Philip II (Spain) (1527–1598; Ruled 1556–1598)

PHILIP II (SPAIN) (1527–1598; ruled 1556–1598)

PHILIP II (SPAIN) (1527–1598; ruled 1556–1598), king of Spain. Philip, the firstborn of Charles V (ruled 1516–1556 as Charles I [Spain]; Holy Roman emperor, ruled 1519–1556) and Empress Isabella, was reared in Castile. The emperor's frequent absences limited Philip's contact with his father, and he was raised in his mother's court until her death in 1539. His tutor (1534–1541) was the future archbishop of Toledo, Juan Martínez Siliceo (1486–1557), while the Castilian nobleman Juan de Zúñiga (d. 1546) headed his household from 1535 and supervised his knightly training. Philip displayed reasonable aptitude in arms and letters alike, though historians have faulted Siliceo's narrow piety, and Philip for ineptitude in modern languages. Later he would study with more illustrious tutors, including the humanist Juan Cristóbal Calvete de Estrella (d. 1593). Philip was close to his sisters, María (1528–1603) and Juana (1535–1573), and to two pages, the Portuguese nobleman Ruy Gómez de Silva (c. 1516–1573) and Luis de Requesens (1528–1576), the son of his governor Zúñiga. These men would serve him throughout their lives, as would Gonzalo Pérez (d. 1566), his secretary from 1541.

Departing Spain in 1543, Charles V named Philip his Spanish regent, leaving him experienced advisors—notably the secretary Francisco de los Cobos (1477–1547) and the general Fernando Álvarez de Toledo, duke of Alba (1507–1582)—and written instructions emphasizing the defense of Catholicism on the one hand and mistrust of his advisors and personal intimacy on the other. Charles also arranged Philip's marriage to a first cousin, María Manuela of Portugal, who died in 1545 after the birth of Don Carlos (1545–1568). Philip acquitted himself well as regent, taking an increasingly active role when advisors such as Cobos and Zúñiga died. In 1548, he left Spain to visit his prospective Burgundian inheritance in the Netherlands. He met Charles in Brussels in 1549 and toured the Low Countries to be formally recognized as heir. Before returning to Spain, Philip attended the Imperial Diet of Augsburg (1550) and lingered while Charles negotiated the 1551 family agreement that would leave the Holy Roman Empire to his brother Ferdinand I (ruled 1558–1564); Philip would inherit Charles's other lands, then succeed his uncle as emperor. Subsequent reverses in Germany, however, invalidated this plan, and Philip renounced his claims to the empire in 1555.

Philip returned to Spain in mid-1551 and resumed his duties as regent. In 1553, in Brussels, Charles negotiated Philip's marriage to Mary Tudor of England (ruled 1553–1558) without consulting the prospective groom, who preferred a Portuguese match and had little interest in Mary or England. Nevertheless, Philip wed Mary in July 1554, receiving Naples and Milan from his father as wedding gifts. He spent fifteen frustrating months as consort in England before departing in September 1555 after Mary's pregnancy proved false.

Having resolved to abdicate, Charles relinquished the Netherlands to Philip in a Brussels ceremony (25 October 1555). A few months later (16 January 1556) Charles resigned Spain and its territories, subsequently transferring the Franche-Comté and—with dubious legality—imperial suzerainty in Italy to his son, now Philip II of Spain. The emperor retired to Castile, where he died in 1558. The young king was soon tested by his dynasty's enemies. War with Pope Paul IV (1555–1559) broke out in 1556, triggering a wider war against Henry II of France (ruled 1547–1559) in 1557. Alba quickly triumphed in Italy, while victories over the French at St. Quentin (10 August 1557) and Gravelines (13 July 1558) led to the 1559 Peace of Cateau-Cambrésis. Mary Tudor died in 1558, enabling Philip to seal the treaty by marrying Henry II's daughter, Isabelle de Valois.

