Philip the Handsome (
July 22,
1478 –
September 25,
1506; ; ; ) was the son of the
Holy Roman Emperor Maximilian I.
Through his mother
Mary of Burgundy he inherited the greater part of the
Burgundian state the
Burgundian Netherlands and through his wife
Joanna the Mad he briefly succeeded to the
kingdom of Castile. He was the first
Habsburg ruler in
Spain and his successors recognized him as
Philip I of Spain.
History
Early life
Philip was born in
Bruges, in the
County of Flanders (today in
Belgium) and was named after his great-grandfather,
Philip the Good. In 1482, upon the death of his mother
Mary of Burgundy, daughter of
Charles the Bold, he succeeded to her
Burgundian possessions under the guardianship of his father. A period of turmoil ensued which witnessed sporadic hostilities between, principally, the large towns of Flanders (especially
Ghent and
Bruges) and the supporters of Maximilian.
During this interregnum, the young Philip became caught up in events and was even briefly sequestered in
Bruges as part of the larger Flemish campaign to support their claims of greater autonomy, which they'd wrested from Mary of Burgundy in an agreement known as the Blijde Inkomst or
Joyous Entry of 1477. By the early 1490s, the turmoil of the interregnum gave way to an uneasy stand-off, with neither French support for the cities of the Franc (Flanders), nor Imperial support from Maximilian's father
Frederick III proving decisive. Both sides came to terms in the
Peace of Senlis in
1493, which smoothed over the internal power struggle by agreeing to make the 15-year old Philip prince in the following year.
The Burgundian inheritance and the Spanish alliance
In
1494 Maximilian relinquished his regency under the terms of the Treaty of Senlis and Philip, at the age of 16, took over the rule of the Burgundian lands himself, although in practice authority was derived from a council of Burgundian notables. On
October 20,
1496, he married
Joanna, daughter of
Ferdinand of Aragon and
Isabella of Castile, in
Lier, Belgium.
The marriage was one of a set of family alliances between the Habsburgs and the
Trastámara, designed to strengthen both against growing French power, which had increased significantly thanks to the policies of
Louis XI and the successful assertion of regal power after war with the
League of the Public Weal. The matter became more urgent after
Charles VIII's invasion of
Italy (known as the
First Peninsular War).
Philip's sister
Margaret married
Juan, Prince of Asturias, the only son of Ferdinand and Isabella and successor to the unified crowns of
Castile and
Aragon. The double alliance was never intended to let the Spanish kingdoms fall under Habsburg control. At the time of her marriage to Philip, Juana was third in line to the throne, with both Juan and his elder sister
Isabella married and hopeful of progeny.
The Castilian inheritance
In 1500, shortly after the birth in Flanders of Juana and Philip's second child (the future
Charles V), the succession to the Castilian and Aragonese crowns was thrown into turmoil. The
heir apparent, Juan, had died in 1497 very shortly after his marriage to Margaret of Austria. The succession thereby passed to Isabella, who had married
Manuel I of Portugal. She died in 1498, while giving birth to a son,
Miguel, to whom succession to the united crowns of Castile, Aragon and Portugal now fell; however, the infant was sickly, and he died during the summer of 1500. The succession to the Castilian and Aragonese crowns now fell to Juana. Because Ferdinand could conceivably produce another heir, the
Cortes of Aragon refused to recognise Juana and Philip as the heirs presumptive to the Kingdom of Aragon. In Castile, however, the succession was clear. Moreover, there was no
salic tradition which the Castilian Cortes could use to thwart the succession passing to Juana. At this point, the issue of Juana's mental incompetence moved from courtly annoyance to the centre of the political stage, since it was clear that Philip and his Burgundian entourage would be the real power-holders in Castile.
In 1502, Philip, Juana and a large part of the Burgundian court travelled to Spain to receive fealty from the
Cortes of
Castile as king-consort of Juana, a journey chronicled in intense detail by
Antoon van Lalaing, the future
Stadtholder of Holland and Zeeland. Philip and the majority of the court returned to the Low Countries in the following year, leaving a pregnant Juana behind in Madrid, where she gave birth to
Ferdinand, later Holy Roman Emperor. Philip's life with Joanna was rendered extremely unhappy by his infidelity and by her jealousy, which, working on a neurotic temperament, furthered her insanity. The princess gave way to paroxysms of rage, in which she was guilty of acts of atrocious violence. Before her mother's death, in 1504, she was unquestionably quite insane, and husband and wife lived apart.
Struggle for power in Spain
When Isabella died, Ferdinand endeavoured to lay hands on the regency of Castile, but the nobles, who disliked and feared him, forced him to withdraw. Philip was summoned to Spain, where he was recognized as king. He landed, with his wife, at
La Coruña on
April 28,
1506, accompanied by a body of German mercenaries. Father and son-in-law mediated under
Cardinal Cisneros at
Remesal, near
Puebla de Sanabria, and at
Renedo, the only result of which was an indecent family quarrel, in which Ferdinand professed to defend the interests of his daughter, who he said was imprisoned by her husband.
A civil war would probably have broken out between them; but Philip, who had only been in Spain long enough to prove his incapacity, died suddenly at
Burgos, apparently of
typhoid fever, on
September 25,
1506. His wife refused for long to allow his body to be buried or to part from it.
Family
Philip and
Joanna of Castile had six children:
Ancestors
Titles
27 March 1482–25 September 1506: Titular Duke of Burgundy as Philip IV
27 March 1482–25 September 1506: Duke of Brabant as Philip III
27 March 1482–25 September 1506: Duke of Limburg as Philip III
27 March 1482–25 September 1506: Duke of Lothier as Philip III
27 March 1482–25 September 1506: Duke of Luxemburg as Philip II
27 March 1482–25 September 1506: Margrave of Namur as Philip V
27 March 1482–25 September 1506: Count Palatine of Burgundy as Philip VI
27 March 1482–25 September 1506: Count of Artois as Philip VI
27 March 1482–25 September 1506: Count of Charolais as Philip III
27 March 1482–25 September 1506: Count of Flanders as Philip IV
27 March 1482–25 September 1506: Count of Hainault as Philip II
27 March 1482–25 September 1506: Count of Holland as Philip II
27 March 1482–25 September 1506: Count of Zeeland as Philip II
27 March 1482–1492: Duke of Guelders as Philip I
27 March 1482–1492: Count of Zutphen as Philip I
26 November 1504–25 September 1506: jure uxoris King of Castile as Philip I
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