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Five years later he had attempted to manipulate the outcome of the marriage of Isabella II of Spain against French interests in order to align Britain with a liberal Spain

In February 1848, a new revolution in Paris threatened to upset Anglo-French relations altogether

he Second Republic was therefore seen as unstable and potentially militaristic, and Palmerston’s reaction was to issue a confidential  paper outlining government preparations for an imminent invasion of Britain

There was considerable relief in London, then, when in October the political body in France agreed to usher in a republic under the authority of a president elected for four years by universal adult manhood suffrage. The future of Anglo-French relations would now hinge  on the identity of the new president

In December, Louis-Napoléon Bonaparte, nephew to the great defeated enemy of England, was elected first president of the Second Republic, gaining 74.3 per cent of the 7,449,471 votes cast in metropolitan France

In Britain, initial reaction to the news was mixed. Louis-Napoléon had spent three years in exile in England between 1831 and 1848, and over five separate visits had acquired a respect for, and knowledge of, the country unrivalled among European heads of state

The sepoy revolt in India in May 1857 could hardly be blamed on Napoleon III, but in some quarters the suggestion was made that he was secretly helping them. A short visit to Osborne in August to meet the Queen and Palmerston put the matter straight (though none there had believed it).

When the French navy was not seen to be steaming up the Thames the panic dissipated, but the fears were resurrected after Louis-Napoléon’s coup d’état of December 2nd, 1851, dissolving the National Assembly and declaring a new constitution. Opinion polarised both in France and Britain; on the one hand Louis-Napoléon was declared a ‘saviour of society’ and on the other the ‘Antichrist’

even the Queen hoped that Louis-Napoléon’s enemies abroad would remain ‘perfectly passive’. But the press and its public were united in bitter condemnation. By January 1852, the poet Coventry Patmore had persuaded nineteen friends to form the first Rifle Club as part of a nation-wide army of volunteers to repel, as he put it later, ‘the threats of the French colonels and by suspicions of the intentions of Louis-Napoléon

The second invasion panic did not subside until a formal alliance was established in March 1854, preceding the Crimean War. In April 1855 the Emperor Napoleon III (as Louis-Napoléon had declared himself in December 1852) enjoyed a successful state visit to Britain, reciprocated by an equally successful visit by Victoria to Paris in August. Throughout the Crimean War, Napoleon III allowed Britain to lead affairs

personal relations between Palmerston and Napoleon III continued to deteriorate throughout the early 1860s

The incident most dangerous to Franco-British relations occurred on January 14th, 1858, when an attempt was made to assassinate Napoleon III in the streets of Paris, the plot hatched in London by political refugees

But popular opinion in England remained suspicious of the Second Republic, and the economic upturn was accompanied by the first of three intense ‘invasion panics’, which recalled to mind those set in motion many years earlier by Napoleon I

Outright war between France and England might have resulted had two different players been involved: Napoleon III apologised to Lord Cowley, Britain’s ambassador in Paris, for having overlooked the jingoistic pronouncements in Le Moniteur universel, while Palmerston attempted to introduce a Conspiracy Bill, which would have elevated the crime of conspiring to murder persons abroad from a misdemeanour to a felony.

To Napoleon III from Queen Victoria’ promised to him in 1855 but somehow ‘forgotten’. The entente had been saved by an imperial whisker

In the wake of the assassination attempt Napoleon III was keen to demonstrate that his improvements to the naval base at Cherbourg were not a threat to Britain, and in August 1858 he invited Victoria and Albert, several politicians and naval men, to inspect them as a mark of trust.

The third invasion panic, the following year, originated in Napoleon III’s military attempt in May 1859 to oust Habsburg influence in Italy and prepare the peninsula for some form of unification and self-government

France’s annexation of Nice and Savoy in 1860 as a reward from Piedmont-Sardinia following the war in Italy was wholeheartedly approved by the local populace in a referendum

Napoleon III’s attempt to set up by direct intervention a European monarchy in Mexico from October 1861 (when a French, Spanish and British naval fleet worked in concert to extract the payment of debts from a corrupt Mexican administration) was approved by Palmerston but again vigorously opposed by Albert and all the royal family – and was unpopular in Britain, although offset by several other actions. Napoleon III’s vigorous support of free trade resulted in the pioneering Cobden-Chevalier Treaty of 1860 which, while it undoubtedly harmed a minority of trades, vastly improved the majority, increasing prosperity and mutual trust

