The system of ecclesiastical patronage, whether understood as referring to the protection of saints or to powerful magnates with respect to local churches, can trace its origins to the beginnings of Church history (Gaudemet 1997). In the era of the early Church, patronage operated under a regime in which churches were privately owned, enabling founders and their successors to possess the buildings, their assets and ecclesiastical revenues, and which also gave them the right to appoint officiating clerics. Such prerogatives were conferred on the owners of the land and/or those who sponsored the building and maintenance of the churches, in recognition of their role in the foundation process. In the context of the Reform Church between the 11th and 13th centuries and the creation of ecclesiastical dominium (Mazel 2013, 2021) when simony and other forms of secular interference in ecclesiastical affairs were restricted or prohibited, and at a decisive moment in the development of Canon Law (Viaut 2021), the right of patronage came to replace the right of possession and recognised certain privileges to the founders regarding the churches established by them. Among other honorary and material rights, ² the right of patrons to appoint priests continued to be recognised, whom the respective diocesan bishop would confirm and invest with the cura animarum. In turn, the right to the revenues of these institutions was replaced by the collecting of an annual tribute designated colheita (harvest) or jantar (a meal).

Despite the setting-out of these particulars in legislation produced in the 12th century, up to the end of the Ancien Régime, the right of patronage continued to represent an important form of power over ecclesiastical institutions and was the cause of frequent jurisdictional disputes and judicial litigation—both in lay and ecclesiastic courts—over institutional, fiscal and territorial land rights (Gonçalves 2000). In Portugal, study of the right of patronage in the Middle Ages has not been copious, but it has inspired important research on networks of patronage, at regional and diocesan level—Braga in the 13th century (Marques 1990) and Évora in the 14th century (Vilar 2002)—and at urban level with respect to Lisbon (Farelo 2006). In Portugal, as in the rest of Europe (Brown 2014), this right, which represented one of the most potent forms of lay interference in the ecclesiastical sphere, has also been the subject of studies concerned with the nobility and royal power (Sá-Nogueira 1988; Farelo 2013).

It is, however, a dimension that has been little touched-upon in the context of monastic history, despite the fact that Portuguese monasteries held the right of patronage over a considerable number of churches. ³

In the case of the Monastery of Lorvão, identifying all the churches over which it exercised the right of patronage has proven a highly complex task. The inherent difficulties of this undertaking are owed to the fact that the acquisition of these rights which was normally through donations to the monastery, go back to its sparsely-documented early history, and, no less important, the fact of the monastery having suffered certain vicissitudes in its history, namely in the first quarter of the 12th century, which interfered in the composition of the monastic estate.

Thus, it is imperative to go back to the context of its foundation (or refoundation, according to some authors), to understand its geopolitical importance in the 10th, 11th and 12th centuries, and, as briefly as possible, to understand the reasons for its swift regional implantation. Such factors, as we shall see, led to numerous churches being incorporated within its estate together with the respective right of patronage over them. We will also examine how the transfer of the Monastery of Lorvão, along with all its assets, to the Cathedral of Coimbra in 1109—and its retention under the cathedral’s control until 1116—significantly influenced its destiny in various crucial ways. This impact extended to matters of ownership and the patronage of numerous churches.

The Monastery of Lorvão, situated approximately 17 kilometres from the city of Coimbra, holds a prominent place as one of Portugal’s most significant and thoroughly studied monasteries. However, its origins remain a subject of debate, with respected scholars offering differing interpretations.

To summarise the issue, some believe that the primitive community dates back to the early 6th century, a theory initially proposed by Fr. Bernardo de Brito and later supported by other 17th-century writers ⁴ and, more recently, by Nelson Correia Borges, who tried to rehabilitate the Cistercian chronicler’s thesis, using archaeological sources checked against chronological data related to Lucêncio, Bishop of Conimbriga between 561 and 572. Lucêncio, if this hypothesis is confirmed, would have been the first abbot of Lorvão (Borges 1983, 57-58; 1984, 143-158). Other authors, however, claim that the monastery’s foundation dates back to the second half of the 9th century, while differing over precisely when it occurred. Rui de Azevedo advanced the position that it was founded in the last quarter of the 9th century, shortly after the reconquest of Coimbra in 878 and the subsequent repopulation promoted by Hermenegildo Guterres (Azevedo 1933). This position was followed by several authors, such as Maur Cocheril (1966, 84; 1986, 217-218; 1992, 522), Maria Alegria Marques (1998, 75), Adriano de Gusmão (1989, 60) and Maria João Branco (2008, 32), ⁵ but meanwhile Aires Nascimento (2008; 2009) contested it, arguing that the 777 date of a document included in the Liber Testamentorum Coenobii Laurbanensis—evidently an error—should be read 857 and that Lorvão Monastery would have been founded sometime prior to that year.

