Castilian and Leonese royalty
House of Trastámara
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Henry II (I of Leon) |
| Children include |
| Prince John (future John I) |
| Eleanor, Queen of Navarre |
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John I |
| Children include |
| Henry, Prince of Asturias (future Henry III of Castile and II of
Leon) |
| Ferdinand I of Aragon, Valencia and Sicily |
|
Henry III (II of Leon) |
| Children include |
| John, Prince of Asturias (future John II) |
| Maria, Queen of Aragon, Valencia, Sicily and Naples |
|
John II |
| Children include |
| Henry, Prince of Asturias (future Henry IV of Castile and III of
Leon) |
| Infanta Isabella (future Isabella I) |
| Alfonso, Prince of Asturias |
|
Henry IV (III of Leon) |
| Children |
| Joan, Queen of Portugal |
|
Isabella I with Ferdinand IV (V of Leon) |
| Children |
| Isabella, Queen of Portugal |
| Juan, Prince of Asturias |
| Joan, Princess of Asturias (future Joan I) |
| Maria, Queen of Portugal |
| Catherine, Queen of England |
| Grandchildren include |
| Miguel da Paz, Prince of Portugal and Spain |
|
Joan with Philip I |
| Children |
| Eleanor, Queen of Portugal and France |
| Charles, Prince of Asturias (future Charles I of Spain and
V of the Holy Roman Empire) |
| Isabella, Queen of Denmark and Norway |
| Ferdinand I of the Holy Roman Empire |
| Mary, Queen of Hungary and Bohemia |
| Catherine, Queen of Portugal |
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Isabella I of Castile (April 22 1451 – November 26 1504) was Queen
regnant of Castile and Leon. She and her husband, Ferdinand II of Aragon,
laid the foundation for the political unification of Spain under their grandson, Carlos I of Spain (Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor).
The Castilian version of her name was Ysabel (Isabel in modern spelling), which
traces etymologically to Hebrew Elisth or 'Elizabeth'.
In Germanic countries, she is usually known by the Italian form of her name, 'Isabella'. Likewise, her husband is Fernando
in Spanish, but Ferdinand in other languages. The official inscription on their tomb renders their names in Latin as
"Helizabeth" and "Fernandus".
Pope Alexander VI named Ferdinand and Isabella "The Catholic Monarchs" (In Spanish, "los Reyes Católicos"). She
is also known as Isabel la Católica.
Isabella was the last monarch of the Trastámara dynasty established by
Henry II of Castile.
Isabella expelled the Jews from Spain and made the Inquisition into a powerful institution whose main victims were Jewish
conversos. However, like a great part of Iberians in general and most of Iberian
nobility, she had some Jewish ancestry: three of her great-great-grandparents had Iberian (Sephardic) Jewish roots.[1]
Early years
Isabella was born in Madrigal de las Altas Torres on April 22, 1451. Her brother Alfonso was born three years later. When her father,
John II, died in 1454, her much older half-brother
Henry IV became king. As soon as he ascended to the throne, he sequestered his half-siblings to Segovia and his stepmother to
Arévalo, in virtual exile.
Henry IV, whose first marriage to Blanca of Navarre was not
consummated and had been annulled, remarried to have his own offspring. He then married Joana
of Portugal. His wife gave birth to Joan, princess of Castile. When Isabella
was about ten, she and her brother were summoned to the court, to be under more direct supervision and control by the king. In
the Representation of Burgos the nobles challenged the King; among other items, they demanded
that Alfonso, Isabella's brother, should be named the heir to the kingdom. Henry agreed, provided Alfonso would marry his
daughter, Joan. A few days later, he changed his mind.
The nobles, now in control of Alfonso and claiming him to be the true heir, clashed with Henry's forces at the Battle of Olmedo in 1467. The battle was a draw. One year later, Alfonso died
at the age of fourteen, and Isabella became the hope of the rebelling nobles. But she refused their advances, acknowledging
instead Henry as king, and he, in turn, recognized her as the legitimate heir in the Treaty of the Bulls of Guisando, rather than Joan whose paternal origin was in dispute.
