Spanish Empire
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The flag of New Spain, one of the Viceroyalties of the Spanish Empire. |
The
Spanish Empire was one of the first truly
global empires. It was also one of the largest empires in world history. During the
16th century Spain and
Portugal were in the vanguard of European global exploration and colonial expansion and the opening of trade routes across the oceans, with trade flourishing across the Atlantic between Spain and the
Americas and across the
Pacific between
East Asia and
Mexico via the
Philippines.
Conquistadors toppled the
Aztec and
Inca civilizations and laid claim to vast stretches of land in
North and
South America. For a time, the Spanish Empire dominated the oceans with its experienced
navy and ruled the
European battlefield with its fearsome and well trained infantry, the famous
. Spain enjoyed a
cultural golden age in the
17th century.
Gold and silver from the colonies financed the military capability of
Habsburg Spain in its long series of
African and
European wars. Between the incorporation of the
Portuguese empire in
1580 (lost in
1640) and the loss of its American colonies in the 19th century, Spain maintained the largest empire in the world even though it suffered fluctuating military and economic fortunes from the
1640s. Confronted by the new experiences, difficulties and suffering created by empire-building Spanish thinkers formulated some of the first
modern thoughts on
natural law,
sovereignty,
international law,
war, and
economics â€" and were to even question the legitimacy of
imperialism â€" in related schools of thought referred to collectively as the
School of Salamanca.
[[Image:Spanish Empire.png|thumb|450px|An anachronous map showing areas pertaining to the Spanish Empire at various times over a period exceeding 400 years. For detailed key click on map.
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Constant contention with rival powers caused territorial, commercial, and religious conflict that contributed to the slow decline of Spanish power from the mid 17th century. In the
Mediterranean Spain warred constantly with the
Ottoman Empire; on the European continent,
France became comparably strong. In the Atlantic, Spain was initially rivalled by
Portugal, and later by the
English and
Dutch. English, French, and Dutch-sponsored piracy; overextension of its territories; increasing government corruption; economic stagnation caused by military expenditures and the influx of precious metals; all ultimately contributed to this decline. Spain's European empire was finally undone by the
Peace of Utrecht (
1713), which stripped Spain of its remaining territories in
Italy and the
Low Countries. Spain's fortunes improved thereafter, but it remained a second rate power in Continental European politics.
However, Spain maintained and enlarged its vast overseas empire until the
19th century, when the shock of the
Peninsular War sparked declarations of independence in
Venezuela and
Paraguay (
1811) and successive revolutions that split away its territories on the mainland (the
Spanish Main) of the Americas. Spain retained significant fragments of its empire in the
Caribbean (
Cuba and
Puerto Rico);
Asia (
Philippines), and
Oceania (
Guam,
Micronesia,
Palau, and
Northern Marianas) until the
Spanishâ€"American War of
1898. Spanish participation in the
Scramble for Africa was minimal:
Spanish Morocco was held until
1956 and
Spanish Guinea and the
Spanish Sahara were held until
1968 and
1975 respectively. The
Canary Islands,
Ceuta,
Melilla and the other
have remained part of Spain.
Three examples set for the Spanish empire are to be recognized in the
Aragonese,
Burgundian and
Portuguese Empire.
Meanwhile, during the latest part of
Reconquista,
the Castilian kings, tolerated the Moorish
taifa client-kingdom of
Granada by exacting tributes of
gold, the
parias, and, in so doing, ensured that gold from the
Niger region of
Africa entered
Europe. Castile also intervened in Northern Africa itself, competing with the
Portuguese Empire, when
Henry III of Castile began the colonization of the
Canary Islands in
1402, sending
Norman explorer
Jean de Béthencourt.
The marriage of the
Reyes Católicos (
Ferdinand II of Aragon and
Isabella I of Castile) created a
confederation of reigns, each with their own administrations, but ruled by a common monarch. According to
Henry Kamen, Spain was created by the Empire, rather than the Empire being created by Spain. The Castilian Empire was the result of a period of rapid colonial expansion into the
New World, as well as the
Philippines and
colonies in
Africa:
Melilla was captured by Castile in
1497 and
Oran in
1509.
The Catholic Monarchs decided to support the
Aragonese house of
Naples against
Charles VIII of France in the
Italian Wars from
1494. As
king of Aragon, Ferdinand had been involved in the struggle against
France and
Venice for control of Italy; these conflicts became the center of Ferdinand's foreign policy as king. In these battles, which established the supremacy of the Spanish infantry against French knights,
Gonzalo Fernández de Córdoba would forge the nearly invincible Spanish army of the
16th and early
17th centuries.
In
1492, Spain drove out the last Moorish king of Granada. After their victory, they negotiated with
Christopher Columbus, a
Genoese sailor attempting to reach
Cipangu by sailing west. Castile was already engaged in a
race of exploration with Portugal to reach the
Far East by sea when Columbus made his bold proposal to Isabella. Columbus instead inadvertently "discovered"
America, inaugurating the
Spanish colonization of the continent. The
Indies were reserved for Castile.
After the death of Queen Isabella, Ferdinand as Spain's sole monarch adopted a more aggressive policy than he had as Isabella's husband, enlarging Spain's sphere of influence in
Italy and against
France. Ferdinand's first investment of Spanish forces came in the
War of the League of Cambrai against
Venice, where the Spanish soldiers distinguished themselves on the field alongside their French allies at the
Battle of Agnadello (
1509). Only a year later, Ferdinand became part of the
Holy League against France, seeing a chance at taking both
Milan â€" to which he held a dynastic claim â€" and
Navarre. The war was less of a success than that against Venice, and in
1516, France agreed to a truce that left Milan in her control and recognized Spanish control of Upper Navarre.
