Biography

by Erik Alder

Queen Isabel I of Castile was born in 1451 to the weak-willed Juan II during a time when the nobility had greater sway over politics than the monarchy. She became the center of a succession crisis when her older half brother Henry IV had become king and rumors spread that his only issue, Joanna, was illegitimate, making her younger brother Alfonso a claimant to the throne. After several battles with the king and with the support of rivaling nobles, the latter succeeding in forcing Henry to name him as heir presumptive to the throne. He then unexpectedly died, having named Isabel in his will as his successor. Before any further warring between the nobility, Isabel successfully negotiated with Henry IV to honor Alfonso's will, and in 1474, she ascended to the throne, having carefully manuevered a marriage with Fernando II of Aragon, and consequently unifying the two powerful provinces.

She spent the first two decades consolidating her power, quelling rebellions from the nobility, and recrafting the monarchy into a legitimate, centralized power. Unlike her recreating and disinterested predecessors who acquiesced to sycophants, she took her role as queen as a call from God, reserving all government of Castile for herself and limiting Fernando to his own province. She disciplined and restructured law enforcement and reduced crime. She recovered land from the nobles and shrewdly managed money so that the crown gained an advantage over the rival nobility. She wisely managed the institutions she had at hand, organized effectly, and streamlined the state during her first decades, promoting education, and investing in arts, culture, and innovation. This put her in a position to take great risks with great rewards in 1492: first, she conquered Granada, the last Muslim territory on the peninsula, greatly increasing her popularity and public image; second, she agreed to finance Christopher Columbus's expedition across the Atlantic that ultimately yielded a seemingly endless stream of resources for the Spanish crown; finally, she established the Inquisition, the most systematized legal institution ever established in Europe. This culmination of intellegent political administration secured Spanish power for centuries to come and would ensure Castilian would be one of the most spoken languages in the world to this day.

Isabel cultivated an austere and pious public image, of necessity owing to the suspicious surrounding a woman who had acquired so much power--particularly linking herself to the Virgin Mary despite her status as the mother of four future European monarchs. Historically, little attention has been paid to her writing and letters, and more to the way her court characterized her in her efforts to consolidate and centralize power, along with the consequences of her political decisions. It is hope that the gathering and transcription of these letters will provide greater insight into Isabel herself and her personality less than how she was used by the men around her.