In 2021, Maria Alegria Marques—who, in 1998, agreed with Rui de Azevedo’s thesis (Marques 1998, 75)—recognised the difficulty of the question by stating that it is not clear when the monastery came into existence, but accepted the date of 857, saying that “the historical existence of the Monastery of Lorvão is attested by the middle of the 9th century, even if the date supporting the hypothesis does not find agreement among scholars” (Marques 2021, 21). ⁶ Indeed, the dating of this document has not achieved a consensus and José Mattoso (2009) has pointed out the impossibility of this interpretation, stating that “the emendation to 857, correct from the palaeographic and diplomatic point of view, is contrary to what we know about the political history of the intervention of the kings of León in the Coimbra area”, and countering it with the position of José María Fernández Catón, who proposes that the diploma’s date be corrected to 907 or 917 (Mattoso leans more towards the latter). ⁷ Aires A. Nascimento, in a more recent work, readily admits that “the oldest authentic document attesting to the existence of the monastery dates from 911” (Nascimento 2016, 15, note 8).

Recently, Manuel Real (2022) attributed the foundation of Lorvão Monastery to Prince Bermudo Ordonhes, “working with [his nephew] Ordonho ([who was] still prince regent or already acting as King of Gallecia), [...] in the first decade of the 10th century, if not in 911”. According to Real, Ordonho (who was later King of Leon) was attentive to the matters of the frontier and, therefore, would have been interested in “founding a well-supported monastic house in the Mondego valley, which would serve as a rearguard to the settlement of the land of Coimbra.” The aforementioned author states that:

Setting aside the issue of the monastery’s founding date—undoubtedly important but not our primary focus here—we wish to emphasise that, with the Monastery of Lorvão existing as early as 911, its manorial domain expanded rapidly during the 10th century. This growth, fuelled by both purchases and donations, ⁹ reflects the pivotal role the monastery played in the religious and economic life of a society located on the Mondego River frontier. For this reason, it is unsurprising that the monastery enjoyed the support of the Leonese counts and monarchs, who were keen to strengthen their hold on the kingdom’s western territories and solidify their recent conquests.

Among the various donations that were made to it, for the present we are particularly interested in the innumerable churches that the new lords of the region were building at that time to respond to the spiritual yearnings of the Christian population and which ended up being transferred to the monastery in remission for the sins of their respective donors. Until 987, that is to say for about eight decades, there are 19 letters of donation and testamentary disposition, in which there are almost three dozen churches and small monasteries donated or bequeathed to the Abbey of Lorvão. ¹⁰

This was certainly due to the rigorous way of life of the monks, which encouraged believers to make oblations in order to benefit from their prayers. But the historical conditions were, in fact, extremely favourable. We need only look at the location of the properties donated to Lorvão in these first centuries, already mapped by Rui de Azevedo (1933, 27) and Maria Alegria Fernandes Marques (2021, 119), to understand how the growth in importance of the monastery is perfectly articulated with the Christian Reconquista and, above all, with the efforts made to intensify the settlement of the conquered areas. This context explains why the assets donated to Lorvão were located throughout the county of Coimbra, aligning mainly along two axes: from Águeda southwards to the city of Coimbra; and, along the Mondego basin, from Montemor-o-Velho to the interior, passing through Coimbra, the area surrounding the Abbey of Lorvão, Penacova, Vila Nova de Poiares, Lousã, Arganil, Mortágua, Santa Comba Dão, Papízios (in the municipality of Carregal do Sal), Tábua, Oliveira do Hospital and Seia, and then, a little further north, Tondela and Viseu. Importantly, there is not a single donation of properties located north of the river Douro and the number of donations above the river Vouga is extremely small.

