The New Monarchy, 1492 - 1500 (Part 1)

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  • Created by: Holly
  • Created on: 28-03-16 13:59

New Monarchy 1492 - 1500

Personal Authority of the monarch:

  • Ferdinand + Isabella travelled extensively (peripatetic) = royal progress = demonstrated their authority
  • Peripatetic = negative = didn't visit all the realm
  • Increased the crown's authority
  • Historians agreed that significant progress was being made = proves New Monarchy
  • "absolute rulers" = Absolutims = no restraints on personal authority = Kamen disagrees
  • Strong centralised government in Castile = "absolute power" = Isabella
  • Government in Aragon different = 3 cortes = Valencia, Aragon, Catalonia
  • Despite F + I marriage (1469) they ruled their own territories = never called themselves monarchs of Spain
  • Enforcing order was a slow process complicated by politics, finance + religion
  • Although Spain had changed = not united + stable

New Monarchy = Histography 

  • J.H. Elliott = "monarchs established strong personal rule, combining this with an effective administration and a degree of centralisation wich had not occurred before"
  • Kamen = "old habits had to be altered and far reaching changes were required in political, economic and social life"

Absolutism

  • Kamen = "Ferdinand + Isabella were supporters of strong authority, but were not impelled, or even able, in the first instance, to exercise it. They had no capital, no standing army, no bureaucracy, no reliable income + certainly no theory of absolutism"

Role of Corregidores:

  • A corregidor was a local, administrative and judical position in Spain
  • They were the representatives of the royal jurisdiction over a town and its district
  • Link between monarchy + localities
  • Royal office with admin + judical duties
  • Members of the gentry class
  • Appointed to all major towns in Castile
  • Some towns protested re-increasing royal influence = Toledo
  • Created by Henry IV = 1460s = disappeared in civil war (1464) = re-emerged in 1500
  • Tax collectors
  • Much opposition centred around the fact that the towns had to pay their salaries
  • 1494 = 54 towns
  • 1515 = 61 towns
  • End of 16th C. = 86 towns

J.H. Elliott = "The office of corregidor was incomparably the most effective measure taken by Ferdinand + Isabella to extend the Crown's power over the Castilian municipalities"

Kamen = "The appointment of a corregidor gave the crown a voice in local affairs but in no way impled a policy of centralisation"

Role of Royal Council:

  • Intended to be central governing

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