Crown of Castile

• 1. Introduction

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  The Crown of Castile carried two names side by side. Sometimes it was called simply Castile. Sometimes, more fully, it was called the Crowns of Castile and León. That double name survived because, for a long stretch of its history, one ruling family answered to two separate kingdoms at once. This was a crown built out of mergers and arguments over inheritance. Eventually it sent fleets toward continents nobody in the original kingdom had ever seen.

  How did two neighboring medieval kingdoms end up sharing one monarch? Why did a regional language spoken in one corner of Iberia come to carry an entire empire's name? What marriages, civil wars and disputed successions decided who would wear that crown next? And how far did that crown's territory eventually reach, and under what name did it finally disappear?

• 2. Two Kingdoms, One Throne

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  Castile began as a county inside the Kingdom of León. For much of the 10th and 11th centuries it changed hands between León and the Kingdom of Navarre. It became a kingdom in its own right during the 11th century.

  The two crowns had already been joined twice before Ferdinand III's time. Ferdinand I of León held both from 1037 until he died in 1065. His kingdoms then split three ways. León went to his son Alfonso VI. Castile went to Sancho II. Galicia went to a third son, García. A second union ran from 1072 to 1157. It passed from Alfonso VI, to Urraca, to Alfonso VII. Galicia briefly broke away from that union, between 1111 and 1126. In 1157 Alfonso VII's sons divided the inheritance again. Ferdinand II took León. Sancho III took Castile.

  Between 1199 and 1201, Alfonso VIII's Castilian armies invaded the Kingdom of Navarre. They annexed Álava, Durangaldea and Gipuzkoa. That included the towns of San Sebastián and Vitoria. Those Basque territories kept their Navarrese charters even under Castilian rule.

  Ferdinand III inherited Castile from his mother, Queen Berengaria, granddaughter of Sancho III, in 1217. He inherited León from his father, Alfonso IX, son of Ferdinand II, in 1230. The two kingdoms were then united for good, as the Kingdom of León and Castile. Ferdinand III went on to conquer the Guadalquivir Valley. His son Alfonso X later took the Kingdom of Murcia from Al-Andalus, extending the crown's territory further.

  Castile's kings came to style themselves rulers of Castile, León, Toledo, Galicia, Murcia, Jaén, Córdoba and Seville, and lord of Biscay and Molina. Since the 14th century, the heir to that throne has carried the title Prince of Asturias, a title whose origin traces back to a marriage negotiation still to come.

• 3. Governing a New Crown

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  The new joint Cortes divided into three estates: the nobility, the church, and the cities. City representatives came from Castile, León, Galicia, Toledo and the Basque Provinces. Which cities got a seat varied for the next century. John I eventually fixed the list for good. His chosen cities included Burgos, Toledo, León, Sevilla, Córdoba, Murcia, Jaén, Zamora, Segovia, Ávila, Salamanca, Cuenca, Toro, Valladolid, Soria, Madrid and Guadalajara. Granada joined that list only after its conquest in 1492.

  Under Alfonso X, the two kingdoms' Cortes mostly met jointly. The Cortes of 1258 in Valladolid described itself as representing Castile, Extremadura and León together. The 1261 Cortes of Seville broadened that to Castile, León and all the other kingdoms. Later sessions sometimes split apart again. In 1301, Castile met at Burgos while León met separately at Zamora. Even then, representatives pushed for the parliaments to reunite.

  The Old Fuero of Castile and separate municipal fueros across Castile, León, Extremadura and Andalucía reflected each kingdom's own historical legal rights. A single legal code for the whole union still took shape over time. It came through the Siete Partidas around 1265, the Ordenamiento de Alcalá in 1348, and the Leyes de Toro in 1505. Those laws stayed in force until 1889, when Spain enacted a new civil code, the Código Civil Español.

• 4. The Language of Power

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  In the 13th century, people across León and Castile spoke several different languages. Among them were Castilian, Leonese, Basque and Galician-Portuguese. Castilian gained ground as the century went on, becoming the language of culture. One example of this rise is the Cantar de Mio Cid. Late in Ferdinand III's reign, Castilian started appearing in important documents. One was the Visigothic Code, which governed Christians living under Muslim rule in Cordova. It was Alfonso X who made Castilian the kingdom's official language. From then on, every public document was written in Castilian. Every translation of Arabic legal and government text was rendered into Castilian too, instead of Latin.

  Historians disagree on why Latin lost ground. Some credit the sheer strength of the new Castilian language. Others point to Hebrew-speaking intellectuals who were hostile to Latin, the language of the Christian Church. In 1492, under the Catholic Monarchs, Antonio de Nebrija published the first edition of his Grammar of the Castilian Language. Conquistadors carried Castilian to the Americas during the 16th century. Because of the language's importance across the lands the Spanish Crown ruled, it also became known as Spanish.

