Dynastic union of the Catholic Monarchs In the 15th century, the most important among all of the Christian kingdoms that made up the old
Hispania were the
Kingdom of Castile, the
Kingdom of Aragon, and the
Kingdom of Portugal. The rulers of the kingdoms of Castile and Aragon were allied with dynastic families in Portugal, France, and other neighboring kingdoms. The death of King
Henry IV of Castile in 1474 set off a struggle for power called the
War of the Castilian Succession (1475–1479). Contenders for the throne of Castile were Henry's one-time heir
Joanna la Beltraneja, supported by Portugal and France, and Henry's half-sister Queen
Isabella I of Castile, supported by the Kingdom of Aragon and by the Castilian nobility. Isabella retained the throne and ruled jointly with her husband,
King Ferdinand II. Isabella and Ferdinand had married in 1469. Their marriage united both crowns and set the stage for the creation of the Kingdom of Spain, at the dawn of the modern era. That union, however, was a union in title only, as each region retained its own political and judicial structure. Pursuant to an agreement signed by Isabella and Ferdinand on January 15, 1474, Isabella held more authority over the newly unified Spain than her husband, although their rule was shared. Together, Isabella of
Castile and Ferdinand of
Aragon were known as the "Catholic Monarchs" (), a title bestowed on them by
Pope Alexander VI.
Conclusion of the Reconquista and expulsions of Jews and Muslims The monarchs oversaw the final stages of the
Reconquista of
Iberian territory from the
Moors with the conquest of
Granada, conquered the
Canary Islands, and expelled the Jews from Spain under the
Alhambra Decree. Although until the 13th century religious minorities (Jews and Muslims) had enjoyed considerable tolerance in Castile and Aragon – the only Christian kingdoms where Jews were not restricted from any professional occupation – the situation of the Jews collapsed over the 14th century, reaching a climax in 1391 with
large scale massacres in every major city except
Ávila. During the violence, Jewish quarters were attacked and looted, synagogues were destroyed, thousands of Jews were killed, and many others were forcibly baptized into Christianity. In 1492, the Catholic Monarchs ordered the remaining Jews in Spain to either
convert to Christianity or face expulsion. Estimates range from tens of thousands to approximately 200,000 expelled. In 1498, around 3,500 Jews were expelled from the Kingdom of Navarre. The expelled Jews, known as
Sephardic Jews (from
Sepharad, the
Hebrew name for Spain), dispersed across the Mediterranean, with large communities settling in North Africa and the
Ottoman Empire. Over the following decades, Muslims faced the same fate; and about 60 years after the Jews, they were also compelled to convert ("
Moriscos") or be expelled. In the early 17th century, the converts were also expelled. Isabella ensured long-term political stability in Spain by arranging strategic marriages for her five children. Her firstborn,
Isabella, married
Afonso of Portugal, forging important ties between these two neighboring countries and hopefully ensuring future alliance, but the younger Isabella soon died before giving birth to an heir.
Juana, Isabella's second daughter, married into the
Habsburg dynasty when she wed
Philip the Fair, the son of
Maximilian I, King of Bohemia (Austria) and likely heir to the crown of the
Holy Roman Emperor. This ensured an alliance with the Habsburgs and the
Holy Roman Empire, a powerful, far-reaching territory that assured Spain's future political security. Isabella's only son,
Juan, married
Margaret of Austria, further strengthening ties with the Habsburg dynasty. Isabella's fourth child,
Maria, married
Manuel I of Portugal, strengthening the link forged by her older sister's marriage. Her fifth child,
Catherine, married King
Henry VIII of England and was mother to Queen
Mary I of England.
Conquest of the Canary Islands, Columbian expeditions to the New World, and African expansion '' by
John Vanderlyn, 1847. Christopher Columbus leads expedition to the New World, 1492, sponsored by Spanish crown in 1509. The Castilian conquest of the
Canary Islands, inhabited by Guanche people, took place between 1402 (with the conquest of
Lanzarote) and 1496 (with the conquest of
Tenerife). Two periods can be distinguished in this process: the noble conquest, carried out by the nobility in exchange for a pact of vassalage, and the royal conquest, carried out directly by the Crown, during the reign of the Catholic Monarchs. By 1520, European military technology combined with the devastating epidemics such as bubonic plague and pneumonia brought by the Castilians and enslavement and deportation of natives led to the extinction of the Guanches. Isabella and
Ferdinand authorized the 1492 expedition of
Christopher Columbus, who became the first known European to reach the
New World since
Leif Ericson. This and subsequent expeditions led to an influx of wealth into Spain, supplementing income from within Castile for the state that was a dominant power in Europe for the next two centuries. Spain established colonies in North Africa that ranged from the Atlantic Moroccan coast to
Tripoli in Libya.