Upon the settlement of
Hispanola which was successful in the early
1500s, the colonists began searching elsewhere to begin new settlements. Those from the less prosperous Hispaniola were eager to search for new success in a new settlement. From there
Juan Ponce de León conquered
Puerto Rico and
Diego Velázquez took
Cuba. The first settlement on the mainland was
Darién in
Panama, settled by
Vasco Núñez de Balboa in
1512. This Castilian Empire abroad became the source of Spanish wealth and power in Europe, and initially stimulated trade and industry and a rapid growth of Spain's few large cities, but ultimately contributed to
inflation in the last decades of the 16th century as imports of
silver grew rapidly, which undermined local industry. Instead of fueling the Spanish economy, the silver ultimately made Spain dependent on foreign sources of
raw materials and
manufactured goods.The wealthy preferred to invest their fortunes in
public debt (
juros) rather than production.
Aristocratic prejudice made manual work dishonorable.The silver and gold whose circulation helped facilitate the economic and social revolutions taking place in France and England and other parts of Europe helped stifle them in Spain. The problems caused by inflation were discussed by scholars at the
School of Salamanca and
arbitristas but they had no impact on government policy.
The
16th and
17th centuries are sometimes called "the Golden Age of Spain" (in
Spanish,
). During the sixteenth century, Spain held the equivalent of 1.5 trillion (
1990 terms) in
gold and silver received from
New Spain. It was often said during this time that it was
the empire on which the sun never set. The unwieldy empire of this Golden Age was controlled, not from distant inland Madrid, but from
Seville. The
Habsburg dynasty squandered the American and Castilian riches in wars across Europe for Habsburg interests, defaulted on their debt several times, and left Spain bankrupt (with the tensions between the Empire and the people of Castile exploding in the popular rebellion of the
Castilian War of the Communities (
1520â€"
22). The Habsburg political goals were several:
*Access to
American (
gold,
silver,
sugar) and
Asian products (
porcelain,
spices,
silk)
*Undermining the power of
France and containing it in its eastern borders.
*Maintaining
Catholic Habsburg
hegemony in
Germany, defending
Catholicism against the
Reformation*Defending
Europe against
Islam, notably the
Ottoman Empire.
As a result of the marriage politics of the
, their grandson
Charles inherited the Castilian empire in America, the
Aragonese Empire in the
Mediterranean (including a large portion of modern
Italy), as well as the crown of the
Holy Roman Empire and of the
Low Countries and
Franche-Comté. Thus this Empire was constituted from the inheritance of territories, and not through conquest. After his defeat of the Castilian rebels in the Castilian War of the Communities, Charles became the most powerful man in Europe, his rule stretching over an empire in Europe unrivalled in extent until the
Napoleonic era. Charles attempted to quell the
Protestant Reformation at the
Diet of Worms but
Luther refused to recant his "
heresy." However, Charles's piety could not stop his mutinying troops from plundering the
Holy See in the
Sacco di Roma.
After Columbus, the
colonization of the New World was led by a series of warrior-explorers called the
Conquistadors. The Spanish forces exploited the rivalries between competing local peoples and states, some of which were only too willing to form alliances with the Spanish in order to defeat their more-powerful enemies, such as the
Aztecs or
Incas. The Spanish conquest was also greatly facilitated by the spread of diseases (e.g.
smallpox) common in Europe but unknown in the New World, which decimated the native American populations. This caused a labour shortage and so the colonists initiated the
Atlantic slave trade where
slaves were shipped directly from
Africa to the Americas by Portuguese slave traders; very few ever saw Spain;
see Population history of American indigenous peoples.
Perhaps the most successful conquistador leader was
Hernán Cortés, who with a relatively small Spanish force but also crucially the support of around two hundred thousand
Amerindian allies, overran the mighty
Aztec empire in the campaigns of
1519â€"
21 to bring
Mexico into the Spanish empire as the basis for the colony of
New Spain. Of comparable importance was the conquest of the
Inca empire by
Francisco Pizarro, which would become the
Viceroyalty of Peru. After the conquest of Mexico, rumours of golden cities (
Quivira and CÃbola in
North America,
El Dorado in
South America) caused several more expeditions to be sent out, but many of those returned without having found their goal, or having found it, finding it much less valuable than was hoped. Indeed, the American colonies only began to yield a substantial part of the crown's revenues with the establishment of mines such as that of
Potosi (
1546).
In
1521,
Francis I of France, who found himself surrounded by Habsburg territories, invaded the Spanish possessions in Italy and inaugurated a second round of Franco-Spanish conflict. The war was a disaster for France, which suffered defeat at
Biccoca (
1522),
Pavia (
1525, at which Francis was captured), and
Landriano (
1529) before Francis relented and abandoned Milan to Spain once more.
Battle of Pavia to the Peace of Augsburg (1525â€"1555)
Charles's victory at the
Battle of Pavia,
1525, surprised many Italians and Germans and elicited concerns that Charles would endeavor to gain ever greater power.
Pope Clement VII switched sides and now joined forces with France and prominent Italian states against the Habsburg Emperor, in the
War of the League of Cognac. In
1527, Charles grew exhausted with the pope's meddling in what he viewed as purely secular affairs, and
sacked Rome itself, embarrassing the papacy sufficiently enough that Clement, and succeeding popes, were considerably more circumspect in their dealings with secular authorities. In
1533, Clement's refusal to annul
Henry VIII of England's marriage was a direct consequence of his unwillingness to offend the emperor and have his capital sacked for perhaps a second time. The
Peace of Barcelona, signed between Charles and the Pope in
1529, established a more cordial relationship between the two leaders. Spain was effectively named as the protector of the Catholic cause and Charles was recognized as king of
Lombardy in return for Spanish intervention in overthrowing the rebellious
Florentine Republic.
The Portuguese
Ferdinand Magellan died while in the Philippines commanding a Castilian expedition to
circumnavigate the
globe in
1522.
Juan Sebastián Elcano would led the expedition to success.
In
1528, the great admiral
Andrea Doria allied with the Emperor to oust the French and restore
Genoa's independence, opening the prospect for financial renewal: 1528
marks the first loan from Genoese banks to Charles (Braudel 1984).
