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Y206: Spain 1469–1556

Isabella and Ferdinand: government — situation in Spain in 1469, control of the nobility and towns

  • 1 thing to know
  • Unit group 2

Overview

Recall questions on the situation in Spain in 1469, campaign to secure the throne by 1479, administrative methods, control of the nobility and towns.

What you need to know

Answer each one before you reveal it.

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Key term

Describe the Santa Hermandad and its purpose.

Questions from this subtopic

Each one with the model answer underneath.

  1. 1

    Describe the condition of Castile in 1469.

    Model answer

    Royal authority under Henry IV had collapsed into faction: great nobles ran private armies and held usurped crown lands and revenues, the succession was disputed, the coinage had been debased and banditry was widespread.

  2. 2

    What was the state of the Crown of Aragon in 1469?

    Model answer

    It was a federation of Aragon, Catalonia and Valencia, each with its own laws and Cortes, exhausted by the Catalan civil war of the 1460s, with a much smaller population than Castile but interests in Italy and the Mediterranean.

  3. 3

    Why was the marriage of Isabella and Ferdinand in 1469 controversial?

    Model answer

    They were cousins and married without a genuine papal dispensation, and Henry IV of Castile had not consented, so Isabella married in secret and in defiance of the king she hoped to succeed.

  4. 4

    Who challenged Isabella's claim to Castile, and with whose support?

    Model answer

    Juana, Henry IV's daughter, whose legitimacy was widely doubted; she was backed by a section of the Castilian nobility and by Afonso V of Portugal, who married her and invaded.

  5. 5

    How was the Castilian succession finally settled?

    Model answer

    Isabella's forces held their own at Toro in 1476 and turned it into a propaganda victory, and by the Treaty of Alcáçovas in 1479 Portugal recognised her as queen in return for Castile abandoning its claims to the African coast, keeping only the Canaries.

  6. 6

    What did the Cortes of Toledo in 1480 do for royal government?

    Model answer

    It reorganised the Royal Council so that decisions rested with university-trained lawyers while nobles could attend but not vote, and it resumed crown revenues granted away since 1464, greatly increasing the king's income and control.

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