Iberian Union
Iberian Union Monarchia Hispaniae | |||||||||||||||||||||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
1580–1640 | |||||||||||||||||||||||
Common languages | Spanish and Portuguese | ||||||||||||||||||||||
Religion | Roman Catholic | ||||||||||||||||||||||
Government | Composite monarchy under personal union | ||||||||||||||||||||||
King | |||||||||||||||||||||||
• 1580–1598 | Philip II and I | ||||||||||||||||||||||
• 1598–1621 | Philip III and II | ||||||||||||||||||||||
• 1621–1640 | Philip IV and III | ||||||||||||||||||||||
Legislature | Cortes of Castile Courts of Aragon Courts of Catalonia Courts of Valencia Cortes of Navarre Cortes of Portugal | ||||||||||||||||||||||
History | |||||||||||||||||||||||
25 August 1580 | |||||||||||||||||||||||
1 December 1640 | |||||||||||||||||||||||
Currency | Spanish real and Portuguese real | ||||||||||||||||||||||
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The Iberian Union is a historiographical term used to describe the
As a personal union, the Kingdom of Portugal, the Crown of Castile and the states of the Crown of Aragon remained independent states, sharing only a single monarch. The kings from the Spanish branch of the House of Habsburg were the only element that connected the multiple kingdoms and territories, ruled by the six separate government councils of Castile, Aragon, Portugal, Italy, Flanders-Burgundy, and the Indies. For periods, Portugal maintained a viceroy, appointed by the King, although the turnover was often rapid; in the 60 years of the Union, the country had 13 viceroys and four regency councils (see List of viceroys of Portugal). Similar viceroys were appointed in Aragon, Catalonia, Valencia and other kingdoms of the Union. The governments, institutions, and legal traditions of each kingdom remained independent of one another.[4] Alien laws (Leyes de extranjería) determined that a national of one kingdom was a foreigner in all other kingdoms.[5][6]
The union led to Portugal's involvement in the
Background
The unification of the peninsula had long been a goal of the region's monarchs with the intent of restoring the
Establishment
The
António exploited the opportunity that the war between Elizabeth and Philip presented in order to convince the English to back an amphibious assault on Portugal in April 1589. Led by Francis Drake and John Norris, the expedition of 120 ships and 19,000 men failed due to poor planning.[11][12][13]
Portugal's status was maintained under the first two kings under the Union, Philip II and
Continuity in the administrative system
This section needs additional citations for verification. (November 2016) |
The
Due to the complexity in the management of government, the Spanish Monarch needed some auxiliary bodies, as the Councils (Consejos), dedicated to the advice and resolution of problems, and submitted to the Monarch's knowledge and dictum. This complexity needed a permanent seat, and the king Philip II of Spain established in 1562 the permanent capital in Madrid, seat of the Royal Court and of the administrative staff,[14][15][16][17] although transferred in Valladolid, with the whole administrative staff, during a brief period (1601–1606).[18]
As for the functioning, the administrative correspondence came to the different Councils, to Madrid, then the secretary of every Council arranged the material that had to deliver for the attention of the king, and later the King assembled with the secretaries requesting the opinion of the council. After that, the Council answered afterwards a session to treat the issue and to raise the formal consultation to the monarch. The secretary raise the consultation to the king, and was returned to the council with his response to be executed. The meetings of the Councils took place in the royal palace, and they did not count on the presence of the king habitually. In this poly-synodical system,[19] "Consejo de Estado" (Council of State) stood out for its importance. The Consejo de Estado in Madrid, entrusted to declare on the major decisions that concerned the organization and the defense of the ensemble of the Hispanic monarchy, and it had frequently that to get into Portuguese matters. Even, the Council of War (Consejo de Guerra) exercised its jurisdiction on the troops placed in the Castilian strongholds established on the Portuguese littoral.
