Pedro Fernández de Castro, Count of Lemos


Pedro Fernández de Castro y Andrade, better known as the Great Count of Lemos, was a Galician nobleman who was viceroy of Naples from 1608, and was also president of the Council of the Indies.

Biography

A member of the House of Castro, he was born at Monforte de Lemos.
King Philip III of Spain named him president of the Council of the Indies in 1603. In 1608 he was appointed Viceroy of Naples. During his tenure in southern Italy, he ordered the reconstruction of the University of Royal Studies in Naples, and commissioned the reclamation of lands of the Volturno plain in the Terra di Lavoro.
He was also the patron of writers such as Miguel de Cervantes, Lope de Vega, Francisco de Quevedo, the Argensola brothers and others.
He died in Madrid in 1622.