William Hickling Prescott - The History of the Reign of Ferdinand and Isabella the Catholic (Vol. 1-3)

[56] This cavalier, who was of an ancient and honorable family in Castile, was introduced to the princess's service by the archbishop of Toledo. He is represented by Gonzalo de Oviedo as a man of much sagacity and knowledge of the world, qualities with which he united a steady devotion to the interests of his mistress. Oviedo, Quincuagenas, MS., bat. 1, quinc. 2, dial. 1.

[57] Alonso de Palencia, Corónica, MS., cap. 14.-The bishop told Palencia, that "if his own servants deserted him, he would oppose the entrance of Ferdinand into the kingdom."

[58] Zurita, Anales, lib. 18, cap. 26.—The enrique was a gold coin, so denominated from Henry II.

[59] Zurita, Anales, lib. 18, cap. 26.—Abarca, Reyes de Aragon, tom. ii. p. 273.

[60] Mem. de la Acad. de Hist., tom. vi. p. 78, Ilust. 2.

[61] Alonso de Palencia, Corónica, MS., part. 2, cap. 14.—Zurita, Anales, loc. cit.

[62] This letter, dated October 12th, is cited at length by Castillo, Crónica, cap. 136.

[63] Alonso de Palencia, Corónica, MS., part. 2, cap. 15.

[64] Gutierre de Cardenas was the first who pointed him out to the princess, exclaiming at the same time, " Ese es, ese es ," "This is he;" in commemoration of which he was permitted to place on his escutcheon the letters SS, whose pronunciation in Spanish resembles that of the exclamation which he had uttered. Ibid., part. 2, cap. 15.—Oviedo, Quincuagenas, MS., bat. 1, quinc. 2, dial. 1.

[65] L. Marineo, Cosas Memorables, fol. 182.—Garibay, Compendio, lib. 18, cap. 1.—"Tan amigo de los negocios," says Mariana, "que parecia con el trabajo descansaba." Hist. de España, lib. 25, cap. 18.

[66] "En hermosura, puestas delante S. A. todas las mugeres que yo he visto, ninguna vi tan graciosa, ni tanto de ver corao su persona, ni de tal manera e sanctidad honestísíma." Oviedo, Quincuagenas, MS.

[67] Bernaldez, Reyes Católicos, MS., cap. 201.—Abarca, Reyes de Aragon, tom. ii. p. 362.—Garibay, Compendío, lib. 18, cap. 1.

[68] Mariana, Hist. de España, tom. ii. p. 465.

[69] Carbajal, Anales, MS., año 1469.—Alonso de Palencia, Corónica, MS., part. 2, cap. 16.—Zurita, Anales, lib. 18, cap. 26.—See a copy of the official record of the marriage, Mem. de la Acad., tom. vi. Apend. 4. See also the Ilust. 2.

[70] The intricacies of this affair, at once the scandal and the stumbling-block of the Spanish historians, have been unravelled by Señor Clemencin, with his usual perspicuity. See Mem. de la Acad., tom. vi. pp. 105–116, Ilust. 2.

[71] Alonso de Palencia, Corónica, MS., part. 2, cap. 16.—A lively narrative of the adventures of Prince Ferdinand, detailed in this chapter, may be found in Cushing's Reminiscences of Spain, (Boston, 1833,) vol. i. pp. 225–255.

[72] Castillo, Crónica, cap. 137.—Alonso de Palencia, Corónica, MS., part. 2, cap. 16.

Table of Contents

1469–1474.

Factions in Castile.—Ferdinand and Isabella.—Gallant Defence of Perpignan against the French.—Ferdinand Raises the Siege.—Isabella's Party gains Strength.—Interview between King Henry IV. and Isabella.—The French Invade Roussillon.—Ferdinand's Summary Justice.—Death of Henry IV., of Castile.—Influence of his Reign.