In 1475, Joan married her uncle, the King of Portugal, but their marriage was later annulled by the Pope because of their family
relation. Henry tried to get Isabella married to a number of persons of his choice, yet she evaded all these propositions.
Instead she chose Ferdinand, heir to the throne of Aragon. They were married October 19, 1469 in
Valladolid.
Accession
When Henry IV died on December 10 1474, Isabella acted
quickly. She had herself crowned Queen of Castile at Segovia three days later. While she and
Ferdinand began to reorganize the court, Afonso V of Portugal crossed the border
and declared Joan the rightful heir. The War of the Castilian Succession
had begun. Ferdinand beat the invaders back at the Battle of Toro in 1476, and the challenge to the crown of Castile was rejected. In a series of separate marches, Ferdinand and
Isabella went on to subjugate renegade and rebellious towns, fortresses, and points of power that had developed over time. In
1479, Ferdinand's father then died, and they became rulers of Aragon. In 1480, the couple assembled the Cortes of Toledo where, under their supervision,
five royal councils and 34 civilian representatives produced a codex of laws and edicts as the legal groundwork for the future
Spain. This established the centralization of power with the royals and set the basis for economic and judicial rehabilitation of
the country. As part of this reform, and in their attempt to unify the country, Ferdinand and Isabella solicited Pope
Sixtus IV to authorize the Inquisition. In 1483, Tomás de Torquemada became the first Inquisitor General in
Seville.
The events of 1492
1492 was an important year for Isabella: seeing the conquest of Granada and hence the end of the 'Reconquista' (reconquest), her successful
patronage of Christopher Columbus, and her expulsion of the Jews and Muslims.
Granada
The Kingdom of Granada had been held by the Nasrids
dynasty.Protected by natural barriers and fortified towns, it had withstood the long process of the reconquista. However, in contrast to the determined leadership by Isabella and Ferdinand, Granada's
leadership was divided and never presented a united front. It took ten years to conquer Granada, culminating in 1492.
The Capitulation of Granada by F. Padilla: Boabdil before Ferdinand and Isabella.
When the Spaniards, early on, captured Boabdil (Sultan of Granada) they set
him free - for a ransom - so that he could return to Granada and resume his reign. The Spanish monarchs recruited soldiers from
many European countries and improved their artillery with the latest and best cannons. Systematically, they proceeded to take the
kingdom piece by piece. Often Isabella would inspire her followers and soldiers by praying in the middle of, or close to, the
battle field, that God's will may be done. In 1485 they laid siege to Ronda, which surrendered after extensive bombardment. The following year, Loja was
taken, and again Boabdil 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. When the Spanish camp was destroyed by an accidental fire,
the camp was rebuilt, in stone, in the form of a cross, painted white, and named Santa Fe (i.e. 'Holy Faith'). At the end
of the year, Boabdil surrendered. On January 2, 1492 Isabel and
Ferdinand entered Granada to receive the keys of the city and the principal mosque was
reconsecrated as a church. The Treaty of Granada signed later that year was to
assure religious rights to the Islamic believers - but it did not last.
Columbus
Columbus before Isabella and Ferdinand.
Queen Isabella rejected Christopher Columbus's plan to reach the
Indies by sailing west three times before changing her mind. His conditions (the position of
Admiral; governorship for him and his descendants of lands to be discovered; and ten percent of the profits) were met. On
August 3, his expedition departed. He returned the next year and presented his findings to the
monarchs, bringing natives and gold under a hero's welcome. Spain entered a Golden
Age of exploration and colonization. In 1494, by the Treaty of Tordesillas, Isabella and Ferdinand divided the Earth, outside of Europe, with king
John II of Portugal.
Isabella tried to defend the American aborigines against the abuse of the
colonists. In 1503, she established the Secretary of Indian Affairs, which later became the Supreme
Council of the Indies.