Further Spanish settlements were progressively established in the New World:
New Granada (modern
Colombia) was colonized in the
1530s and
Buenos Aires was established in
1536.
Spain did pass some laws for the protection of the
indigenous peoples of its American colonies, the first such in
1542; the legal thought behind them was the basis of modern
international law. Taking advantage of their extreme remoteness, the European colonists revolted when they saw their power being reduced, forcing a partial revoking of these
New Laws. Later, weaker laws were introduced to protect the indigenous peoples but records show they had little effect. The restored
' exploited the Indians rather than taking care of them.
In 1543, the king of France Francis I announced his unprecedented alliance with the Ottoman sultan, Suleiman the Magnificent, by occupying the Spanish-controlled city of Nice in concert with Ottoman forces. Henry VIII of England, who bore a greater grudge against France than he held against the Emperor for standing in the way of his divorce, joined Charles in his invasion of France. Although the Spanish army was soundly defeated at the Battle of Ceresole in Savoy the French were unable to seriously threaten Spanish controlled Milan, whilst suffering defeat in the north at the hands of Henry, thereby being forced to accept unfavourable terms. The Austrians, led by Charles's younger brother Ferdinand, continued to fight the Ottomans in the east. Charles went to take care of an older problem: the Schmalkaldic League. The League had allied itself to the French, and efforts in Germany to undermine the League had been rebuffed. Francis's defeat in 1544 led to the annulment of the alliance with the Protestants, and Charles took advantage of the opportunity. He first tried the path of negotiation at the Council of Trent in 1545, but the Protestant leadership, feeling betrayed by the stance taken by the Catholics at the council, went to war, led by the Saxon elector Maurice. In response, Charles invaded Germany at the head of a mixed Dutchâ€"Spanish army, hoping to restore the Imperial authority. The emperor personally inflicted a decisive defeat on the Protestants at the historic Battle of Mühlberg in 1547. In 1555, Charles signed the Peace of Augsburg with the Protestant states and restored stability in Germany on his principle of ', a position unpopular with Spanish and Italian clergymen. Charles's involvement in Germany would establish a role for Spain as protector of the Catholic,
Habsburg cause in the
Holy Roman Empire; the precedent would lead, seven decades later, to involvement in the war that would decisively end Spain as Europe's leading power.
Charles had preferred to suppress the Ottomans through a considerably more maritime strategy, hampering Ottoman landings on the
Venetian territories in the
Eastern Mediterranean. Only in response to raids on the eastern coast of Spain did Charles personally lead attacks against the African mainland (
1545).
St. Quentin to Lepanto (1556â€"1571)
Charles V's only legitimate son,
Philip II of Spain (r.
1556â€"
98) parted the Austrian possessions with his uncle
Ferdinand. Philip treated Castile as the foundation of his empire, but the population of Castile (that was about a third of France's) was never great enough to provide the soldiers needed to support the Empire. When he married
Mary Tudor, England was allied to Spain.
Spain was not yet at peace, as the aggressive
Henry II of France came to the throne in
1547 and immediately renewed conflict with Spain. Charles's successor, Philip II, aggressively prosecuted the war against France, crushing a French army at the
Battle of St. Quentin in
Picardy in
1558 and defeating Henry again at the
Battle of Gravelines. The
Peace of Cateau-Cambrésis, signed in
1559, permanently recognized Spanish claims in Italy. In the celebrations that followed the treaty, Henry was killed by a stray splinter from a lance. France was stricken for the next thirty years by chronic civil war and unrest (see
French Wars of Religion) and removed from effectively competing with Spain and the Habsburg family in European power games. Freed from effective French opposition, Spain saw the
apogee of its might and territorial reach in the period
1559â€"
1643.
The opening for the Genoese banking consortium was the state bankruptcy of Philip II in
1557, which threw the German banking houses into chaos and ended the reign of the
Fuggers as Spanish financiers. The Genoese bankers provided the unwieldy Habsburg system with fluid credit and a dependably regular income. In return the less dependable shipments of American silver were rapidly transferred from
Seville to
Genoa, to provide capital for further ventures.
Florida was colonized in
1565 by
Pedro Menendez de Aviles when he founded
Saint Augustine, Florida and then promptly defeated an illegal attempt led by the French Captain
Jean Ribault and 150 of his countrymen to establish a French foothold in
Spanish Florida territory. Saint Augustine quickly became a strategic defensive base for the Spanish ships full of gold and silver being sent to Spain from its New World dominions. On
April 27,
1565, the first permanent Spanish settlement in the
Philippines was founded by
Miguel López de Legaspi and the service of
Manila Galleon was inaugurated.
Manila was established in
1572.
After Spain's victory over France and the beginning of France's religious wars,
Philip II's ambitions grew. In
1565, the Spanish defeated an Ottoman landing on the strategic island of
Malta, defended by the
Knights of St. John.
Suleiman the Magnificent's death the following year and his succession by his less capable son
Selim the Sot emboldened Philip, and he resolved to carry the war to the sultan himself. In
1571, Spanish and
Venetian warships, joined by volunteers across Europe, led by Charles's illegitimate son
Don John of Austria annihilated the Ottoman fleet at the
Battle of Lepanto, in one of the most decisive battles in naval history. The battle ended the threat of Ottoman naval hegemony in the Mediterranean. This mission marked the height of the respectability of Spain and its sovereign abroad as Philip bore the burden of leading the
Counter-Reformation.
The troubled kingdom (1571â€"1598)
The time for rejoicing in Madrid was short-lived. In
1566,
Calvinist-led riots in the Netherlands prompted the
Duke of Alva to march into the country and restore order. In
1568,
William the Silent led a failed attempt to drive the tyrannical Alva from the Netherlands. These battles are generally considered to signal the start of the
Eighty Years' War that ended with the independence of the
United Provinces. The Spanish, who derived a great deal of wealth from the Netherlands and particularly from the vital port of
Antwerp, were committed to restoring order and maintaining their hold on the provinces. In
1572, a band of rebel Dutch privateers known as the
watergeuzen ("Sea Beggars") seized a number of Dutch coastal towns, proclaimed their support for William and denounced the Spanish leadership.
