have to be worked out. But answering that question would at least allow what issues have to be focused on and perhaps give clarity to the compromises that will need to be made.

If monarchists want a king again, they must know it's not enough to say "A monarchy is a better regime". They have to work for that.
But don't forget that those who want a monarchy are a Minority. Many portuguese love to read about royals life and watch royal weddings. But about our own country, most prefer to remain to live in a republic.

As I said, there are not many who wants a King reigning here so the TV's don't care about debates/discussions about the subject. And when they do, the topic of the debate is always the same "Monarchy or republic?" and not something like "who should be our monarch?", simply because most people wouldn't watch it.

Most people know who D. Duarte is, but I have to say that IMO 9 in 10 never heard about Van Uden or Poidimani. So many accept or tolerate D. Duarte, because they don't know anyone else. If they were informed about the real situation, probably many would change their opinions.

With the monarchy supporters things are different. They are divided. Some don't support D. Duarte just because he is not considered as a smart person and they also dislike his personality. I am not particularly fond of him, but this is no reason to reject him as a Pretender. A King doesn't have to be a genius... Others don't support him because (in their opinions) the Law is not with him. Duarte simply doesn't fulfil the legal requisits to become a King.

So as you see royalists are not united, and IMO they won't be because some prefer to follow men's traditions than the written authority (the Law, in this case). I once went to the Real Associação of Lisbon with a friend of mine and while we were there, I asked a few questions to the person who was working there at the time. My impression was that D. Duarte was a religious dogma for him. I support van Uden but if I see that someone else has more rights to the throne than he does, I'll change my mind. I just don't understand why Duarte is the right one, just because his father decided so.

I think the best thing to do is first of all to formally determine who is the right heir. The monarchist associations should call specialists in Law and Monarchies, or go to some european Court that could study this case without passion for any of the sides. An exautive study would reveal who is the legal pretender and that way, it would be easier to defend the Monarchy system. And this Study has to be made one of these days, because Poidimani may be a bit lunatic in his demandings but he is taking legal procedures against D. Duarte and something has to come out of all this.

:flowers:
 
Regina,
What you say makes sense. There must be a common set of criteria which direct how decisions are made. In this case, I believe you are correct in saying that the Law must be the starting point. I assume by Law you are referring to a set of codified criteria for succession. The Law represents what everyone, at least at some point in time, has agreed upon, and if has been in place for some time, it has passed the test of time (i.e., that it has worked even when specific circumstances change), and therefore provides an objective means for achieving a particular outcome. So a legal or executive study sounds like a good idea. And if all monarchists would agree to this and agree to abide by the outcome, then, yes, this would greatly help the cause; at least unity may be achieved. Of course whatever the outcome, someone will lose, or felt they have lost. So, there must be an understanding that both sides will have to be magnaminous.

But in the mean time, I think it would be good for Portuguese monarchists to try to do everything possible to educate the populace in the advantages of having a monarchy at least be part of the government and involved in the life of Portugal. I know it would be a "long up-hill battle" but in the long run may prove worthwhile.
 
A question Regina, why do you include Poidimani? Surely you can´t think he has any claim, or do you? Van Uden, and the others all have some claim to the throne, or at least the right to think they may have some claim, but Poidimani, the self proclaimed heir to the perhaps illegitimate daughter of the last king, who as far as I know (I may be wrong on this) was never really proved to be this. Poidimani wasn´t even related to her in any way he was supposed to support her in exchange for some adoption papers but she complained that he didn´t even keep his side of the bargain.
I am not trying to be argumentive, just curious.
 
D. Miguel de Bragança (the Duke of Viseu) is one of the most discrete members of the royal family. Apart from being a knight of the Order of Malta, he rarely takes part in any royal activities. Instead, he chose to live a quiet life, in the countryside, where he's able to dedicate time to his passions: painting, reading and the studyof paranormal phenomena.

He rarely appears on the press, but in 1998 he accepted to recieve Caras magazine in his home (near Viseu).

