With the objective that we have mentioned, the King of Castile invaded Portugal via the province of Beira. He called no halt in any township but journeyed forward daily with his army, making advances which could not be extensive, owing to the considerable baggage train and large number of troops that he brought with him. Then he captured a castle, Celorico da Beira by name, and left troops there to keep guard over it. He continued on his journey, not too slowly, until he reached Coimbra. On the far side of the river [Mondego], in the direction of the Monastery of São Jorge, all his companies pitched camp, so many of them that it was a fearful sight to behold, with the result that there was not a man who saw them, who, considering the towns and villages which had already declared for the King of Castile, did not believe that the whole of Portugal would be lost within a few days.

Since it was the month of August, and the water-level of the Mondego was low, the vast bulk of the baggage train was able to pass under the arches of the bridge. A number of troops who were making their way along the Rua Direita, in front of the gate of Almedina were involved in a skirmish with the local inhabitants, which led to a few dead and wounded on both sides. The soldiers began to spread out and commit acts of robbery everywhere, some down the riverbank to Montemor-o-Velho, then up to Aveiro, while others went to Soure. They brought away large quantities of booty, along with it a handful of farmworkers, and then the king had them all mutilated.

It is important that you should know, according to what Doctor Christophorus writes in his chapter beginning ‘Truly, after …’, in the paragraph opening with ‘And before we continue, note …’, that, after the King of Castile on this occasion invaded the country and until he reached Leiria, he did not stop resorting to every form of cruelty, both to men and to women and children, ordering their hands to be cut off and their tongues to be cut out, as well as other similar barbaric acts.