However, the incursions of Almansor, who took Coimbra in 987, Viseu in 997 and Montemor-o-Velho in 1000, devastating all the lands up to the Douro, would have shaken the region. ¹¹ For a hundred years, with the territory of Coimbra under Muslim rule, the donations recorded are very few and only one, dated 1002, includes churches: in fact, half of the churches of São Vicente (par. São Vicente de Pereira Jusã, mun. Ovar), Santa Cristina (which we have not been able to identify) and São Martinho, in Maçada (v., par. São Martinho da Gândara, mun. Oliveira de Azeméis), ¹² all located further north, in the Terra de Santa Maria. ¹³

The political and military conjuncture would, however, change and the definitive conquest of Coimbra, by Fernando Magno (“the Great”) in 1064, re-established the defensive border-line of the River Mondego. ¹⁴ The monks of Lorvão quickly recovered most of their lost possessions, adopted the Rule of St. Benedict, ¹⁵ saw their old prestige return, and experienced a growing increase in the number of donations bestowed upon them.

However, the incorporation of new churches among the possessions of the monastery was by then happening at a slower pace, perhaps because the structure of the parish network was increasingly more defined and because the influxes of new colonisers rarely justified adding to the number of existing churches. Or perhaps because, by then, only a short distance from Lorvão, the Monastery of Vacariça was flourishing, with a new sanctuary, that of São Salvador and São Vicente, which was more popular, thus exerting a greater influence on the generosity of the faithful. ¹⁶ However, this slowdown was not the most punishing event that Lorvão Monastery experienced at this time.

The greatest setback occurred when, on 29 July 1109, the Count and Countess of Portucale, Henrique and Teresa, donated it (and all its possessions) to Bishop Gonçalo Pais and the Cathedral of Coimbra, allegedly to remedy the latter’s material needs, the gift being confirmed by the Pope Pascoal II. ¹⁷ It was to be restored on 19 March 1116 by the same bishop who appointed the Prior Eusébio as its abbot, stipulating that the election of its future abbots was to be done with the approval of the Cathedral, to which the monastery remained subject: “Et ut ipse abbas [Eusébio], cum omni suo conuentu [de Lorvão], sit subditus episcopo et canonicis prefate sedis, et sine eorum consilio, isto defuncto, nullatenus alter eligatur.” ¹⁸

This continued subjection to Coimbra Cathedral is essential for understanding the future role of the Bishop of Coimbra, Pedro Soares, in the process that led to the expulsion of the Benedictine monks from Lorvão Monastery in the early 13th century and their replacement by a female community under the tutelage of Queen Teresa (daughter of Sancho I of Portugal), and the reason why, unusually among Cistercian houses, ¹⁹ Lorvão was not exempted from diocesan jurisdiction. ²⁰

Furthermore, as Rui de Azevedo (1933, 35) and José María Fernández Catón (2008, 458), among others, have noted, Bishop Gonçalo Pais, when restoring the Monastery of Lorvão, did not return to it all the property it had possessed in 1109. ²¹ This issue was so important that the monks of Lorvão, at the end of the 12th century or beginning of the 13th century, in a context of conflict with the Bishop of Coimbra, Pedro Soares, wrote a Memória sôbre os agravos e usurpações que o mosteiro de Lorvão sofreu dos bispos de Coimbra (“Memoir concerning the grievances and usurpations that the Monastery of Lorvão suffered at the hands of the Bishops of Coimbra”), where they listed the property formerly theirs, that Bishop Gonçalo had failed to return to them in 1116 (Azevedo 1933, 32 and doc. 21).

In other words, regardless of the property that Lorvão had received since the earliest days of its existence, on 19 March 1116, Bishop Gonçalo Pais fixed the amount of it to be restored. ²² Among these properties, of particular interest for our purposes here are the churches of São Pedro (with its vineyards and vegetable gardens) and of São Bartolomeu (with its vineyards), located on the outskirts of Coimbra (arrabalde), which shall be the focus of our attention: “et infra ciuitatem predictam ecclesiam beati Petri cum omnibus suis uineis et ortis. Et in suburbio eiusdem ecclesiam beati Bartholomei cum omnibus suis uineis [...] excepta parte episcopali, harum supradictarum quinque ecclesiarum.” ²³

Of course, Lorvão continued to increase its possessions, mainly through donations, reflecting the prestige of the monastic community and the devotion of the faithful to the sanctuary of São Mamede. We emphasise, among many others, those donations made by D. Afonso Henriques in 1133 while still a count, and later those he made as the first monarch of Portugal in 1174, 1175, and 1176 (in April and May), ²⁴ which demonstrate how the abbey stayed under careful royal consideration.

