Segovia, church of San Miguel. It is December 13, 1474. Isabel la Católica has just arrived at the temple from the Alcázar of the Castilian city. She entered as a princess, but she comes out as a queen. She has just been proclaimed queen of Castile. He is 23 years old.
550 years have passed since then. This past Monday, the King Felipe VI He presided over an event organized in Segovia to commemorate that anniversary. The monarch signed in the book of honor of the Alcázar, he referred to Isabel I of Castile as “the first great queen of Europe” and she wrote that, together with her husband, King Ferdinand of Aragon, she opened the Modern era.
Isabel was born in Madrigal de las Altas Torres (Ávila) on April 22, 1451. She was the daughter of King Juan II of Castile and his second wife, Isabel de Avís, who belonged to the House of Braganza. He barely got to know his father because the king died in 1453. In his will, Isabel was third in the successionafter his male brothers, Enrique and Alfonso.
The war between Enrique and Alfonso
Isabel’s paternal brother, Enrique was king of Castile from 1454. His daughter Juana was born in 1462 and was named heir to the throne, receiving the title of Princess of Asturias. But much of the Castilian nobility did not agree. In September 1464 the king gave in to these pressures and named his half-brother Alfonso Prince of Asturias.
“Elizabeth took the throne from the true heir.”
It was not enough to appease noble discontent and in June 1465 the Cortes overthrew Enrique and proclaimed Alfonso king of Castile. He was Alfonso XII and he was only 11 years old. But the wound was already open and the fight between Enrique’s supporters and Alfonso’s supporters.
Intelligent, intuitive and energetic
The infanta grew up tall, blonde, with a white, milky complexion, sweet in her appearance and in her way of dealing with people, although, according to all accounts, she was endowed with extraordinary intelligence and energy, reads the website of the Royal Academy of Sciences. the History. He especially highlighted the intuition that allowed him to function successfully in the midst of very complex problems that arose throughout his life. However, it was religious piety that was the most outstanding note of his character. Some decisions that today are considered erroneous were the result of this piety, writes Luis Suárez Fernández.
In August 1467 the battle of Olmedo took place and although according to some versions Enrique was defeated and taken prisoner, the truth is that chance came to his aid. Alfonso died on July 5, 1468 for unknown reasons.
Henry regained power and the title of Prince of Asturias was the responsibility of Juana and Isabel, Enrique’s other half-sister. The nobles had spread the rumor that Juana was not the daughter of Enrique IV but of his valid man Beltrán de la Cueva and that was how she earned the nickname Juana “la Beltraneja”.
Isabel, her supporters and her ambitions
What did Isabel do after Alfonso’s death? It is not clear. According to some authors, for example Luisa Isabel Álvarez de Toledo, she proclaimed herself queen But, lacking support, at the beginning of 1469 she surrendered, obeyed Enrique and was arrested at the Venta de los Toros de Guisando. According to others, such as Vicente Ángel Álvarez Palenzuela, Isabel proclaimed herself only heir to the throne and what happened at the Guisando Bulls was an act in which Henry IV ordered his followers to pay obedience to Isabel as heir.
Isabel acted with determination and cunning to become heiress and later ‘proprietary’ queen of Castile.”
“Isabel acted with determination and cunning to become princess of Asturias, heir and later ‘proprietary’ queen of Castile. To do this he had to humiliate his niece Juana,” the historian Josep Pérez has written. According to him, in Guisando, Henry IV did not declare Juana illegitimate, but he excluded her from the line of succession out of fear of a sector of the aristocracy.
Why the Catholic?
The queen is also known as Isabella the Catholic, a title that was granted to her and her husband by Pope Alexander VI through a bull on December 19, 1496. This is why the royal couple is known as Kings. Catholics, a title that practically all the kings of Spain would use from now on.
The escape, the wedding and the help of the Pope
Be that as it may, Isabel was taken into custody waiting to be married to the King of Portugal Alfonso V. At the same time, Juana would marry a brother of the King of France. But Isabel showed she had character and ambition: she eloped and married her cousin Fernando in Valladolidking of Sicily and heir to the Crown of Aragon, on October 19, 1469.
The marriage did not have legal validity due to the relationship between the couple. It required a papal dispensation. Henry IV disinherited his half-sister and reappointed his daughter Juana as heir. And at this the Pope arrived. In June 1472, Rodrigo Borgia, papal legate of Sixtus IV, landed in Valencia, who needed peace in Castile and Aragon so that they could participate in his crusade against the Muslims.
Isabel owed the Crown of Castile not to her rights but to the strength of those who supported her.”
There was a secret interview with Isabella and Ferdinand, and the papal envoy regularized their marriage through a bull (apparently in exchange for the title of Duke of Gandía for his son). The Borgia convinced Henry IV that Isabella would recognize the rights of his daughter Joan and in December 1473 the king received Isabel in Segovia and reconciled with her and with her husband.
A year later, Enrique died and the will disappeared. The next day, in Segovia, Elizabeth was proclaimed queen by his supporters. At the same time, Juana was recognized as queen for her own, in particular for her fiancé King Alfonso V of Portugal. Both entered Castile in May 1475, were proclaimed kings in Plasencia and married.
What did Elizabeth do as queen?
The Catholic Monarchs did not create a unified Spain, but the double monarchy is not a simple personal union either. Isabel reorganized the system of government and administration, centralizing powers previously held by the nobles; He reformed the citizen security system and carried out economic reform to reduce the debt that the kingdom had inherited from his half-brother and predecessor on the throne, Henry IV. After winning the war in Granada, the Catholic Monarchs expelled the Jews from their kingdoms.
Castilian succession war
War broke out again, this time between Elizabethans and Juanists. The conflict had a marked international character because Isabel was the wife of the heir to the Crown of Aragon, while Juana had married the Portuguese king. France also intervened, supporting Portugal to prevent Aragon, its rival in Italy, from joining Castile.
The clashes continued on land and by sea until 1479. The struggle began well for Juana’s supporters, but after some defeat the side disintegrated between 1476 and 1477. From then on, the war of Castilian succession consisted essentially in a war between Castile and Portugal. The naval war in the Atlantic Ocean was of great importance. The Portuguese fleets prevailed over the Castilian fleets in the fight for access to the riches of Guinea, which were gold and slaves.
The dynastic union managed to transform the variety of kingdoms of medieval Spain into a political body with a single leadership, a single diplomacy, a single army.”
The war ended in 1479 with the signing of the Treaty of Alcazobas. Isabel and Ferdinand were recognized as kings of Castilewhile Juana lost the right to the throne and had to remain in Portuguese lands until her death. In the words of Josep Pérez, “Isabel owed the Crown of Castile, not to her rights, but to the strength of those who supported her; she therefore took the throne from the true heir.”
Spain becomes a political sphere
With peace, Portugal achieved a commercial maritime monopoly on the western African coast by maintaining control of the territories in which it already had a certain presence (Guinea, Elmina, Madeira, Azores, Flores and Cape Verde). The Canary Islands were left outso the crown of Castile continued with its conquest.
According to Pérez, “the dynastic union achieved transform the variety of kingdoms of medieval Spain into a political body with a single direction, a single diplomacy, a single army.” The historian writes that with the Catholic Monarchs, “Spain became a political sphere and took on an original form that it would retain at least until the beginning of the 18th century.”