Melilla was occupied in 1497,
Oran in 1509,
Larache in 1610, and
Ceuta was annexed from the Portuguese in 1668. Today, both Ceuta and Melilla still remain under Spanish control, together with smaller islets known as the
presidios menores (
Peñón de Vélez de la Gomera,
las Islas de Alhucemas,
las Islas de Chafarinas).
Spanish empire The Spanish Empire was one of the first
global empires. It was also one of the
largest empires in world history. In the 16th century, Spain and Portugal were in the vanguard of European global exploration and colonial expansion. The two kingdoms on the conquest and Iberian Peninsula competed with each other in opening of trade routes across the oceans. Spanish imperial conquest and colonization began with the Canary Islands in 1312 and 1402. which began the
Castilian conquest of the Canary Islands, completed in 1495. In the 15th and 16th centuries, trade flourished across the Atlantic between Spain and the Americas and across the Pacific between East Asia and Mexico via the Philippines. Spanish
Conquistadors, operating privately, deposed the
Aztec,
Inca and
Maya governments with extensive help from local factions and took control of vast stretches of land. In the Philippines, the Spanish, using Mexican Conquistadors like
Juan de Salcedo, conquered the
kingdoms and sultanates of the islands by pitting Pagans and Muslims against each other, employing the principle of "Divide and Conquer". They considered their war against the Muslims of the Southeast Asia an extension of the Spanish
Reconquista. This New World empire was at first a disappointment, as the natives had little to trade. Diseases such as smallpox and measles that arrived with the colonizers devastated the native populations, especially in the densely populated regions of the Aztec, Maya and Inca civilizations, and this reduced their economic potential. Estimates of the pre-Columbian population of the Americas vary but possibly stood at 100 million—one fifth of humanity in 1492. Between 1500 and 1600 the population of the Americas was halved. In Mexico alone, it has been estimated that the pre-conquest population of around 25 million was reduced within 80 years to about 1.3 million. In the 1520s, large-scale extraction of silver from the rich deposits of Mexico's
Guanajuato began to be greatly augmented by the silver mines in Mexico's
Zacatecas and Bolivia's
Potosí from 1546. These silver shipments re-oriented the Spanish economy, leading to the importation of luxuries and grain. The resource-rich colonies of Spain thus caused large cash inflows. They also became indispensable in financing the military capability of
Habsburg Spain in its long series of European and North African wars. in the late 16th century. Seville became one of the most populous and cosmopolitan European cities after the expeditions to the New World. Spain enjoyed a
cultural golden age in the 16th and 17th centuries. For a time, the Spanish Empire dominated the oceans with its experienced
navy and ruled the European battlefield with its well trained infantry, the ''''. The financial burden within the peninsula was on the backs of the peasant class while the nobility enjoyed an increasingly lavish lifestyle. From the incorporation of the
Portuguese Empire in 1580 (lost in 1640) until the loss of its American colonies in the 19th century, Spain maintained one of the largest empires in the world even though it suffered military and economic misfortunes from the 1640s. The thought that Spain could bring Christianity to the New World and protect Catholicism in Europe played a strong role in the expansion of Spain's empire.
Spanish Kingdoms under the 'Great' Habsburgs (16th century) Charles I, Holy Emperor (better known in the English-speaking world as the
Holy Roman Emperor Charles V) was the most powerful European monarch of his day. Spain's world empire reached its greatest territorial extent in the late 18th century but it was under the
Habsburg dynasty in the 16th and 17th centuries it reached the peak of its power and declined. The
Iberian Union with Portugal meant that the monarch of Castile was also the monarch of Portugal, but they were ruled as separate entities both on the peninsula and in Spanish America and Brazil. In 1640, the
House of Braganza revolted against Spanish rule and reasserted Portugal's independence. When Spain's first Habsburg ruler
Charles I became king of Spain in 1516 (with his mother and co-monarch Queen Juana I effectively powerless and kept imprisoned till her death in 1555), Spain became central to the dynastic struggles of Europe. Charles also became
Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor and because of his widely scattered domains was not often in Spain. In 1556 Charles abdicated, giving his Spanish empire to his only surviving son,
Philip II of Spain, and the Holy Roman Empire to his brother, Ferdinand. Philip treated Castile as the foundation of his empire, but the population of Castile (about a third of France's) was never large enough to provide the soldiers needed. His marriage to
Mary Tudor allied England with Spain.
