in GranadaOn 13 December 1474, in
Segovia's main square, Isabella pledged to uphold the Church's commandments, protect the integrity of Castile, and respect the rights of the nobility and towns. She was then formally proclaimed queen of Castile by the assembly.
Regulation of crime When Isabella came to the throne in 1474, Castile was in a state of despair due to her brother Henry's reign. It was known that Henry IV was a big spender and did little to enforce the laws of his kingdom. It was even said by one Castilian denizen of the time that murder, rape, and robbery happened without punishment. Because of this, Isabella needed desperately to find a way to reform her kingdom. Due to the measures she imposed, historians during her lifetime saw her to be more inclined to justice than to mercy, and indeed far more rigorous and unforgiving than her husband Ferdinand.
La Santa Hermandad Isabella's first major reform came during the cortes of Madrigal in 1476 in the form of a police force, La Santa Hermandad (the Holy Brotherhood). Up until then, during the late medieval period, the expression
hermandad had been used to describe groups of men who came together of their own accord to regulate law and order by patrolling the roads and countryside and punishing malefactors. These brotherhoods were often suppressed by the monarchs and the justice system, in most parts of the country, was under the control of the nobility instead of royal officials. Isabella brought these brotherhoods under royal authority. Thus, for the first time, the Hermandad was a police force used by the crown. They were established for Castile,
Leon, and
Asturias. The police force was to be made up of locals who were to regulate the crime occurring in the kingdom. It was to be paid for by a tax of 1800
maravedís on every one hundred households. In 1477, Isabella visited
Extremadura and Andalusia to introduce this more efficient police force there as well.
Other criminal reforms Keeping with her reformation of the regulation of laws, in 1481 Isabella charged two officials with restoring peace in
Galicia. This turbulent province had been the prey of tyrant nobles since the days of Isabella's father, John II. Robbers had infested the highways and oppressed the smaller towns and villages. The officials Isabella charged with restoring peace for the province were ultimately successful. Indeed, they drove over 1,500 robbers from Galicia.
Finances From the very beginning of her reign, Isabella fully grasped the importance of restoring the Crown's finances. The reign of Henry IV had left the Kingdom of Castile in great debt. Upon examination, it was found that the chief cause of the nation's poverty was the wholesale alienation of royal estates during Henry's reign. To make money, Henry had sold off royal estates at prices well below their value. The Cortes of Toledo of 1480 came to the conclusion that the only hope of lasting financial reform lay in a resumption of these alienated lands and rents. This decision was warmly approved by many leading nobles of the court, but Isabella was reluctant to take such drastic measures. It was decided that the Archbishop of Toledo would hold an enquiry into the tenure of estates and rents acquired during Henry IV's reign. Those that had not been granted as a reward for services were to be restored without compensation, while those that had been sold at a price far below their real value were to be bought back at the same sum. While many of the nobility were forced to pay large sums of money for their estates, the royal treasury became even richer. Isabella's one stipulation was that there would be no revocation of gifts made to churches, hospitals, or the poor. Another issue of money was the overproduction of coinage and the abundance of mints in the kingdom. During Henry's reign, the number of mints regularly producing money had increased from just five to 150. Much of the coinage produced in these mints was nearly worthless. During the first year of her reign, Isabella established a monopoly over the royal mints and fixed a legal standard to which the coinage had to approximate. By shutting down many of the mints and taking royal control over the production of money, Isabella restored the confidence of the public in the Crown's ability to handle the kingdom's finances.
Government Both Isabella and Ferdinand established very few new governmental and administrative institutions in their respective kingdoms. Especially in Castile, their main achievement was to use more effectively the institutions that had existed during the reigns of John II and Henry IV. Historically, the center of the Castilian government had been the royal household, together with its surrounding court. The household was traditionally divided into two overlapping bodies. The first body was made up of household officials, mainly people of the nobility, who carried out governmental and political functions for which they received special payment. The second body was made up of some 200 permanent servants or
continos who performed a wide range of confidential functions on behalf of the rulers. By the 1470s, when Isabella began to take a firm grip on the royal administration, the senior offices of the royal household were simply honorary titles and held strictly by the nobility. The positions of a more secretarial nature were often held by senior churchmen. Substantial revenues were attached to such offices and were therefore enjoyed greatly, on an effectively hereditary basis, by the great Castilian houses of nobility. While the nobles held the titles, individuals of lesser breeding did the real work. Traditionally, the main advisory body to the rulers of Castile was the
Royal Council. The council, under the monarch, had full power to resolve all legal and political disputes. The council was responsible for supervising all senior administrative officials, such as the Crown representatives in all of the major towns. It was also the supreme judicial tribunal of the kingdom. In 1480, during the Cortes of Toledo, Isabella made many reforms to the Royal Council. Previously there had been two distinct yet overlapping categories of royal councillor. One formed a group which possessed both judicial and administrative responsibilities. This portion consisted of some bishops, some nobles, and an increasingly important element of professional administrators with legal training known as
