Lucas de Tuy (died 1249) was a Leonese

Kingdom of León

The Kingdom of León was an independent kingdom situated in the northwest region of the Iberian Peninsula. It was founded in AD 910 when the Christian princes of Asturias along the northern coast of the peninsula shifted their capital from Oviedo to the city of León...

 cleric and intellectual, remembered best as a historian

Historian

A historian is a person who studies and writes about the past and is regarded as an authority on it. Historians are concerned with the continuous, methodical narrative and research of past events as relating to the human race; as well as the study of all history in time. If the individual is...

. He was Bishop of Tuy

Tui, Galicia

Tui , in Spanish Tuy, is a town in Galicia , in the province of Pontevedra. It is located on the left bank of the Minho River, facing the Portuguese town of Valença....

 from 1239 until his death.

Born in León, Lucas was a canon

Canon (priest)

A canon is a priest or minister who is a member of certain bodies of the Christian clergy subject to an ecclesiastical rule ....

 of San Isidoro there between 1221 and 1239. While a canon he wrote De Miraculis Sancti Isidori in defence of Isidore of Seville

Isidore of Seville

Saint Isidore of Seville served as Archbishop of Seville for more than three decades and is considered, as the historian Montalembert put it in an oft-quoted phrase, "le dernier savant du monde ancien"...

. He also travelled extensively: to Rome

Rome

Rome is the capital of Italy and the country's largest and most populated city and comune, with over 2.7 million residents in . The city is located in the central-western portion of the Italian Peninsula, on the Tiber River within the Lazio region of Italy.Rome's history spans two and a half...

, Constantinople

Constantinople

Constantinople was the capital of the Roman, Eastern Roman, Byzantine, Latin, and Ottoman Empires. Throughout most of the Middle Ages, Constantinople was Europe's largest and wealthiest city.-Names:...

, Cyprus

Cyprus

Cyprus , officially the Republic of Cyprus , is a Eurasian island country, member of the European Union, in the Eastern Mediterranean, east of Greece, south of Turkey, west of Syria and north of Egypt. It is the third largest island in the Mediterranean Sea.The earliest known human activity on the...

, Jerusalem, Armenia

Armenia

Armenia , officially the Republic of Armenia , is a landlocked mountainous country in the Caucasus region of Eurasia...

, and France

France

The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...

. He visited all four of the Holy Nails: in France, Constantinople, Nazareth

Nazareth

Nazareth is the largest city in the North District of Israel. Known as "the Arab capital of Israel," the population is made up predominantly of Palestinian Arab citizens of Israel...

, and Tarsus

Tarsus (city)

Tarsus is a historic city in south-central Turkey, 20 km inland from the Mediterranean Sea. It is part of the Adana-Mersin Metropolitan Area, the fourth-largest metropolitan area in Turkey with a population of 2.75 million...

. In 1233 or 1234 he passed Easter

Easter

Easter is the central feast in the Christian liturgical year. According to the Canonical gospels, Jesus rose from the dead on the third day after his crucifixion. His resurrection is celebrated on Easter Day or Easter Sunday...

 in Rome and completed his tract De altera vita fideique controversiis adverus Albigensium errores against the Cathars, taking inspiration mainly from Isidore and Jerome

Jerome

Saint Jerome was a Roman Christian priest, confessor, theologian and historian, and who became a Doctor of the Church. He was the son of Eusebius, of the city of Stridon, which was on the border of Dalmatia and Pannonia...

.

In 1236, upon a request from Queen Berenguela

Berenguela of Castile

Berengaria was Queen regnant of Castile in 1217 and Queen consort of León from 1197 to 1204.-Family origins:...

, he composed the Chronicon mundi, a four-part chronicle of world history and his magnum opus

Masterpiece

Masterpiece in modern usage refers to a creation that has been given much critical praise, especially one that is considered the greatest work of a person's career or to a work of outstanding creativity, skill or workmanship....

. Beginning with Creation

Creation according to Genesis

The Genesis creation narrative describes the divine creation of the world including the first man and woman...

 and ending in 1236, the Chronicon aspired to give comprehensive coverage to two topics: the world and the Spains. Lucas' principal sources are Isidore, John of Biclar, Hydatius

Hydatius

Hydatius or Idacius , bishop of Aquae Flaviae in the Roman province of Gallaecia was the author of a chronicle of his own times that provides us with our best evidence for the history of the Iberian Peninsula in the 5th century.-Life:Hydatius was born around the year 400 in the...

, Osorio

Osório

Osório is a city in Rio Grande Do Sul, Brazil. Its population is about 40,000 inhabitants.Osório is situated 90 km east of Porto Alegre....

, the Chronicle of Alfonso III

Chronicle of Alfonso III

The Chronicle of Alfonso III is a chronicle composed in the early tenth century on the order of King Alfonso III of León with the goal of showing the continuity between Visigothic Spain and the later Christian medieval Spain...

, the Crónica Silense, and Sampiro

Sampiro

Sampiro was a Leonese cleric, politician, and intellectual, one of the earliest chroniclers of post-conquest Spain known by name. He was also the Bishop of Astorga from 1034 or 1035 until his death....

. Lucas does contain a few historical titbits which are found nowhere else, but he is not generally regarded as reliable in this regard.

In 1239 he was made bishop of Tuy, and there he died ten years thence.