BRITO, BERNARDO de. - Portuguese Cistercian monk, born Balthazar de Brito de Andrade, who lived between 1561 and 1617; he was a poet, historian, and scholar. His principal works are the Monarquia lusitana and the Chronica de Cister; the former extends from the origins of the world to 1098, the presumed year of the granting of the county of Portugal to Count D. Enrico (thus stopping precisely where it ought to begin), while the latter likewise remained unfinished after its first part, which runs from the foundation of the Order of s. Benedetto to the life of s. Giuliana (6th–13th centuries). More than for their historical value, however, the two works are worthy of appreciation as models of style and documents of learning, since the Monarquia is a pompous exaltation of the Lusitanian lineage, stuffed with falsehoods and inventions of every kind, and the Chronica (in which national history also occupies ample space) abounds in visions and miracles, the fruits of B.'s imagination and of his immoderate desire to glorify his own Order.
An edition of the Monarquia lusitana was published at Alcobaça-Lisbona between 1597 and 1609 (the 2nd ed. in 1609), and more recently under the editorship of p. Joaquim de Foyos (Lisbona 1806-1809); the collection of poems entitled Sylvia de Lisardo appeared at Lisbona in 1597; the Chronica de Cister, in 1602. Various works by B. still remain unpublished.