Isabel Osorio

Isabel Osorio (circa 1522 – October 1589) was a Spaniard courtier and the long-term mistress of Philip II, King of Spain.

Life

Ancestry and early life Isabel Osorio was born around 1522 as the daughter of Pedro de Cartagena y Leiva, Lord of Olmillos, regidor of Burgos in Castile and León and his wife, María de Rojas, daughter of Diego Osorio and Isabel de Rojas, herself a daughter of Sancho de Rojas, Lord of Monzón and María de Pereira. Isabel's father was a descendant of Selomóh Ha-Leví, rabbi of the Jewish quarter of Burgos who later converted to Christianity and became the bishop of the same diocese. The relationship seems to have ended around 1559, when Philip was already King of Spain and married his third wife, Princess Elisabeth of France.

Later life Osorio retired to the Palace of Saldañuela near Burgos which she had built after acquiring the tower that stood there with a sum of 2 million maravedís she received from the king. She lived in this palace until her death, and never married. She founded "el convento de las Trinitarias de Sarracín", the Convent of the Trinity in Sarracín, where she was buried after her death in October 1589. Her nephew Pedro Osorio de Velasco, son of her only sister María de Rojas inherited her estate.