Expulsion of the Jews and Muslims
With the institution of the Roman 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 cleansing". Though Isabella opposed taking harsh measures against Jews on economic
grounds, Torquemada was able to convince Ferdinand. On March 31 1492, the Alhambra Decree for the expulsion of the Jews was issued (See
main article on Inquisition). Approximately 200,000 people left Spain. Others
converted, often only to be persecuted further by the Inquisition investigating Judaizing conversos (Marranos). The Muslims of the newly conquered Granada had been initially granted religious freedom, but pressure
to convert increased, and after some revolts, a policy of forced expulsion or conversion was also instituted in 1502 (see
Moriscos).
Later years
Isabella received with her husband the title of Reina Católica by Pope Alexander VI, a pope of whose secularism Isabella did not approve. Along with the physical
unification of Spain, Isabella and Ferdinand embarked on a process of spiritual unification, trying to bring the country under
one faith (Roman Catholicism). As part of this process, the Inquisition became institutionalized. After an uprising in
1499, the Treaty of Granada was broken in
1502 and Muslims were forced to either be baptized or to be expelled. Isabella's 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.
Queen Isabella's Will, by E.Rosales. On the left: Juana and Ferdinand; on the right: Cardinal Cisneros (black
cap).
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.
Politically this can be seen in attempts to outflank France and to unite the Iberian peninsula. By early 1497 all the pieces
seemed to be in place: Juan, the Crown Prince, married Margaret of Austria,
establishing the connection to the Habsburgs. The eldest daughter, Isabella, married
Manuel I of Portugal, and Juana was married to another Habsburg prince, Philip.
However, Isabella's plans for her children did not work out. Juan died shortly after his marriage. Isabella died in childbirth
and her son Miguel died at the age of two. Queen Isabella's titles passed to her daughter Juana the Mad ('la Loca') whose marriage to Philip the
Handsome was troubled. Isabella died in 1504 in Medina
del Campo, before Philip and Ferdinand became enemies.
Isabella is entombed in Granada in the Capilla Real, which
was built by her grandson, Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor (Carlos I of
Spain), alongside her husband Ferdinand, her daughter Juana and Juana's husband Philip; and Isabella's 2-year old grandson,
Miguel (the son of Isabella's daughter, also named Isabella, and King Manuel of Portugal). The museum next to the Capilla Real
houses her crown and scepter.
Influence
Isabella and her husband established a highly effective coregency under equal terms. They utilized a prenuptial agreement to
lay down their terms. During their reign they supported each other effectively in accordance to their joint motto of equality:
Tanto monta, monta tanto, Isabel como Fernando ("They amount to the same, Isabella and Ferdinand"). In addition to her
sponsorship of Columbus, Isabella was also the principal sponsor of Gonzalo
Fernández de Córdoba, the greatest military genius and innovator of the age. Isabella and Ferdinand's achievements are
remarkable - Spain was united, the crown power was centralized, the reconquista was successfully concluded, the groundwork for
the most dominant military machine of the next century and a half was laid, a legal framework was created, the church reformed.
Even without the benefit of the American expansion, Spain would have been a major European power. Columbus' discovery set the
country on the course for the first modern world power.
Isabella and contemporary politics and religion
In the twentieth century, the regime of Francisco
Franco claimed the prestige of the Catholic Monarchs. As a result, Isabella was despised by those opposed to Franco.
Some Catholic Spaniards have attempted to have Isabella declared as Blessed, with the aim of
later having her canonized as a Saint. Their justification is that Isabella was a protector
of the Spanish poor and of the American Indians from the rapacity of
the Spanish nobility; in addition, miracles have reportedly been attributed to her. This
movement has met with opposition from Jewish organizations, Liberation theologians
and Jean-Marie Cardinal Lustiger, due to the fact that Isabella had many Moors
killed after her entrance to Cordoba. In 1974,
Pope Paul VI opened her cause for beatification.
