Beatrix da Silva

Who was Beatrix da Silva?

Beatrice of Silva, O.I.C., was a noblewoman of Portugal, who became a nun and was the foundress of the monastic Order of the Immaculate Conception of Our Lady. She is honored as a saint of the Roman Catholic Church.

Beatrice was born in Campo Maior, one of the eleven children of Rui Gomes da Silva, the first governor of Campo Maior, located on the border of Castile and Portugal, and of Isabel de Menezes, the Countess of Portalegre, an illegitimate daughter of Dom Pedro de Menezes, 1st Count of Vila Real and 2nd Count of Viana do Alentejo, in whose army her father was serving at the time of her birth. One of her brothers was the Blessed Amadeus of Portugal, O.F.M., a noted reformer of the Order of Friars Minor.

Beatrice was raised in the castle of Infante John, Lord of Reguengos de Monsaraz. In 1447 Beatrice accompanied his daughter, Princess Isabel of Portugal, to Castile as her lady-in-waiting when Isabel left to marry King John II of Castile and became Queen of Castile and León. Beatrice was her good and close friend,. Soon, however, her great beauty began to arouse the irrational jealousy of the Queen, who had her imprisoned in a tiny cell. During this incarceration, Beatrice experienced an apparition of the Blessed Virgin Mary, in which she was instructed to found a new Order in Mary's honor.