Juan Fernández de Velasco y Tovar, 5th Duke of Frías

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Juan Fernández de Velasco, 5th Duke of Frías
Bornc. 1550
Died(1613-03-15)15 March 1613
Madrid
Noble familyHouse of Velasco
Spouse(s)María Girón de Guzmán
FatherÍñigo Fernández de Velasco, 4th Duke of Frías
MotherMaría Ángela de Aragón y Guzmán El Bueno

Juan Fernández de Velasco, 5th Duke of Frías[1] (c. 1550 – 15 March 1613) was a Spanish nobleman and diplomat.

Biography[edit]

Juan Fernández de Velasco was the son of Íñigo Fernández de Velasco; and of Maria Angela de Aragón y Guzmán El Bueno. He inherited his father's title of Constable of Castile, and was present at the signing of the Treaty of London (1604).

London in 1604[edit]

He was sent to London to sign the recently negotiated peace treaty. The resident Spanish ambassador, the Count of Villamediana, asked King James if Velasco could be lodged at Somerset House, and Anne of Denmark granted his request.[2] The lodging was decorated with royal tapestries, and his bedchamber furnished with a bed of "morado damask" bordered with gold. Velasco arrived in London on 10 August 1604.[3]

He came to Somerset House on a barge on the Thames.[4] His arrival was managed by the Earl of Northampton.[5], and watched by spectators in boats and barges near the Tower of London, including Anne of Denmark, the Countess of Suffolk, the Earl of Nottingham, and Robert Cecil. The queen and her companions wore black masks and their barge was disguised, without royal insignia.[6]

The Constable saw King James on 15/25 August and had an audience with Anne of Denmark three days later at Whitehall Palace, and he watched Prince Henry dance and exercise with a pike in the garden. He gave the prince a pony.[7] Prince Henry danced for the guests. The Constable gave Prince Henry a Spanish horse with a rich saddle and bridle and an embroidered doublet with a sash. He signed the treaty in the chapel royal at Whitehall on 19 August. Afterwards at a banquet, he gave Anne of Denmark a cup of crystal garnished with gold, shaped like a dragon. From the windows, the party watched greyhounds and mastiffs fight bears. King James gave him a service of vintage gilt plate, and Anne of Denmark gave him a jewelled locket with miniature portraits, supplied by John Spilman for £1000,[8] with a stomacher or necklace (garganto) set with pearls for his wife. He left England from Dover.[9]

Details of embassy are known from letters of the Earl of Northampton, and the Spanish Relación de la Jornada del Condestable de Castilla published in Antwerp 1604.

Governor of Milan[edit]

Juan Fernández de Velasco was Governor of the Duchy of Milan in the period 1592–1600 and 1610–1612. In 1595, he led the Spanish forces in the Battle of Fontaine-Française against the French, where he let victory slip through his fingers, due to excessive caution.

Works[edit]

Quaderno de varias escrituras en las diferencias de iuridiciones ecclesiastica y real del estado de Milan, 1597
  • Quaderno de varias escrituras en las diferencias de iuridiciones ecclesiastica y real del estado de Milan (in Spanish). Milano: Georg Herolt. 1597.

Descendants[edit]

Around 1580, the Duke married María Girón de Guzmán, eldest daughter of Pedro Girón de la Cueva, 1st Duke of Osuna. Together they had a son and a daughter. The daughter, Ana de Velasco y Girón in turn married Teodósio II, Duke of Braganza and in 1604 gave birth to João, 8th Duke of Bragança, who was crowned King João IV of Portugal on 1 December 1640. In 1608, after the death of his first wife, Juan Fernández de Velasco married Joana de Córdoba y Aragón, and together they had three children:

By María Girón de Guzmán:

By Joana de Córdoba y Aragón:

Notes[edit]

  1. ^ In full, Spanish: Don Juan Fernández de Velasco y Aragón, quinto duque de Frías, décimo Condestable de Castilla, septimo conde de Haro, tercer marqués de Berlanga, tercer conde de Castilnovo, noveno mayorazgo y señor de la Casa de Velasco, señor de la Casa y Estado de Tovar, Camarero mayor y Copero mayor del Rey, gobernador y capitán general del Estado de Milán, presidente del Consejo de Italia, del Consejo de Estado y de Guerra. embajador de SM en Inglaterra
  2. ^ Horatio Brown, Calendar State Papers, Venice: 1603-1607, vol. 10 (London, 1900), p. 148 no. 207.
  3. ^ Horatio Brown, Calendar State Papers, Venice: 1603-1607, vol. 10 (London, 1900), p. 175 no. 261: Henry Ellis, Original Letters, series 2 vol. 3 (London, 1827), p. 209.
  4. ^ Maurice Lee, Dudley Carleton to John Chamberlain, 1603–1624 (Rutgers UP, 1972), 61.
  5. ^ Linda Levy Peck, Northampton: Patronage and Policy at Court of James I (London, 1982), 110.
  6. ^ John Nichols, Progresses of James the First, vol. 4 (London, 1828), p. 1063: Henry Ellis, Original Letters, 2nd series vol. 3, pp. 207-15, citing Relacion de la Jornada de Condestable de Castilla en Londres 1604 (Antwerp, 1604), 22: Calendar State Papers Domestic, 1603–1610, 141, SP 14/9A/f.12r.
  7. ^ Horatio Brown, Calendar State Papers, Venice: 1603-1607, vol. 10 (London, 1900), p. 178 no. 266.
  8. ^ Diana Scarisbrick, Jewellery in Britain, 1066-1837 (Norwich: Michael Russell, 1994), 76: Frederick Devon, Issues of the Exchequer (London, 1836), 16–17.
  9. ^ Ethel C. Williams, Anne of Denmark (London: Longman, 1970), 96–97: Henry Ellis, Original Letters, series 2 vol. 3 (London, 1827), 211–15.

Sources[edit]

  • Castro Pereira Mouzinho de Albuquerque e Cunha, Fernando de (1995). Instrumentário Genealógico – Linhagens Milenárias (in Portuguese). pp. 329–30.
  • Hobbs, Nicolas (2007). "Grandes de España" (in Spanish). Retrieved 15 October 2008.
  • Instituto de Salazar y Castro. Elenco de Grandezas y Titulos Nobiliarios Españoles (in Spanish). periodic publication.
  • "Genealogia" (in Portuguese). Archived from the original on March 11, 2007. Retrieved 15 October 2008.
Government offices
Preceded by Governor of the Duchy of Milan
1592–1595
Succeeded by
Preceded by Governor of the Duchy of Milan
1595–1600
Succeeded by
Preceded by Governor of the Duchy of Milan
1610–1612
Succeeded by
Honorary titles
Preceded by Constable of Castile
1585–1613
Succeeded by
Spanish nobility
Preceded by Duke of Frías
1585–1613
Succeeded by
Count of Haro
1575–1580
Succeeded by