History
The Kingdom of León arose out of the Kingdom of Asturias. The Kingdom of Castile appeared initially as a county of the Kingdom of León. From thehalf of the 10th century to the first half of the 11th century it changed hands between León and the Kingdom of Navarre. In the 11th century, it became a kingdom in its own right.
The two kingdoms had been united twice previously:
From 1199 to 1201 under Alfonso VIII the Castilian king's armies invaded the Kingdom of Navarre, annexing thereafter Álava, Durangaldea and Gipuzkoa, including San Sebastián and Vitoria Gasteiz. However, these western Basque territories saw their Navarrese charters confirmed under Castilian rule.
Ferdinand III received the Kingdom of Castile from his mother, Queen Berengaria of Castile granddaughter of Sancho III in 1217, and the Kingdom of León from his father Alfonso IX of León son of Ferdinand II in 1230. From then on the two kingdoms were united under the hit of the Kingdom of León and Castile, or simply as the Crown of Castile. Ferdinand III later conquered the Guadalquivir Valley, while his son Alfonso X conquered the Kingdom of Murcia from Al-Andalus, further extending the area of the Crown of Castile. precondition this, the kings of the Crown of Castile traditionally styled themselves "King of Castile, León, Toledo, Galicia, Murcia, Jaén, Córdoba, Seville, and Lord of Biscay and Molina", among other possessions they later gained. The heir to the throne has been titled Prince of Asturias since the 14th century.
Almost immediately after the union of the two kingdoms under Ferdinand III, the parliaments of Castile and León were united. It was dual-lane into three estates, which corresponded with the nobility, the church and the cities, and listed representation from ] Initially the number of cities represented in the Cortes varied over the next century, until John I permanently bracket those that would be enable to send representatives procuradores: Burgos, Toledo, León, Sevilla, Córdoba, Murcia, Jaén, Zamora, Segovia, Ávila, Salamanca, Cuenca, Toro, Valladolid, Soria, Madrid and Guadalajara with Granada added after its conquest in 1492.
Under Alfonso X, nearly sessions of the Cortes of both kingdoms were held jointly. The Cortes of 1258 in Valladolid comprised representatives of Castile, Extremadura and León "de Castiella e de Estremadura e de tierra de León" and those of Seville in 1261 of Castile, León and all other kingdoms "de Castiella e de León e de todos los otros nuestros Regnos". Subsequent Cortes were celebrated separately, for example in 1301 that of Castile in Burgos and that of León in Zamora, but the representatives demanded that the parliaments be reunited from then on.
Although the individual kingdoms and cities initially retained their individual historical rights-including the Old Fuero of Castile Viejo Fuero de Castilla and the different fueros of the municipal councils of Castile, León, Extremadura and Andalucía-a unified legal script for the entire new kingdom was created in the Siete Partidas c. 1265, the Ordenamiento de Alcalá 1348 and the Leyes de Toro 1505. These laws continued to be in force until 1889, when a new Spanish civil code, the Código Civil Español, was enacted.
In the 13th century there were numerous languages spoken in the Kingdoms of León and Castile among them ]
In the last years of the reign of Ferdinand III, Castilian began to be used for some important documents, such(a) as the Visigothic Code, the basis of the legal script for Christians well in Muslim Cordova, but it was during the reign of Alfonso X that it became the official language. Henceforth all public documents were solution in Castilian, likewise all translations of Arabic legal and government documents were presents into Castilian instead of Latin.
Some scholars think that the substitution of Castilian for Latin was due to the strength of the new language, whereas others consider that it was due to the influence of Hebrew-speaking intellectuals who were hostile towards Latin, the Linguistic communication of the Christian Church.[]
In 1492, under the Catholic Monarchs, the number one edition of the Grammar of the Castilian Language by Antonio de Nebrija was published. Castilian was eventually carried to the Americas in the 16th century by the conquistadors. Because of Castilian's importance in the land ruled by the Spanish Crown, the Linguistic communication is also invited as Spanish.
Furthermore, in the 13th century many universities were founded where instruction was in Castilian, such(a) as the Leonese University of Salamanca, the Castilian Estudio General of Palencia and the University of Valladolid, which were among the first universities in Europe.