  The 13th century also produced several of Europe's earliest universities, teaching in Castilian. One was the Leonese University of Salamanca. Two more were the Castilian Estudio General of Palencia and the University of Valladolid.

  That same century, local groups of grazers combined into the powerful Mesta. It anchored the wool trade for the following three centuries. By the late Middle Ages, Castile had become a leading wool exporter.

• 5. Crowns in Conflict

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  Alfonso XI's death set off a succession fight between his two sons. Peter was his legitimate heir, born to Maria of Portugal. Henry, Count of Trastámara, was one of several children Alfonso XI had with his mistress, Eleanor of Guzman. Their dispute pulled in the Hundred Years' War between England and France. Peter allied with Edward, Prince of Wales, known as the Black Prince. In 1367 the Black Prince defeated Henry's allies at the Battle of Nájera and restored Peter to power. When Peter failed to repay his expenses, the Black Prince left Castile. Henry, who had fled to France, seized the opening and returned to the fight. In 1369, at the Battle of Montiel, Henry finally won and had Peter killed.

  Castilian nobles, and to a lesser degree the clergy, backed Henry's Trastámara faction in that civil war. Jews, conversos and town councils tended to side with Peter instead. Once the Trastámaras prevailed, a large share of royal land passed to the nobility. Antisemitic feeling in Castile grew sharper as a result.

  In 1371 the Black Prince's brother, John of Gaunt, 1st Duke of Lancaster, married Constance, Peter's daughter. In 1386, John of Gaunt claimed the Crown of Castile in Constance's name. He cited the Cortes de Seville of 1361 as naming her the legitimate heir. He landed an army at A Coruña and took the city. He then occupied Santiago de Compostela, Pontevedra and Vigo. He demanded that Henry II's son, John I, hand the throne to Constance. John refused, but offered a different bargain instead. His own son, the Infante Henry, would marry John of Gaunt's daughter Catherine. Both sides accepted the arrangement. The title Prince of Asturias was created for that couple. The agreement ended the conflict and settled peace between England and Castile.

  John I had also tried to claim the Portuguese crown. He pursued it through his marriage to Beatrice of Portugal, daughter of King Ferdinand I. That ambition led Castile to invade Portugal in 1385. At the Battle of Aljubarrota, Castilian forces suffered a crushing defeat. Their opponents were the Portuguese, led by John of Avis. The loss ended Castile's hopes of annexing Portugal. It also secured Portuguese independence under the new House of Avis.

  Henry III later restored royal authority over an overmighty Castilian nobility. In his final years he handed power to his brother, Ferdinand I of Antequera. Ferdinand became regent, alongside his wife, Catherine of Lancaster, during the childhood of Henry's son, John II. After the Compromise of Caspe in 1412, Ferdinand left Castile to take the Aragonese throne instead. John II took the Castilian throne himself at age 14. He married his cousin, Maria of Aragon. He handed his government to regent Álvaro de Luna. Álvaro de Luna allied with the lesser nobility, the cities, the clergy and the Jews. That alliance united the greater Castilian nobility with the Aragonese Infantes, sons of Ferdinand I of Antequera. War broke out between the two sides, in 1429 and 1430. Álvaro de Luna won the war and drove the Aragonese Infantes out of Castile.

  Henry IV inherited that fractured nobility. He tried, without success, to restore peace. His second wife, Joan of Portugal, gave birth to Infanta Joanna. Rumor held that the real father was Beltrán de la Cueva, one of Henry's chief ministers. Under pressure from riots and noble demands, Henry signed a treaty. It named his half-brother Alfonso as successor, cutting Joanna out of the succession. After Alfonso died in an accident, Henry signed a second treaty. This was the Treaty of the Bulls of Guisando, signed with his half-sister, Isabella I. It named Isabella heiress, in exchange for letting Henry approve her husband.

• 6. A Union With Aragon

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  In October 1469, Isabella I married Ferdinand II, heir to the Aragonese throne. The ceremony was secret, held at the Palacio de los Vivero in Valladolid. Ferdinand and Isabella were cousins, and Isabella refused to proceed without a papal dispensation. Ferdinand's father forged one instead. Isabella believed it was genuine when the wedding went ahead. A real dispensation arrived only afterward. Pope Alexander VI later gave the couple a title: 'los Reyes Católicos', the Catholic Monarchs.

