Juan Gil de Zamora

Juan Gil de Zamora (c. 1240 – c. 1320), known in Latin as Aegidius Zamorensis,[2] was a Castilian Franciscan friar and prolific writer of the literary circle around Alfonso X.

His exact birth year is unknown, but is thought to be early as the 1220s on the basis of Gil González Dávila's claim that he served as a secretary to Ferdinand III.

[6] This latter date is arrived at on the basis that Juan was a deacon and thus 25 years old when he wrote the Vita Isidori Agricolae in 1266, but his authorship of this biography of Isidore the Laborer is doubtful.

[5] Juan appears around this time as a scribe in the court of King Alfonso X, who entrusted to him the education of his heir, the future Sancho IV.

[6] He was with Sancho at San Esteban de Gormaz on 26 October 1278, when the prince issued a charter defining the relationship of the church and municipal council of Zamora.

[21] Several scholars have advanced the thesis that Juan was the author of the Lucidario [es], an encyclopedic work associated with the court of Sancho IV.

Two historiated initials S and Q from a late 13th-century manuscript showing Juan Gil writing his Liber de preconiis Hyspanie (top) and presenting it to Sancho IV (bottom). [ 1 ]