Juan de Borja y Castro

He was born accidentally in Bellpuig as his father was assisting at the courts Monzón as the head caballerizo representing Charles I at the time.

After entering the service of Philip II of Spain as a staff member for Prince Carlos, he became a soldier at Gipuzkoa, where under the command of the contemporary Viceroy of Navarre, Vespasiano I Gonzaga, he took part in the defense of the province against the French during the Italian Wars.

His diplomatic career began in 1569 when he was sent to Portugal as a substitute for the ambassador Fernando Carrillo Muñiz de Godoy y Valenzuela.

[2][3] Juan died at the age of 73 in September 1606, the victim of an accident which occurred when the litter basket in which he was carried, due to his suffering from gout, fell down a staircase at El Escorial.

His body was initially buried at the Colegio Imperial de Madrid until 1613, when it was transferred to the Church of Saint Roch in Lisbon, Portugal.