For Spain, the war became an endless
quagmire, sometimes literally. In
1574, the Spanish army under
Luis de Requeséns was repulsed from the
Siege of Leiden after the Dutch broke the
dykes, thus causing extensive flooding. In
1576, faced with the bills from his 80,000-man army of occupation in the Netherlands, the cost of his massive fleet that had won at Lepanto, together with the growing threat of piracy in the open seas reducing his income from his American colonies Philip was forced to accept
bankruptcy. The army in the Netherlands mutinied not long after, seizing
Antwerp and looting the southern Netherlands, prompting several cities in the previously peaceful southern provinces to join the rebellion. The Spanish chose the route of negotiation, and pacified most of the southern provinces again with the
Union of Arras in
1579.
The Arras agreement required all Spanish troops to leave these lands. In
1580, this gave King Philip the opportunity to strengthen his position when the last member of the
Portuguese royal family,
Cardinal Henry of Portugal, died. Philip asserted his claim to the Portuguese throne and in June sent the Duke of Alba with an army to Lisbon to assure his succession. Though the Duke of Alba and the Spanish occupation, however, was little more popular in
Lisbon than in
Rotterdam, the combined Spanish and Portuguese empires placed into Philip's hands almost the entirety of the explored New World along with a vast trading empire in Africa and Asia. In
1582, when
Philip II moved his court back to Madrid from the Atlantic port of
Lisbon where he had temporarily settled to pacify his new Portuguese kingdom, the pattern was sealed, in spite of what every observant commentator privately noted: "Sea power is more important to the ruler of Spain than any other prince" wrote a commentator, "for it is only by sea power that a single community can be created out of so many so far apart." A writer on tactics in
1638 observed, "The might most suited to the arms of Spain is that which is placed on the seas, but this matter of state is so well known that I should not discuss it, even if I thought it opportune to do so." (quoted by Braudel 1984)
Portugal required an extensive occupation force to keep it under control, and Spain was still reeling from the
1576 bankruptcy. In
1584, William the Silent was assassinated by a half-deranged Catholic, and the death of the popular Dutch resistance leader was hoped to bring an end to the war. It did not. In
1586, Queen
Elizabeth I of England, sent support to the Protestant causes in the Netherlands and France, and
Sir Francis Drake launched attacks against Spanish merchants in the
Caribbean and the
Pacific, along with a particularly aggressive attack on the port of
CadÃz. In
1588, hoping to put a stop to Elizabeth's meddling, Philip sent the
Spanish Armada to attack England. Favorable weather, smaller more manÅ"uverable English ships, and the fact that England had been warned by their spies in Netherland and were ready for the attack resulted in defeat for the outnumbered but heavier Armada of Spain. Nevertheless the defeat of the massive military attack,
The Drakeâ€"Norris Expedition, 1589 marked a turning point in the
1585â€"
1604 Angloâ€"Spanish War in Spain's favour, and few can doubt that the Spanish fleet was the strongest in Europe until the Dutch fleet inflicted the defeat of the
Battle of the Downs in
1639, when an increasingly exhausted Spain began to visibly weaken.
Spain had invested itself in the religious warfare in France after Henry II's death. In
1589,
Henry III, the last of the
Valois lineage, died at the walls of Paris. His successor,
Henry IV of Navarre, the first
Bourbon king of France, was a man of great ability, winning key victories against the
Catholic League at
Arques (1589) and
Ivry (
1590). Committed to stopping Henry of Navarre from becoming King of France, the Spanish divided their army in the Netherlands and invaded France in 1590.
"God is Spanish" (1596â€"1626)
Faced with wars against
England,
France and the
Netherlands, each led by extraordinarily capable leaders, already-
bankrupted Spain was outmatched. Faced with continuing piracy against its shipping in the
Atlantic and the disruption of its vital gold shipments from the New World, Spain was forced to admit bankruptcy again in
1596. The Spanish attempted to extricate themselves from the several conflicts they were involved in, first signing the
Treaty of Vervins with France in
1598, recognizing
Henry IV (since
1593 a Catholic) as king of France, and restoring many of the stipulations of the previous
Peace of Cateau-Cambrésis. With a series of defeats at sea and an endless guerrilla war against Catholics in Ireland supported by Spain, an exhausted England agreed to the
Treaty of London, 1604, following the accession of the more tractable
Stuart King
James I.
Peace with England and France implied that Spain could focus her energies on restoring her rule to the Dutch provinces. The Dutch, led by
Maurice of Nassau, the son of William the Silent and perhaps the greatest strategist of his time, had succeeded in taking a number of border cities since
1590, including the fortress of
Breda. Following the peace with England, the new Spanish commander
Ambrosio Spinola pressed hard against the Dutch. Spinola, a general of abilities to match Maurice, was prevented from conquering the Netherlands only by Spain's renewed
bankruptcy in
1607. Faced with ruined finances, in
1609, the
Twelve Years' Truce was signed between Spain and the
United Provinces. Spain was at peace, the
.
Spain made a fair recovery during the truce, ordering her finances and doing much to restore her prestige and stability in the run-up to the last truly great war in which she would play as a leading power. Philip II's successor,
Philip III, was a man of limited ability uninterested in politics, preferring to allow others to take care of the details. His chief minister was the capable
Duke of Lerma. The Duke of Lerma (and to a large extent Philip II) had been uninterested in the affairs of their ally,
Austria.
In
1618, the king replaced him with
Don Balthasar de Zúñiga, a veteran ambassador to
Vienna. He believed that the key to restraining the resurgent French and eliminating the Dutch was a closer alliance with Habsburg Austria. In
1618, beginning with the
Defenestration of Prague, Austria and the
Holy Roman Emperor,
Ferdinand II, embarked on a campaign against the
Protestant Union and
Bohemia. Zúñiga encouraged Philip to join the Austrian Habsburgs in the war, and Ambrogio Spinola, the rising star of the Spanish army, was sent at the head of the
Army of Flanders to intervene. Thus, Spain entered into the
Thirty Years' War.
