Isabella: The Warrior Queen

The advantage a reader unfamiliar with the subject of a biography has is that he/she can approach the subject with few, if any, preconceived notions. I knew that Isabella was the mother of Catherine of Aragon, the first wife of the famously non-uxorious King Henry VIII of England; and that she launched Columbus sailing 'the ocean blue in 1492'. Given the characterization of the book elsewhere, I had suspected that Kirstin Downey's book might be something of a feminist screed (not that there's anything wrong with that), but this was not the case. Downey has written a fascinating book that is feminist, but only insofar as the life of Isabella was female. She was, in fact, one of the pivotal characters of world history.The world of Isabella was dangerous, complex, and violent. She led a somewhat unsettled childhood and grew up in the shadow of her elder half-brother King Enrique of Castile. At his death, the succession was unclear but Isabella seized the throne in her own right. Marrying Ferdinand of Aragon, Isabella and her husband completed the reconquest of the Iberian peninsula, an accomplishment that threw Light on Isabella's supreme worth as a ruler. While Ferdinand commanded the Spanish army, Isabella worked tirelessly to supply her husband with troops, armaments, food, and medical supplies. What is starkly clear, and what is proved by Ferdinand's sorry record as sole ruler after Isabella's death, was that the military successes of Ferdinand were only made possible by the efforts of his queen. No need for feminist special pleading here -- the facts speak for themselves.It' is readily apparent that a biography of Isabella could easily turn into a multi-volume monument. The European discovery of the Americas, the Inquisition, the continual threat from the Ottoman Turks, Castile-Aragon's relationship with the Portuguese, and European politics in general -- particularly the predations of the French; each of these topics would require at least one book to explicate. Downey's singular triumph is to distill all this into an easy read. Not easy to plumb, but easy in the sense that the book flows quite nicely. It reads like a novel.The chapter dealing with the first voyages of Columbus is very lucid and Downey makes it clear that the impetus for exploration came from Isabella as Queen of Castile. This was her enterprise, she funded it, and Ferdinand just wasn't that interested. And here it is important to emphasize that Isabella was, first and foremost, Queen of Castile. Ferdinand was not allowed to interfere in her rule in Castile. She and her husband single-mindedly fought the Muslim rulers in southern Iberia, but it was Isabella who controlled everything else when it came to the interests of HER kingdom. This is a point that has been glossed over for 500 years and it bears re-emphasizing.Downey handles the Inquisition with kid gloves. She finds Isabella culpable for its genesis and subsequent horrors of its execution but she tempers her criticism with something like the standard device of pointing out the dangers of anachronistic finger-pointing. Still Downey does not shy away from describing the injustices served to Muslims, Jews, and Conversos. Downey also does not refrain from telling the sorry tale of Isabella and Ferdinand reneging on their promises to let the Muslims and Jews practice their religions in perpetuity, and that the Conversos would not be subjected to the prying eyes of the inquisitors.Downey's feminist slant is rightly deployed to prove convincingly that her daughter Juana (later dubbed La Loca) was the victim of bad press. Isabella worked tirelessly to find suitable and advantageous marriages for her children. She married off her daughter Juana to Philip of Austria and, in a sort of two for one deal, acquired Philip's sister Margaret for Prince Juan, heir to the throne of Castile. Philip and Margaret were the children of Maximilian who became the Holy Roman Emperor. Excellent matches, politically, but Juan died young and Juana's husband turned out to be a classic example of spousal abuse toward Juana. It is too complicated to go into detail here, but it appears more than likely that the abuse heaped on Juana led to her being sequestered and being declared insane (after Isabella's death). Downey's evidence to the contrary is persuasive but the clincher for me was that when Juana and Philip were forced to land in England on their way to claim the throne of Castile, no less a personage than King Henry VII of England (future father-in-law of Isabella's daughter Catherine) deemed Juana to be quite sane and self-possessed. If anyone could read people it was Henry VII, who had spent his life reading people and their motives.There is so much more to this fascinating book. Isabella's ups and downs with Rodrigo Borgia, who became Pope Alexander VI (and father of the even more infamous Cesare), her relations with the Portuguese monarchy and, above all, her constant fretting about the aims of the Ottoman sultan du jour would all make for further books. If anything, though, Downey's book is a model of concision and an excellent launching pad for further reading. There are extensive end notes, a good bibliography, and a useful index. The only things missing are genealogies of the Castilian and Aragonese monarchies (and one of the concurrent Portuguese monarchy would have been welcome). Isabella's reign echoes down the centuries. Except for Brazil and the Guayanas, Spanish is the dominant language of South America and Central America, the Roman Catholic Church paid dearly for its excesses during the Spanish Civil War, and far away in the Middle East some would-be caliph dreams of regaining Al Andalus for the Prophet.A great read.