Napoleon III was careful to appear subservient, enabling Palmerston to acknowledge that the British ‘throughout had their own way and ... led the way’

The Duruz were the aggressors in this instance, and thousands of Christians were killed during a period resolved only through French diplomacy, Turkish aid and Algerian sympathy

Napoleon III reacted by sighing that once he used to say ‘avec Lord Palmerston on peut faire les grandes choses’ but now he seemed determined to prevent him doing anything at all

The most bizarre was that Napoleon III was looking for the nephew of Marie Cantillon, a man who had attempted to assassinate the Duke of Wellington in Paris in 1818, to pay him money Napoléon I had bequeathed Cantillon in his recently published will

Napoleon III’s attempt to set up a European monarchy in Mexico was his only independent action undertaken in the 1860s to meet with Palmerston’s general approval, but only for what the scheme potentially meant for British trade

Following military defeat by Prussia and deposition by Parisian ideologues in 1870, Napoleon III died in England on January 9th, 1873.

Gladstone soon came to terms with the new Third French Republic, and the rest of Europe again took Britain’s lead in officially recognising the new French regime

The Napoleonic wars did not end at Waterloo, but in Paris in the hands of Napoleon III. Punch stated why on January 18th, 1873

The war in Spain, which began in 1705, continued until the end of 1710. By then the Bourbon forces had defeated the second Allied attempt to establish Charles III in Madrid.

Twice Philip V had to abandon his capital precipitately, and once Charles III actually entered Madrid in triumph

When Peterborough reached Lisbon, he concerted plans with Charles III and Prince George of Hesse, fresh from his heroic defence of Gibraltar.

Charles III and his German ministers seized this opportunity to leave Portugal where it seemed unlikely that anything would be achieved, since the Portuguese were remarkably reluctant to take the offensive against the Bourbon forces

The first landing on Bourbon territory took place at Altea, where the local population flocked to recognize the new King of Spain

Though many citizens were said to be favourably disposed towards the Austrian cause, the Governor, Velasco, remained loyal to Philip V

Certainly, the King and his ministers believed the Earl had deceived them as to his real intentions

Pressure from Charles III, Hesse and Shovell, seemed to have some effect, and a plan to re-embark for Italy was dropped. Instead, “my Lord Peterborough hath been at last disposed to offer to the King, for an expedient, the march to Tarragona, and from thence to extend our quarters to Tortosa, and even into Valencia; which the King willingly accepted, as the only hope left for him that might conduct him to the throne.

On September 11th, it had been unanimously decided to march to Tarragona, yet on the 13th a small Allied force attacked the citadel of Montjuich, a decision that was to result in the capture of Barcelona and almost placed Charles III on the throne of Spain

the Prince of Hesse went thither as a volunteer

Peterborough had another piece of luck when the Marquis de Risburg, on his way to Montjuich with 3,000 reinforcements from Barcelona, questioned Colonel Allan and the other prisoners who were being escorted from the citadel to the city

The surviving 300 defenders quickly surrendered and Colonel Southwell, with the consent of the King, was made Governor of Montjuich as a reward for his services in capturing it

There appeared no possibility of relief and Velasco feared the horrors of a sack and the hostility of the populace, who were disposed to recognize Charles III

The Allies were given an enthusiastic welcome by the citizens of Barcelona and, indeed, many of the garrison volunteered to serve under Charles III. On October 23rd, the Austrian claimant made his formal entry into the city and, amid great rejoicing, was proclaimed King of Spain. The submission of the rest of Catalonia, except Rosas in the far north, quickly followed and the leading cities of Gerona, Tarragona, Tortosa and Lerida were either seized by the Miquelets or spontaneously declared their support for the Austrian cause

Charles III wrote to Queen Anne praising the conduct of Peterborough, while the Earl declared his debt to all the members of the expedition.