letrados. The second category of traditional councillor had a less formal role. This role depended greatly on the individuals' political influence and personal influence with the monarch. During Isabella's reign, the role of this second category was eliminated. As mentioned previously, Isabella had little care for personal bribes or favors. Because of this, this second type of councillor, usually of the nobility, was only allowed to attend the council of Castile as an observer. Isabella began to rely more on the professional administrators than ever before. These men were mostly of the
bourgeoisie or lesser nobility. The council was also rearranged and it was officially settled that one bishop, three
caballeros, and eight or nine lawyers would serve on the council at a time. While the nobles were no longer directly involved in the matters of state, they were welcome to attend the meetings. Isabella hoped that forcing the nobility to choose whether to participate or not would weed out those who were not dedicated to the state and its cause. Isabella also saw the need to provide a personal relationship between herself as the monarch and her subjects. Therefore, Isabella and Ferdinand set aside a time every Friday during which they themselves would sit and allow people to come to them with complaints. This was a new form of personal justice that Castile had not seen before. The Council of State was reformed and presided over by the king and queen. This department of public affairs dealt mainly with foreign negotiations, hearing embassies, and transacting business with the Court of Rome. In addition to these departments, there was also a Supreme Court of the Santa Hermandad, a Council of Finance, and a Council for settling purely Aragonese matters. Although Isabella made many reforms that seem to have made the Cortes stronger, in actuality the Cortes lost political power during the reigns of Isabella and Ferdinand. Isabella and her husband moved in the direction of a non-parliamentary government and the Cortes became an almost passive advisory body, giving automatic assent to legislation which had been drafted by the royal administration. After the reforms of the Cortes of Toledo, the queen ordered a noted jurist,
Alfonso Diaz de Montalvo, to undertake the task of clearing away legal rubbish and compiling what remained into a comprehensive code. Within four years the work stood completed in eight bulky volumes and the Ordenanzas Reales took their place on legal bookshelves.
Events of 1492 Granada ; it resides in the
Capilla Real, in
Granada. At the end of the
Reconquista, only
Granada was left for Isabella and Ferdinand to conquer. The
Emirate of Granada had been held by the Muslim
Nasrid dynasty since the mid-13th century. Protected by natural barriers and fortified towns, it had withstood the long process of the Reconquista. On 1 February 1482, the king and queen reached
Medina del Campo and this is generally considered the beginning of the
Granada War. While Isabella's and Ferdinand's involvement in the war was apparent from the start, Granada's leadership was divided and never able to present a united front. It still took ten years to conquer Granada, however, culminating in 1492. The Spanish monarchs recruited soldiers from many European countries and improved their artillery with the latest and best cannon. Systematically, they proceeded to take the kingdom piece by piece. In 1485 they laid siege to
Ronda, which surrendered after only a fortnight due to extensive bombardment. The following year,
Loja was taken, and again
Muhammad XI was captured and released. One year later, with the
fall of
Málaga, the western part of the Muslim Nasrid kingdom had fallen into Spanish hands. The eastern province succumbed after the fall of
Baza in 1489. The siege of Granada began in the spring of 1491 and Muhammad XI finally surrendered at the end of the year. On 2 January 1492, Isabella and Ferdinand entered Granada to receive the keys of the city and the principal mosque was consecrated as a church. The
Treaty of Granada was signed later that year; in it, Ferdinand and Isabella gave their word to allow the Muslims and Jews of Granada to live in peace. During the war, Isabella noted the abilities and energy of
Gonzalo Fernández de Córdoba and made him one of the two commissioners for the negotiations. Under her patronage, De Córdoba went on to an extraordinary military career that revolutionized the organization and tactics of the emerging Spanish military, changing the nature of warfare and altering the European balance of power.
Columbus and Portuguese relations Just three months after entering Granada, Queen Isabella agreed to sponsor
Christopher Columbus on an expedition to reach the
East Indies by sailing west (for a distance of 2,000 miles, according to Columbus). The crown agreed to pay a sum of money as a concession from monarch to subject. Columbus's expedition departed on 3 August 1492, and arrived in the
New World on 12 October. Spain then entered a
Golden Age of
exploration and
colonization—the period of the
Spanish Empire. In 1494, by the
Treaty of Tordesillas, Isabella and Ferdinand agreed to divide the Earth, outside of Europe, with King
John II of
Portugal. The Portuguese did not recognize that
South America belonged to the Spanish because it was in Portugal's sphere of influence, and King John II threatened to send an army to claim the land for the Portuguese. Beyond her support for Columbus, Queen Isabella also played a pivotal role in shaping the Spanish linguistic legacy in the New World. In 1492, she endorsed the first grammar of the Castilian language titled
Gramática de la lengua castellana, written by Elio Antonio de Nebrija, the father of Spanish grammar. This grammar was intended to spread the Spanish language across the newly discovered lands, aligning with Spain's imperial ambitions, as Nebrija himself declared it would teach the language to the inhabitants of these territories.