INTERNAL POLICIES

Philip returned to Castile in 1559, establishing his court permanently at Madrid in 1561. He would never again leave Iberia. During his first years in Spain the Inquisitor-General Fernando de Valdés (1483–1568) spearheaded a campaign against heterodoxy, rooting out Protestant cells within Castile and contriving to destroy his rival (and Philip's confidant), Bartolomé de Carranza (1503–1576), archbishop of Toledo. Philip's government strove to rebuild crown finances, crushed by decades of military expenditures, and succeeded by 1562 in increasing Castilian revenues by 43 percent. During this period rivalry between two principal ministers, Ruy Gómez de Silva (now prince of Éboli) and the duke of Alba dominated the court. By 1565, Éboli's influence waned while Philip elevated Diego de Espinosa (1502–1572) to president of the Council of Castile, inquisitor-general, and cardinal. Espinosa's repressive policies provoked the Granadine Morisco revolt (1568–1570), suppressed with difficulty by forces under Don Juan de Austria (1547–1578), Philip's illegitimate half-brother.

As Espinosa (1572) and Éboli died (1573), and Alba fell from grace, Philip governed more personally through secretaries such as Mateo Vázquez de Leca (1543–1591) and Antonio Pérez (1540–1611). Increasingly the king manifested the traits of a roi casanier ('stay-at-home king')—sedentary, obsessed with redacting state papers, and reclusive, retiring for months at a time to the Escorial and other palaces. Personal tragedy prompted some of Philip's introversion. His heir Don Carlos died insane under house arrest in 1568, soon followed to the grave by Queen Isabelle, who left Philip two daughters, Isabel Clara Eugenia (1566–1633) and Catalina Micaela (1567–1598). To secure the succession, Philip married his niece, Anna of Austria (1549–1580), in 1570. They had five children, including the eventual heir, Philip III (ruled 1598–1621). Philip's isolation allowed Antonio Pérez to embroil him in the 1578 murder of Don Juan de Austria's secretary, Juan de Escobedo. The unraveling of Pérez's plot forced him to flee to Zaragoza and caused the revolt of Aragón (1591). Philip sent Castilian troops to suppress the uprising, but afterward left most traditional Aragonese privileges intact.

Philip's reign in Iberia was marked by one great triumph—the annexation of Portugal and its empire in 1580–1581, following the death of his nephew, King Sebastian (ruled 1557–1578)—and also by the crown's worsening financial difficulties. Even unprecedented silver yields from America could not offset the expense of Philip's warlike policies. Four times—in 1557, 1560, 1575, and 1596—he suspended payments and renegotiated terms with his bankers. From 1590, the crown imposed the regressive excises known as the millones ('millions'). Royal debt—Castile's share tripled to 85 million ducats between 1560 and 1598—and mounting taxation contributed to Castilian economic deterioration, and eventually to the eclipse of Spanish power in Europe.

THE WARS OF PHILIP II

Constant warfare—against Muslims, rebellious subjects, and the Protestants of northwestern Europe—occupied much of the attention of Philip II, and in the long run overextended the resources of his realm. In the first decade of his reign, Philip's government faced acute threats in the Mediterranean from the naval forces of the Ottoman sultan Suleiman the Magnificent (ruled 1520–1566) and his North African clients. Spain was shocked by the loss of thirty galleys and six thousand troops at Djerba in 1560; combined with subsequent disasters, the king's fleet was reduced by 40 percent by 1562. Massive sums went into rebuilding the galleys by 1565, when García de Toledo (1514–1578) led them to the successful relief of the Turkish siege of Malta. That victory and the death of Suleiman provided some respite in the later 1560s, although the Morisco uprising excited fears of a Muslim invasion of Spain, while the Turkish assault on Cyprus in 1570 sharpened the threat to Venice. These anxieties fostered the brief and unstable Holy League, a naval alliance between Philip and the Venetians brokered in 1571 by Pope Pius V (1566–1572). Commanded by Don Juan de Austria, the Holy League inflicted a crushing defeat on the Ottoman fleet at Lepanto (7 October 1571), which would stand as the greatest victory of Philip's reign. The Holy League collapsed when Venice withdrew in 1573, but Lepanto opened a period of relative disengagement in the Mediterranean, as both Philip and his Ottoman counterparts attended to other affairs.

