Syntactic Trees

Family letter from Francisca, Domingas, Madalena and Isabel de Freitas to the husband and father, João Gonçalves.

The author, on behalf of her mother and sisters, reproaches the addressee because he neglected his family.

The process concerns João Gonçalves, who was accused of the crime of bigamy. He married Inês Dias while he was still married to Francisca Freitas, his first wife. We was sentenced to exile for 5 years, in the galleys.

«Dear father.

We were very much pleased with the news of your good health, which were given to us by a youth known as Gil Farinha. We are all in good health, along with my mother, who seems to be the youngest of us all. And so, this last year, she wanted to go to that town to visit you and the woman you have been living with, while ignoring her and your three children, as if you had never been married before. And we don’t understand how Our Lord does you any grace, or how the confessors admonish you for ignoring my mother and us. However, the fact is that you don’t confess being married and having left your wife with three daughters, never remembering them, not even to send something to our sister Isabel, even though you had promised to do it on the occasion of her wedding. Despite that, she succeeded in getting married and becoming an honoured woman, while we remain obedient to my mother. Now, what we ask you is to send us detailed news, which we will much appreciate. Having said this, may God keep you. Today, 9th January 1663 years. From your wife and daughters, Francisca de Freitas and Domingas and Madalena and Isabel de Freitas»