Castro

The House of Castro was a great Castilian noble lineage, probably named after Castrojeriz in Burgos. Its first clearly attested member was the twelfth-century count Fernando García de Hita, a vassal of Queen Urraca. After the senior line failed, a branch settled in Galicia, becoming its most powerful nobility and holding Lemos, Trastámara and Sarria.

Pedro Fernández de Castro, called the Warrior, was lord of Monforte de Lemos in the early fourteenth century. His daughter Inés, born in 1320, loved the future Peter I of Portugal, but Afonso IV had her killed at Coimbra in 1355; Peter later had her remains crowned as queen.

The county of Lemos became a hereditary title in the family in 1456 and was raised to the first rank of grandees in 1520. The house died out for lack of heirs, and Lemos passed to the House of Alba.