The early 1560s saw the progressive breakdown of religious unity and allegiance to the Spanish crown in the Low Countries as Calvinism made inroads in the southern towns, and the nobles grew restive under the government of Philip's half-sister Margaret of Parma (1522–1586) and Cardinal Granvelle (1517–1586). Philip worsened matters by appearing to relent in the face of noble protests in 1564–1565—he dismissed Granvelle, and excited false hopes of relaxed strictures on heresy—before his continued rigidity provoked open rebellion in 1566. After some hesitation, Philip opted for repression, dispatching Alba and a Spanish army to restore order in the Low Countries in 1567. The duke's harsh measures had nearly crushed the revolt when the diversion of Castilian resources to the Holy League, coupled with the assaults of the Sea Beggars (Dutch privateers who harassed Spanish shipping), allowed rebellion to flare again in 1572. Alba was relieved of command in 1573. Despite following more flexible policies, his successors, notably Luis de Requesens (1573–1576) and Don Juan de Austria (1576–1578), could not fully restore crown authority. From 1578, Philip had a more adept governor in the Low Countries, his nephew Alexander Farnese, duke of Parma (1545–1592). Through shrewd diplomacy and military skill, Farnese forced the rebels onto the defensive, and perhaps only English intervention (negotiated in the 1585 Treaty of Nonsuch) thwarted Philip's reconquest of the Dutch provinces.

Elizabeth's (ruled 1558–1603) interference spurred a rapid deterioration in Anglo-Spanish relations, punctuated by the execution of the Catholic Mary Stuart (ruled Scotland 1542–1567), and Francis Drake's (1540?–1596) raids on Iberian ports in 1587. Provoked, Philip activated a plan for an amphibious invasion of England, the Enterprise of England, aborted by the disastrous voyage of the Spanish Armada in 1588. Primary responsibility for its failure rests with Philip, who named a naval tyro (the duke of Medina Sidonia) to command his great fleet, while persistently disregarding the difficulties of coordination that would frustrate the planned English Channel rendezvous between Parma's Army of Flanders and the Armada. Philip impassively shrugged off this setback but beyond its cost in treasure, matériel, and trained manpower, the defeat of the Armada proved a great psychological victory for Philip's Protestant foes.

Undeterred, from 1589 Philip intervened in the final phases of the French Wars of Religion, ordering Parma's army into France in a failed effort to unseat Henry IV (ruled 1589–1610), and perhaps dreaming of placing his favorite daughter, Isabel Clara Eugenia, on the French throne. This adventure too came to naught (and cost Farnese his life), and Philip II's long reign ended with his negotiation of the inconclusive Peace of Vervins with Henry IV in 1598. This treaty and Philip's designation of Isabel Clara Eugenia and her consort the Archduke Albert (1559–1621) as rulers of the Low Countries were intended to scale back the monarchy's commitments for the benefit of the king's callow heir, Philip III, but the costly and seemingly endless conflict in the Low Countries would bedevil the Spanish Habsburgs for another half-century.

REY PRUDENTE?

As the bête noire of late sixteenth-century Protestantism, Philip II acquired an odious reputation, which grew only more fearsome with the passage of time. His vexed and conflicted relations with several popes, however, belie any notion that he was a simple pawn of the church, while accusations of cruel treachery should be balanced against the conscientiousness attested by the king's work habits, and the concern for his subjects' welfare reflected in his 1559 instructions to a viceroy: "The first thing you must realize is that the community was not created for the prince but rather that the prince was created for the sake of the community."

Conversely, the traditional Castilian appreciation of Philip II as el rey prudente ('the prudent king') will not withstand critical scrutiny either. In crises, his vaunted deliberation in reaching decisions partook more of avoidance than prudence. Philip's bureaucratic and reclusive bent and his mistrust of his counselors led to decision making divorced from practical considerations. The king repeatedly privileged statecraft over politics, for example, in his choice to impose his will on the Low Countries by proxy rather than journeying north to conciliate his powerful subjects. A cleric excoriated Philip for "the manner of transacting business adopted by your majesty, being permanently seated at your papers . . . in order to have a better reason to escape from people." The Armada fiasco and the quixotism of the Spanish intervention in France testify to Philip's recklessness rather than prudence, while the lasting deleterious effects of his unrelenting wars arose largely from his lifelong inability to grasp the monarchy's financial circumstances or the consequences of his expenditures.