This long introduction will help us retain some important points for a better understanding of the next topics of analysis. From the very start, the number of churches donated to Lorvão was indeed extraordinary, a fact associated, on the one hand, with the repopulation of the land along the Mondego River following the first reconquest of Coimbra and, on the other, with the role played by the monks of Lorvão, including the prestige they achieved as well as the support granted to them from the beginning by the Leonese monarchs and the counts of the region. Thus, the right of patronage Lorvão held over a considerable group of churches in the 13th and 14th centuries can in fact be traced back to the 10th century.

Secondly, the loss of the territory of Coimbra to Almansor in 987 slowed down this growth, but after the definitive reconquest of Coimbra by Fernando Magno in 1064, the monastery recovered most of the assets it had lost and underwent remarkable development, both economically and culturally, which is evident, among other things, from the importance of its scriptorium and in the quality of the codices produced there. ²⁵

Thirdly, the donation of the Monastery of Lorvão and its property to the Cathedral of Coimbra, by the Count and Countess, D. Henrique and D. Teresa, conditioned its subsequent history at various levels. Although restored in 1116, it remained subject to the Cathedral, saw its property greatly diminished and the number of churches over which it held the right of patronage reduced to less than half of those it had held beforehand. This fact sustained the tensions between the monks of Lorvão and the Cathedral, which resulted, for instance, in the aforementioned Memória sôbre os agravos e usurpações written by the monks between 1192 and 1205 (Azevedo 1933, 32 and doc. 21), which could have motivated their expulsion by Bishop Pedro Soares. It is also worth remembering that at the time of the monks’ expulsion—which Maria Alegria Marques places between March 1205 and September 1206 (Marques 1998, 87)—the prelate of Coimbra gave the Monastery of Lorvão to D. Teresa, daughter of King Sancho I of Portugal, with the careful exception of episcopal rights (“concessimus uobis memoratum monasterium saluo iure in omnibus sedis episcopalis”), thus starting a long and complicated process that only ended in 1211 when an apostolic judgment was executed determining the establishment of the first community of Cistercian nuns in Portugal.

Finally, despite the loss of much property, which resulted in its incorporation into the episcopal sphere in 1109, and its unsatisfactory restoration in 1116, Lorvão continued to exercise the right of patronage over a fairly considerable number of churches, as can be seen in Table 1 in the appendix, especially when compared with more recent monasteries, founded in the 13th century. ²⁶ Ultimately, this discrepancy reflects the historical importance of the Monastery of Lorvão.

In the wake of the Christian military success of the 11th century, the ecclesiastical authorities sought to organise their territorial structure in the region. After the definitive conquest of the city of Coimbra in 1064, whereby the River Mondego now formed a relatively stable border, ²⁷ we find D. Paterno (Morujão 2010, 81-85) instated as the first bishop of the restored diocese, prior to 1080. The documentation produced in Coimbra gradually over the course of the 11th and 12th centuries, particularly that collected in the cathedral cartulary in the 13th century, reveals a city where buildings were built and rebuilt, for ordinary housing as well as for civil administration and ecclesiastical tutelage (Rossa 2001, 235-394). Thus, this documentation also allows us to recognise the presence of more or less ancient churches in the urban fabric whose ecclesiastical functions and status as parish churches came to be defined within the administrative framework of the Reform. ²⁸ Between the beginning of the last quarter of the 12th century and the end of the first quarter of the 13th century, we can see that these churches were the scene of a refoundation that manifested at several levels, two of which we will highlight. The first concerns the buildings themselves since, at this time, all of them were rebuilt in the Romanesque architectural style, and thus the marks of an artistic and formal programme already widespread in the centre of Christendom came to be adopted in its westernmost extremity (Alarcão 2008, 145-192; Botelho 2013, 433-455). The second is related to its institutional character, as we come to discern the formation of small ecclesiastical communities that shared a common life within the same temple and that, from the 13th century onwards, are designated unequivocally as chapters. The earliest references to these communities are very vague in the definition of their typology, but from the second half of the 12th century the mentioning of priors or prelates reveals that there occurred a separation and hierarchization of clerical functions. Thus, at the beginning of the 13th century, Coimbra had seven collegiate houses that would survive throughout the Middle Ages and the Ancien Regime, with a community structure characterised by a body of portionaries (porcionários) or prebendaries (raçoeiros) directed by a prior (Campos 2019). In the case of the collegiate church of São Pedro, which we will discuss further below, there also emerges the figure of the cantor (Varandas 1999).