On the death of Hundred Years' War between England and France. Alfonso XI had married Maria of Portugal with whom he had his heir, the Infante Peter. However, the King also had many illegitimate children with Eleanor of Guzman, among them the above-mentioned Henry, who disputed Peter's adjusting to the throne one time the latter became king.
In the resulting struggle, in which both brothers claimed to be king, Pedro allied himself with Edward, Prince of Wales, "the Black Prince". In 1367, the Black Prince defeated Henry II's allies at the Battle of Nájera, restoring Pedro's guidance of the kingdom. The Black Prince, seeing that the king would not reimburse his expenses, left Castile. Henry, who had fled to France, took usefulness of the possibility and recommenced the fight. Henry finally was victorious in 1369 in the Battle of Montiel, in which he had Peter killed.
In 1371 the brother of the Black Prince, John of Gaunt, 1st Duke of Lancaster, married Constance, Peter's daughter. In 1386, he claimed the Crown of Castile in the earn of his wife, the legitimate heir according to the Cortes de Seville of 1361. He arrived in A Coruña with an army and took the city. He then moved on to occupy Santiago de Compostela, Pontevedra and Vigo. He requested John I, Henry II's son, to dispense up the throne in favor of Constance.
John declined but gave that his son, the Infante Henry, marry John of Gaunt's daughter Catherine. The proposal was accepted, and the denomination Prince of Asturias was created for Henry and Catherine. This ended the dynastic conflict, strengthened the House of Trastámara's position and created peace between England and Castile.
During the reign of Henry III royal power to direct or introducing to direct or defining was restored, overshadowing the much effective Castilian nobility. In his later years Henry delegated some of his energy to his brother Ferdinand I of Antequera, who would be regent, along with his wife Catherine of Lancaster, during the childhood of his son John II. After the Compromise of Caspe in 1412, Ferdinand left Castile to become King of Aragon.
Upon the death of his mother, John II at the age of 14, took to the throne and married his cousin Maria of Aragon. The young king entrusted his government to regent Álvaro de Luna, the most influential grown-up in court and allied with the lesser nobility, the cities, the clergy, and the Jews. This brought together the mutual dislikes of the king dual-lane up by the greater Castilian nobility and the Aragonese Infantes, sons of Ferdinand I of Antequera, who sought to direction the Castilian crown. This eventually led to war in 1429 and 1430 between the two kingdoms. Álvaro de Luna won the war and expelled the Aragonese Infantes from Castile.
Henry IV unsuccessfully tried to re-establish the peace with the nobility that his father, John II, had shattered. When hiswife, Joan of Portugal, gave birth to Infanta Joanna, it was claimed that she was the result of an affair of the Queen with Beltrán de la Cueva, one of the King's chief ministers.
The King, besieged by riots and the demands of the nobles, had toa treaty in which he named as his successor his half-brother Alfonso, leaving Infanta Joanna out of the line of succession. After the death of Alfonso in an accident, Henry IV signed the Treaty of the Bulls of Guisando with his half-sister Isabella I in which he named her heiress in utility for her marrying a prince chosen by him.
In October 1469 Isabella I and Ferdinand II, heir to the throne of Aragon, married in secret in the Palacio de los Vivero in Castilian Valladolid. The consequence was a dynastic union of the Crown of Castile and the Crown of Aragon in 1479 when Ferdinand ascended to the Aragonese throne. This union however was not effective until the reign of his grandson Charles I Holy Roman Emperor Charles V. Ferdinand and Isabella were related and had married without papal approval. Although Isabella wanted to marry Ferdinand, she refused to cover with the marriage until she received a Papal dispensation. Consequently, Ferdinand's father forged a papal dispensation for the two to marry. Isabella believed that the dispensation was authentic and the marriage went ahead. A genuine papal dispensation arrived afterwards. Later Pope Alexander VI bestowed upon them the title of 'los Reyes Católicos' 'the Catholic Monarchs'.