Throughout his reign, Philip II tenaciously guarded his territorial inheritance from Charles V and heeded the emperor's 1543 warning not to "allow heretics to enter into your kingdoms." The lingering quagmire of the Netherlands war was the principal legacy of the policies Philip learned from the father, whom he did not know well but extravagantly admired. Even on his deathbed, Philip continued to defer to his father, ordering the exhumation of Charles V so he might learn what a ruler properly wore to the grave, and grasping the emperor's crucifix as he expired at the Escorial in September 1598. Overmatched by his myriad responsibilities, during a long reign Philip did his duty, but failed to achieve his fondest goals.

See also Alba, Fernando Álvarez de Toledo, duke of ; Armada, Spanish ; Burgundy ; Calvinism ; Cateau-Cambrésis (1559) ; Charles V (Holy Roman Empire) ; Cobos, Francisco de los ; Dutch Republic ; Dutch Revolt (1568–1648) ; Éboli, Ruy Gómez de Silva, prince of ; Elizabeth I (England) ; Ferdinand I (Holy Roman Empire) ; Granada ; Henry II (France) ; Henry IV (France) ; Holy Leagues ; Holy Roman Empire ; Inquisition, Spanish ; Isabel Clara Eugenia and Albert of Habsburg ; Juan de Austria, Don ; Lepanto, Battle of ; Mary I (England) ; Medina Sidonia, Alonso Pérez de Guzmán, 7th duke of ; Moriscos ; Moriscos, Expulsion of (Spain) ; Netherlands, Southern ; Ottoman Empire ; Parma, Alexander Farnese, duke of ; Philip III (Spain) ; Pius IV (pope) ; Pius V (pope) ; Portugal ; Sea Beggars ; Spain ; Suleiman I ; Wars of Religion, French ; William of Orange .

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Primary Sources

Cabrera de Córdoba, Luis. Historia de Felipe II, rey de España. 4 vols. 1998. First two volumes first published 1619.

Porreño, Baltasar. Dichos y hechos del rey D. Felipe II. Edited by Ángel González Palencia. Madrid, 1942. First edition, 1628.

Secondary Sources

Bouza Álvarez, Fernando. "La majestad de Felipe II: Construcción del mito real." In La corte de Felipe II, edited by José Martínez Millán, pp. 37–72. Madrid, 1994. Brilliantly suggestive.

Bratli, Carl. Felipe II, rey de España: Estudio sobre su vida y su carácter. Translated by Ángel Vega. Madrid, 1927. 1st ed. Copenhagen, 1909. Dated but perspicacious.

Eire, Carlos M. N. From Madrid to Purgatory: The Art and Craft of Dying in Sixteenth-Century Spain. Cambridge, U.K., 1995. Book 2 provides a fascinating account of Philip's death.

Kamen, Henry. Philip of Spain. New Haven, 1997. A favorable recent life.

Koenigsberger, H. G. "The Statecraft of Philip II." European Studies Review 1 (1971): 1–21. Concise and stimulating.

Marañón, Gregorio. Antonio Pérez (El hombre, el drama, la época). 2 vols. 6th ed. Madrid, 1958. Vol. 1, chapter 3 offers an influential and controversial assessment of the king's personality.

Mattingly, Garrett. The Armada. Boston, 1959. Unsurpassed narrative of the climax of Philip's wars.

Parker, Geoffrey. The Grand Strategy of Philip II. New Haven, Conn., 1998. Especially valuable for delineating Philip's governing style.

——. Philip II. 4th ed. Chicago, 2002. Concise and readable.

Rule, John C., and John TePaske, eds. The Character of Philip II: The Problem of Moral Judgments in History. Boston, 1963. Useful excerpts from contemporary observers and later historians.

Williams, Patrick. Philip II. New York, 2001. A judicious synthesis.

James M. Boyden