The marriage of Ferdinand and Isabella disconcerted the operations of the marquis of Villena, or, as he should be styled, the grand master of St. James, since he had resigned his marquisate to his elder son, on his appointment to the command of the military order above mentioned, a dignity inferior only to the primacy in importance. It was determined, however, in the councils of Henry to oppose at once the pretensions of the princess Joanna to those of Isabella; and an embassy was gladly received from the king of France, offering to the former lady the hand of his brother the duke of Guienne, the rejected suitor of Isabella. Louis the Eleventh was willing to engage his relative in the unsettled politics of a distant state, in order to relieve himself from his pretensions at home. [1]

An interview took place between Henry the Fourth and the French ambassadors in a little village in the vale of Lozoya, in October, 1470. A proclamation was read, in which Henry declared his sister to have forfeited whatever claims she had derived from the treaty of Toros de Guisando, by marrying contrary to his approbation. He then with his queen swore to the legitimacy of the princess Joanna, and announced her as his true and lawful successor. The attendant nobles took the usual oaths of allegiance, and the ceremony was concluded by affiancing the princess, then in the ninth year of her age, with the formalities ordinarily practised on such occasions, to the count of Boulogne, the representative of the duke of Guienne. [2]

This farce, in which many of the actors were the same persons who performed the principal parts at the convention of Toros de Guisando, had on the whole an unfavorable influence on Isabella's cause. It exhibited her rival to the world as one whose claims were to be supported by the whole authority of the court of Castile, with the probable co-operation of France. Many of the most considerable families in the kingdom, as the Pachecos, [3] the Mendozas in all their extensive ramifications, [4] the Zuñigas, the Velascos, [5] the Pimentels, [6] unmindful of the homage so recently rendered to Isabella, now openly testified their adhesion to her niece.

Ferdinand and his consort, who held their little court at Dueñas, [8] were so poor as to be scarcely capable of defraying the ordinary charges of their table. The northern provinces of Biscay and Guipuscoa had, however, loudly declared against the French match; and the populous province of Andalusia, with the house of Medina Sidonia at its head, still maintained its loyalty to Isabella unshaken. But her principal reliance was on the archbishop of Toledo, whose elevated station in the church and ample revenues gave him perhaps less real influence, than his commanding and resolute character, which had enabled him to triumph over every obstacle devised by his more crafty adversary, the grand master of St. James. The prelate, however, with all his generous self-devotion, was far from being a comfortable ally. He would willingly have raised Isabella to the throne, but he would have her indebted for her elevation exclusively to himself. He looked with a jealous eye on her most intimate friends, and complained that neither she nor her husband deferred sufficiently to his counsel. The princess could not always conceal her disgust at these humors, and Ferdinand, on one occasion, plainly told him that "he was not to be put in leading-strings, like so many of the sovereigns of Castile." The old king of Aragon, alarmed at the consequences of a rupture with so indispensable an ally, wrote in the most earnest manner to his son, representing the necessity of propitiating the offended prelate. But Ferdinand, although educated in the school of dissimulation, had not yet acquired that self- command, which enabled him in after-life to sacrifice his passions, and sometimes indeed his principles, to his interests. [9]

The most frightful anarchy at this period prevailed throughout Castile. While the court was abandoned to corrupt or frivolous pleasure, the administration of justice was neglected, until crimes were committed with a frequency and on a scale, which menaced the very foundations of society. The nobles conducted their personal feuds with an array of numbers which might compete with those of powerful princes. The duke of Infantado, the head of the house of Mendoza, [10] could bring into the field, at four and twenty hours' notice one thousand lances and ten thousand foot. The battles, far from assuming the character of those waged by the Italian condottieri at this period, were of the most sanguinary and destructive kind. Andalusia was in particular the theatre of this savage warfare. The whole of that extensive district was divided by the factions of the Guzmans and Ponces de Leon. The chiefs of these ancient houses having recently died, the inheritance descended to young men, whose hot blood soon revived the feuds, which had been permitted to cool under the temperate sway of their fathers. One of these fiery cavaliers was Rodrigo Ponce de Leon, so deservedly celebrated afterwards in the wars of Granada as the marquis of Cadiz. He was an illegitimate and younger son of the count of Arcos, but was preferred by his father to his other children in consequence of the extraordinary qualities which he evinced at a very early period. He served his apprenticeship to the art of war in the campaigns against the Moors, displaying on several occasions an uncommon degree of enterprise and personal heroism. On succeeding to his paternal honors, his haughty spirit, impatient of a rival, led him to revive the old feud with the duke of Medina Sidonia, the head of the Guzmans, who, though the most powerful nobleman in Andalusia, was far his inferior in capacity and military science. [11]