In
1621, the inoffensive and ineffective Philip III was replaced by the considerably more religious
Philip IV. The following year, Zúñiga was replaced by
Gaspar de Guzman, Count-Duke of Olivares, a reasonably honest and able man who believed that the center of all Spain's woes rested in Holland. After certain initial setbacks, the Bohemians were defeated at
White Mountain in
1621, and again at
Stadtlohn in
1623. The war with the Netherlands was renewed in 1621 with Spinola taking the fortress of
Breda in
1625. The intervention of
Christian IV of Denmark in the war worried some (Christian was one of Europe's few monarchs who had no worries over his finances) but the victory of the Imperial general
Albert of Wallenstein over the Danes at
Dessau Bridge and again at
Lutter, both in
1626, eliminated that threat. There was hope in Madrid that the Netherlands might finally be reincorporated into the Empire, and after the defeat of Denmark the Protestants in Germany seemed crushed. Perfidious France was once again involved in her own instabilities (the famous
Siege of La Rochelle began in
1627), and Spain's eminence seemed irrefutable. The Count-Duke Olivares stridently affirmed "God is Spanish and fights for our nation these days" (Brown and Elliott, 1980, p. 190) and many of Spain's opponents may have grudgingly agreed.
The road to Rocroi (1626â€"1643)
Olivares was a man sadly out of time; he realized that Spain needed to reform, and to reform it needed peace. The destruction of the
United Provinces of the Netherlands was added to his list of necessities because behind every anti-Habsburg coalition there was Dutch money: Dutch bankers stood behind the
East India merchants of
Seville, and everywhere in the world Dutch entrepreneurship and colonists undermined Spanish and Portuguese
hegemony. Spinola and the Spanish army were focused on the Netherlands, and the war seemed to be going in Spain's favor.
1627 saw the collapse of the Castilian economy. The Spanish had been
debasing their currency to pay for the war and
prices exploded in Spain just as they had in previous years in Austria. Until 1631, parts of Castile operated on a
barter economy as a result of the currency crisis and the government was unable to collect any meaningful taxes from the peasantry, depending on its colonies. The Spanish armies in Germany resorted to "paying themselves" on the land. Olivares, who had backed certain tax measures in Spain pending the completion of the war, was further blamed for an embarrassing and fruitless
war in Italy The Dutch, who during the Twelve Years' Truce had made their increasingly potent navy (
see Battle of Gibraltar, 1607) a priority, devastated Spanish maritime trade, on which Spain was wholly dependent after the economic collapse. Spanish military resources were now fully stretched across Europe and also at sea protecting their maritime trade against the greatly improved Dutch fleet. In
1628 the Dutch captain
Piet Hein captured the treasure fleet, badly undermining Spain's economy, while consolidating that of the Netherlands. The Spanish were simply no longer able to cope effectively with the growing naval threats, not only from the Netherlands but from France and England while still maintaining a strong naval presence in the Mediterranean to defend against the threat of the Ottoman navy and Muslim pirates. The Portuguese part of the empire was particularly afflicted by raids upon shipping and assaults upon trading posts and territories.
In
1630,
Gustavus Adolphus of
Sweden, one of history's most noted commanders, landed in Germany and relieved the port of
Stralsund that was the last stronghold on the continent held by German forces belligerent to the Emperor. Gustavus then marched south winning notable victories at
Breitenfeld and
Lützen, attracting greater support for the Protestant cause the further he went. The situation for the Catholics improved with Gustavus's death at Lutzen in
1632 and a key victory at
Nordlingen in
1634. From a position of strength, the Emperor approached the war-weary German states with a peace in
1635; many accepted, including the two most powerful,
Brandenburg and
Saxony. Then France entered.
Cardinal Richelieu had been a strong supporter of the Dutch and Protestants since the beginning of the war, sending funds and equipment in an attempt to stem Habsburg strength in Europe. Richelieu decided that the recently-signed
Peace of Prague was contrary to French designs and declared war on the Holy Roman Emperor and Spain within months of the peace being signed. The more experienced Spanish forces scored initial successes; Olivares ordered a lightning campaign into northern France from the Spanish Netherlands, hoping to shatter the resolve of
King Louis XIII's ministers and topple Richelieu. In the
"",
1636, Spanish forces advanced as far south as
Corbie, threatening
Paris and quite nearly ending the war on their terms. After
1636, however, Olivares stopped the advance, fearful of provoking another disastrous bankruptcy. The hesitation in pressing home the advantage proved fateful. The Spanish army would never again penetrate so far. At the
Battle of the Downs in
1639 a Spanish fleet carrying troops was destroyed by the Dutch navy, and the Spanish found themselves unable to adequately supply and reinforce their forces in the Netherlands. The Spanish Army of Flanders, which represented the finest of Spanish soldiery and leadership, faced a French invasion led by
Louis II de Bourbon, Prince de Condé in the Spanish Netherlands at
Rocroi in
1643. The Spanish, led by
Francisco de Melo, were devastated, with most of the Spanish infantry slaughtered or captured by French cavalry. The high reputation of the Army of Flanders was broken at Rocroi, and with it, the grandeur of Spain.
Traditionally, historians mark the
Battle of Rocroi (
1643) as the end of Spanish dominance in Europe, but the war was not finished. Supported by the French, the
Catalans,
Neapolitans, and
Portuguese rose up in revolt against the Spanish in the 1640s. With the Netherlands effectively lost after the
Battle of Lens in
1648, the Spanish made peace with the Dutch and recognized the independent United Provinces in the
Peace of Westphalia that ended both the
Eighty Years' War and the
Thirty Years' War.
