Notes for a biography of Juan de Persia

Abstract

Thanks to the life pension granted by Philip III Don Juan de Persia could keep Alonso Seoane Delgado at home as a servant. From 1602 to 1616 he also hosted a clergyman as instructor in the faith as a result of a tax clause to this pension. He maintened a certain personal relationship with Francisco de Gurmendi, royal interpreter of oriental languages, for whose Doctrina Phisica y Moral de príncipes he drafted a nuncupatory sonnet. Settled in Madrid in 1606, he married María Villate. The fruit of his marriage was Bernarda de Persia Villate, already an orphan of father and mother in 1621. Don Juan de Persia’s death must have occurred between 1616 and 1621.