GOMES EANES DE ZURARA (1410?–1474) wrote four works about the Portuguese in Africa: Crónica da Tomada de Ceuta (1449–1450); Crónica de Guiné (1452–1454); Crónica do Conde D. Pedro de Meneses, composed between 1458 and 1464, which tells us about the Captain of Ceuta during the years 1415–1437; and Crónica do Conde D. Duarte de Meneses, a chronicle written between the years 1464 and 1468 that highlight the Captain of Ksar es-Seghir in the period 1458 to 1464. We will examine here the ideal models held up for Christian military personnel, particularly what it meant to be a “Good Captain” and to be “Daring Warriors.”

Zurara's works were part of a writing project to legitimize the power of the Portuguese royalty and nobility, as well as to justify their actions in a specific place, Africa. This project is explicit in his Northern African chronicles, which, sometimes, have stretches in common. His Moroccan trilogy tells of the Lusitanians’ achievements in North Africa from the conquest of Ceuta in 1415 until the death of Count Duarte de Meneses in 1464. All Zurara's chronicles together—including the West African Crónica de Guiné—describe the Portuguese conquests in North Africa and their voyages and raids along the African coasts.

The context described (1415–1464) is wider than the time in which Zurara wrote his works (1449–1468). The former witnessed several political upheavals: agreements and alliances—or their breaking—in the Iberian Peninsula and Christendom; conflicts between Christians; the war against Muslims; and successful or ill-fated adventures, including conquests and sacrifices. The chronicler sought to legitimize Portugal's expansionist policy in North Africa. However, what really matters for this research is that, within the context of warfare marked by the clash between Christians and Muslims, acts of bravery, cowardice, violence, and clemency were used by Zurara to impose ideal models on the Portuguese Christian nobility. Based on this thesis, I shall present preliminary research on these “Northern African” chronicles, with a particular focus on the depiction of warriors aimed at those who fought for the Portuguese king in Africa.

I will then go on to explore more closely several chapters in these chronicles, all of them expounding the martial values that defined the Lusitanian nobility's chivalric profiles.