In the western part of the Iberian Peninsula, as in the rest of Western Christendom, these were centuries in which ecclesiastical institutions and functions came to be defined, and during which bishops consolidated their authority over their territories as well as over the populations and churches within their dioceses (Mazel 2016, 237-306). Moreover, this period was marked by the enforcement of Rome’s authority to unify the liturgical rite and religious practices, shaping the clerical body of the peninsula in line with the norms and precepts established by the Supreme Pontiff for the broader Christian world. As has been stressed in the historiography concerning Coimbra and its diocese, this policy of integrating the conquered territories of western Europe into the ecclesiastical network, and of organising and administering them in a uniform way from Rome, was done by appointing foreign clerics to peninsular cathedral chapters and to episcopal chairs. This was the case with Maurício Burdino, Bishop of Coimbra between 1099 and 1108 (Morujão 2010, 90-93; Renzi 2021, 23-37), whose initiatives were to be continued by the autochthonous Gonçalo Pais (Bishop of Coimbra between 1109 and 1127†), an important reformer of the chapter of Coimbra who introduced the Roman Rite and was an unequivocal defender of the Reform (Morujão 2010, 93-98). During the episcopates of these two bishops, we notice a tendency to receive donations of churches located throughout the Coimbra diocese, which Maria do Rosário Morujão, with whom we are fully in accord, interprets as being a concerted strategy to establish episcopal rights over the whole territory (Morujão 2010, 93).

During the episcopate of Maurício Burdino, who came from the Cluniac priory of Saint Martial of Limoges (indeed, he had accompanied Archbishop Bernardo of Toledo on his arrival in the Iberian Peninsula), ²⁹ there was the donation of the church of Santa Justa de Coimbra to the priory of Sainte Marie de la Charitè of the Loire, also belonging to Cluny (Rodrigues and Costa 1999, doc. 22). This donation has been interpreted as a gesture by the prelate with a double meaning: on the one hand, it reveals the desire of connecting the city and the diocese of Coimbra to the network of Cluniac priories to reinforce reformist intentions; on the other, it supported the previous donation of the Monastery of São Pedro de Rates also to the same priory, by the Count and Countess D. Henrique and D. Teresa. ³⁰ Importantly, over and above these interpretations, we want to emphasise that this donation was made with the exception of the episcopal rights of the Bishop of Coimbra over this institution, which shows that despite the prelate’s generosity towards Cluny, he would not abdicate the prerogatives and privileges of his position.

From the episcopate of his successor, in addition to the restoration of a vast number of churches throughout the diocese, the aforementioned donation of the Monastery of Lorvão in 1109 to the Bishop of Coimbra, stands out. After, in 1094, Bishop Crescónio (1092-1098†) (Morujão 2010, 86-90) had received the donation of the Monastery of Vacariça, ³¹ with all its assets, including the church of São Salvador de Coimbra, the Monastery of Lorvão was the last of the Mozarabic monastic strongholds in the region, which thus came under the tutelage of the prelate of Coimbra. In 1116, Bishop Gonçalo restored the Monastery of Lorvão and, among other assets, handed it the churches of São Pedro and São Bartolomeu, both in Coimbra, whose association to the monastery dated back further, as we have already said. Despite the significant amount of property that this document transferred to the monastery, since at this same time the bishop elected an abbot to lead the life of the monks from then on, the act clearly expressed the obedience that this community henceforth would owe to the bishop and the canons of the Cathedral of Coimbra. ³² In the following pages we shall consider how this submission conditioned the management of the monastery’s property with regard to its right to exercise its patronage over these churches of Coimbra. Before doing so, however, it is important to present briefly the institutional history of both churches.

Both churches are documented since the 10th century, but despite the significant efforts of archaeologists (Alarcão 2008), architects (Rossa 2001) and art historians (Real and Fernandes 2021), it is difficult to divine the characteristics of the primitive buildings. The church of São Bartolomeu, previously called São Cristóvão, was the object of a donation dated 957 to the Monastery of Lorvão. This church, together with that of São Cucufate, belonged to the estate of priest Pedro, who left it to Lorvão through the priest Samuel, his vicar. The document concerning the bequest describes this church as follows: “ecclesia Sancti Christofori qui uocant ea Sancti Bartolomeus [...] in arraualde de Conimbrie et suos domos cum suas cortes et suas uineas qui sunt in giro de illa(s) ecclesia(s).” ³³ In terms of Coimbra’s topography and urban structure, São Bartolomeu occupied a privileged position in the lower part of the city, next to the bridge which was the most impressive entrance to the city throughout the Middle Ages (Campos 2021).