His gallantry and audacity were to win Valencia for Charles III

When James returned from Ireland in the summer of 1690 he was intent on preparing an invasion of England across the Channel from Normandy. Energetically supported by the leading Jacobites in exile, his negotiations with Louis XIV resulted in the major Franco-Jacobite invasion attempt of June 1692

James calculated, correctly, that these three ingredients would stimulate loyalty and attract visitors to his Court – whether Jacobites already in exile, others impatiently awaiting his return to England, or the many French courtiers who, like Louis XIV himself, regularly made the short journey from Versailles to Saint-Germain

James’s optimism remained with him throughout the period 1690-92, particularly when his able and devoted Secretary of State, the Earl of Melfort, rejoined him from a lengthy embassy to Rome at the end of 1691

He wrote to Louis XIV, blaming himself for bringing bad luck to the French fleet and offering to leave France, so that Louis’ military and naval successes could be resumed. The King of France kindly rejected his offer

Religious nonconformity had been illegal in France since the revocation of the Edict of Nantes in 1685, so James had to be cautious. He knew perfectly well that Louis had strong feelings on the subject, and that he had refused to allow Anglican and other Protestant services to be held openly, even within the Château de Saint-Germain

The disappointment which James  had experienced in 1692 was repeated in 1696. At the end of February, James left Saint-Germain and travelled to Calais, where an army had been assembled to invade England

The abortive Assassination Plot, an unauthorised attempt by certain Jacobites to break the deadlock by killing William III, resulted in the cancellation of the planned invasion and James’s return (his third) to Saint-Germain

William III used Louis’ recognition of James III as de jure king of England to renew his war with France, but it was no more than a pretext. All English kings, including William himself, claimed to be the de jure kings of France. During the 1690s, James II had been admitted as a Canon of Tours Cathedral because that was a privilege claimed by the English kings as de jure Counts of Anjou

James II decided to establish in the Chapel Royal at Saint-Germain the devotion known as Bona Morte, a confraternity of people who would meet together to contemplate the Passion of Christ

These medals were intended to remind people that his son was the de jure Prince of Wales, and that one day he would unavoidably become King James III

James wanted to be absolutely sure that Louis XIV would recognise his son as James III when he was dead. He need not have worried. Recognition was in no sense contrary to the Treaty of Ryswick, and Louis already knew that it was his religious duty to recognise the legitimate succession

Louis would become the guardian of both of James’s children, and would recognise his son as James III so long as he remained a Catholic. James II recorded Louis’ side of the agreement in a codicil to his will, dated March 5th

In this way it was already settled that Louis would eventually give the same treatment to James III as he was already giving to James II, not in September 1701 – an important point which all historians seem to have overlooked

At the end of the year he was distressed to discover that Louis XIV intended to lay off even more Irish troops and wrote unsuccessfully to dissuade him

The letter contained some confidential comments, as one might expect between two brothers, about the Jacobite sympathies of various Scottish noblemen and the chances of persuading France to resume its support for James II’s claims to the British thrones

All that remained was to remind the prince repeatedly that he must continue to be a Catholic if he was to retain and deserve the support of Louis XIV. James finally died on September 16th. Louis’ recognition of James III, as we have seen, had been arranged long before it finally came into effect

It is extraordinary that the last years of any British king, and particularly one whose life is quite well documented, should have received such little attention from generations of British historians

When England terminated the Treaty of Ryswick by declaring war on France in 1702, Louis XIV was able to resume the support of the Stuarts which he could not do while the Treaty remained in force

The circumstances of his death make James II an ideal subject for the study of royal DNA. His remains are more accessible than those of any other British monarch, and thus allow us to determine definitely, one way or the other, if the porphyria gene which was passed down by Mary, Queen of Scots through James I to his daughter Elizabeth, the ‘Winter Queen’ (and from her to the Hanoverians and their descendants today) was also transmitted by Charles I to the later Stuarts, including James III and Bonnie Prince Charlie.

Despite its demographic growth, it remained throughout the old regime period a court city, dominated by the king's household and government and their interests, as well as by the courtiers and other nobles and commoners attracted by the prospect of jobs, pensions, good marriages and high status

The threat this implied to order inspired some of the most significant of the reforms undertaken under Charles III

Not surprisingly, when Charles III -who had lived in Italy since 1731 as Duke of Parma and, from 1734 to 1759, as the first Bourbon king of Naples - arrived in his capital for the first time since he left it as a young boy, he was depressed by almost all that he saw. His determination to impose change provided a major impetus for the coming reforms

To Charles III and his ministers they seemed unworthy of the greatness of the Spanish imperial monarchy. Equally significant, they seemed to reinforce too strongly the presence of the church in an era in which enlightened thought set out to undermine baroque religiosity and clerical influence in secular life

Madrid had only been Spain's capital since 1561, when Philip II made what had been a town of purely secondary importance the political centre of his empire

