Battle of Alfarrobeira

Date	20 May 1449
Location	Alverca, near Lisbon, Portugal
Result	Rebellion suppressed; Supremacy of the main line of the House of Aviz preserved

Belligerents

Kingdom of Portugal

Coimbra Rebels

Commanders and leaders

Afonso V of Portugal
Duke of Braganza

Duke of Coimbra †

Strength

30,000 men

6,000 men:

5,000 infantry
1,000 cavalry

Casualties and losses

500 dead or wounded

4,000 dead, wounded, or captured

6,000 men:

The Battle of Alfarrobeira (Portuguese pronunciation: [aɫfɐʁuˈbɐjɾɐ]) took place on 20 May 1449. It was a confrontation between the forces commanded by King Afonso V of Portugal and his uncle Afonso, Duke of Braganza, against the army of the rebellious Peter, Duke of Coimbra. The place was Alverca do Ribatejo, near Lisbon, at the margins of the creek of Alfarrobeira. The result was the clear defeat and death of the Duke of Coimbra and the establishment of the Braganzas as the most powerful House of Portugal.

After the death of King Fernando, the last of the First Dynasty, in 1383, power fell on the regent Queen Leonor, hated by the people, and her daughter Beatrice, married to the Castilian King Juan I. Fernando's half-brother John, Master of Aviz, led a revolution against Queen and the Castilian King, defeating them with a smaller army in the battle of Aljubarrota. The battle became a turnpoint in Portuguese and the world's History, and King John I and his military aide, Constable Nuno Álvares Pereira, became immortal idols.

King John I had a first illegitimate son, Afonso, and a daughter Beatrice; after marrying Philippa of Lancaster, John of Gaunt's daughter, and establishing the House of Aviz, they had a first boy (died of young age), a girl Isabella (who became a famous duchess of Burgundy and Flanders), then five boys who were grew up under the memories of the famous battle. Edward (Duarte) was trained to become King, Peter (Pedro), Henry (Henrique, a.k.a. "The Navigator"), that was becoming powerful and famous with the military actions in Northern Africa against Muslims; John and Fernando, the youngest, died before Alfarrobeira. For ten years Peter lived abroad.

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