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VI. On an unrecorded Contract entered into between Ferdinand and Isabella, King and Queen of Castille and Leon, and Ferdinand, King of Sicily, for the Marriage of Isabella, eldest daughter of Ferdinand and Isabella, with Ferdinand, Prince of Capua, May 21, 1476

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  25 January 2012

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Extract

Prior to the fifteenth century, Spain being constituted by a number of small independent states, their interests clashed with each other, and serious feuds became the natural consequence. When reduced, however, to one common rule, belonging to one nation, discovery and conquest followed, and its domestic institutions, together with the character of its literature, improved. It is to the reign of Ferdinand and Isabella that this beneficial consolidation and completion is to be ascribed. The states into which Spain in the beginning of the fifteenth century was arranged, consisted of Castille, Aragon, Navarre, and Granada. These at length were included within one monarchy, and Castille became the capital of the kingdom.

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Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © The Society of Antiquaries of London 1857

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References

page 58 note a Mr. Prescott has given an able summary of the Castilian Monarchy before the fifteenth century in his Introductory Chapter of “The History of the Eeign of Ferdinand and Isabella, the Catholic, of Spain, ” Lond. J838, 3 vols. 8vo.

page 59 note a See Rymer's Fœdera, xii. 411.

page 59 note b This ceremony is particularly described by Prescott, vol. ii. p. 160.

page 61 note a Prescott gives in a note (Hist, of Ferd. and Isab., II. 378) an explanation relating to the epithet Most Catholic. This title, as applied to Ferdinand and Isabella, was given to them by the ‘Pope, who, desirous of offering a compliment upon their conquest of Granada, addressed them as the Most Christian, which, however, being a title hitherto only applied to the sovereigns of France, was objected to by the Cardinals, and the epithet of Most Catholic substituted for it. The term Catholic had been before applied to the Asturian prince Alphonso, and also to Pedro II., so that it was not new either to the house of Castille or Arragon, and the phrase Los Reyes Catolicos is applicable either to a female or male, agreeably to the Spanish idiom, though sounding singularly incorrect to an English ear. The Spanish language requires that when a word having reference both to a masculine and a feminine noun is employed, it should be expressed in the former gender.

page 62 note a It is thus printed in the MS. In English Isabel is correctly rendered by Elizabeth.

page 76 note a Prescott, vol. i. p. 210, from Palencia MS. part i. c. lxii.; Castillo, c. lxviii., lxix., lxxiv.

page 77 note a See Aleson, Zurita, Castillo, and other authorities.

page 77 note b This compact is given by Marina, Teoria, Appendix No. XI. and quoted by Prescott.

page 77 note c See Palencia MS. and other authorities quoted by Prescott, i. 202, note.

page 78 note a Vol. i. p. 209.

page 78 note b Vol. i. p. 210.

page 79 note a See Mariana, torn. ii. p. 465.

page 82 note a Vol. i. p. 283.