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The Crown of Castile, also known as the Crown of Castile and León, was a medieval polity in the Iberian Peninsula that formed in 1230 as a result of the third and definitive union of the crowns and, some decades later, the parliaments of the kingdoms of Castile and León upon the accession of the then Castilian king, Ferdinand III, to the vacant Leonese throne. It continued to exist as a separate entity after the personal union in 1479 of the crowns of Castile and Aragon with the marriage of the Catholic Monarchs up to the promulgation of the Nueva Planta decrees by Philip V in 1716.
In 1492, the voyage of Christopher Columbus and the discovery of the Americas were major events in the history of Castile. The West Indies, Islands and Mainland of the Ocean Sea were also a part of the Crown of Castile when transformed from lordships to kingdoms of the heirs of Castile in 1506, with the Treaty of Villafáfila, and upon the death of Ferdinand the Catholic. The discovery of the Pacific Ocean, the conquest of the Aztec Empire, the conquest of the Inca Empire, the Spanish conquest of New Granada as well as the conquest of the Philippines all helped shape the Crown of Castile into a global empire in the 16th Century.
The title of "King of Castile" remained in use by the Habsburg rulers during the 16th and 17th centuries. Charles I was King of Aragon, Majorca, Valencia, and Sicily, and Count of Barcelona, Roussillon and Cerdagne, as well as King of Castile and León, 1516–1556.
In the early 18th century, Philip of Bourbon won the War of the Spanish Succession and imposed unification policies over the Crown of Aragon, supporters of their enemies. This unified the Crown of Aragon and the Crown of Castile into the kingdom of Spain. Even though the Nueva Planta decrees did not formally abolish the Crown of Castile, the country (of Castile and Aragon) was called "Spain" by both contemporaries and historians.
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 the second half 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 name 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. Given 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 divided into three estates, which corresponded with the nobility, the church and the cities, and included representation from Castile, León, Galicia, Toledo, and the Basque Provinces. Initially the number of cities represented in the Cortes varied over the next century, until John I permanently set those that would be allowed 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, most 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 code 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 many languages spoken in the Kingdoms of León and Castile among them Castilian, Leonese, Basque and Galician-Portuguese. But, as the century progressed, Castilian gained increasing prominence as the language of culture and communication – one example of this is the Cantar de Mio Cid.
In the last years of the reign of Ferdinand III, Castilian began to be used for some important documents, such as the Visigothic Code, the basis of the legal code for Christians living in Muslim Cordova, but it was during the reign of Alfonso X that it became the official language. Henceforth all public documents were written in Castilian, likewise all translations of Arabic legal and government documents were made 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 language of the Christian Church.
In 1492, under the Catholic Monarchs, the first 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 language is also known as Spanish.
Furthermore, in the 13th century, many universities were founded where instruction was in Castilian, such 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.
In the 13th century, emerging groups of local grazers coalesced into the powerful Mesta, the headpin for wool trade over the following three centuries. In time, Castile would become a leading export market for wool in the late middle ages.
The Castilian Civil War pitting supporters of Henry of Trastámara against Peter I entailed a struggle of competing factions, with the former party being favoured by the Castilian nobility (and, to a lesser extent, the Clergy), whereas the latter party lied on the side of Jews', conversos' and town councils' interests. A substantial transfer from the royal patrimony to the nobles ensued upon the prevail of the Trastámaras in the conflict. Likewise, the resulting dynastic change ran parallel to a radicalization of the antisemitic sentiment in Castile.
On the death of Alfonso XI a dynastic conflict started between his sons, the Infantes Peter (Pedro) and Henry, Count of Trastámara, which became entangled in the 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 right to the throne once 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 reign of the kingdom. The Black Prince, seeing that the king would not reimburse his expenses, left Castile. Henry, who had fled to France, took advantage of the opportunity 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, John of Gaunt claimed the Crown of Castile in the name 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 asked John I, Henry II's son, to give up the throne in favor of Constance.
John declined but proposed that his son, the Infante Henry, marry John of Gaunt's daughter Catherine. The proposal was accepted, and the title 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.
In the midst of these dynastic negotiations, John I also sought to claim the Portuguese crown through his marriage to Beatrice of Portugal, daughter of King Ferdinand I. This led to a Castilian invasion of Portugal in 1385, culminating in the Battle of Aljubarrota, where Castilian forces suffered a crushing defeat at the hands of the Portuguese under John of Avis. The battle decisively ended Castile's hopes of annexing Portugal and ensured Portuguese independence under the newly established House of Avis.
During the reign of Henry III royal power was restored, overshadowing the much powerful Castilian nobility. In his later years Henry delegated some of his power 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 person in court and allied with the lesser nobility, the cities, the clergy, and the Jews. This brought together the mutual dislikes of the king shared by the greater Castilian nobility and the Aragonese Infantes, sons of Ferdinand I of Antequera, who sought to reign 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 his second wife, 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 to sign a 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 return 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 proceed 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').
Text from the Wikipedia article “Crown of Castile”, available under CC BY-SA 4.0.