The Hispanic Monarchy in the Modern Age: Catholic Monarchs, Habsburgs and Bourbons
What the exam tests
From the dynastic union of 1469 to the end of Charles II and the War of the Succession: how the Hispanic Monarchy worked as a composite of kingdoms, what Habsburg imperial policy cost, and how the Bourbons centralised the state.
Catholic Monarchs (1474/1479–1516)
- 1469 marriage; 1474 Isabella in Castile, 1479 Ferdinand in Aragon: a dynastic union, not a unified state - each kingdom kept its laws, Cortes and coinage.
- Institutions: Consejo Real de Castilla (1480), Santa Hermandad (1476), Inquisition (1478), corregidores, Casa de Contratación (1503).
- 1492: Granada, expulsion of the Jews (Alhambra Decree), Columbus; 1494 Tordesillas; 1512–15 Navarre annexed to Castile.
The Habsburgs
- Charles I (1516–1556): Comuneros (1520–21, Villalar) and Germanías (1519–23); imperial title 1519; abdications 1556.
- Philip II (1556–1598): Escorial, Lepanto 1571, Portugal 1580, Armada 1588, Alpujarras revolt 1568–71.
- 17th century: validos (Lerma, Olivares), expulsion of the Moriscos 1609, Unión de Armas 1626, revolts of 1640, Westphalia 1648, Pyrenees 1659.
- "Decline" is relative: Castile suffered fiscal exhaustion and demographic loss, but the Monarchy's other kingdoms and the American trade survived.
The Bourbons
- War of the Succession 1701–14; Utrecht 1713 (Gibraltar, Menorca, asiento de negros); Nueva Planta decrees: Aragon and Valencia 1707, Mallorca 1715, Catalonia 1716; intendentes and secretarías de despacho replace the Habsburg councils.
- Charles III (1759–88): Esquilache riots 1766, expulsion of the Jesuits 1767, free-trade decrees 1765 and 1778, Floridablanca's census 1787.
Worked example
Faced with an extract from the Nueva Planta decree of 1716, first classify it (royal legislation, Philip V, post-war). Then extract its content: abolition of Catalan law and institutions, Castilian law and language imposed, taxation equalised. Interpret it as the replacement of a composite monarchy by administrative uniformity, and conclude that it established the Bourbon model of a centralised state while preserving regional fiscal privileges elsewhere.
Mark-losing traps
- 1469 is the marriage; 1479 is Ferdinand's accession in Aragon - do not merge them with state unification.
- Casa de Contratación (1503) and Consejo de Indias (1524) are not the same body.
- Comuneros (Castile) and Germanías (Valencia) were different movements.
- Utrecht (1713) closes the Succession War; Westphalia (1648) ends the Thirty Years' War.
- The Nueva Planta did not abolish the Basque and Navarrese fueros.