For too long the history of seventeenth-century Spain has been dismissed as a story of imperial decline after the achievement of the sixteenth century. Resilience of the Spanish monarchy presents a fresh appraisal of the survival of Spain and its European and overseas empire under the last Spanish Habsburg, Carlos II (1665–1700). Hitherto it has largely been assumed that in the ‘Age of Louis XIV’ Spain collapsed as a military and naval power, and only retained its empire because states which had hitherto opposed Spanish hegemony came to its aid. Spain's allies did play a role, but this view se ... More

For too long the history of seventeenth-century Spain has been dismissed as a story of imperial decline after the achievement of the sixteenth century. Resilience of the Spanish monarchy presents a fresh appraisal of the survival of Spain and its European and overseas empire under the last Spanish Habsburg, Carlos II (1665–1700). Hitherto it has largely been assumed that in the ‘Age of Louis XIV’ Spain collapsed as a military and naval power, and only retained its empire because states which had hitherto opposed Spanish hegemony came to its aid. Spain's allies did play a role, but this view seriously underestimates the efforts of Carlos II and his ministers to find men for Spain's various armies – in Flanders, Lombardy and Catalonia – and to ensure a continued naval presence in the Atlantic and the Mediterranean. These commitments were costly, adding to the fiscal pressure upon Carlos's subjects, and to political tensions within the monarchy, but Spain managed the burden of imperial defence more successfully than has been acknowledged. This was due to various factors, including the continued contribution of Castile and American silver, some administrative development, and the contribution of both the non-Castilian territories within Spain and the non-Spanish territories within Europe, such as Naples. This book revises our understanding of the last decades of Habsburg Spain, which is shown to have been a state and society more committed to the retention of empire and more successful in doing so than a preoccupation with the ‘decline of Spain’ has recognised.