As far as the church of São Pedro is concerned, we can only identify this patron saint after the count’s conquest in 878, in a contract of sale dated 980, which mentions a court in the suburbs of Coimbra that faced the church of São Pedro on one side. ³⁴ This identification presupposes that this church was later moved to within the city’s walls, since this is where it stood after the conquest of Fernando Magno (“the Great”). ³⁵ Having disappeared during the central and Late Middle Ages, it is known that this church was located adjacent to a main street in the medieval city which connected the Castle to the Alcáçova.

For the first half of the 12th century, we can trace the existence of a confraternity in each of these churches, which was otherwise only the case with the Church of Santiago. ³⁶ Given the way these indications appear, we have been tempted to consider, along with Cristina Guardado (2000, 27), that by this time the confraternities of these churches corresponded to the designations of their first ecclesiastical communities. Indeed, as we have already mentioned, the ill-defined typology of ecclesiastical institutions in this period is evident for both this region and the rest of Western Christendom. For her part, Ana Rita Rocha (2019, 194-196) recalls how it was common for confraternities to operate within churches, or in close connection with them, to reinforce the religious service and spiritual support they provided to local populations. A careful analysis of the documentary sources has not yet allowed us to present certainties about the functions of these confraternities. On the one hand, the written sources tend to show that they were institutions, distinct from their respective churches, with communities ³⁷ that included clergy and laypeople, men and women, ³⁸ who benefited from important donations, ³⁹ and that retained and eventually operated in their own buildings. On the other hand, from the moment that terms such as “prior,” “canon,” “portionary” and “chapter” become standardised in the lexicon of the documentation of Coimbra, reference to these confraternities seems to become less frequent, which may lend force to the first hypothesis. Moreover, it should be noted that, throughout the 14th century, when the term collegiate house is plainly established and in use in different types of documents, there is (or continues to be) ambiguity in the sources, since the small collegiate church of São João de Almedina is frequently referred to as the Church and/or Collegiate of São Brás—the patron saint of the confraternity that occupied it. ⁴⁰

What is certain is that, by the middle of the 12th century, both churches and confraternities functioned to provide a spiritual framework for local populations as the seats of parishes. In the case of São Bartolomeu, this is evident in documentation post 1144; ⁴¹ in the case of São Pedro, post 1165. ⁴² From the same period we also have evidence of the rebuilding of both churches and, in the case of São Bartolomeu, we know that its new church was consecrated on 27 July 1214 (Campos 2020a, 29). Throughout the 13th century, both were fully regarded as chapter communities headed by a prior. At São Pedro, after one acknowledges the isolated references to a Prior Pedro in 1139 ⁴³ and 1143, ⁴⁴ we are aware that this position was established definitively from 1165 onwards and that a community of clerics lived there. ⁴⁵ Examination of the oldest documents produced or preserved by the Church of São Pedro suggests that its institutional organisation developed early, since we only have information about other priors and beneficiaries of other parish churches in Coimbra from the second half of the 12th century onwards. ⁴⁶ Despite this, the term capitulus is used for the first time for this church only in the second quarter of the 13th century. ⁴⁷ Unlike all the other collegiate churches in Coimbra—whose communities would have had only a prior and a body of beneficiaries assisted by a group of auxiliary clerics and officials, laypeople and clerics—São Pedro also had a cantor from 1282 onwards. ⁴⁸

Regarding São Bartolomeu, we have knowledge of a prior as early as 1169 ⁴⁹ and, a document survives from 1201 recording an agreement between the prior of São Bartolomeu and the abbot of the Monastery of Lorvão concerning the number of prebends sustainable within the chapter of that church (Marques 1998, doc. 2). The number was not to exceed twelve, otherwise it could compromise the status of the prebendaries and the service provided by the church. This document not only marks an important moment in the institutionalisation of the chapter of São Bartolomeu in Coimbra, but it is also proof of the influence, power and authority of the Benedictine community in this church.

After having presented the churches of São Pedro and São Bartolomeu and their connections to the Monastery of Lorvão, it is now necessary to detail the character of the relationships between them and their patron throughout the Middle Ages. This study is based on the documents preserved in the archives of the respective collegiate churches and the monastery, kept at the Portuguese National Archive, and some documents published in various other works. Analysis of this corpus shows that, throughout the Late Middle Ages, Lorvão’s right to exercise patronage over the two churches expressed itself in two ways. At the church of São Bartolomeu, the monastery had the right to receive every year a hide, often called falifa, and an annual harvest (colheita) when the abbess travelled to Coimbra. At the church of São Pedro, the monastery held the right to appoint a benefice.

