The cult around the holiness and the relics of Saint Elizabeth of Portugal is a remarkable phenomenon, not only in the field of religion, but in the artistic, literary, social and political ones as well. Elizabeth or Isabel of Aragon was a most remarkable person in her time and the cult around her holiness and her relics would know a continuing and unstoppable advance. Even before the canonical recognition of her holiness and immediately after her death, she was considered by the faithful Christians, especially those of Coimbra, a most important intercessor with God. She had spent the last years of her life in this city where she decided to be buried. The beautiful tomb with her relics, the most tangible sign of the presence of the Holy Queen, turned into an important holy place of pilgrimage. This book studies the different dimensions of this phenomenon, from medieval to modern times: the theological implications of the cult of the relics, the study of the mendicant spirituality that inspired D. Isabel, the works of art, such as the Queen's first tomb, or the celebratory literature of her heroic figure, exploring the documental sources as well, which reveal the historical, social and political circumstances of the evolution of her cult at the Monastery of Santa Clara, the College of Arts, the University and in the city of Coimbra. |