The great power of Spain in the 16th century

By middle of the sixteenth century Spain was the greatest power in Europe. It was Spain golden age. The dominions of Philip II (1556 – 98) of Spain stretched from the Atlantic to the Pacific: his continental territories included the Netherlands in the North and Milan and Naples in Italy.

Spain was among the first European states to create a strong national monarchy, late in the 15th century. In 1580 Philip II became king of Portugal, uniting all the states of the Iberian Peninsula. With the addition of Portugal’s Atlantic ports and its sizeable fleet, Spanish maritime power now was unsurpassed. Spain was also a great cultural and intellectual center.

The fashions and tastes of its golden age dominated all the courts of Europe. The expansion of Spanish domination and the increase of Spain’s wealth and prestige was reflected in a self conscious spirit of national pride that could be seen in the story of Don Quixote, the knight who tilted at windmills in search of greatness in the novel published by Miguel de Cervantes between 1605 and 1615.

The Spanish Conquest was a watershed event on the colonization of the New World and the 16th century expansion of the Spanish Empire, which became one of the first and for a time, the greatest seafaring empire of Western Europe amid a time when other nations sent out competing voyages of discovery and exploration.

As a result of the voyages of Christopher Columbus and other explorers, from 1492 through the 16th century, Spain claimed the entire Caribbean Basin, most of Central and South America (excluding Brazil) and the southwestern portion of the modern United States, including all or parts of California.

In the New World, Spain created an efficient and highly bureaucratic colonial government headed in Madrid.

In Mediterranean Spain alone stood out against the expansion of Ottoman power. The sultan’s navy continually threatened to turn the Mediterranean into a Turkish lake, while his armies attempted to capture and hold Italian soil. All Europe shuddered at the news each Ottoman advance. Pope called for holy wars against the Turks but only Philip heeded the cry. From nearly moment that he inherited the Spanish crown he took up the challenge of defending European Christianity.

For over a decade Philip maintained costly coastal garrison in North Africa and Italy and assembled large fleets and larger army to discourage or repel Turkish invasions. This sparring could not go on indefinitely, and in 1571 both sides prepared for a decisive battle.

A combined Spanish and Italian force of over three hundred ships and eighty thousand men meet an even larger ottoman flotilla off the coasts of Greece. The Spanish naval victory of Lepanto was considered one of the great events of the sixteenth century, celebrated in story and songs for the next three hundred years, though the Turks continued to menace the Mediterranean islands, Lepanto marked the end of Ottoman advanced.

Spanish naval power was dented by defeat of the Spanish Armada in 1588. During the 17th century, Spanish political and economic power declined.
The great power of Spain in the 16th century

War in Europe in 16th century

“War is one of the scourges with which it has pleased God to afflict men”, wrote Cardinal Richelieu (1585-1642), the French Minister who played no small part in spreading the scourge.

War usually undertaken to gain additional territory or to reclaim lost territory, with rights of inheritance and claims through marriage or treaty given as the reasons for fighting when negotiations failed to produce a settlements of conflicting claims.

War affected every, member of the society from combatants to civilians. There were no innocent bystanders.

The early part of the century had witnessed the dynastic struggle between the Hapsburgs and the House of Valois as well as beginnings of the religious struggle between Catholic and Protestants.

But the wars that dominated Europe from 1555 to 1648 brought together the worst of both of these conflicts. War was fought on a larger scale, it was more brutal and more expensive, and it claimed more victims.

It brought ruin, misery, and displacement to innocent masses, especially to the poor and deprived. Some of the major wars were: Hundred Years’ War (1337-1453) between England and France, Germany experienced three different civil wars within three decades (1522-1555), the Dutch fought the Spanish (catholic) occupation for nearly nine hundred years and finally won independent in 1648.

During this century war extended thorough out the Continent.

Military technology increased in sophistication and expense following the ‘gunpowder revolution’ in the 14th-16th centuries and the oceanic explorations of 15th century and as highly trained and costly state based standing armies and navies were developed from the 16th century.

In the 16th century, the rulers of France, England and the Holy Roman Empire – who during part of the 16th century included the King of Spain, dominated warfare in international military campaign.

By end of the 16th century there were three great , centralized, gunpowder kingdoms in Europe, France, Spain, England, a diffuse but powerful Habsburg empire in central Europe and a number of smaller states - Sweden, The Netherlands – whose local power could not be ignored.
War in Europe in 16th century