And also, there were Councils of territorial character, which functions specialized in a concrete territorial space, the Council of Castile, Council of Aragon, Council of Navarre, Council of Italy, Council of The Indies, Council of Flanders, and the Council of Portugal. The Council of Portugal, established in 1582, was integrated with a president and six (later four) counselors, and it was abolished at the end of the war in 1668, when Charles II of Spain gave up his title as King of Portugal. The function of the Council consists in representing close to the king the courts of the Crown of Portugal for the matters that depend on the justice, grace, finally, the economy of the royal Portuguese domain. Any decision of the king who concerning his Kingdom must do the object of a consultation to the council before being transmitted to the chancellery of Lisbon and to the concerned courts. The Council of Portugal knows two eclipses: in 1619, for the presence of the King in Lisbon, and between 1639 and 1658, replaced with the Junta of Portugal. From the Restauração, the Council continued existing, since Philip IV had not recognized the independence of Portugal, and carried out the attending to the faithful Portuguese to the Spanish monarch, and the government of Ceuta.[20]
Relating to the particular government of the kingdom of Portugal itself. During the union of the kingdom of Portugal to the Spanish monarchy, the Spanish Hasburgs on the whole respected the pledges made at Thomar in 1581 to allow considerable Portuguese autonomy and to respected the territories of its empire. Public offices were reserved for Portuguese subjects at home and overseas. The king was represented at Lisbon sometimes by a governor and sometimes by a viceroy. So, Spain left the administration of Portugal and its empire largely to the Portuguese themselves, under general supervision from Madrid channeled through a viceroy in Lisbon. Important matters, however, were referred to Madrid, where they came before the Council of Portugal. In the kingdom of Portugal, the polisynodial system is reinforced:
- Council of State. The Conselho de Estado of Lisbon is the King's private Council, entrusted of debating major issues related to the Crown, especially as for foreign policy. The counselors could send their remarks to the king, and the King consulted them through his Viceroy. Although the Conselho de Estado of Lisbon, worked as the great adviser Council of the King's delegate, this Council of State was without clearly defined administrative powers and actually it did not perform relevant role of coordination. The Spanish kings maintained the system of two secretaries of state, one for the kingdom and the other for "India", that is to say, for the colonies, despite several conflicts over jurisdiction, until the creation of the Conselho da Índia in 1604.
- In the same way, Spanish kings retained the Mesa da Consciência e Ordens, which was both tribunal and council for religious affairs and was responsible for administering ecclesiastical appointments and for the property of the military orders in the colonies as well as in the home country.
- Portuguese Inquisition remained independent from the Mesa da Consciência e Ordens. There were three major courts in Lisbon, Coimbra and Évora.
- Also preserved was the Desembargo do Paço. The pinnacle of the entire Portuguese judicial system was the Desembargo do Paço or Royal Board of Justice in Lisbon. This board, the highest court in the kingdom, controlled the appointment of all magistrates and judges and oversaw the Casa da Suplicação or Court of Appeals in Lisbon, as well as the high courts in the Portuguese overseas territories. The first function of the Desembargo do Paço was to control the recruitment of the magistrates (leitura de bacharéis) and to monitor them in the exercise of their charge, its control spreads to the whole of the juridical professions. The Desembargo do Paço had to arbitrate conflicts between other courts of the kingdom. This court granted dispensations, acts of legitimization and another relevant issues about the justice and the grace, and which on occasions advised the king on political and economic as well as judicial matters. Moreover, a commission of jurists set up to reform the legal system produced a new code for Portugal, the Ordenações Filipinas, promulgated in 1603.
- The Casa da Suplicação and the Casa do Cível, both are two royal courts of appeal for civil cases as criminal cases. The Casa do Cível exercised jurisdiction over the northern part of the kingdom, and the Casa da Suplicação over the rest on the realm including the islands and overseas.
- In 1591, the four Vedores da Fazenda (overseers of the Treasury) were replaced by a Conselho da Fazenda composed of one Vedor da Fazenda presiding over four councillors (two of them lawyers) and four secretaries. The Conselho da Fazenda exercised a control over the officials of finance, administered the particular king's goods and exercised its jurisdiction over the customs and the arsenals, the court of accounts and the administration of the monopolistic trade with overseas.
