Theresa , Countess of Portugal Theresa of Portugal ( Portuguese : " Teresa " ; Galician - Portuguese : " Tareja " ) ( 1080 – 11 November 1130 ) was the Countess of Portugal . She rebelled against vassalage to the Kingdom of León , and was referred to as Queen of Portugal by the pope in 1116 , but was forced to accept Portugal ' s status as a county subject to León in 1121 . Her political and amorous affairs with Galician nobleman Fernando Pérez de Traba led to her ouster by her son , Afonso Henriques , who with the support of the Portuguese nobility and clergy defeated her at the Battle of São Mamede in 1128 . Birth and marriage . Theresa was the illegitimate daughter of King Alfonso VI of León and Castile by Ximena Moniz . In 1093 , her father married her to a French nobleman , Henry of Burgundy , nephew of Queen Constance , a brother of the Duke of Burgundy , a descendant of the kings of France in the male line . Henry was providing military assistance to his father - in - law against the Muslims on the Portuguese march . In the first months of 1096 , Henry and his cousin Raymond of Burgundy , husband of Queen Urraca , reached an agreement whereby each swore under oath that Raymond would give Henry the kingdom of Toledo and one - third of the royal treasury after King Alfonso ' s death and , if that was not possible , Henry would receive the kingdom of Galicia , while Henry , in turn , promised to support his cousin Raymond in securing all of the king ' s dominions and two - thirds of the treasury . King Alfonso , however , after becoming aware of this covenant , appointed Henry governor of all the land between the Minho River and Santarem , governed until then by Raymond , thereby limiting his son - in - law ' s government to Galicia . The two cousins then , instead of being allies , became rivals , each vying to obtain the king ' s favor . Upon the death of King Alfonso , Henry and Theresa continued governing these lands south of the Minho , and later , in December 1111 under the reign of Queen Urraca , were also governing Zamora . Struggle with sister . At first , Theresa and Henry were vassals of her father , but Alfonso VI died in 1109 , leaving everything to his legitimate daughter , Queen Urraca of Castile . Henry invaded León , hoping to add it to his lands . When he died in 1112 , Theresa was left to deal with the military and political situation . She took on the responsibility of government , and occupied herself at first mainly with her southern lands , that had only recently been reconquered from the Moors as far as the Mondego River . In recognizing her victory in defending Coimbra , she was called " Queen " by Pope Paschal II and in light of this recognition , she appears in her documents as " Daughter of Alphonso and elected by God " , explicitly being called queen in an 1117 document , leading some to refer to her as the first monarch of Portugal . In 1116 , in an effort to expand her power , Theresa fought her half - sister , Queen Urraca . They fought again in 1120 , as she continued to pursue a larger share in the Leonese inheritance , and allied herself as a widow to the most powerful Galician nobleman for that effect . This was the Count of Trava , who had rejected his first wife to openly marry her , and served her on her southern border of the Mondego . In 1121 , she was besieged and captured at Lanhoso , on her northern border with Galicia , fighting her sister Urraca . A negotiated peace was coordinated with aid from the Archbishops of Santiago de Compostela and Braga . The terms included that Theresa would go free and hold the county of Portugal as a fief of León , as she had received it at first . Rebellions . By 1128 , the Archbishop of Braga and the main Portuguese feudal nobles had had enough of her persistent Galician alliance , which the first feared could favour the ecclesiastical pretensions of his new rival the Galician Archbishop of Santiago de Compostela , Diego Gelmírez , who had just started to assert his pretensions to an alleged discovery of relics of Saint James in his town , as his way to gain power and riches over the other cathedrals in the Iberian Peninsula . The Portuguese lords rebelled , and the Queen was deposed after a short civil war . Her son and heir , Afonso , defeated Teresa ' s troops at the Battle of São Mamede near Guimarães and led her , along with the Count of Traba and their children , into exile in the kingdom of Galicia , near the Portuguese border , where the Traba had founded the monastery of Toxas Altas . Teresa died soon afterwards in 1130 . She was succeeded by her son , who would eventually lead Portugal into becoming a fully independent nation . Issue . By Henry , Count of Portugal , Theresa had : She had two daughters with count Fernando Pérez de Traba :