Philip II and the wars of religion In the 1560s, plans to consolidate control of the Netherlands led to unrest, which gradually led to the
Calvinist leadership of the revolt and the
Eighty Years' War. The Dutch armies waged a war of
maneuver and
siege, successfully avoiding
pitched battle. This conflict consumed much Spanish expenditure during the later 16th century. Other extremely expensive failures included an attempt to invade Protestant England in 1588 that produced the worst military disaster in Spanish history when the
Spanish Armada—costing 10 million ducats—was scattered by a storm. Economic and administrative problems multiplied in
Castile, and the weakness of the native economy became evident in the following century. Rising
inflation, financially draining wars in Europe, the ongoing aftermath of the
expulsion of the Jews and Moors from Spain, and Spain's growing dependency on the silver imports, combined to cause several bankruptcies that caused economic crisis in the country, especially in heavily burdened Castile. The
great plague of 1596–1602 killed 600,000 to 700,000, or about 10% of the population. Altogether more than 1,250,000 deaths resulted from the extreme incidence of plague in 17th-century Spain. Economically, the plague destroyed the labor force as well as creating a psychological blow.
Cultural Golden Age (Siglo de Oro) '' by
El Greco, between 1596 and 1600 The Spanish Golden Age (
Siglo de Oro) was a period of flourishing arts and letters in the
Spanish Empire (now Spain and the Spanish-speaking countries of Latin America), coinciding with the political decline and fall of the
Habsburgs. Arts flourished despite the decline of the empire in the 17th century. The last great writer of the age, Sor
Juana Inés de la Cruz, died in
New Spain in 1695. The
Habsburgs were great patrons of art in their countries.
El Escorial, the great royal monastery built by King
Philip II, invited the attention of some of Europe's greatest architects and painters.
Diego Velázquez, regarded as one of the most influential painters of European history and a greatly respected artist in his own time, cultivated a relationship with King Philip IV and his chief minister, the
Count-Duke of Olivares, leaving several portraits that demonstrate his style and skill.
El Greco, a respected Greek artist from the period, settled in Spain, and infused Spanish art with the styles of the Italian renaissance and helped create a uniquely Spanish style of painting. Some of Spain's greatest music is regarded as having been written in the period. Such composers as
Tomás Luis de Victoria,
Luis de Milán and
Alonso Lobo helped to shape
Renaissance music and the styles of
counterpoint and
polychoral music, and their influence lasted into the
Baroque period. Spanish literature blossomed as well, most famously demonstrated in the work of
Miguel de Cervantes, the author of
Don Quixote. Spain's most prolific playwright,
Lope de Vega, wrote possibly as many as one thousand plays over his lifetime, over four hundred of which survive.
Decline under the 'Minor' Habsburgs (17th century) Spain's severe financial difficulties began in the middle 16th century, and continued for the remainder of Habsburg rule. Despite the successes of Spanish armies, the period was marked by monetary inflation,
mercantilism, and a variety of government monopolies and interventions. Spanish kings were forced to declare
sovereign defaults nine times between 1557 and 1666. Philip II died in 1598, and was succeeded by his son
Philip III. In his reign (1598–1621) a ten-year truce with the Dutch was overshadowed in 1618 by Spain's involvement in the European-wide
Thirty Years' War. Philip III was succeeded in 1621 by his son
Philip IV (reigned 1621–65). Much of the policy was conducted by the
Count-Duke of Olivares, the inept prime minister from 1621 to 1643. He over-exerted Spain in foreign affairs and unsuccessfully attempted domestic reform. His policy of committing Spain to recapture Holland led to a renewal of the Eighty Years' War while Spain was also embroiled in the Thirty Years' War (1618–1648). His attempts to centralise power and increase wartime taxation led to revolts in Catalonia and in Portugal, which brought about his downfall. During the Thirty Years' War, in which various Protestant forces battled Imperial armies, France provided subsidies to Habsburg enemies, especially Sweden. Sweden lost and France's First Minister,
Cardinal Richelieu, in 1635 declared war on Spain. The open
war with Spain started with a victory for the French at
Les Avins in 1635. The following year Spanish forces based in the Southern Netherlands hit back with devastating lightning campaigns in northern France that left the economy of the region in tatters. After 1636, however, Olivares, fearful of provoking another bankruptcy, stopped the advance. In 1640, both
Portugal and
Catalonia rebelled. Portugal was lost for good; in northern Italy and most of Catalonia, French forces were expelled and Catalonia's independence was suppressed. In 1643, the French defeated one of Spain's best armies at
Rocroi, northern France. in June 1660, part of the process to put an end to the
Franco-Spanish War (1635–59). The Spanish "Golden Age" politically ends no later than 1659, with the
Treaty of the Pyrenees, ratified between France and
Habsburg Spain. During the long regency for