At the beginning of the 13th century, in the Roman Curia the Monastery of Lorvão claimed the right to the papal third of the tithes owed by both churches, but this question never arose again, which suggests that, from then on, the bishop asserted the primacy of his episcopal right over these churches ⁵⁰ —as he did over the monastery itself, through his donation of it to D. Teresa Sanches, which Maria Alegria Marques places between March 1205 and September 1206 (Marques 1998, 87). ⁵¹

Throughout the 14th and 15th centuries, there are several indications of how the abbesses of Lorvão controlled the right to the harvest and to receive a hide. In 1309, a bailiff was sent to Coimbra to demand five pounds for the said hide and her harvest (colheita) of bread, wine and fish, an entitlement deemed to have existed since “the time of the ancient population of the land” (“o tempo d’antigidade delo poboamento da tera.”) ⁵²

More illuminating is the disagreement between the abbess and the prior and chapter of São Bartolomeu, which occurred early in the tenure of D. Mécia Lopes (1350-1388) ⁵³ and has come down to us through a judgment document published by Saul Gomes (2020, 49-51). ⁵⁴ Unhappy because her harvest was not paid, the newly appointed Abbess D. Mécia Lopes had a new psalter of the collegiate pawned. ⁵⁵ The prior and the prebendaries of São Bartolomeu complained about this to Bishop Jorge, claiming to have already paid what was owed for that year, even though they had done so to the previous abbess. Through the letter of judgment, the prelate of Coimbra was vehement in stating that the said church was subject to the bishop, by ordinary law, and not to the abbess. Therefore, not only did the abbess have no right to seize any property, but, in these matters, she had to obey the ordinary authority of the bishop, who threatened her with excommunication in the event of a repeat offence.

Later, in 1356, following a disagreement about the value of the harvest and its insufficiency for the abbess and her entourage’s sojourns in the city, the vicar-general of the Bishop of Coimbra issued a sentence ratifying the agreement between the two parties that established the value of the harvest at 70 pieces of bread, three almudes of wine and six fresh, or eight dried, hakes (Guardado 2000, doc. 48). ⁵⁶ However, the disputes between the Lorvão abbesses and the prior and chapter of São Bartolomeu of Coimbra, arising from the non-fulfilment of these obligations, lasted throughout the 14th century, ⁵⁷ leading to later revisions to update the value of the harvest, as also occurred in the 15th ⁵⁸ and 16th centuries. ⁵⁹ Throughout the 15th century, this dispute forced both parties to resort to episcopal, archiepiscopal and pontifical audiences.

From an overall reading of the documents drawn up as part of these processes, we can see that the church of São Bartolomeu represented, from the material and logistical point of view, in Coimbra, a guarantee of provision for the abbess and her circle, which was especially opportune when she came to the city to receive the prelate’s blessing and confirmation in her office. At least that was the case with D. Mécia Vasques da Cunha (1390-1399) ⁶⁰ and, apparently, also with D. Mécia Lopes, namely when she had the aforementioned psalter pawned. However, the influence that the Convent had on the religious and community life of the collegiate church would be very small, if any, since there is no record of the abbess interfering in the choices of priors or prebendaries, nor was she consulted during processes of vacancy, election, selection and confirmation, which explains the total absence of documentation concerning litigation over such a right, had she had one. ⁶¹

In 1453, following the death of Prior Nicolau Ramos of São Bartolomeu, Bishop Luís Coutinho appointed Gil Martins, half-canon of the cathedral, to the vacant position, assigning to him spiritual and corporal care and regimentation of that church, declaring that he was responsible for the presentation of the prior and prebendaries of São Bartolomeu. ⁶² Although there is reference to a constitution drawn up at the time of the prelate João Cabeça de Vaca (1378-1384), we do not know of any normative document concerning the life of the chapter that allows us to say that this had been the practice in previous times, but at the beginning of the second half of the 15th century, the Bishop of Coimbra gave little margin for the influence or interference of other ecclesiastical powers in the affairs of this institution. In contrast to the practices in the city’s other collegiate bodies, it is remarkable that the chapter’s authority appeared to be side-lined. Typically, in the other collegiate institutions of Coimbra, the standard method for selecting the prior involved election and co-option among the beneficiaries of the chapter (Campos 2019).