Position on slavery Isabella was not in favor of enslaving the
American natives. She established the royal position on how the indigenous people should be treated by following the recent policies implemented in the
Canary Islands (which had a small number of native inhabitants), which stated that all peoples were subjects of the
Crown of Castile, and could not be enslaved in most situations. She was annoyed by the enslavement of the natives by Columbus, and established a royal position on how the indigenous shall be treated. There were some circumstances in which a person could be enslaved, including being a
prisoner of war, or for practising
cannibalism or
sodomy. After an episode in which Columbus captured 1,200 men, Isabella ordered their return and the arrest of Columbus, who was insulted in the streets of Granada. Isabella realized that she could not trust all the conquest and evangelization to take place through one man, so she opened the range for other expeditions led by
Alonso de Hojeda,
Juan de la Cosa,
Vicente Yáñez Pinzón, or
Pedro Alonso Niño. To prevent her efforts from being reversed in the future, Isabella instructed her descendants in her
last will as follows: "do not give rise to or allow the Indians [indigenous Americans] to receive any wrong in their persons and property, but rather that they be treated well and fairly, and if they have received any wrong, remedy it."
Expulsion of the Jews With the institution of the
Catholic Inquisition in Spain, and with the
Dominican friar Tomás de Torquemada as the first
Inquisitor General, the Catholic Monarchs pursued a policy of religious and national unity. Though Isabella opposed taking harsh measures against Jews on economic grounds, Torquemada was able to convince Ferdinand. On 31 March 1492, the
Alhambra decree for the expulsion of the Jews was issued. The Jews had until the end of July (four months) to leave the country and they were not to take with them gold, silver, money, arms, or horses. Hundreds of those that remained came under the Inquisition's investigations into relapsed
conversos (
Marranos) and the Judaizers who had been abetting them.
Later years (c. 1500–1504) Isabella was given the title of
Catholic Monarch by
Pope Alexander VI, of whose behavior and involvement in matters Isabella did not approve. Along with the physical unification of Spain, Isabella and Ferdinand embarked on a process of religious unification, trying to bring the country under their own
Catholic faith. As part of this process, the Inquisition became institutionalized. After a Muslim uprising in 1499 triggered by their policy of forced conversions, and further troubles thereafter, the Catholic Monarchs broke the
Treaty of Granada in 1502, and Muslims were ordered to either become Christians or to leave. Isabella's inflexible confessor,
Cisneros, was named Archbishop of
Toledo. He was instrumental in a program of rehabilitation of the religious institutions of Spain, laying the groundwork for the later
Counter-Reformation. As Chancellor, he exerted more and more power. Isabella and her husband had created
an empire and in later years were consumed with administration and politics; they were concerned with the succession and worked to link the Spanish crown to the other rulers in Europe. By early 1497, all the pieces seemed to be in place: The son and heir
John, Prince of Asturias, married a Habsburg princess,
Margaret of Austria, establishing the connection to the
House of Habsburg. The eldest daughter,
Isabella of Aragon, married King
Manuel I of Portugal, and the younger daughter,
Joanna of Castile, was married to Margaret of Austria's brother,
Philip of Austria. In 1500, Isabella granted all non-rebellious natives in the colonies citizenship and full legal freedom by decree. However, Isabella's plans for her eldest two children did not work out. Her only son, John of Asturias, died shortly after his marriage. Her daughter, Isabella of Aragon, died during the birth of her son,
Miguel da Paz, who died shortly after, at the age of two. Queen Isabella I's crowns passed to her third child, Joanna, and her son-in-law, Philip I. Isabella did, however, make successful dynastic matches for her two youngest daughters. The death of Isabella of Aragon created a necessity for Manuel I of Portugal to remarry, and Isabella's third daughter,
Maria of Aragon and Castile, became his next bride. Isabella's youngest daughter,
Catherine of Aragon, married England's
Arthur, Prince of Wales, but his early death resulted in her being married to his younger brother, King
Henry VIII of England.
Women in the court of Queen Isabella I of Castile Isabella cultivated a court consisting of important women known by their contemporaries as "
puellae doctae" (learned girls). Queen Isabella of Castile made
Catalina de Medrano y Bravo de Lagunas her lady-in-waiting in 1497 and shortly after became the patron and protector of the first female professor in Europe,
Luisa de Medrano. Luisa de Medrano's intellectual abilities and solid formation caught the attention of the Queen and enabled her to teach Latin at the
University of Salamanca. She received the chair left by
Antonio de Nebrija (Antonio Martínez de Cala) in 1508 (Poetry and Grammar), although it is not known how long she maintained the post. Under the protection of Queen Isabel I, Luisa de Medrano learned history, culture and
humanist philosophy alongside children of the royal family. Luisa de Medrano not only received a privileged and nurtured education with the royal daughters,
Isabel and
Juana, she undoubtedly benefited from living in the climate of tolerance and advancement for women that Isabel I actively cultivated in her court, and which disappeared after her death. == Death ==