War with France continued for eleven more years. Although France suffered from a civil war from
1648â€"
52 (
see Wars of the Fronde) the Spanish economy was so exhausted that it was unable to effectively cope. Spain retook Naples in
1648 and
Catalonia in
1652, but the war came effectively to an end at the
Battle of the Dunes (1658) where the French army under Vicomte de
Turenne defeated the remnants of the Spanish army of the Netherlands. Spain agreed to the
Peace of the Pyrenees in
1659 that ceded to France
Roussillon,
Foix,
Artois, and much of
Lorraine.
Portugal had rebelled in
1640 under the leadership of
John IV of Portugal, a
Braganza pretender to the throne. He had received widespread support from the Portuguese people, and the Spanish â€" who had to deal with rebellions elsewhere, along with the war against France – were unable to respond, and the Spanish and Portuguese had existed in a
de facto state of peace from
1644 to
1657. When John IV died in
1657, the Spanish attempted to wrest Portugal from his son
Alfonso VI of Portugal, but were defeated at
Ameixial (
1663) and
Monte Claros (
1665), leading to Spain's recognition of Portugal's independence in
1668.
Spain did have a huge overseas empire, but France was now the superpower in Europe, and the United Provinces in the
Atlantic.
Charles II and his
regency were incompetent in dealing with the
War of Devolution that
Louis XIV of France prosecuted against the Spanish Netherlands in
1667â€"
68, losing considerable prestige and territory, including the cities of
Lille and
Charleroi. In the
Nine Years' War Louis once again invaded the Spanish Netherlands. French forces led by the
Duke of Luxembourg defeated the Spanish at
Fleurus (
1690), and subsequently defeated Dutch forces under
William III of Orange, who fought on Spain's side. The war ended with most of the Spanish Netherlands under French occupation, including the important cities of
Ghent and
Luxembourg. The war revealed to Europe how vulnerable and backward the Spanish defenses and bureaucracy were, but the ineffective Spanish Habsburg government took no action to improve them.
The final decades of the
seventeenth century saw utter decay and stagnation in Spain; while the rest of western Europe went through exciting changes in government and society â€" the
Glorious Revolution in England and the reign of the
Sun King in France â€" Spain remained adrift. The Spanish bureaucracy that had built up around the charismatic, industrious, and intelligent
Charles I and
Philip II demanded a strong and hardworking monarch; the weakness and lack of interest of
Philip III and
IV contributed to Spain's decay.
Charles II was retarded and impotent. In his final will, the childless king of Spain left his throne to the
Bourbon prince
Philip of Anjou, rather than to a member of the family that had tormented him throughout his life. This resulted in the
War of the Spanish Succession.
Under the
Treaties of Utrecht (
April 11,
1713), the European powers decided what the fate of Spain would be, in terms of the continental balance of power. The new Bourbon king
Philip V retained the Spanish overseas empire, but ceded the
Spanish Netherlands,
Naples,
Milan, and
Sardinia to Austria;
Sicily and parts of the
Milanese to
Savoy; and
Gibraltar and
Minorca to
Great Britain. Thus the Empire largely turned its back on European territories (the disastrous showing in the
War of the Quadruple Alliance,
1718â€"
20, confirmed this reorientation). Moreover, he granted the British the exclusive right to
slave trading in
Spanish America for thirty years, the so-called
', as well as licensed voyages to ports in Spanish colonial dominions, openings, as Fernand Braudel remarked, for both licit and illicit smuggling (Brudel 1984 p 418).
With a Bourbon monarchy came a repertory of Bourbon mercantilist ideas based on a centralized state, put into effect in America slowly at first but with increasing momentum during the century (see Enlightenment Spain). The Spanish Bourbons' broadest intentions were to break the power of the entrenched aristocracy of the Criollos (locally born colonials of European descent), and, eventually, loosen the territorial control of the Society of Jesus over the virtually independent theocracies of Guarani ': the
Jesuits were expelled from Spanish America in
1767. In addition to the established
' of Mexico City and Lima, firmly in the control of local landowners, a new rival ' was set up at
Vera Cruz.
Immediately Philip's government set up a ministry of the Navy and the Indies (
1714) and created first a
Honduras Company (1714), a
Caracas Company (
1728) and â€" the only one destined to thrive â€" a
Havana Company (
1740). In
1717â€"
18 the structures for governing the Indies, the
' and the ' that governed investments in the cumbersome escorted fleets were transferred from
Seville to
CadÃz, which became the one port for all Indies trading (see
flota system). Individual sailings at regular intervals were slow to displace the old habit of armed convoys, but by the
1760s there were regular packet ships plying the Atlantic between CadÃz and
Havana and
Puerto Rico, and at longer intervals to the
Rio de la Plata, where an additional
viceroyalty was created in
1776. The contraband trade that was the lifeblood of the Habsburg empire declined in proportion to registered shipping (a shipping registry having been established in
1735).
Two upheavals registered unease within Spanish America and at the same time demonstrated the renewed resiliency of the reformed system: the
Tupac Amaru uprising in Peru in
1780 and the rebellion of the
' of Venezuela, both in part reactions to tighter, more efficient control.
As a result, in the 18th century Spain was basically a client state of France, and hardly a superpower. Its vast empire in the Americas made it relevant, but it is difficult â€" even in light of Floridablanca's reforms â€" to say that it was anywhere near the ranks of Austria or Russia, let alone France or Britain. Spain failed to recover Gibraltar. However the 18th century was a century of prosperity for the overseas Spanish Empire as trade within grew steadily, particularly in the second half of the century, under the Bourbon reforms. Rapid shipping growth from the mid-1740s was disrupted by a rampantly successful British navy during the Seven Years' War (1756â€"63). A gradual recovery from the wars end in 1763 was again interrupted by British attacks during Spain's involvement in the American Revolutionary War (1779â€"83). But with the last ' sailing in
1778, effectively bringing about
free trade in the empire, shipping trade once again began growing, but this time at an extraordinary rate, expanding in size many times over in the
1780s.
