HABSBURG SPAIN - Spain and Portugal: A Reference Guide from the Renaissance to the Present - page 13

Fifty years after the child of King Philip I had succeeded to the throne
of Castile, the weary global monarch Charles V abdicated his multiple
crowns and withdrew to the tranquillity of a Spanish monastery. Not
all of his enterprises had been successful, and he left the management
of the Habsburg concerns in central Europe and the Balkan perimeter
to his brother as Holy Roman Emperor Ferdinand I. The Spanish
Habsburg line and its vast dependencies would now be headed by Philip
II, only son of Charles V, and a thoroughly Castilian king both in tem-
perament and priorities. Proceeding methodically, Philip II confronted
and crushed Spain's longtime rival, France, in 1559. It would be well
into the next century before this rival could again dream of challenging
Spain for the mastery of Europe. The alien challenge from Islam was
next confronted. A Turkish defeat at the siege of Malta in 1565 and the
death of the aggressive sultan Suleiman the Magnificent in the follow-
ing year slowed the advance of Spain's Ottoman adversary in the Medi-
terranean. At the Battle of Lepanto in 1571 Spain's naval forces
delivered what amounted to a death blow against the “infidel.” Coming
after the defeat of a rebellion in Aragon by crypto-Muslims who had
been spared in earlier purges, the triumph at Lepanto elevated Philip II
to the position of champion of Christendom. Even Protestant Europe
applauded his victory.
But Philip was no respecter of Protestantism. He had already focused
the attention of the Inquisition upon the extirpation of heresy.
Founded in Castile in 1478 and soon extended to Aragon and then to
all of the Spanish possessions, the Spanish Inquisition had diminished
its early persecutions of Jewish and Muslim suspects in favor of vigi-
lance against “luteranos.” Employing a small army of police, judges,
and jailers and relying on paid informers as well as the denunciations
of “loyal Christians,” it maintained a constant safeguarding of ortho-
doxy that was viewed abroad as a hallmark of Spanish political and
religious identity. During the reign of Philip II the Inquisition became
the centerpiece of the “Leyenda Negra” (“Black Legend”) about the
sinister and oppressive nature of Spanish society that shaped its image
throughout the world for centuries to come. Although harassment of
unorthodox thinkers—religious or secular—was common to all
regimes, and although relatively few of the Inquisition's prisoners
were subjected to torture or execution, Spain became known as the
stronghold of intolerance. Descriptions of the auto de fe —the public
burning of heretics—were a commonplace in anti-Spanish
propaganda.
Other elements of the Leyenda Negra included portrayals of Philip as
a gloomy misanthrope and his massive palace-monastery residence, El