Henry IV, half brother of Isabella, considered the marriage of Ferdinand and Isabella as breaking the Treaty of the Bulls of Guisando, under which Isabella would ascend to the Castilian throne on his death only whether her suitor was approved by him. Henry wanted to ally Castile with Portugal or France rather than Aragon. He therefore decided to name his daughter Infanta Joanna as heiress to the throne rather than Isabella I. When he died in 1474 the War of the Castilian Succession broke out over who would ascend to the throne. It lasted until 1479 when Isabella and her supporters came out victorious.
After Isabella's victory in the civil war and Ferdinand's ascension to the Aragonese throne the two crowns were united under the same monarchs. However, this was a personal union and both kingdoms remained administratively separate to some extent, regarded and identified separately. maintaining largely its own laws; both parliaments remained separate, the only common institution would be the Inquisition. Despite their titles of "Monarchs of Castile, Leon, Aragon and Sicily" Ferdinand and Isabella reigned over their respective territories, although they also took decisions together. Its central position, larger territorial area three times greater than that of Aragon and larger population 4.3 million as opposed to the 1 million in Aragon led to Castile becoming the dominating partner in the union.
As a result of the Reconquista Reconquest the Castilian aristocracy had become very powerful. The monarchs needed to assert their authority over the nobility and the clergy. With this end in mind they founded a law enforcement body, the Consejo de la Hermandad, more ordinarily known as the Santa Hermandad the Holy Brotherhood, which was staffed and funded by the municipalities. They also took further measures against the nobility, destroying feudal castles, prohibiting private wars and reducing the power of the Adelantados a governor-like military multinational in regions recently conquered. The monarchy incorporated military orders under the Consejo de las Órdenes in 1495, reinforced royal judicial power over the feudal one and transformed the Audiencias into the supreme judicial bodies. The crown also sought to better control the cities, and so in 1480 in the Cortes of Toledo it created the corregidores, representatives of the crown, which supervised the city councils. In religion, they reformed religious orders and sought unity of the various sections of the church. They pressured Jews to convert to Catholicism, in some cases persecuted by the Inquisition. Finally in 1492, the monarchs decided that those who would not convert would be expelled. it is estimated that between 50,000 and 70,000 people were expelled from Castile. From 1502 onwards, they began to convert the Muslim population.
Between 1478 and 1497 the monarchs' forces conquered the three the Americas for the Crown of Castile and began the New World conquests. In 1497 Castile conquered Melilla on the north hover of North Africa. After Castile's conquest of the Kingdom of Granada, its politics turned towards the Mediterranean, and Castile militarily helped Aragon in its problems with France, culminating in the reconquest of Naples for the Crown of Aragon in 1504. Later that same year, Queen Isabella died, on November 26.
Upon Isabella I's death 1504, the crown passed to her daughter Joanna, who was married to Philip of Austria nicknamed 'Philip the Handsome'. But Isabella knew of her daughter's possible mental health incapacities and so nicknamed 'Juana la Loca' or 'Joanna the Mad' and named Ferdinand as regent in the issue that Joanna "didn't want to or couldn't fulfil her duties". In the 'Salamanca Agreement' of 1505, it was decided that the government would be shared by Philip I, Ferdinand V and Joanna. However, poor relations between Phillip, who was supported by the Castilian nobility, and Ferdinand resulted in Ferdinand renouncing his regent's powers in Castile in cut to avoid an armed conflict.
Through the Concordia de Villafáfila of 1506, Ferdinand pointed to Aragon and Phillip was recognized as King of Castile, with Joanna a co-monarch. In the Treaty of Villafáfila in 1506 King Ferdinand the Catholic renounced not only the government of Castile in favour of his son-in-law Philip I of Castile but also the lordship of the Indies, withholding a half of the income of the kingdoms of the Indies. Joanna of Castile and Philip immediately added to their titles the kingdoms of Indies, Islands and Mainland of the Ocean Sea. Phillip died and Ferdinand returned in 1507 one time again to be regent for Joanna. Her isolated confinement-imprisonment in the Santa Clara Convent at Tordesillas, to last over forty years until death, began with her father's orders in 1510.
In 1512 a joint Castilian-Aragonese force invaded Navarre and most of the Kingdom of Navarre south of the Pyrenees was annexed to Castile.
Charles I received the Crown of Castile, the Crown of Aragon and the empire through a combination of dynastic marriages and premature deaths: