Fernando Fernández de Carrión - AbsoluteAstronomy.com

Fernando Fernández or Fernán Fernándiz de Carrión (fl.
Floruit
Floruit , abbreviated fl. , is a Latin verb meaning "flourished", denoting the period of time during which something was active...

1107–1125) was a count in the Kingdom of León

Kingdom of León

The Kingdom of León was an independent kingdom situated in the northwest region of the Iberian Peninsula. It was founded in AD 910 when the Christian princes of Asturias along the northern coast of the peninsula shifted their capital from Oviedo to the city of León...

during the reign of Queen Urraca.
Fernando's origins are obscure. Though his patronymic

Patronymic

A patronym, or patronymic, is a component of a personal name based on the name of one's father, grandfather or an even earlier male ancestor. A component of a name based on the name of one's mother or a female ancestor is a matronymic. Each is a means of conveying lineage.In many areas patronyms...

indicates that his father was also named Fernando, his father has not been identified. He may have been related to Pedro Ansúrez

Pedro Ansúrez

Pedro Ansúrez was a Castilian count of Liébana, Saldaña and Carrión in the closing decades of the eleventh century and the opening decades of the twelfth. He is considered the founder and first lord of Valladolid....

. He probably hailed from the region of León

León (province)

León is a province of northwestern Spain, in the northwestern part of the autonomous community of Castile and León.About one quarter of its population of 500,200 lives in the capital, León. The weather is cold and dry during the winter....

, where he is known to have held properties and where he appears in some local documents.

Fernando married into the royal family when he wed a certain Elvira Alfonso, a daughter of Alfonso VI. Unfortunately, Alfonso had two daughters of this name and scholars differ as to which one Fernando married. One Elvira was the daughter of a concubine, Jimena Muñoz, and the sister of Theresa of Portugal

Theresa, Countess of Portugal

Theresa of Portugal was the first ruler of independent Portugal...

. She was the elder and was married to Raymond IV of Toulouse

Raymond IV of Toulouse

Raymond IV of Toulouse , sometimes called Raymond of St Gilles, was Count of Toulouse, Duke of Narbonne, and Margrave of Provence and one of the leaders of the First Crusade. He was a son of Pons of Toulouse and Almodis de La Marche...

. Either she returned to Spain shortly after her husband's death in 1105 or she did not return to Spain before Urraca's death in 1126 and could not have been the wife of Fernando. The other Elvira was a legitimate daughter, but by which queen is disputed. Her mother was a certain Isabel (Elizabeth), reputedly the daughter of Louis VI of France

Louis VI of France

Louis VI , called the Fat , was King of France from 1108 until his death . Chronicles called him "roi de Saint-Denis".-Reign:...

, but this chronologically difficult. It is more likely that she was merely from France or Burgundy

Duchy of Burgundy

The Duchy of Burgundy , was heir to an ancient and prestigious reputation and a large division of the lands of the Second Kingdom of Burgundy and in its own right was one of the geographically larger ducal territories in the emergence of Early Modern Europe from Medieval Europe.Even in that...

. It is also possible that Alfonso married his mistress Zaida

Zaida of Seville

Zaida of Seville was a refugee Muslim princess who was a mistress and then perhaps queen of Alfonso VI of Castile.She is said by Iberian Muslim sources to have been the daughter-in-law of Al Mutamid, the Muslim King of Seville, wife of his son Abu al Fatah al Ma'Mun, Emir of Cordoba,...

, who was thereupon baptised under the Christian name Isabel. This Elvira married by 1120 to Roger I of Sicily

Roger I of Sicily

Roger I , called Bosso and the Great Count, was the Norman Count of Sicily from 1071 to 1101. He was the last great leader of the Norman conquest of southern Italy.-Conquest of Calabria and Sicily:...

, and since the wife of Fernando was still in Castile as late as 1133, most historians have concluded that she was the widow of the Count of Toulouse and daughter of Alfonso by Jimena.

