Isabella II of Spain
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Categories: Spanish monarchs | Princes of Asturias | Queens regnant | House of Bourbon | Knights of the Golden Fleece | Roman Catholic monarchs | Child rulers who reached age of majority | 1830 births | 1904 deaths
Isabella II (October 10 1830 – April 10 1904), Isabel II in Spanish, was Queen regnant of Spain ("Queen of the Spains" officially from August 13 1836, Isabella II the "queen of Castile, Leon, Aragon,...") She was Spain's first and so far only queen regnant, although in the counting of spanish kings the previous kings of Leon and Castile were counted as kings of Spain (and henceforth, the numeral second). Isabella was born in Madrid in 1830 and was the eldest daughter of Ferdinand VII, king of Spain, and of his fourth wife and niece, Maria Christina, a Neapolitan Bourbon and also the niece of Marie Antoinette. Maria became queen-regent on September 29 1833, when her daughter Isabella, at the age of three years, was proclaimed queen on the death of the king. Queen Isabella succeeded to the throne because Ferdinand VII induced the Cortes to assist him in setting aside the Salic law, which the Bourbons had introduced in the beginning of the 18th century, and to re-establish the older succession law of Spain. The brother of Ferdinand, Carlos, the first pretender, fought seven years, during the minority of Isabella, to dispute her title. Supporters of Carlos and his descendants were known as Carlists and the age old fight over the succession was the subject of a number of Carlist Wars in the 19th century. Isabella's rights were only maintained through the support of the army. The Cortes and the Liberals and Progressives, who at the same time established constitutional and parliamentary government, dissolved the religious orders, confiscated the property of the orders including the Jesuits, and attempted to restore order in finances. After the Carlist war the queen-regent, Christina, resigned to make way for Baldomero Espartero, Prince of Vergara, the most successful and most popular general of the Isabelline armies, who remained regent for only two years. He was turned out in 1843 by a military and political pronunciamiento led by Generals O'Donnell and Narvaez, who formed a cabinet, presided over by Joaquin Maria Lopez, and this government induced the Cortes to declare Isabella of age at thirteen. Three years later the Moderado party or Castilian Conservatives made their Queen marry, at sixteen, her cousin, Prince Fernando I Francisco de Asis de Bourbon-Cadige (1822–1902), on the same day (October 10 1846) her younger sister married the duke of Montpensier. These marriages suited the views of France and Louis Philippe, who nearly quarrelled in consequence with Britain; but both matches were anything but happy. In fact, persistent rumor had it that few if any of the Spanish Queen regnant's children were conceived by her king-consort, a homosexual. The heir to the throne, who would eventually become Alfonso XII, for instance, was widely believed to be Isabella's child by a captain of the guard, Enrique Puig y Moltó. Isabella had twelve children, but only four reached adulthood:
Queen Isabella II often interfered in politics in a wayward, unscrupulous manner that made her very unpopular. She showed most favour to her reactionary generals and statesmen, to the Church and religious orders, and was constantly the tool of corrupt and profligate courtiers and favourites who gave her court a bad name. She went into exile at the end of September 1868, after her Moderado generals had made a slight show of resistance that was crushed at the battle of Alcolea by Marshals Serrano and Prim. Other events of Queen Isabella's reign were a war against Morocco, which ended in an advantageous treaty for Spain and some Morroccan cession of territory; the fruitless Chincha Islands War against Peru and Chile; tensions with the United States; independence revolts in Cuba and Puerto Rico; and some progress in public works, especially railways and a slight improvement in commerce and finance. Image:Isabella II of Spain in exile.jpg
Queen Isabella II of Spain in exile at Paris
Her exile in 1868, helped create the Franco-Prussian war, as the Spanish found a possible candidate in Prince Leopold of Hohenzollern-Sigmaringen. Queen Isabella II was a Bourbon ( a member of the old French royalty ), this raised the possibility of a German sitting on the vacant Spanish throne, something the French under Napoleon III would never accept. Isabella was induced to abdicate in Paris on June 25, 1870 in favour of her son, Alfonso XII, and the cause of the restoration was furthered. She had separated from her husband in the previous March and continued to live in France after the restoration in 1874. On the occasion of one of her visits to Madrid during Alfonso XII's reign she began to intrigue with the politicians of the capital, and was peremptorily requested to go abroad again. She resided in Paris for the rest of her life, seldom traveling abroad except for a small numbers of visits to her native Spain. During her exile she grew closer to her husband, with whom she maintained an ambiguous friendship until his death in 1902. The last days of her life were marked by her youngest daughter's matrimonial problems. She died on April 10, 1904 and is entombed in El Escorial. TitularyIn 1837, Spain developed legislatively into a constitutional monarchy. Before that date, the underage Isabella was still known by the feudal-like centuries-old, symbolic long titulary: Doña Isabel II por la Gracia de Dios, Reina de Castilla, de León, de Aragón, de las Dos Sicilias, de Jerusalén, de Navarra, de Granada, de Toledo, de Valencia, de Galicia, de Mallorca, de Sevilla, de Cerdeña, de Córdoba, de Córcega, de Murcia, de Menorca, de Jaen, de los Algarbes, de Algeciras, de Gibraltar, de las Islas Canarias, de las Indias Orientales y Occidentales, Islas y Tierra firme del mar Océano; Archiduquesa de Austria; Duquesa de Borgoña, de Brabante y de Milan; Condesa de Aspurg, Flandes, Tirol y Barcelona; Señora de Vizcaya y de Molina &c. &c. At the change, a new format of the titulary was taken into use for Isabella: Por la gracia de Dios y la Constitución de la Monarquía española, Reina de las Españas (By the grace of God and the Constitution of the Spanish monarchy, Queen of the Spains). Ancestors
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