[13] Because Azurara is found to have been the son of a Canon, it does not necessarily follow that he was illegitimate, and, in fact, no letters of legitimation exist in respect of him.
[14] Definiçoẽs e Estatutos dos Cavalleiros e Freires da Ordem de N. S. Jesu Cristo com a historia da origem & principio della. Lisbon, 1628.
[15] D. Carolina Michaëlis de Vasconcellos, however, is of opinion that this, and the popular songs hereafter referred to, are pious frauds, invented in the first half of the seventeenth century to form materials for the canonisation of Nun' Alvares.
[16] Chronica dos Carmaelitas, vol. i, pp. 469, 486. Lisbon, 1745.
[17] Chronica de Ceuta, ch. 2.
[18] Azurara's chief informants were D. Pedro, Regent in the minority of Affonso V, and D. Henrique, in whose house he stayed some days for the purpose by the king's orders; "for he knew more than anyone in Portugal about the matter" (Chronica de Ceuta, ch. 12). To this fact must be attributed the prominent place he gives D. Henrique in his narrative. The same circumstance is noticeable in the Chronica de D. Duarte, which was begun by Azurara and finished by Ruy de Pina, of which hereafter.
[19] Diccionario Bibliographico Portuguez, vol. iii, p. 147.
[20] Pisano testifies of Azurara, "scientiæ cupiditate flagravit".—De Bello Septensi, p. 27.
[21] Chronica de Ceuta, ch. 38.
[22] Vide Theophilo Braga, Historia da Universidade de Coimbra, Lisbon, 1892, vol. i, ch. 4, for the catalogues of these libraries and an account of the books they contained.