ABSTRACT
The history of the commandery of Marmelar began with the creation of the Portel lordship by King Alfonso III of Portugal in 1258, 1 who had given this southern region of the kingdom of Portugal, which was characterized by a scarcity of administrative structures, to João de Aboim, one of the most important fi gures in the royal court and the king’s mordomo mor (main butler) since 1264. 2 The need for church administration in this territory led to the involvement of the Order of St John thirteen years later. In April 1271, the lord of Portel granted the church of Santa Maria of Portel and all other churches in the region to the Hospitaller Afonso Peres Farinha, who was close to the king. 3 In October 1272, Grand Master Hugo Revel confi rmed the agreement, and in April 1274, the bishop of Évora defi ned the jurisdiction of the monastery of Marmelar, thus creating the commandery. 4
In the early 1270s Marmelar was geographically remote from the core of the Hospitallers’ Portuguese estates. The Order of St John settled there primarily because it was an international order not exclusively dependent on the Castilian monarchy. The commandery of Marmelar gained great importance because of a relic, believed to be a fragment of the True Cross. The date at which the relic was acquired by the church is diffi cult to determine. The earliest surviving record to mention it is a testament drawn up by King Dinis in 1322, which unfortunately does not shed any light on the earlier history of the relic. 5
The association of the Hospitallers with the True Cross was not a Portuguese innovation. In the 1170s Pope Alexander III emphasized that the Hospitallers’ fi rst commitment was to the sick and that they should take part in military campaigns only because the relic of the True Cross accompanied the Christian army. 6 In this way, the True Cross legitimized military action for the Hospitallers. The belief in the invincibility of the Cross and its power was undoubtedly the greatest reason behind the high esteem and wide diffusion of Holy Cross relics in medieval Europe.
