[1] He began to cultivate the making of verses in the palace of John II, and he reported that how one night when the king was in bed he caused him Resende to repeat some "trovas" (troubador songs) of Jorge Manrique, saying it was as needful for a man to know them as to know the Pater Noster.

This was the Cancioneiro Geral (General Songbook), probably starting in 1483, though not printed until 1516, which includes the compositions of some three hundred fidalgos of the reigns of kings Afonso V, John II, and Manuel I.

[1] The main subjects of its pieces are love, satire and epigram; and most of them are written in the national redondilha verse, but the metre is irregular and the rhyming careless.

The Spanish language is largely employed, because the literary progenitors of the whole collection were Juan de Mena, Jorge Manrique, Boscán and Garcilaso.

As a rule the compositions were improvised at palace entertainments, at which the poets present divided into two bands, attacking and defending a given theme throughout successive evenings.