This was, then, the practice in the collegiate church of São Pedro. As has been studied, the understanding of the daily life of this collegiate church benefits from a compilation of statutes, unique for their detail and the circumstances under which they were produced. ⁶³ After 1348, when the whole community of São Pedro disappeared having fallen victim to the plague, the new prior, supported by the cantor and two prebendaries, set down the customs for the church that were to take effect from then on. ⁶⁴ This directive opens specifically with the provisions concerning to the election of prebendaries and the provision of prebends, stipulating clearly that whenever there was a vacancy, all the prebendaries in the kingdom were to be summoned by sealed letter to elect a successor. This document adds, in this regard, the total prohibition of the prior electing without the chapter, as well as confirming a benefice that had not resulted from an election. ⁶⁵ None of the constitutions mention patronage, nor do they refer to the Convent of Lorvão, or the Bishop of Coimbra, nor do we know of the bishop’s confirmation of these directives. However, the survival and preservation of the document to the present-day suggests its content had been observed in the organisation of community life. ⁶⁶

However, despite the silence of the statutes of this collegiate church in relation to the influence of its patron in the organisation of community life, the remaining documentation shows that the Monastery of Lorvão intervened in the provision of one of the prebends of the chapter. It was a privilege exercised at least since the time of Abbess D. Maria Afonso (1237-1255). ⁶⁷ Naturally, this benefice in Coimbra was used by the abbesses to finance men they trusted in the city, or simply to reward them for services previously rendered, either directly or through the collation of their relatives or heirs. Thus, in 1283, D. Maria Anes de Sousa nominated, in anticipation, Martinho Afonso, son of Afonso Peres, a citizen of Coimbra, identified as someone always devoted to the Convent. ⁶⁸ In July 1346, Jorge Afonso, a cleric of minor orders, who served in the bishop’s court, was nominated and confirmed, ⁶⁹ and, in January 1349, a servant of the Convent, Vasco Anes, was nominated. ⁷⁰ The confirmation of these individuals to the prebend of São Pedro was carried out by the prior, in the presence of the rest of the chapter. In this regard, we do not know if the latter was confirmed in the prebend, since the prebendary who received the nomination letter stated that, on his own, he had no authority to confirm a prebend. Furthermore, in October of that year, Pero Esteves, prior of Tentúgal, was confirmed in that prebend. ⁷¹

In this respect, there seems to have always been an understanding between the two institutions until October 1396, when the provision of the income belonging to the son of Gonçalo Mateus gave rise to a conflict between the latter and the collegiate church of São Pedro, which was eventually resolved in an audience with the Archbishop of Braga who decided in favour of the church of Coimbra. Gonçalo Mateus, who lived in Coimbra, had complained at an audience of the Bishop of Coimbra that the prior and the chapter of São Pedro had not handed over the part of the revenues that belonged to his son, André Anes, holder of a prebend of the church which belonged to the Convent of Lorvão. Faced with a judgment that required them to deliver the said revenues to André Anes within eight days, under penalty of excommunication, the prior and chapter said they could not accept a judgment from an audience to which they had not been summoned, nor did they recognise the standing of a layman to claim ecclesiastical property, and they had no knowledge that Gonçalo Mateus was the legitimate representative of his son. These arguments were enough for them to win the process at a hearing of the Archbishop of Braga, who exempted them from any excommunication penalty they might have been subject to. ⁷²

We have showed that the connection of the churches of São Pedro and São Bartolomeu in Coimbra to the Monastery of Lorvão is attested from the 10th century and extended throughout the Middle Ages. After the monastery’s restoration, in 1116, and, more specifically, after its incorporation into the Cistercian Order, this connection survived in accordance with the precepts of the right of patronage. Gone are the days of private churches, and we now find a system of shared patronage, and why not say it, regulated by the Bishop of Coimbra, who not only never abdicated his episcopal authority over these churches, as he did in the other parish churches of the city, but also never abdicated his ordinary authority over them.

Despite what we have just said, the churches of São Pedro and São Bartolomeu in Coimbra always played an important role within the institutional network and in the array of revenues that constituted the seigniory of the abbesses and the Convent of Lorvão. At São Bartolomeu, the abbess had a place of shelter and provision whenever she went to Coimbra or, if she did not go in person, where she could send her proxy to claim her harvest or dues (jantar), as well as a hide. At São Pedro, the privilege of appointing a benefice holder enabled the abbess to sustain or reward men she trusted, whom she thus placed in the seat of the diocese.