Here's that so rare interview:

http://img166.imageshack.us/img166/6687/miguel1qr3.jpg

http://img166.imageshack.us/img166/1097/miguel2do5.jpg

http://img166.imageshack.us/img166/7540/miguel3pl7.jpg

http://img166.imageshack.us/img166/3181/miguel4eo5.jpg

http://img166.imageshack.us/img166/8571/miguel5ky6.jpg

Credit to Caras.
 
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Thanks to Menarue :flowers:, I found out a very interesting thing. Maybe some of you already knew it, but well I didn't.

Several Presidents of USA, including George Bush (father & son) are descendents of D. Afonso Henriques, the first King of Portugal.

Click here
Those Presidents who have the red circle are descendents of William I of England.

One King William's descendents, King Edward I, married Leonor of Castilla who was a descendent of D. Urraca of Portugal (daughter of King D. Afonso Henriques).
 
Several Presidents of USA, including George Bush (father & son) are descendents of D. Afonso Henriques, the first King of Portugal.

One King William's descendents, King Edward I, married Leonor of Castilla who was a descendent of D. Urraca of Portugal (daughter of King D. Afonso Henriques).
That's interesting, Regina ;)
But well, I'd say, one way or another, we all could find a remote royal ancester, couldn't we?... I mean, according to genealogists, more than 300.000 Portuguese men and women have royal/noble ancestors, so I myself and you, Regina, can well descendend from D. Afonso Henriques too... Queen Elsa of the Celtiberics :queen3: and Queen Regina of the Moors:queen:

:D;)
 
Not really Elsa. There are quite a number of people that are descended from D. Afonso Henriques but you have to remember that just a few generations ago people did not marry out of their class, of course there is always "the other side of the blanket" but that is difficult find out and even more difficult to prove. The US Presidents are all very well documented and can trace back from son to father/ mother etc. right back to King William the Conqueror (with the descendants of Edward II having D. Afonso Henriques as a common ancestor, the most surprising of these for me were Ronald Reagan, Richard Nixon and Bill Clinton (through his real father and not his adopted father).
Fascinating.
 
That's interesting, Regina ;)
But well, I'd say, one way or another, we all could find a remote royal ancester, couldn't we?... I mean, according to genealogists, more than 300.000 Portuguese men and women have royal/noble ancestors, so I myself and you, Regina, can well descendend from D. Afonso Henriques too...

Well I don't descended from D. Afonso Henriques :D :D I am sure of it. What surprises me is how many north american presidents have our first king as their ancester...

Yes, most of the portuguese people have some royal/noble ancester... Here is a very interesting article about it. The title means "We are all descendents of Nobles, Vagabonds and Priests".

The article says that more and more people in Portugal are paying to specialized companies to know who are their ancestors. There is a recent need to know from who each of us came from... Iza Luso Barbosa, the President of the Portuguese association of geneology says that we (the Portuguese), all have nobles, beggars, and priests in the family.


Queen Elsa of the Celtiberics :queen3: and Queen Regina of the Moors:queen:

:D;)

Jewish Queen of the Moors Land! :D
 
Not really Elsa. There are quite a number of people that are descended from D. Afonso Henriques but you have to remember that just a few generations ago people did not marry out of their class, of course there is always "the other side of the blanket" but that is difficult find out and even more difficult to prove. The US Presidents are all very well documented and can trace back from son to father/ mother etc. right back to King William the Conqueror (with the descendants of Edward II having D. Afonso Henriques as a common ancestor, the most surprising of these for me were Ronald Reagan, Richard Nixon and Bill Clinton (through his real father and not his adopted father).
Fascinating.

Exactly! The Presidents are indeed sure of their Royal ancestors. I find it fascinating too.
I know the mormons are always very concerned with genealogy. In America, they have very good sites and tools to help you to find more about your family history, ancestry, etc.
 
I read recently about a priest in the time of D.João II who had over 300(in fact I think it was more like 350) children and was condemned to death, but D.João said he was helping populate the north of Portugal so pardoned him....... so there must be a lot of people in Portugal who are descended from him.
 
I've never heard about any portuguese priest who has 350 (!) children :eek: I'm surprised with the number. Do you know something else about this priest like the name or his city? It's an interesting story.

