One of the better known heroes of Portugal is Brites de Almeida, a woman who worked as a baker in Aljubarrota, a small town where the Battle of Aljubarrota took place on August 14th of the year 1385, between the portuguese and castillian armies. At that time the Kingdom of Castilla wanted to take control of the Portuguese Kingdom through marriage. D. Beatriz, was the Portuguese crown heiress since she was the only daughter of the Portuguese King, D. Fernando, and a marriage between her and D.Juan I of Castilla was arranged. However, the portuguese law not only forbade foreigners to inherit the Portuguese Crown but the sons and daughters of women who married foreigners aswell1 - this would exclude D. Juan I of Castilla and all of his descendants. Even though the law was simple, the Castillians did not accept portuguese law, only their own. So, the spanish population started to cross the border into Portugal to steal the harvests, burn houses and do all kinds of mischief2.
The nobles decided to support Infante D.João, who was at the time under arrest by the spanish, but he was a traitor for he had, at one time, fought on the spanish side against Portugal, and the common portuguese people dispised him because of that. The plebians were supporting another man, also called D. João, known as the Master of Avis. He was the illegitimate son of D. Pedro, so D. Fernando’s half brother and the uncle of D. Beatriz.
Master of Avis, being a witness to the oppression the portuguese people were suffering and refusing to see his country loose its independence, accepted to lead the people against the spanish. This man was one of a kind, educated by the Order of Christ, a warrior religious order, successor of the famous Templars, he was great in battle, humble and had good allies, the greatest of them was D. Nuno Álvares Pereira, who is not only one of the greatest portuguese stategists and historical figures, but is also a Catholic Saint. I will later write about these heroes. Today I’m going to tell you the story of Brites de Almeida, whose greatest deed was accomplished in the Battle of Aljubarrota.
Brites de Almeida is believed to be a legendary figure, and the reason why she is not considered an historical person is due to the inexistence of records about her. But we must keep in mind that she was a plebeian, and history has no place for such a person. Collective memory does. And even if it is true that the details of her story may have been changed by time and imagination, the essence of the story is, I believe, true. It’s important to enphasize that portuguese people talk about this woman as a real person, scholars doubt her existence, common people do not.
Brites de Almeida
Brites de Almeida was born in Faro in the Kingdom of Algarve, one of the two kingdoms belonging to the Portuguese Crown. She came from a humble family, poor but not extremely poor, since her parents owned a tavern and were able to provide an inheritance for their daughter.
Brites had a manly character since childhood, prefering swords instead of dolls, enjoying fighting and, in time, she started to be feared not only by women but also by men.
She became an orphan at the age of 26 and used her inheritance to buy swords and learn sword-play. Even though she is described as an ugly woman, she had a some suitors, the most relevant for our story was a soldier from the north of the Tagus river, who fell deeply in love with Brites because of her courage and strength. He proposed to her, and was challenged for a duel, which he lost (he died on the spot). And this duel was the cause of all Brites’ problems. She killed a man so she had to escape, she did it by boat. She met some moors who abducted her and sold her to a turkish man, who used her to do house chores, a female job - an offense she could not forgive. To escape, she killed the turk and his familly, escaped by boat, and recued two portuguese men who had also been enslaved by the turks. Back then, it was common for moors to take portuguese, and other people from Europe, as slaves to those areas of the world.
It was a very difficult journey, very long and with no provisions, eventually the two portuguese men passed away. Brites was left alone dying, but at last arrived to Portugal, and was found by several fishermen from Ericeira, where she was taken care for for five months.
After that period she found a job as a muleteer in Torres Vedras, a town fairly close to Lisbon. One day she had to transport wine to Lisbon and, on her way, she had to stop in a inn to rest and eat a meal. Also there were some saloios (name given to the people who live in the rural areas of Lisbon, like Loures and Odivelas: after the conquest of Lisbon by D. Afonso Henriques, he allowed some moors, also called Çaloios, who lived in these areas to stay; the word “saloio” means “desert inhabitant” in arab3 ) who were drunk and started to insult Brites. On her deffence, she tried to ignore them, but they kept insulting her until the point she felt it would be a dishonour not to act. She attacked them, did not kill them, but fearing to have done it, she ran away to evade justice.
While she was on a dark forest, she started to listen to pleas for help. She could not ignore it, since she knew doing so would make her a bad Catholic and would dishonour her. She followed the noises and found an almost naked man tied to a tree. While he was telling her his story, she untied him. He had been attacked by seven thieves, who took everything from him, except his life, and now he was asking Brites to help him to return to Lisbon and she agreed.
While they were on their way they found a small houses with the lights on, so the man decided it would be a good idea to ask for help there since it was, probably, the house of a farmer. It was not, it was the house of the seven thieves, and they were both abducted. They would have been killed, but Brites told the man to lay on the floor, then she turn off the lights and killed all the men she could reach. Only two escaped.
The man was very thankfull, she had saved him two times now. She stayed in his house some time and afterwards left to Aljubarrota, where she started to work on a oven. Then the war began. The battle of Aljubarrota gave the victory to the portuguese people, and the spanish soldiers started to run away from the battle. As Brites baked bread for all town, she had fresh bread which attracted the starved soldiers. When they were preparing to get inside, Brites appeared and warned them that if they got in she would kill them. As they were not from the area, they did not know Brites, so they got inside, and she killed them with the bread shovel. She then left and organized an all women militia to hunt down the remaining spanish soldiers.
It is said that for many centuries the bread shovel with which the spanish were killed was kept in Aljubarrota as a treasure.
Today, Brites is still remembered as a portuguese heroin and a symbol of feminine courage. When a woman is compared to “the baker of Aljubarrota” it is always a compliment.
Bibliography used for the biography of Brites de Almeida:
COSTA, Diogo da, Auto novo, e Curioso da Forneira de Aljubarrota, Em que se contém a vida e façanhas desta Valerosa Matrona, Officina dos Her. de António Pedroso Galram, Lisboa, 1743
VIEIRA, Padre António, Arte de Furtar, pág.98, Fronteira do Caos Editores, 2006, Porto, 989-8070-02-1
ALMEIDA, Virginia de Castro, História da Grande Batalha de Aljubarrota e da Padeira que Matou Sete Espanhóis, pág.3, Edições S.P.N, 1939, Lisboa
https://ciberduvidas.iscte-iul.pt/consultorio/perguntas/saloio/15311