D.Rodrigo da Cunha (1577 – 3 January 1643) was a Portuguese prelate of the first half of the seventeenth century and who, as Archbishop of Lisbon, played an important role in supporting the restoration of Portuguese independence from Spain.[1]
Biography
D. Rodrigo was born in Lisbon, son of D. Pedro da Cunha, Lord of the Majorat of Tábua, and his wife Maria da Silva.
He began his studies at the College of Saint Anthony the Great (Colégio de Santo Antão), a Jesuit college in Lisbon. He received his doctorate in Canon Law at the University of Coimbra.
During the Portuguese Restoration War, he supported the revolutionaries and, together with the Archbishop of Braga, ruled the kingdom until the return of João IV. His name appears as one of the main presences in the "Act of Accession and Oath of King John IV" performed on 15 December 1640.[2] and as in the following act solemnly confirming it on 28 January 1641.[3]
As a historian, D. Rodrigo da Cunha contributed to the historiography of the Church in Portugal, writing several works on Braga, Porto and Lisbon.
He died at the age of 65, on 3 January 1643. He is buried in the Cathedral of Lisbon.
Redacção Quidnovi, com coordenação de José Hermano Saraiva, História de Portugal, Dicionário de Personalidades, Volume XIV, Ed. QN-Edição e Conteúdos, S.A., 2004
^Cronicas e Vidas dos Reys de Portugal..., por Duarte Nunez do Lião, e autos de Levantamento e Juramentos a El-Rey D. João IV, Tomo II, compilação de D. Rodrigo da Cunha, em Lisboa, na oficina de José de Aquino Bolhões, de 1780, pág. 471