But the characteristics which most typified Enlightenment reform in Spain were - apart from the heavy the arts as means of improvement -the impetus it received from Charles III and most of his ministers and the significant role played by some noblemen

Only during the reaction of the 1790s against the excesses of the French Revolution did most progressive thinkers find themselves effectively hedged in by the ministers and inquisitors of the new king, Charles IV (1788-1808). Under Charles HI, however, the king and his family, his ministers, sundry aristocrats in Madrid and elsewhere, many clerics and royal officials and some men and women of the professional and commercial middle classes harboured reformist ideas and patronised broadly enlightened artists and writers

This culture of the wealthy, enlightened elite, so heavily gallicised and secular-minded, was increasingly alienated from the ordinary people of Madrid, as well as the more traditionalist middle and upper ranks who chose to play no role in enlightened society

High food prices and the shortage of necessities could easily spark riots, as they did in the spring of 1766. The so-called Esquilache uprising, named after the Sicilian-born minister who was a principal target of the crowd's anger, spread from Madrid to many cities across Spain

The Manzanares was canalised and the Municipal Charity Committee, devised by Armona, was so successful that Charles III ordered similar bodies to be set up elsewhere. Free primary schools, essentially vocational, were established in each neighbourhood

Charles III, who had added numerous important buildings to Naples and nearby towns during his years as king there, sought from his first months in Spain to enhance his new capital

Travellers describing the capital in the 1770s and 1780s were impressed by its well lit, clean and impeccably paved streets; by the Paseo del Prado, which became one of Europe's finest thoroughfares; and by most of the structures Charles III had had built

Adolf Fredrik, Gustav III’s father, was described by one English contemporary as having ‘the title of king, with hardly the privileges of a subject’. Unlike his British counterpart George II, he had no power to summon or dissolve his parliament.

all radical improvements in national character take place during the severest wars’. Russia, having annexed the Crimea, had embarked on a titanic struggle with the Ottoman Empire which was absorbing stupendous quantities of manpower and treasure. At the beginning of 1788 he began making plans to attack Russia from the rear.

The new constitution that Gustav now promulgated, in place of that of 1720-72, brought Sweden more into line with contemporary Britain.

The main difference between the British and Swedish systems was that, whereas in Britain the monarch’s executive power was in practice delegated to ministers more industrious, more  proficient and, for the most part,  more intellectually gifted than their royal master, in Sweden it was Gustav III himself who was indisputably in day to day charge

No other of the Enlightened Despots was more fond than Gustav of the time-wasting rituals of court life, the levées, formal audiences and ceremonial entries and exits.

Whereas Napoleon, in his coup d’etat of 19e Brumaire 1799 broke down and began mumbling in front of the popular assembly he was trying to overawe, Gustav III easily faced down his opponents in the Riksdag

Gustav III may well have held a record among monarchs prior to the nineteenth century for the number of other crowned heads he met. What Louis XV and Louis XVI of France or Ferdinand IV of Naples thought of him is uncertain, though none of these Bourbons were exactly noted for their insight into character. Pope Pius VI pretended to be delighted with Gustav (the first Protestant monarch ever to meet a pope) and made him a Knight of the Golden Spur. The other Enlightened Despots, Frederick the Great, Catherine the Great and Joseph II, agreed in thinking Gustav charming in a wearying sort of way, and faintly ridiculous. Leopold II, Joseph II’s brother and successor, perhaps the ablest politician among the Enlightened Despots – he was still only Grand Duke of Tuscany when Gustav met him

the Swedish king was a positive menace with his incessant scheming and readiness to interfere in other governments’ affairs

Gustav was an unimpressive figure physically, weedy and foppish, and slightly lame since birth, but when he addressed the members of the Riksdag he made them flinch with his phrases of masterful contempt

Gustav found himself far from his capital, stuck with an army that would not obey him. He was rescued  by the Danish government declaring war on him. Hurrying back to Sweden, Gustav rode to Gothenburg, 250 miles cross country in forty-eight hours – the last sixty miles quite alone and on borrowed farm horses, in blinding hailstorms – to rally the defences of the city against the invading Danes

The senior Swedish officers rejected all the courses of action proposed by Gustav and his latest discovery, William Sidney Smith, a British naval captain who had turned up without the permission of his own government; they even, according to Smith, talked of ‘proposing terms of Capitulation independent of the King’.

