Diego Velazquez was a Spanish administrator. He was born about 1460 at Cuellar, near Valladolid and died in 1522. He sailed with Cgristopher Columbus on his second voyage, and in 1511 conquered Cuba, of which he became governor, founding several towns, and remaining there until his death. Velazquez was responsible for an expedition which discovered Yucatan, in 1517, and sent Hernando Cortes to Mexico in 1518. Regretting, however, the extensive powers he had given to Cortes, he sent a force under Panfilo de Narvaez, which was overthrown by Cortes in 1520.
Diego Rodriguez De Silva Y Velazquez was a Spanish painter. He was born in 1599 at Seville and died in 1660. He studied under Francesco Herrera and then, when Herrera's temper got too much for him, under Pacheco whose daughter he later married. Velazquez also came under the influence of Luis Tristan, a pupil of El Greco. Settling in Madrid in 1623, he there painted a portrait of Fonseca, almoner to Philip IV which introduced him to the notice of the king. In the same year he painted a portrait of Philip IV, the first of a very long series which he painted of that king at every period of his life.
In 1628 Velazquez met Rubens, who came to Madrid as ambassador from the regent of the Netherlands. Having then conceived an eager desire to visit Italy, he left Spain in 1629, journeying to Venice, and then to Rome, by way of Ferrara and Bologna, and in 1630 was in Naples. The next year saw him back again at Madrid, and from that time began his long series of notable portraits.
His second visit to Italy was paid in 1649, v/hen his main object was to collect pictures and casts from the antique. On this occasion he painted his celebrated portrait of Pope Innocent X. In 1651, home again in Spain, he was given a high court appointment by the king, which took up much time. His pictures at this period include Maids of Honour, and the Tapestry Weavers.
The main feature of the art of Velazquez is its absolute truth. He was an impressionist in the truest meaning of the word, could seize upon an effect in its momentary force, and represent it in all its bare truth, painting colour as it really was. He had an unequalled command of values. There is never any false lighting or inaccurate incidence of light in his pictures, and he not only understood atmosphere, but grasped the mystery of shadows and darkness. He selected essentials with unerring judgement, and no other works are so near to the effect of nature as are his, or produce like them the true perspective of the atmosphere. Research Diego Velazquez
Inez de Castro was a Portuguese noble lady. She was a lady of noble birth, secretly married to Pedro, son of Alphonso IV, the king of Portugal, after the death of his wife Constantia in 1345. The old king Alphonso IV, fearful that this marriage would injure the interests of his grandson Ferdinand (the son of Pedro by his deceased wife), resolved to put Inez to death. Three noblemen, Diego Lopez Pacheco, Pedro Coelho, and Alvarez Gonsalvez, were his counsellors in this scheme, and carried it out themselves by stabbing Inez within the convent where she lived in 1355. Two years after King Alphonso IV died, and Pedro, inducing the king of Castile to give up to him two of the murderers, who had taken refuge there - the third, Diego Lopez, having managed to escape - put them to death with cruel tortures. The king then made public declaration of the marriage that had taken place between him and the deceased Inez; and had her corpse disinterred and placed on a throne, adorned with the diadem and royal robes, to receive the homage of the nobility. The body was then conveyed to Alcobaga and buried with great honours. The history of the unhappy Inez has furnished many poets of different nations with materials for tragedies, and her story is one of the finest episodes in the Lusiads of Camoens. Research Inez de Castro
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