  Henry IV, Isabella's half-brother, saw the marriage as breaking the earlier treaty, since he had never approved Ferdinand as her husband. Henry preferred an alliance with Portugal or France over Aragon. He named his daughter, Infanta Joanna, as heiress instead. When Henry died in 1474, the War of the Castilian Succession broke out. It lasted until 1479, when Isabella and her supporters won. Ferdinand ascended to the Aragonese throne that same year. The two crowns joined under one pair of monarchs.

  The Inquisition became the one institution Castile and Aragon shared, even after their personal union. Castile and Aragon otherwise kept separate laws and separate parliaments. Ferdinand and Isabella carried a joint title, Monarchs of Castile, León, Aragon and Sicily, but each still ruled their own territory, deciding some matters together. Castile's central position made it the dominant partner. So did its territory, three times the size of Aragon's. So did its population, 4.3 million against Aragon's 1 million.

  The long Reconquista had already made the Castilian aristocracy formidable. The monarchs moved to rein it in. They founded the Santa Hermandad, a law enforcement body funded by the municipalities. They tore down feudal castles and banned private wars. They cut back the power of the Adelantados, the crown's military governors in newly conquered regions. In 1495 they folded the military orders into the Consejo de las Órdenes. In 1480 the Cortes of Toledo created the corregidores, royal representatives who oversaw city councils.

  In 1492 the monarchs ordered that anyone who refused to convert to Catholicism would be expelled from Castile. An estimated 50,000 to 70,000 people left as a result. That decision followed years of pressure on Jews to convert, in some cases enforced by the Inquisition. From 1502 onward, the same pressure was extended to the Muslim population.

  Between 1478 and 1497 the monarchs' forces conquered the Canary Islands. These were Gran Canaria, La Palma and Tenerife. On the 2nd of January 1492, the monarchs entered Granada's Alhambra, completing the Reconquista. That same year, Christopher Columbus's voyage claimed newly found lands in the Americas for the Crown of Castile. In 1497 Castile also took Melilla, on the coast of North Africa. Castilian forces then helped Aragon against France. That campaign culminated in the reconquest of Naples for the Crown of Aragon in 1504. Isabella died that same year, on the 26th of November.

• 7. An Empire Beyond the Sea

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  The discovery of the Pacific Ocean, credited to the Crown of Castile, was one part of a wave of conquest across the 16th century. Castilian forces conquered the Aztec Empire and the Inca Empire. They extended Castilian rule into New Granada and as far as the Philippines. Together, those campaigns turned this one crown into a global empire within a single century.

  In 1492 the crown grouped the West Indies, Islands and Mainland of the Ocean Sea as an abstract Kingdom of the Indies. Castile organized its new possessions this way, as kingdoms rather than mere colonies. An early Viceroyalty of the Indies governed the first Caribbean holdings. It was ruled by a hereditary viceroy drawn from Christopher Columbus's own family, until it was abolished in 1526.

  The Viceroyalty of New Spain was created in 1521, grouping the overseas kingdoms of Santo Domingo, México, Guatemala, New Galicia and the Philippines under a viceroy based in Mexico City. The Viceroyalty of Perú followed in 1542, grouping Tierra Firme, Lima, New Granada, Charcas, Quito, Chile and Buenos Aires under a viceroy based in Lima. Together these two viceroyalties eventually absorbed most of Castile's overseas territory.

  Beneath those viceroyalties, individual overseas kingdoms answered to their own royal courts, called Real Audiencias. Each was founded in a different year. Santo Domingo's dates to 1526. México's dates to 1527. Tierra Firme's dates to 1538. Lima's dates to 1542. Guatemala's dates to 1543. New Galicia's dates to 1548. New Granada's dates to 1549. Charcas's dates to 1559. Quito's dates to 1563. Chile's dates to 1565. The Philippines' dates to 1584. Buenos Aires's dates to 1661, the last of these overseas kingdoms to be organized under the Crown of Castile.

• 8. Habsburg Rule and the End

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  With Isabella gone, the throne of Castile passed to her daughter Joanna. Joanna was married to Philip of Austria, known as Philip the Handsome. Isabella had already recognized signs of her daughter's mental health struggles. That struggle was the source of Joanna's enduring epithet, Juana la Loca, Joanna the Mad. Isabella named Ferdinand regent, in case Joanna could not fulfill her duties. Under the Salamanca Agreement of 1505, government was to be shared among Philip I, Ferdinand V and Joanna. Poor relations between Philip and Ferdinand followed. Ferdinand gave up his regent's powers rather than risk armed conflict.