- From 1604, the newly created Conselho da Índia was invested with powers for all overseas affairs, apart from matters concerning Madeira, the Azores and the strongholds of Morocco, and colonial officials were appointed and their dispatches handled by it. However, it was the Conselho da Fazenda which dealt with naval expeditions, the buying and selling of pepper and the collection of the royal revenues, in fact with all economic business. The Conselho da Índia, therefore, exercised only limited powers. As a creation of the Spanish king, it was regarded with disfavour by the Portuguese and because of the jealousy of the Mesa da Consciência e Ordens disappeared in 1614.
Nevertheless, the political conjuncture need urgent reactions, and in this context a system of meetings appeared for specific issues, as the Junta for the reform of the Council of Portugal (1606–1607, 1610), the Junta for the classification of the debts to the treasury (since 1627) or the Juntas for the organization of the navies of succor of Brazil (since 1637).[21]
Portuguese Empire challenged
Throughout the 17th century, the increasing raids on Portuguese merchant shipping by Dutch, English and French privateers and their establishment of trading posts in Africa, Asia and the Americas undermined Portugal's monopoly on the lucrative spice trade. This sent the Portuguese spice trade into a long decline. The diversion of wealth from Portugal by the Habsburg monarchy to support the Catholic side of the Thirty Years' War also created strains within the union, although Portugal did also benefit from Spanish military power in helping to retain Brazil and in disrupting Dutch trade. These events, and those that occurred at the end of Aviz dynasty and the Iberian Union, led Portugal to a state of dependency on its colonies, first India and then Brazil.
The joining of the two crowns deprived Portugal of a separate foreign policy, and Spain's enemies became Portugal's.
In the 17th century, taking advantage of this period of Portuguese weakness, many Portuguese territories in Brazil were occupied by the Dutch, who gained access to the sugarcane plantations. John Maurice, Prince of Nassau-Siegen, was appointed as the governor of the Dutch possessions in Brazil in 1637 by the Dutch West India Company. He landed at Recife, the port of Pernambuco, in January 1637. By a series of successful expeditions, he gradually extended the Dutch possessions from Sergipe on the south to São Luís de Maranhão in the north. He likewise conquered the Portuguese possessions of Elmina Castle, Saint Thomas, and Luanda, Angola, on the west coast of Africa. After the dissolution of the Union in 1640, Portugal reestablished its authority over the lost territories of the Portuguese Empire. The Dutch intrusion into Brazil was long-lasting and troublesome to Portugal. The Seventeen Provinces captured a large portion of the Brazilian coast including Bahia (and its capital Salvador) and Pernambuco (and its capital Olinda). The whole Brazilian northeast was occupied, but the Dutch conquest was short-lived. The recapture of Salvador by a Spanish-Portuguese fleet in 1625 was followed by a rapid recovery of the lost territories. The Dutch returned in 1630 and captured Recife and Olinda in the captaincy of Pernambuco, the largest and richest sugar-producing area in the world. This began a war over Brazil, which would see the Dutch establish a colony called New Holland. However, the Second Battle of Guararapes, second and decisive battle in a conflict called Pernambucana Insurrection, ended the Dutch occupation of the Portuguese colony of Brazil.[citation needed]
On the other hand, the Iberian Union opened to both countries a worldwide span of control, as Portugal dominated the African and Asian coasts that surrounded the Indian Ocean, and Spain the Pacific Ocean and both sides of Central and South America, while both shared the Atlantic Ocean space.[citation needed]
Decline of the Union and revolt of Portugal
When Philip II of Portugal (and III of Spain) died, he was succeeded by Philip III (and IV of Spain) who had a different approach on Portuguese issues. Taxes raised affected mainly the Portuguese merchants (Carmo Reis 1587). The Portuguese nobility began to lose its importance at the Spanish Cortes, and government posts in Portugal were occupied by Spaniards. Ultimately, Philip III tried to make Portugal a royal province, and Portuguese nobles lost all of their power.