Whichever Elvira was Fernando's wife had married by 8 July 1117, when together the couple made a private donation of the monastery of San Salvador de Ferreira to the abbey of Cluny. As this was in Galicia it probably represented a portion of his wife's inheritance. The marriage does not appear to have been a happy one. On 17 December 1120 Elvira sold the estate at Fuentes de los Oteros which she had received as arras (a bridal gift). The couple had separated by 1121, when Fernando married again, to Sancha González. His children were Diego, García, and Teresa. Elvira was still living as late as 16 April 1157.
Fernando was in the service of Henry

Henry, Count of Portugal

Henry of Burgundy, Count of Portugal was Count of Portugal from 1093 to his death. He was brother of Hugh I, Duke of Burgundy, and Odo I, Duke of Burgundy, all sons of Henry, the heir of Robert I, Duke of Burgundy. His name is Henri in modern French, Henricus in Latin, Enrique in modern Spanish...

, Count of Portugal, from 1108 until Henry's death in 1112. From 1111 he ruled Lamego

Lamego

Lamego is a municipality in northern Portugal, with a population of 27,054 inhabitants Lamego is a municipality in northern Portugal, with a population of 27,054 inhabitants Lamego is a municipality in northern Portugal, with a population of 27,054 inhabitants (the catchment of the city of...

. After Count Henry he no longer appears in Portuguese documents. Outside of Portugal at different times he held the tenencias of Salnellas (1113), Toro

Toro, Zamora

Toro is a town and municipality in the province of Zamora, part of the autonomous community of Castile and León, Spain. It is located on a fertile high plain, northwest of Madrid at an elevation of 740 meters....

(1116–17), Bolaños

Bolaños

The municipality of Bolaños is located in the north of the Mexican state of Jalisco.The municipality shares its border on the north with the municipalities of Mezquitic and Villa Guerrero and to the southeast with the municipality of Chimaltitán...

(1117), and Tierra de Campos (1119). He held the tenencia of Malgrat (Malgrado), modern Benavente

Benavente, Zamora

Benavente is a municipality in the north of the province of Zamora, in the autonomous community Castile and León of Spain. It has about 20,000 inhabitants....

, from 1117 to 1124. The spurious acta of a synod supposed to have taken place in Oviedo

Oviedo

Oviedo is the capital city of the Principality of Asturias in northern Spain. It is also the name of the municipality that contains the city....

in 1115 record the presence of Fernando, calling him ex campi Zamorae, et campi Tauri ("out of the field of Zamora

Zamora, Spain

Zamora is a city in Castile and León, Spain, the capital of the province of Zamora. It lies on a rocky hill in the northwest, near the frontier with Portugal and crossed by the Duero river, which is some 50 km downstream as it reaches the Portuguese frontier...

and the field of Toro", that is, coming from those tenencias). A similar description of territories occurs in a document of 1117: in tauro et in camorus mandante ("in Toro and in Zamora commanding").

In 1121, when the royal court wintered in León, Fernando was in attendance. He had two documents drawn up by royal notaries Pedro Vicéntez and Juan Rodríguez, both dated to the joint reign of Urraca and her son, the future Alfonso VII. The following spring Urraca campaigned in Galicia, perhaps with Fernando accompanying. Fernando's death probably occurred towards the end of Urraca's reign, as he does not appear in any charters of Alfonso VII and the Chronica Adefonsi imperatoris does not list him among the nobles who did homage to the new king in 1126. He was buried in San Zoilo de Carrión and the inscription on his tomb was recorded by Prudencio de Sandoval

Prudencio de Sandoval

Fray Prudencio de Sandoval was a Spanish historian and Benedictine, the Bishop of Tuy from 1608 to 1612 and Bishop of Pamplona thereafter until his death. He continued the chronicle begun by Florián de Ocampo and Ambrosio de Morales, and rather uncritically compiled a large collection of...

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