Variorum Collected Studies
2 total works
These studies present various aspects of a long-running enquiry into the development of government, the state and absolutism in early-modern Spain, distinctively based on thorough use of central and local manuscript sources. In the first section, five papers on government and institutions cover the Spanish Council of War under Philip II, the military-administrative bureaucracy of Habsburg Spain, an authoritative general history of Spanish government under Philip IV and the nature of Castilian absolutism, together with a detailed review paper on the legal process and sociology of law in early-modern Castile. The second section reprints four major articles re-interpreting the position of representative institutions during the period of Habsburg absolutism. The first two of these, on the Castilian Cortes between 1590-1665, were the first serious studies of the topic for over a century, and have been instrumental in re-directing further historical work in this subject. Their conclusions are reinforced by a very detailed study of representatives to the Cortes, which appears for the first time in English, and a comparative study of the Castilian Cortes and the English Parliament.
The historical study of war in the Spain of Philip II forms the starting point for the articles in this volume. They approach this not so much from a military angle, but as a problem of organization, procurement and finance. In a sense, the articles represent an assessment of the effectiveness of the Spanish government and so, given the apparent precocity of government growth in 16th-century Spain, they can also be seen as a critical commentary on the operational capabilities of the early-modern absolutist state. Six of the essays here focus on the Spanish Armada, in terms of its political and military objectives, but demonstrating how these were conditioned by basic systems limitations, not least in the procurement of suitable cannon. In the final articles Dr Thompson turns to the impact of war and its financing on the social structure, bearing in particular on the definition of nobility (and its sale), and on local democracy, and making full use, here as elsewhere, of the relatively unexplored local sources. Two of the papers here appear for the first time in English, whilst a third has been newly prepared for this volume. L’étude historique de la guerre sous Philippe II, roi d’Espagne, est à la base des articles contenus dans le présent recueil. Ceci est abordé non tant sous l’angle militaire, mais comme un problème d’organisation, d’acquisition de matériel et de financement. En un certain sens, ces documents représentent une évaluation de l’efficacité du gouvernement espagnol et peuvent par conséquent, étant donnée l’apparente précocité de la croissance gouvernementale en Espagne au 16 siècle, être considérés comme un commentaire critique quant aux capacités opérationnelles de l’Etat absolu proto-moderne. Une demi douzaine des essais font l’examen de l’Armada espagnole, en terme d’objectifs politiques et militaires, tout en démontrant comment ces derniers étaient conditionnés par des contraintes structurales,