Several other problems also damaged Portuguese support of their union with Spain. One of these was certainly the pressure from the center, especially from the Count-Duke of Olivares, towards uniformity and sharing the financial and military burden of Castile's wars in Europe. However, the Portuguese were hardly inclined to help with that, as Spain had failed to prevent the Dutch occupation of several of Portugal's colonial holdings, despite the fact that both the Portuguese and the Spanish were nominally under the same crown.[23]
This situation culminated in a revolution by the nobility and high
The support of the people became apparent almost immediately and soon
Restoration War and the end of the Union
The subsequent Portuguese Restoration War against Philip III (Portuguese: Guerra da Restauração) consisted mainly of small skirmishes near the border. The most significant battles were the Battle of the Lines of Elvas (1659), the Battle of Ameixial (1663), the Battle of Castelo Rodrigo (1664), and the Battle of Montes Claros (1665); the Portuguese were victorious in all of these battles. However, the Spaniards won the Battle of Vilanova (1658) and the Battle of the Berlengas (1666). The Battle of Montijo (1644) was indecisive, starting out with great Spanish success and ending with Portuguese success; the number of casualties were nearly equal.
Several decisions made by John IV to strengthen his forces made these victories possible. On 11 December 1640, the Council of War was created to organize all the operations.
English soldiers were sent to Portugal and helped the Portuguese rout
Legacy
In the
The Spanish city of Ceuta was a part of the Portuguese Empire until the end of the Iberian Union in 1640, after which it decided to remain with Spain. Thus the coat of arms of the city is nearly identical to that of the Kingdom of Portugal, showing the seven castles over the red bordure and the five escutcheons with silver roundels, and the gyronny field of its flag is identical to that of the flag of Lisbon, to commemorate the fact of that flag having been the first raised in Ceuta by the Portuguese when they conquered the city in 1415.
See also
References
Citations
- ^ António Henrique R. de Oliveira Marques, History of Portugal. 1972, p. 322. Boris Fausto, A Concise History of Brazil, p. 40.
- ^ "Indicaciones sobre la investigacion "Ciudadanía, identidades complejas y cultura política en los manuales escolares españoles". Centro de Investigación MANES" (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on 2016-03-04. Retrieved 2012-08-09.
there is consensus among professional historians that the most adequate term is Hispanic monarchy
- ^ ISBN 9789726160823.
- ^ The "Spanish Century"[unreliable source?]
- ISBN 9788474687378.
- ^ La Condición Jurídica de "Español" Como Producto del Derecho Indiano
- ^ Debate Sobre la Identidad de España. El Mundo
- ^ Notice that, before the emergence of the modern country of Spain (beginning with the dynastic union of Castile and Aragon in 1479, followed by political unification in 1516), the Latin word Hispania, in any of the Iberian Romance languages, either in singular or plural forms (also rendered in English as Spain or Spains), was used to refer to the whole of the Iberian Peninsula, and not, as in modern usage, for a country of Spain to the exclusion of Portugal.
- ISBN 0-521-08462-8, p. 35
- ^ Henry Kamen, The duke of Alba (New Haven–London: Yale University Press, 2004), Pp. x + 204.
- ^ Bindoff, S T (1950). Tudor England. Penguin. p. 280.
- ^ Van Meteren, Emanuel (1602). A True Discourse Historical of the Succeeding Governors in the Netherlands. Amsterdam: De Capo. p. 118.
- ^ Wingfield, Anthony (1589). Discourse Written by a Gentleman. Amsterdam: Da Capo. p. 1.
- ISBN 9781740598590– via Google Libros.
- ISBN 9780520071407. Retrieved 2010-08-22.
- ISBN 9780415027847.
- ISBN 9780719040580. Retrieved 2010-08-22.
- ISBN 9781900639378. Retrieved 2010-08-22.
- ISBN 9780415027847. Retrieved 2010-08-22 – via Google.es.
- ISSN 0213-375X. Retrieved 2010-08-22.
- ISBN 9788474815863. Retrieved 2010-08-22.
- ^ "Recife – A City Made by Sugar". Awake!. Retrieved 21 September 2016.
- ISBN 0-14-100703-6.
- ISBN 0-14-100703-6.
- ^ (Mattoso Vol. VIII 1993)
Sources
- Leslie Bethell, The Cambridge history of Latin America, Cambridge University Press (1984)
- Jean-Frédéric Schaub, Le Portugal Au Temps Du Conde-duc D'olivares, Casa de Velázquez (2001)
- Luis Suárez Fernández, José Andrés Gallego, La Crisis de la hegemonía española, siglo XVII, Ediciones Rialp (1986)