Abstract:
This article discusses the Afonso II Inquiries of 1220. As other inquiries carried on by further monarchs, they are usually considered as a whole. In an institutional perspective, the analysis is naturalized by a driving force that considers all the king’s initiatives as derived from a political plan of centralization. Therefore, in the case of Afonso II, we should mention the “general laws of 1211”, the “general confirmations of 1217” and the “general inquiries of 1220” as a bundle of instruments that constitutes his “plan of power centralization”. Otherwise, it is possible to add different forms of interpreting the problem of the inquiries in order to contribute to a better understanding of the royal power in Portugal, in the Middle Ages, that considers the institutions in a wider political scenario, in which the king’s performance doesn’t “steal the scene”.
Keywords:
Inquiries of 1220; King’s Jurisdiction; Afonso II