This places her on the path toward possible sainthood. In the Catholic Church, she is thus titled
Servant of God.
Isabella was the first named woman to appear on a United States coin, an 1893 commemorative quarter, celebrating the 400th anniversary of Columbus's first voyage. In the same year she was the first woman to be featured on U.S. postal
stamps, namely on three stamps of the Columbian Issue, also in celebration of Columbus.
She appears in the Spanish court scene replicated on the 15-cent Columbian (above), on the $ 1 issue, and in full portrait, side
by side with Columbus, on the $4 Columbian, the only stamp of that denomination ever issued and one which collectors prize not
only for its rarity (only 30,000 were printed) but its beauty, an exquisite carmine with some copies having a crimson hue. Mint
specimens of this commemorative have been sold for more than $20,000.
Isabella in popular culture
- Ferdinand and Isabella appear in Lope de Vega's play Fuente Ovejuna (c. 1611), represented positively as supporters
of a group of villagers in their struggle against their feudal overlord.
- Isabella appears as the mother of Catherine, the titular heroine of the novel The Constant Princess, by
Philippa Gregory.
- The Royal Diaries, a series of biographical novels about royal women from around
the world, includes Isabel, Jewel of Castilla, Spain, 1466 by Carolyn Meyer. It
details her life from the time she was exiled to the time she married.
- Isabella is movingly evoked in Norah Lofts' historical novel "Crown of Aloes" (1973).
- Christopher Columbus negotiates with Isabella and her husband, Ferdinand of Aragon, in Orson Scott Card's Pastwatch: The Redemption of Christopher Columbus.
- Isabella is a character in the short story "Christopher Columbus and Queen Isabella of
Spain Consummate Their Relationship" by Salman Rushdie.
- In film, Isabella has been played by Lola Flores, in Juana
la Loca, de vez en cuando (1983), by Sigourney
Weaver, in Ridley Scott's 1492:
Conquest of Paradise (1992) and by Rachel Weisz in
Darren Aronofsky's film, The Fountain
(2006).
- In the videogame Civilization IV Isabella appears as a leader for the
Spanish Empire.
- Isabella is the leader of the Spanish Empire in the computer game Age of Empires
III.
Notes
- ^ The founder of Trastamara dynasty Henry II of Castile was a son of Castilian King Alfonso
XI and his mistress of Jewish converso origin Eleanor of Guzman; his grandson
Henry III of Castile married Katherine of
Lancaster whose mother was a daughter of Castilian King Pedro the Cruel and his
Jewish converso mistress/wife Maria de Padilla: Ines Pirez, a mistress of
John I of Portugal and mother of Afonso, 1st Duke of Braganza was a Jewish converso; finally all royal families of Iberia
and consequently, most of European royalty descended by female lines from the first Navarrese
dynasty which was in part of Iberian Jewish descent, that includes Isabella's Castilian ancestors Alfonso XI and Pedro the
Cruel, John I of Portugal, John of Gaunt, Eleanor of Aragon. etc. Peggy K. Liss, "Isabel the Queen," New York:
Oxford University Press, 1992, p. 165; Norman Roth, "Conversos, Inquisition, and the Expulsion of
the Jews from Spain," Madison, WI, The University of Wisconsin Press, 1995,p. 150; Isabel Violante
Pereira, De Mendo da Guarda a D.Manuel I, Lisboa, 2001, Livros Horizonte; James
Reston, Jr. "Dogs of God," New York: Doubleday, 2005, p. 18.
References
- Miller, T. The Castles and the Crown. Spain 1451-1555 (New York: Coward-McCann, New York, 1963)
- Carroll, Warren H. Isabel Of Spain: The Catholic Queen
- Meyer, Carolyn. Isabel: Jewel of Castilla, Spain, 1466 (The Royal Diaries)
- Rubin, Stuart, Nancy. "Isabella of Castile: The First Renaissance Queen" ( New York, St. Martin's Press, 1991, 1992, 2005
iUniverse.com)
See also
External links
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