This is very extensive and detailed. As a lover of Spanish history, I appreciated the details and insights provided. Too much detail fora casual reader.

There has probably never been in all of recorded history a woman whose actions had more far-reaching consequences than Queen Isabella of Spain. Her two most significant acts were 1) the expulsion of the Muslims from Spain after a 700-year occupation and 2) the financial support she gave to Christopher Columbus for his experimental voyage of sailing west to find the East. The first effectively secured Western Europe for Christianity up until the present day. The second changed the course not only of Spain and Europe, but of the entire world. Forever. These were momentous achievements, but there were other, more complex issues that she had a hand in. She was appalled by the growing corruption of the Catholic Church and tried to do something to “purify” it. She obviously possessed the Zeitgeist of the age, as Martin Luther in the North had similar ideas. Luther’s solution was Protestantism; Queen Isabella’s was The Spanish Inquisition. A side effect of the Inquisition was the expulsion of the Jews. Some of those exiled Jews emigrated to the newly-discovered America and ultimately ended up in tolerant New Amsterdam. As a result, New York was strongly influenced by Jews from the very beginning, who created a climate of “high culture” unsurpassed in the New World.Author Kirsten Downey examines Queen Isabella’s life and achievements with both intellectual curiosity and compassion for her subject. Isabella was a complex person, deeply religious, fiercely protective of her family and her realm, and determined to have control over her own life, rather than relegate it to a husband. In Downey’s account, Isabella knew what she wanted from an early age, made a plan, and put it into action. She literally crowned herself. This is exhaustively-researched history writing that is also easy-to-read, exciting and provocative. My only criticism is that in the final chapter Downey interprets the events after the death of Isabella through the currently fashionable prism of misandry: men sure know how to make women’s lives miserable and they do it just because they can. But I’ll still give the book five stars. It sheds a lot of light on the ways that people of that time and place thought and behaved, which still influence us today. Highly recommended.

Thoughtful and comprehensive biography of Isabella the warrior queen of Spain. Born into the second and less important family of the Castilian King, Downey explores the hard scrabble life of the princess and her younger brother left in a back water castle in a lawless and unsettled land. Despite a meager household, she thrives on stories of Joan of Arc and is groomed for an advantageous political marriage. Though she is not given a great education, she seems to be able to understand her importance of her own place in the world. Her duty to her nation. Negotiations with England to make her Edward IV's queen are squashed when he marries an unimportant widow. Isabella is miffed by his choice. Even at a young age, she is filled with both pride and confidence of her superior standing. Taken to her brother's hostile and dangerous court, she learns to navigate the dangerous shoals of politics. We all know that Isabella married her second cousin, Ferdinand, harried the Muslims from Spain, allowed the church to create the infamous Inquisition, and finally financed Christopher Columbus. Downey's book is well written, packed with facts and just on the verge of dry, but stick with it. Kirsten Downey's book fleshes out the woman, who wrestled a dangerous world, to seize the opportunity to unite her fractious country using only her grit and determination to overcome the obstacles of her time. Isabella is revealed as more then the cardboard character known though history. She was a warrior queen who paved the way for strong women like Elizabeth of England and Catherine of Russia to take thrones and prove that a woman could lead her country as successfully as a man.

First the author describes the epoch. Then the personages, Isabella and Ferdinand and most importantly their interactions. The important role Isabella played in designating the Pope, liberating Spain from centuries of Muslim occupation, setting the stage for the growth of the Americas, and most importantly, in my eyes disproving that Queen Juana was not crazy but the victim of a husband and a father whose intent was to destroy her which they did.

Very good book. It explain how Spain became a great power. Also about other contries of that period and Columbus.

Beautifully written book. Meticulous research. Beautiful writing. The character of, arguably the most important character in the history of the world, comes alive before the reader. Would recommend it highly.

An excellent read and makes one want to explore in greater depths many of the points raised in this comprehensive exploration of the life and times of Isabella

Il libro è scritto in modo scorrevole e leggibile. La storia è molto rilevante per capire gli eventi attuali, anche in relazione all' islam.Poi per una volta che si tratta di una donna notevole ....