The ending of CadÃz's
trade monopoly with America brought about a rebirth of Spanish manufactures. Most notable was the rapidly growing
textile industry of
Catalonia which by the mid-1780s saw the first signs of
industrialisation. This saw the emergence of a small polically-active commercial class in
Barcelona. Though the scale of such industry was absolutely tiny compared to the vast industry in
Lancashire, it was growing rapidly and was to become the biggest center of such industry in the Mediterranean the following century. However one must not exaggerate such scattered examples of local modernity, though they disprove the notion of economic stasis. Most of the improvement was in and around some major coastal cities and the major islands such as
Cuba, with its
plantations, and a renewed growth of
precious metals
mining in the Americas. On the other hand most of rural Spain and its empire, where the great bulk of the population lived, many in remote communities served by poor roads over often extremely rugged terrain, lived in backward conditions that were reinforced by intransigent age old customs.
Agricultural productivity remained low despite efforts to introduce new techniques to an uninterested, exploited peasant and landless labouring class. Governments were inconsistent in their policies. Nevertheless a quickening tempo of life in the latter part of the century, however patchy, is discernible.
These modernizing economic and institutional reforms were to bear some fruit militarily when Spanish forces easily retook
Naples and
Sicily from the Austrians in
1734 (
War of Polish Succession), thwarted British attempts to seize the strategic city of
Cartagena de Indias and
Cuba during the
War of Jenkins' Ear (
1739â€"
42) and, though Spain lost territories to the emerging British
superpower in the
Seven Years' War (
1756â€"
63), it was to recover its losses and the British naval base in the
Bahamas during the
American Revolutionary War (
1775â€"
83), thus playing a not insignificant role in hampering British efforts in recovering their rebellious colonies.
The
California mission planning was begun in
1769. The
Nootka Convention (
1791) resolved the dispute between Spain and Great Britain about the British settlement in Oregon to British Columbia. In
1791 the king of Spain gave
Alessandro Malaspina an order to search for a
Northwest Passage.
The Spanish empire had still not returned to first rate power status, but it had recovered considerably from the dark days at the beginning of the eighteenth century when it was totally at the mercy of other powers' political deals. The relatively peaceful century under the new monarchy had allowed it to rebuild and start the long process of modernizing its institutions and economy. The demographic decline of the seventeenth century had been reversed. It was now a strong middle ranking power with great power pretensions that could not be ignored. But time was to be against it. The growth of trade and wealth in the colonies caused increasing political tensions as frustration grew with the improving but still restrictive trade with Spain. Malaspina's recommendation to turn the empire into a looser
confederation to help improve governance and trade so as to quell the growing political tensions between the élites of the empire's periphery and centre was suppressed by a monarchy afraid of losing control. It would take just a generation to prove the wisdom of Malaspina's report. All was to be swept away by the tumult that was to overtake Europe at the turn of the century with the
French Revolutionary and
Napoleonic Wars.
The first major territory Spain was to lose in the
nineteenth century was the vast and wild
Louisiana Territory, which stretched north to
Canada and was ceded by France in
1763. The French, under Napoleon, took back possession as part of the
Treaty of San Ildefonso in
1800 and sold it to the
United States (
Louisiana Purchase,
1803).
The destruction of the main Spanish fleet, under French command, at the
Battle of Trafalgar (
1805) undermined Spain's ability to defend and hold on to its empire. The later intrusion of Napoleonic forces into Spain in
1808 (see
Peninsular War) cut off effective connection with the empire. But it was internal tensions that ultimately ended the empire in the Americas.
Napoleon's sale in
1803 of the
Louisiana Territory to the United States was to cause border disputes between the United States and Spain that, with rebellions in
West Florida (
1810) and in the remainder of Louisiana at the mouth of the
Mississippi, led to their eventual cession to the United States, along with the sale of all of
Florida, in the
Adamsâ€"OnÃs Treaty (
1819).
In
1808 the Spanish king was tricked and Spain was taken over by Napoleon without firing a shot, but the unpopular French provoked a popular uprising from the Spanish people and the grinding
guerrilla warfare, which Napoleon dubbed his "ulcer", the
Peninsular War, (brilliantly depicted by the painter
Goya) ensued, followed by a power vacuum lasting up to a decade and turmoil for several decades, civil wars on succession disputes, a
republic, and finally a corrupt
liberal democracy. Spain lost all the colonial possessions in the first third of the century, except for Cuba, Puerto Rico and, isolated on the far side of the globe, the
Philippines,
Guam and nearby Pacific islands, as well as
Spanish Sahara (mostly desert), parts of
Morocco, and
Spanish Guinea.
The wars of independence in the Americas were triggered by another failed
British attempt to seize Spanish American territory, this time in the
Viceroyalty of the RÃo de la Plata in
1806. The
viceroy retreated hastily and disgracefully to the hills when defeated by a small British force. However when the
Criollos militias and colonial army thrashed the now reinforced British force in
1807 and, with the example of the North American revolutionaries very much in their minds, they quickly set about the business of winning their own independence and inspiring independence movements elsewhere in the Americas. A long period of wars began which led to the independence of
Paraguay (
1811),
Uruguay (
1815, but subsequently ruled by
Brazil until
1828),
Argentina (
1816) and
Chile (
1818). Further north
Simon Bolivar led forces that won independence for the area that is currently
Venezuela,
Colombia (included
Panama until
1903),
Ecuador,
Peru and
Bolivia by
1825. In
1810 a free thinking priest,
Miguel Hidalgo y Costilla, declared
Mexican independence, which was won by
1821.
Central America declared its independence in
1821 and was joined to Mexico for a brief time (
1822â€"
23).
Santo Domingo likewise declared independence in 1821 and began negotiating for inclusion in Bolivar's
Republic of Gran Colombia, but was quickly occupied by
Haiti, which ruled it until an
1844 revolution. Thus only Cuba and Puerto Rico remained in Spanish hands in the New World.
