Catholic Monarchs of Spain
The Catholic Monarchs[a][b] were Queen Isabella I of Castile (r. 1474–1504)[1] and King Ferdinand II of Aragon (r. 1479–1516), whose marriage and joint rule marked the de facto unification of Spain.
[2] They were both from the House of Trastámara and were second cousins, being both descended from John I of Castile; to remove the obstacle that this consanguinity would otherwise have posed to their marriage under canon law, they were given a papal dispensation by Sixtus IV.
[3] Spain was formed as a dynastic union of two crowns rather than a unitary state, as Castile and Aragon remained separate kingdoms until the Nueva Planta decrees of 1707–16.
Sources tend to cite Carrillo de Acuña, Archbishop of Toledo, as the person who provided the dispensation, while other scholars point at Antonio Veneris.
The coat of arms of the Catholic Monarchs was designed by Antonio de Nebrija with elements to show their cooperation and working in tandem.
[12] Their emblems or heraldic devices, seen at the bottom of the coat of arms, were a yoke (yugo) and a sheaf of arrows (haz de flechas).
These badges were later used by the fascist Spanish political party Falange, which claimed to represent the inherited glory and the ideals of the Catholic Monarchs.
To establish a more uniform judicial system, the Catholic Monarchs created the Royal Council, and appointed magistrates (judges) to run the towns and cities.
Isabella also sought various ways to diminish the influence of the Cortes Generales in Castile, though Ferdinand was too thoroughly Aragonese to do anything of the sort with the equivalent systems in the Crown of Aragon.
Even after his death and the union of the crowns under one monarch, the Aragonese, Catalan, and Valencian Corts (parliaments) retained significant power in their respective regions.
On receiving a petition for authority, Pope Sixtus IV issued a bull in 1478 to establish a Holy Office of the Inquisition in Castile.
The papal bull gave the sovereigns full powers to name inquisitors, but the papacy retained the right to formally appoint the royal nominees.
The pope also granted the Catholic Monarchs the right of patronage over the ecclesiastical establishment in Granada and the Canary Islands, which meant the control of the state in religious affairs.
With the fall of Granada in January 1492, Isabella and Ferdinand pursued further policies of religious unification of their realms, in particular the expulsion of Jews who refused to convert to Christianity.
[citation needed] The Inquisition had been created in the twelfth century by Pope Lucius III to fight heresy in the south of what is now France and was constituted in a number of European kingdoms.
On 1 November 1478, Pope Sixtus IV published the papal bull Exigit Sinceras Devotionis Affectus, by which the Inquisition was established in the Kingdom of Castile; it was later extended to all of Spain.
The matrimonial policy of the monarchs sought advantageous marriages for their five children, forging royal alliances for the long-term benefit of Spain.
Their first-born, a daughter named Isabella, married Afonso of Portugal, forging ties between these two neighboring kingdoms that would lead to enduring peace and future alliance.
This ensured an alliance with the Holy Roman Empire, a powerful, far-reaching European territory which assured Spain's future political security.
Their only son, John, married Margaret of Austria, seeking to maintain ties with the Habsburg dynasty, on which Spain relied heavily.
Their fourth child, Maria, married Manuel I of Portugal, strengthening the link forged by Isabella's elder sister's marriage.
Under the Catholic Monarchs an efficient army loyal to the Crown was created, commanded by Castilian Gonzalo Fernández de Córdoba, known as the Great Captain.
Fernández de Córdoba reorganised the military troops on a new combat unit, tercios reales, which entailed the creation of the first modern army dependent on the crown, regardless of the pretensions of the nobles.
[19] Through the Capitulations of Santa Fe, navigator Christopher Columbus received finances and was authorised to sail west and claim lands for Spain.
