The monastery was founded in 1289 by D. Berengária Aires, maid of Queen Santa Isabel and wife of D. Rodrigo Garcia, in fulfillment of the testamentary wish of her mother, D. Sancha Pires. The works resulted from the joint initiative of the founder and the Holy Queen, the latter having ordered the construction of the cloister and the infirmary. After the completion of the works, the queen continued to express interest in the monastery, leaving it around a thousand pounds in her will. The date of completion of the works is unknown, only knowing that, when the founder died in 1210, they had not yet been completed.
After the extinction of the religious orders, in 1834, the monastery was progressively abandoned, entering a phase of dilapidation and destruction of its rich heritage that would last until almost the middle of the 20th century. Still in 1910, the church was vandalized and robbed, with tiles, paintings and a portico that existed in the Chapter House missing. In the 50s of the 20th century, the state of degradation that the complex had reached led to the replacement of the vaulted roof of the central nave with the current wooden ceiling. The organ and the coat of arms on the main portico had already been dismantled, while the building attached to the church was transformed into a cowshed. Since then, the complex has been the subject of extensive restoration work, which seeks to restore, as much as possible, some of its original characteristics.