I think it must be only a legend, because even the King couldn't go against the roman church's decision to condemn him to death... Anyway, it's still a funny situation.
 
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I read recently about a priest in the time of D.João II who had over 300(in fact I think it was more like 350) children and was condemned to death, but D.João said he was helping populate the north of Portugal so pardoned him....... so there must be a lot of people in Portugal who are descended from him.
Yes, I read something about that too... P.e Francisco Costa was his name. He was the priest of Trancoso and had 275 children from 54 different women!! :ohmy:
 
I read about this priest in "D.João II" by Luis Adão da Fonseca. I will try to find exactly what was said about him tomorrow. I probably got the number of children wrong - but it was only by about 100, LOL.
He was definitely a busy parish priest.
 
Yes, I read something about that too... P.e Francisco Costa was his name. He was the priest of Trancoso and had 275 children from 54 different women!! :ohmy:

I read about him right now on Wikipedia. The Wiki article says "Beira Alta", not North of Portugal... but who knows, maybe both places he helped to populate both places :D

I wasn't doubting any of you, but the story is really surprising! 275 children from 54 women represents more than 5 children per woman...


He was definitely a busy parish priest.

Menarue... :lol:

Anyway :D ... I didn't reply to your post #42 Menarue, sorry. I did it here
 
I have just found the reference. It is not in the book I mentioned (good book it is too) it is from the Arquivo Nacional da Torre do Tombo.
Padre Francisco da Costa, prior de Trancoso, who at the time was sixty-two years old was to be hanged, drawn and quartered. His crime was having given 29 goddaughters, 97 daughters and 37 sons. There is a list of the other women he had had children with including close family members (too close). On the whole he had a total of 299 children of which 214 were girls and 85 were boys and the mothers were 53 women.
It goes on to say that D.João II pardoned him and set him free on 17th March 1487 saying that he would help populate the region of Beira Alta that was so poorly inhabited at that time.
(Autos arquivados na Torre do Tombo, Armário 5).

Unbelievable.
 
I'm still astonished... He should be on the Guiness book of records! :D
I wonder if there are not genetic problems in Trancoso.

Santos Costa wrote a book about this story (the article calls it a "legend" because there are no documents proving that he was the father of such number of children). Article
 
It does sound as though it is a legend . The children sound like a few too many but I remember something about the 100 sons (not counting the girls) of a royal in an Eastern country. A bit like Chinese whispers, he probably had a large number of children and then it was exaggerated - but like most legends it was probably based on something or in this case someone....
The largest family I know personally has 6 boys and 19 girls and all the same parents that could be the material for a legend in the future. lol.
 
Thanks to Menarue :flowers:, I found out a very interesting thing. Maybe some of you already knew it, but well I didn't.

Several Presidents of USA, including George Bush (father & son) are descendents of D. Afonso Henriques, the first King of Portugal.

Click here
Those Presidents who have the red circle are descendents of William I of England.

One King William's descendents, King Edward I, married Leonor of Castilla who was a descendent of D. Urraca of Portugal (daughter of King D. Afonso Henriques).

This is very interesting. What was the source of this information?

Thanks,
Keith
 
Yes, I read something about that too... P.e Francisco Costa was his name. He was the priest of Trancoso and had 275 children from 54 different women!! :ohmy:

Wow!!!!! What a guy!!!!:whistling:
 
The ancestry of the Presidents of the US can be seen on www.geneall.net go to any President´s name (I started at President Bush) and then click on US Presidents and the whole list appears, every one that has a red dot next to it shows that this President is a descendant of William the Conqueror and most of them from the first King of Portugal through the wife of Edward I of England. I find this fascinating.
You may have to sign up to get the full information but it is very cheap.
 
What an interesting story this of this priest and his many children! I can believe it(even though not 300 or 2oo). My own ancestors came from Galizia, when Portugal was still tied up with Spain. They later settled in the region of Minho, north of Portugal. The Galizians speak very similar to Portuguese.
As to Saramago, I think, he is a strange person with his theories of Portugal being incorporated by Spain. Also, I don´t think he deserved the Nobel Prize.
 
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