Inês de Castro

(1325-1355) Galician lady, mother of three offspring by Prince Pedro, future king of Portugal, who claimed to have married her in secret after the death of his own wife, Constanza Manuel, whom Inês had accompanied to Portugal as lady-in-waiting. From this union were born: Prince João, Prince Dinis, Dona Beatriz.
She is the protagonist of a large number of famous literary works, in Portugal and abroad, focusing on her tragic love story.
Inês de Castro was the daughter of Pedro Fernández de Castro and his mistress Aldonça Lourenço de Valadares, a member of the Portuguese lesser nobility.
Dona Inês de Castro is referred as a sobrinha of King Pedro of Portugal, because she was the daughter of one of the king's blood cousins. She had the same great-grandfather as Pedro of Portugal, namely King Afonso III of Porugal. For that reason, a dispensation from the Pope was required for Inês and Pedro to be married. [Pedro, ch. 28: 77-79]
Doña Constanza Manuel, the wife of King Pedro of Portugal, often called 'co-mother' to Dona Inês de Castro because she was the godmother of their first-born, Prince Luís, who died in infancy. [João1, ch. 187: 29, 32]
The Castros were a very influential family in Galicia and Castile. Inês's half-sister, Juana de Castro, was the second wife of Pedro I of Castile (1354), though he abandoned her shortly afterwards.
In the opening lines of chapter 27 of his Chronicle of King Pedro of Portugal, Fernão Lopes refers to an earlier passage where he has already spoken of the death of Dona Inês. He probably means his chronicle of Afonso IV (1291-1357), the king who ordered her demise. Unfortunately, this chronicle has been lost. For further information on this chronicle see note 2 in the Prologue of the printed edition.