30.3 Europe: a.d. 1501 to 1600  (Page 11/29)

By the time Charles returned with German troops, the rebellion had already pretty well burned itself out and Spain became an absolute monarchy.

Charles abdicated all titles in 1556 while in Brussels and his son Philip II took over as king of Spain. It was Philip who sent the great Spanish Armada against England in 1588 to avenge the death of Mary of Scots and to restore Catholicism to England, but as we shall see shortly, he failed in this endeavor. This preoccupation with northern Europe was new to Spain, basically a Mediterranean country, and it happened only as a result of the dynastic accidents and manipulations of the Habsburgs. Philip II ruled more of the earth's surface than anyone since the beginning of history, but all of the silver from Peru and Mexico had not kept the Spanish court from sinking ever deeper into debt, a lot of the money disappearing into the conflicts in the Netherlands. The Spanish court repudiated its debts to the Fuggers on 5 separate occasions between 1557 and 1627 and those bankers progressively withdrew from financing governments. In 1580 the Spanish cavalry, under the Duke of Alva, quickly conquered Portugal and from then on for the rest of the century Spain and Portugal were united under a common Iberian crown, which ruled three empires - the silver empire of Spanish America, the spice empire of the Indian Ocean and the sugar empire of the south Atlantic. From 1,000 to 2,000 Spaniards left Spain for America each year during this century. (Ref. 51 , 139 , 8 , 260 )

We must add some details about Philip's war with England. Actually he feared this, but was egged on by the pope and some of his advisors, so that eventually he was enticed into gathering a great fleet of ships from all over Iberia and Italy, for the purpose of holding the English fleet at bay while the Duke of Parma led Spanish troops, which were then in Belgium, across the channel to restore Catholicism to England. Provisioning the great fleet was a problem never adequately solved, partly because of Spain's worsening financial situation. A raid along the southern coast by Sir Francis Drake, which among other insults resulted in the destruction of about 1,700 tons of hoops and pipe staves, which had been destined to be made into casks to carry 25,000 to 30,000 tons of water, wine, salt meat, salt fish and biscuits, did not help matters. The substitute, green barrel staves, which the Spaniards then had to use, made leaky and quickly fouled casks.

In late May of 1588, under a somewhat inexperienced and reluctant Captain-General Medina Sidonia, the Spanish armada finally set off from Lisbon. In the first line were 10 Portuguese and 10 Castillian galleons, reinforced by 4 great, armed West India merchant- men. Then there were 4 galleasses of Naples manned by 300 soldiers and sailors, 300 rowers and 50 guns apiece. The second line had 4 squadrons of 10 large merchantmen, each heavily armed, and attached to them were 34 light, fast ships and 23 awkward hulks acting as freighters and supply ships, making a total of 130 vessels. Included in the personnel were 180 friars and priests. The armada carried 2,431 cannon (of which 934 were iron, instead of bronze), 7,000 arquebuses, 1,000 muskets and 123,790 bullets and shot. (Ref. 260 )