  Through the Concordia de Villafáfila in 1506, Ferdinand withdrew to Aragon. Philip was recognized as King of Castile, with Joanna as co-monarch. In the accompanying Treaty of Villafáfila, Ferdinand also gave up the lordship of the Indies to Philip, while keeping half of the income from those kingdoms. Joanna and Philip immediately added the Indies, Islands and Mainland of the Ocean Sea to their royal titles. Philip died soon after. Ferdinand returned in 1507 to serve as regent once more. On his orders, Joanna's isolated confinement at the Santa Clara Convent in Tordesillas began in 1510. It lasted more than forty years, until her death. In 1512 a combined Castilian-Aragonese army invaded Navarre. It annexed most of the kingdom south of the Pyrenees to Castile.

  Charles I assembled the Crown of Castile, the Crown of Aragon and an empire through a run of dynastic marriages and untimely deaths. His father Philip I died in 1506, making Charles sovereign of the Netherlands. His grandfather Ferdinand II of Aragon died in 1516. That gave Charles the rule of Aragon and Castile, including the Americas, in co-regency with his mother Joanna. He maintained her confinement, so she remained queen in title only. When his paternal grandfather Maximilian died in 1519, Charles was elected Holy Roman Emperor. That title is the source of his better-known name, Charles V.

  Charles had been born in Ghent, and Castile did not welcome him warmly. He had granted key posts to Flemish courtiers even before arriving in Castile. He spent Castilian money funding his court. Nobles and cities edged toward open revolt. Many favored his younger brother Ferdinand, who had grown up in Castile. The Council of Castile itself opposed making Charles king. In 1518 the Castilian parliament in Valladolid named the Wallonian Jean de Sauvage as its president. That choice provoked angry protests against foreign influence. Juan de Zumel, representing Burgos, led the parliament's resistance. He forced Charles to respect Castile's laws, remove foreigners from government posts and learn to speak Castilian. After swearing that oath, Charles received a subsidy of 600,000 ducats.

  Charles needed Castile's wealth to fund his imperial ambitions. His broken promises only deepened resentment. In 1520 the Toledo parliament refused him a further subsidy. The Santiago de Compostela parliament followed suit. When parliament met in A Coruña, many members were bribed and others barred from entering. The subsidy passed anyway. The Castilians who voted for it saw their houses burned by angry crowds. Charles then left Castile in 1520. The Revolt of the Comuneros broke out. The rebels freed Joanna and urged her to depose her son and rule alone. She refused to sign anything against him. The Comuneros were defeated in 1521. Afterward, parliament was reduced to a merely consultative role. Charles kept Joanna confined until her death in 1555. After that, he became Spain's sole monarch.

  Philip II kept Charles's policies, but went further. He made Castile the core of the empire and centralized administration in Madrid. Other Spanish regions kept some autonomy, governed by a Viceroy. The financial burden of empire, already resting on Castile since Charles's reign, quadrupled under Philip II. He raised existing taxes and invented new ones, including the excusado in 1567. That same year he proclaimed La Pragmática. It ordered all Moriscos to abandon Moorish customs and adopt Catholic practice fully. That crackdown on Morisco religion, language and culture provoked the Morisco Revolt. It ran from 1568 to 1571, and John of Austria eventually put it down. Castile slid into recession starting in 1575, dragging the rest of Spain with it. Wages were suspended for a third time during his reign. In 1590 the Cortes approved the millones, a new tax on food. It drained Castilian cities and damaged the economy further. Pay was suspended again in 1596.

  Government posts under Philip II typically went to graduates of the University of Alcalá or the University of Salamanca. After Philip III, the nobility reclaimed its old grip on government. The shift came with a push to prove a purer bloodline among the ruling class. Religious persecution culminated in Philip III's order expelling the Moriscos, in 1609. Philip IV then faced a collapsing treasury. The Count-Duke of Olivares was the king's favourite from 1621 to 1643. He tried to reform the empire through the Unión de Armas. This was a planned army of 140,000 reservists, drawn proportionally from every territory. The plan failed. The Spanish Crown stayed a confederation of separate kingdoms. Luis Méndez de Haro succeeded Olivares as royal favourite between 1659 and 1665. He worked to calm revolts in Portugal, Catalonia and Andalusia, and to secure peace across Europe.

  Philip IV died in 1665, leaving Charles II to face an economic slowdown and infighting among rival favourites. Charles II proved incapable of governing. When he died in 1700 without an heir, the War of the Spanish Succession broke out over who would take the throne. In the early 18th century, Philip of Bourbon won that war. He imposed unification policies on the Crown of Aragon, whose leaders had backed his rivals, merging Aragon and Castile into a single kingdom. The Nueva Planta decrees never formally dissolved the Crown of Castile as a legal entity. Even so, both contemporaries and later historians simply started calling the merged country by one name: Spain.