In devastated Spain the post-Napoleonic era created a political vacuum, broke apart any traditional consensus on sovereignity, fragmented the country politically and regionally and unleashed wars and disputes between progressives, liberals and the reactionaries, the last in particular being unable to accept the reality of the country's greatly reduced status internationally. The result was constant instability that inhibited Spain's development, which had started fitfully gathering pace in the previous century. A brief period of improvement occurred in the
1870s when the capable
Alfonso XII of Spain and his thoughtful ministers succeeded in restoring some vigour to Spanish politics and prestige, in part by accepting and working intelligently within the reality of the country's reduced circumstances.
An increasing level of
nationalist, anti-colonial uprisings in various colonies culminated with the
Spanishâ€"American War of 1898 in which Spain came into conflict with the United States over
Cuba. Military defeat was followed by the independence of Cuba and the cession, for
US$20 million, of
Puerto Rico, the Philippines, and
Guam to the United States. Her American presence ended, Spain then sold her
Pacific Ocean possessions to Germany in
1899, retaining only her African territories.
In
1481 the papal
Bull Æterni regis had granted all land south of the
Canary Islands to Portugal. Only this archipelago and the cities of
Sidi Ifni (
1476â€"
1524), known then as "
Santa Cruz de Mar Pequeña", Melilla (conquered by
Pedro de Estopiñán in
1497),
Villa Cisneros (founded in
1502 in current
Western Sahara),
Mazalquivir (
1505),
Peñón de Vélez de la Gomera (
1508),
Oran (
1509â€"
1790),
Algiers (
1510â€"
29),
Bugia (
1510â€"
54),
Tripoli (
1511â€"
51),
Tunis (
1535â€"
69) and
Ceuta (ceded by Portugal in
1668) remained as Spanish territory in Africa.
In
1778,
Fernando Póo (now
Bioko) Island, adjacent islets, and commercial rights to the mainland between the
Niger and
Ogoue Rivers were ceded to Spain by the Portuguese in exchange for territory in South America (
Treaty of El Pardo). In the
19th century, some Spanish explorers and missionaries would cross this zone, among them
Manuel de Iradier.
In
1848, Spanish troops conquered the
Islas Chafarinas.
In
1860, after the
Tetuan War,
Morocco ceded
Sidi Ifni to Spain as a part of the
Treaty of Tangiers. The following decades of Franco-Spanish collaboration resulted in the establishment and extension of Spanish protectorates south of the city, and Spanish influence obtained international recognition in the
Berlin Conference of
1884: Spain administered Sidi Ifni and
Western Sahara jointly. Spain claimed a
protectorate over the coast of Guinea from
Cape Bojador to
Cap Blanc, too.
RÃo Muni became a protectorate in
1885 and a colony in
1900. Conflicting claims to the Guinea mainland were settled in 1900 by the
Treaty of Paris.
In
1911,
Morocco was divided between the French and Spanish.The
Rif Berbers rebelled led by
Abdelkrim, a former officer for the Spanish administration.The
Disaster of Annual (
1921) was a sudden, grave, and almost fatal, military defeat suffered by the Spanish army against Moroccan insurgents. A leading Spanish politician emphatically declared:
"We are at the most acute period of Spanish decadence". The statement reflected the mood of the country. The rebellion exposed the utter corruption and incompetence of the military and destabilised the Spanish government, leading to dictatorship. A campaign in conjunction with the French suppressed the Rif rebels by
1925 but at a terrible cost to both sides. In
1923,
Tangier was declared an international city under Frenchâ€"Spanishâ€"British (and later Italian)
joint administration. The African army led by the unemotional and ruthlessly efficient veteran of the Moroccan campaign,
Francisco Franco, started the
Spanish Civil War (
1936â€"
39). Between
1926 and
1959, Bioko and Rio Muni were united as the colony of
Spanish Guinea. During the
Second World War the
Vichy French presence in Tangier was overcome by that of
Francoist Spain.
Spain lacked the wealth and the interest to develop an extensive economic infrastructure in her African colonies during the first half of the
20th century. However, through a
paternalistic system, particularly on Bioko Island, Spain developed large
cocoa plantations for which thousands of
Nigerian workers were imported as laborers. The Spanish also helped Equatorial Guinea achieve one of the continent's highest
literacy rates and developed a good network of health care facilities.
In
1956, when
French Morocco became independent, Spain surrendered
Spanish Morocco to the new nation, but retained control of Sidi Ifni,
Tarfaya region and Spanish Sahara. Moroccan
Sultan (later
King)
Mohammed V was interested in these territories and
invaded Spanish Sahara in
1957 (The
Ifni War, or, in Spain, the
Forgotten War,
'). In 1958, Spain ceded Tarfaya to Mohammed V and joined the previously separate districts of Saguia el-Hamra (in the north) and RÃo de Oro (in the south) to form the province of Spanish Sahara.
In 1959, the Spanish territory on the Gulf of Guinea was established with status similar to the provinces of metropolitan Spain. As the Spanish Equatorial Region, it was ruled by a governor general exercising military and civilian powers. The first local elections were held in 1959, and the first Equatoguinean representatives were seated in the Spanish parliament. Under the Basic Law of December 1963, limited autonomy was authorized under a joint legislative body for the territory's two provinces. The name of the country was changed to Equatorial Guinea.
In March 1968, under pressure from Equatoguinean nationalists and the United Nations, Spain announced that it would grant independence to Equatorial Guinea. At independence in 1968, Equatorial Guinea had one of the highest per capita incomes in Africa. In 1969, under international pressure, Spain returned Sidi Ifni to Morocco. Spanish control of Spanish Sahara endured until the 1975 Green March prompted a withdrawal. The future of this former Spanish colony remains uncertain.
The Canary Islands and the cities in the African mainland are considered an equal part of Spain and the European Union, but have a different tax system without Value Added Tax.
Morocco still claims the Canary Islands, Ceuta, Melilla and ' to be part of Morocco.
Isla Perejil (
Arabic:
("night")) was occupied on
July 11,
2002 by
Moroccan Gendarmerie and troops, who were evicted without bloodshed by
Spanish naval forces.
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Sizes of the largest Empires in History:"To Rule the Earth"
