Inez & Pedro - Portugal's Romeo & Juliet

“It all started in the 14th century in Coimbra when Prince Pedro (1320-1367), who was at the time the rightful heir to the throne, met Constança from Castela Kingdom who he was expected to marry in an arranged marriage. Pedro, however, fell in love with one of Contança’s maids, her name was Inês de Castro (1320 or 1325-1355) and she reciprocated the prince’s love.

Pedro and Inês had a secret affair which became public as soon as Queen Constança died giving birth to Pedro’s child. This made Pedro feel comfortable enough to make his relationship official, but his father, King Afonso IV, was having none of it and forbade them to marry. Nevertheless, Pedro and Inês decided to live together in Coimbra and have children anyway.

Legend has it that Inês’s brothers had a big influence on Pedro which started to bother the royal family. Then, the fact that Pedro and Inês had supposedly secretly married made their children heirs to the throne. Soon King Afonso IV decided that it was time to get rid of Inês de Castro and so he gathered a group of men and demanded that they’d kill her.

The legend says she was killed at Quinta das Lágrimas in Coimbra where people can visit the fountain where one can still see her blood on the rocks. But she was in fact killed at Paços de Santa Clara, also in Coimbra.

Pedro became furious and wanted to start a war with his father but his mother, Queen Beatriz, appealed for peace and made her son give up on this idea. At this time, Pedro also swore not to hunt down the men who killed the love of his life, but right after his father’s death he changed his mind and demanded their deaths. The assassins were tortured and Dom Pedro inflicted them a macabre death by ripping their hearts out of their chest and back. Legend has it that he did it with this bare hands and that he even ate the hearts. This action gave him the nickname of Pedro the Cruel.

King Pedro and Inês became reunited after their death. After Inês’s death, Pedro crowned her as queen making her the first and only Portuguese queen crowned after her death. King Pedro made sure this royal title was visible on her tomb and then he ordered that his tomb to be next to hers, to stay side by side for eternity.”

And so ends the legend of Pedro and Inês of Coimbra. Their beautifully carved, marble tombs are not in Coimbra though. They are in a monastery in Alcobaça and they are something to see!

We walked over the Mondango River on a coloured pedestrian bridge dedicated to Pedro and Inês, to the “Quinta das Lágrimas“ (Estate of Tears), a famous estate in Coimbra, once inhabited by Portuguese nobility. The original castle was built in the 14th century during the reign of King Afonso IV. The estate had very lush and famous hunting grounds often visited by many kings and emperors of Europe. There are seven centuries of gardens here with over 51 remarkable trees from all over the world - China, Japan, England, Peru, etc.

We wandered around this lovely palace, turned into a fancy hotel, looking for the fountain called the "Fonte Das Lágrimas". It is on the property where Inês was slain and supposedly her blood and bloody tears still stains its stone bottom. We found it and if you look carefully you can see the red stones in one of the photos (an algae?). For centuries, the estate has been reportedly haunted by the ghost of Inês, who is heard crying on the grounds. Also, the legend has it that Inês' spirit still roams the estate, eternally searching for her lost love, Pedro.Read more