"João I" redirects here. For the king of Kongo, see
João I of Kongo
.
John I
(
Portuguese
:
João
[1]
[ʒuˈɐ̃w̃]
; 11 April 1357 – 14 August 1433), also called
John of Aviz
, was
King of Portugal
from 1385 until his death in 1433. He is recognized chiefly for his role in Portugal's victory in
a succession war
with
Castile
, preserving his country's independence and establishing the
Aviz (or Joanine) dynasty
on the Portuguese throne. His long reign of 48 years, the most extensive of all Portuguese monarchs, saw the beginning of Portugal's overseas expansion.
[2]
John's well-remembered reign in his country earned him the epithet
of Fond Memory
(
de Boa Memória
); he was also referred to as "the Good" (
o Bom
), sometimes "the Great" (
o Grande
), and more rarely, especially in
Spain
, as "the Bastard" (
Bastardo
).
On the death without a male heir of his half-brother,
King Ferdinand I
, in October 1383, strenuous efforts were made to secure the succession for
Beatrice
, Ferdinand's only daughter. As
heir presumptive
, Beatrice had married king
John I of Castile
, but popular sentiment was against an arrangement in which Portugal would have been virtually annexed by Castile. The
1383–1385 Portuguese interregnum
followed, a period of political anarchy, when no monarch ruled the country.
Acclamation
On 6 April 1385, the Council of the Kingdom (the
Portuguese Cortes
) met in
Coimbra
and declared John, then Master of Aviz, to be king of Portugal.
[3]
This was followed by the liberation of almost all of the
Minho
in the course of two months as part of a war against Castile in opposition to its claims to the Portuguese throne. Soon after, the king of Castile again invaded Portugal with the purpose of conquering
Lisbon
and removing John I from the throne.
John I of Castile
was accompanied by French allied cavalry while English troops and generals took the side of John of Aviz (see
Hundred Years' War
). John and
Nuno Álvares Pereira
, his
constable
and talented supporter, repelled the attack in the decisive
Battle of Aljubarrota
on 14 August 1385.
[4]
John I of Castile then retreated. The Castilian forces abandoned
Santarém
,
Torres Vedras
and
Torres Novas
, and many other towns were delivered to John I by Portuguese nobles from the Castilian side. As a result, the stability of the Portuguese throne was permanently secured.
John I of Castile died in 1390 without issue from his wife Beatrice, which meant that a competing legitimate bloodline with a claim to the throne of Portugal died out. John I of Portugal was then able to rule in peace and concentrate on the economic development and territorial expansion of his realm. The most significant military actions were the
siege and conquest of the city of Ceuta
by Portugal in 1415, and the successful
defence of Ceuta
from a Moroccan counterattack in 1419. These measure were intended to help seize control of navigation off the African coast and trade routes from the interior of Africa.
The raids and attacks of the
Reconquista
in the
Iberian Peninsula
created captives on both sides who were either ransomed or sold as slaves. The Portuguese crown extended this practice to North Africa. After the attack on Ceuta, the king sought papal recognition of the military action as a
Crusade
. Such a ruling would have enabled those captured to be legitimately sold as slaves.
[5]
In response to John's request, Pope Martin V issued the
Papal bull
Sane charissimus
of 4 April 1418,
[6]
which confirmed to the king all of the lands he might win from the Moors. Under the auspices of Prince
Henry the Navigator
, voyages were organized to explore the African coast. These led to the discovery of the uninhabited islands of
Madeira
in 1417 and the
Azores
in 1427; all were claimed by the Portuguese crown.
Contemporaneous writers describe John as a man of wit who was very keen on concentrating power on himself, but at the same time possessed a benevolent and kind demeanor. His youthful education as master of a religious order made him an unusually learned king for the Middle Ages. His love for knowledge and culture was passed on to his sons, who are often referred to collectively by Portuguese historians as the "
illustrious generation
" (
Ínclita Geração
):
Edward
, the future king, was a poet and a writer;
Peter
, the Duke of Coimbra, was one of the most learned princes of his time; and Prince Henry the Navigator, the duke of Viseu, invested heavily in science and the development of nautical pursuits. In 1430, John's only surviving daughter,
Isabella
, married
Philip the Good
, Duke of Burgundy, and enjoyed an extremely refined court culture in his lands; she was the mother of
Charles the Bold
.