Charles II, the last of the Spanish Habsburgs, favouritism milked Spain's treasury, and Spain's government operated principally as a dispenser of patronage. Plague, famine, floods, drought, and renewed war with France wasted the country. The Peace of the Pyrenees (1659) had ended fifty years of warfare with France, whose king,
Louis XIV, found the temptation to exploit a weakened Spain too great. Louis instigated the
War of Devolution (1667–68) to acquire the
Spanish Netherlands. By the 17th century, the Catholic Church and Spain had a close bond, attesting to the fact that Spain was virtually free of Protestantism during the 16th century. In 1620, there were 100,000 Spaniards in the clergy; by 1660 the number had grown to about 200,000, and the Church owned 20% of all the land in Spain. The Spanish bureaucracy in this period was highly centralized, and totally reliant on the king for its efficient functioning. Under Charles II, the councils became the sinecures of wealthy aristocrats despite attempts at reform. Political commentators in Spain, known as
arbitristas, proposed a number of measures to reverse the decline of the Spanish economy, with limited success. In rural areas, heavy taxation of peasants reduced agricultural output as peasants migrated to the cities. The influx of
silver from the Americas has been cited as the cause of inflation, although only the
quinto real (royal fifth) actually went to Spain. A prominent internal factor was the Spanish economy's dependence on the export of luxurious
Merino wool, which had its markets in northern Europe reduced by war and growing competition from cheaper textiles. The once proud Spanish army was falling far behind its foes. It did badly at
Bergen op Zoom in 1622. The Dutch won very easily at
's-Hertogenbosch and
Wesel in 1629. In 1632 the Dutch captured the strategic fortress town of
Maastricht, repulsing three relief armies and dooming the Spanish to defeat. While Spain built a rich American Empire that exported a silver treasure fleet every year, it was unable to focus its financial, military, and diplomatic power on building up its Spanish base. The Crown's dedication to destroying Protestantism through almost constant warfare created a cultural ethos among Spanish leaders that undermined the opportunity for economic modernization or industrialization. When Philip II died in 1598, his treasury spent most of its income on funding the huge deficit, which continued to grow. In peninsular Spain, the productive forces were undermined by steady inflation, heavy taxation, immigration of ambitious youth to the colonies, and by depopulation. Industry went into reverse – Seville in 1621 operated 400 looms, where it had 16,000 a century before. Religiosity led by saints and mystics, missionaries and crusaders, theologians and friars dominated Spanish culture, with the psychology of a reward in the next world. Palmer and Colton argue: : the generations of crusading against infidels, even, heathens and heretics had produced an exceptionally large number of minor aristocrats, chevaliers, dons, and hidalgos, who as a class were contemptuous of work and who were numerous enough and close enough to the common people to impress their haughty indifference upon the country as a whole. Elliott cites the achievements of Castille in many areas, especially high culture. He finds: :A certain paradox in the fact that the achievement of the two most outstanding creative artists of Castile – Cervantes and Velázquez – was shot through with a deep sense of disillusionment and failure; but the paradox was itself a faithful reflection of the paradox of sixteenth-and seventeenth-century Castile. For here was a country which had climbed to the heights and sunk to the depths; which had achieved everything and lost everything; which had conquered the world only to be vanquished itself. The Spanish achievement of the sixteenth century was essentially the work of Castile, but so also was the Spanish disaster of the seventeenth; and it was
Ortega y Gasset who expressed the paradox most clearly when he wrote what may serve as an epitaph on the Spain of the House of Austria: ‘Castile has made Spain, and Castile has destroyed it.’ The Habsburg dynasty became extinct in Spain with Charles II's death in 1700, and the
War of the Spanish Succession ensued in which the other European powers tried to assume control of the Spanish monarchy. King
Louis XIV of France eventually lost the War of the Spanish Succession. The victors were Britain, the Dutch Republic and Austria. They allowed the crown of Spain to pass to the
Bourbon dynasty, provided that Spain and France never merged. After the War of the Spanish Succession, the assimilation of the
Crown of Aragon by the
Castilian Crown, through the
Nueva Planta Decrees, was the first step in the creation of the Spanish
nation state. And like other European nation-states in formation, it was not on a uniform
ethnic basis, but by imposing the political and cultural characteristics of the dominant ethnic group, in this case the Castilian, on those of the other ethnic groups, so they become
national minorities to be assimilated. Nationalist policies, sometimes very aggressive, and still in force, have been and are the seeds of repeated territorial conflicts within the state. == Spain under the Bourbons, 1715–1808 ==