Catherine, still preoccupied with the war with Turkey, was glad to patch up a compromise peace

While the Stockholm crowds stood outside cheering him, Gustav confronted the chamber of nobles with a new constitution, and when they howled it down he coolly ordered the secretary of the chamber to record their vote as yes: a piece of blatant illegality combined with intimidation that anticipates the tactics of twentieth-century dictators. In fact, apart from giving the King the power to make war without the Riksdag’s consent, the new constitution marked little advance on that of 1772

Eleven weeks after Gustav rammed his new constitution down the throats of the nobles, the Estates General met at Versailles and by the time of the peace settlement with Russia the French ancien régime was well on the way to dissolution.

I cannot allow that it is right to support rebels against their Lawful King

Despite the fact that Sweden was virtually bankrupt in the aftermath of the Russian war he now offered to land 16,000 Swedish and 8,000 Russian troops at Ostend, in Austrian territory, and to march on Paris to overthrow the Constituent Assembly, with the support of an Austrian army advancing from the Rhine. In June 1791 he went to Aachen and was greeted there as a saviour by the French royalist exiles. While he was there Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette made their bid to escape from Paris

Marie Antoinette’s brother Leopold, who had succeeded Joseph II as Holy Roman Emperor and ruler of Austria the year before, was enraged by Gustav’s interference: there were some too, including Gustav’s uncle Henry of Prussia, who believed that his schemes for an armed intervention in France were merely a cover for a secret plan to seize Norway from the Danes

On March 1st, 1792, Leopold died – poisoned, it is said, by an aphrodisiac of his own concoction – but Gustav was destined never to learn that there was no longer any challenge to his self-appointed role as leader of the monarchist opposition to the French Revolution

Gustav III was only forty-six when he died. That was at least eight years older than the most brilliant of his predecessors on the Swedish throne, Gustav II Adolf, Karl X and Karl XII – and if he had lived a normal span he would still have been king at the time of Waterloo.

The economic weakness of his country, the inveterate opposition of the social class that elsewhere might have been a king’s chief support, and the increasing influence of the revolutionary ferment in France may have meant that, even if he had lived, he would not have been able to go as far as he dreamed: he is one of the great might-have-beens of history.

The victory of John I may be regarded as a triumph of the national spirit over the feudal attachment to established order. Because much of the older nobility sided with Castile, John rewarded his followers at their expense and the crown’s. Meanwhile, commerce prospered, and the marriage of John’s daughter Isabella to Philip III (the Good) of Burgundy was to be followed by the growth of close trading relations between Portugal and Philip’s county of Flanders.

In 1437, during the short reign of John’s eldest son, Edward (Duarte; 1433–38), an unsuccessful attempt to conquer Tangier was made by John’s third son, Prince Henry the Navigator, and his younger brother Ferdinand (who was captured by the Moors and died, still unransomed, in 1443). Edward’s son Afonso V (1438–81) was still a child when Edward died, and Edward’s brother Pedro, duke of Coimbra (Dom Pedro), had himself made regent (1440) instead of the widow, Leonor of Aragon.

Having married Joan, daughter of Henry IV of Castile, Afonso laid claim to the Castilian throne and became involved in a lengthy struggle with Ferdinand and Isabella in the region of Zamora and Toro, where he was defeated in 1476. He then sailed to France in a failed attempt to enlist the support of Louis XI, and on his return he concluded with Castile the Treaty of Alcáçovas (1479), abandoning the claims of his wife. Afonso never recovered from his reverse, and during his last years his son John administered the kingdom.

John II (1481–95) was as cautious, firm, and jealous of royal power as his father had been openhanded and negligent.

his forces departed in June 1578 and on August 4 were utterly destroyed by the Moors in the Battle of the Three Kings near Alcazarquivir (Ksar el-Kebir). Sebastian and some 8,000 of his forces were killed, some 15,000 were captured, and only a handful escaped.

As a condition of his marriage to Isabella, Manuel was required to “purify” Portugal of Jews. After Jews were expelled from Spain in 1492, John II had admitted many Jewish refugees; he had taxed the Jews heavily but was also to supply ships for them to leave Portugal.

If Manuel failed to realize his dream of ruling Spain, his son John III (1521–57) lacked the power to resist Castilian influence.

In 1529 the settlement by the Treaty of Zaragoza (Saragossa) of a dispute over the possession of the Moluccas (an island group part of present-day Indonesia) removed an obstacle to Portuguese-Spanish understanding, and the line dividing Portuguese and Spanish interests in the New World (established by the Treaty of Tordesillas) was matched by a similar line in the Pacific.

John III was succeeded by his grandson Sebastian (1557–78), then only three years old. As a child Sebastian became obsessed with the idea of a Crusade against Morocco.

Predeceased by his legitimate son, John II was succeeded by his cousin the duke of Beja, as Manuel I (1495–1521), known as “the Fortunate.” Manuel, who assumed the title of “Lord of the Conquest, Navigation, and Commerce of India, Ethiopia, Arabia, and Persia,” inherited, because of the work of John II, a firmly established autocratic monarchy and a rapidly expanding overseas empire. Drawn toward Spain by the common need to defend their overseas interests as defined by the Treaty of Tordesillas (1494), Manuel nourished the hope that the whole peninsula could be united under the house of Aviz; to that end he married Isabella, eldest daughter of Ferdinand and Isabella. However, she died in 1498 while giving birth to a son, Miguel da Paz. This child, recognized as heir to Portugal, Castile, and Aragon, died in infancy. Manuel then married Isabella’s sister Maria (died 1517) and eventually Eleanor, sister of the emperor Charles V.

Sebastian was succeeded by his great-uncle, Cardinal Henry (1578–80), a brother of John III. His age and celibacy made it certain that the Portuguese throne would soon pass from the direct line of Aviz. Philip II of Spain, nephew of John III and husband (by his first marriage) of John’s daughter Maria

Henry was the sixth child and fourth son of Henry II and Catherine de’ Medici

France had been embroiled in a civil war between the crown and its Protestant or Huguenot subjects since 1562. In 1567 Henry took command of the royal army

He travelled to Poland with an entourage, but during the summer of 1574 he was informed of the death of his brother, Charles IX. He thus became king of both France and Poland

Without so much as bidding adieu to his Polish subjects, Henry made haste to  return to France by way of Austria and northern Italy

In February 1575 he married Louise de Vaudémont, a princess of the House of Lorraine, whose beauty had dazzled him on the eve of his departure for Poland

The situation had been aggravated by the accidental death of Henry II in 1559, which had left the kingdom in the hands of his widow, Catherine de’ Medici, and her young sons. As queen mother under Francis II, then as regent under Charles IX

In the absence of Henry begetting a son, the heir to the throne was his brother-in-law Henry of Navarre (1553-1610), who, as a Huguenot, was unacceptable to the Catholic majority in France. In 1576, a group of cities headed by Paris had formed an armed association, called the Catholic League, aimed at excluding Navarre from the throne. It chose Charles, cardinal of Bourbon,

As king, Henry III was apparently well-intentioned towards his subjects regardless of their faith. As he returned to Lyon from Poland in 1574, he declared a wish to be at peace with them all, and he seemed better equipped than his recent predecessors to succeed. He was probably the most intellectually gifted of the later Valois kings

The task of ruling France that the king faced in 1574 was far from easy, as so much hatred had arisen between Catholics and Huguenots

The court’s extravagance at a time of severe economic crisis incurred much criticism

He believed that his authority would be enhanced by distancing himself from his subjects

Although Henry III valued privacy, he liked to surround himself with a select group of intimate friends, mostly men of his own generation who came to be known as mignons

Whereas Charles IX had taken part in 109 civic entries during his ‘Grand Tour of France’ in 1564-66, Henry had only four in his entire reign

The king of France is so familiar with his subjects that he treats them all as his companions and no one is ever excluded from his presence, so that even lackeys of the lower sort are bold enough to wish to enter his privy chamber in order to see all that is going on there and to hear all that is being said… This familiarity, if it makes the nation insolent and arrogant, nevertheless inspires love, devotion and loyalty to its prince.

The supreme irony of Henry III’s reign was his failure to win over the capital by his presence

aloofness, extravagance and eccentricity

Believing Guise to be plotting a coup d’etat, Henry decided to exterminate him. Having lured the duke to his antechamber at Blois, the king stood by as his guards hacked Guise to death

This cold-blooded murder was by far Henry’s biggest blunder

Henry III’s only hope of regaining control of the capital was to join forces with  his appointed heir, the Huguenot leader, Henry of Navarre

Henry III on his deathbed appointing Navarre as his successor

Neither intellect nor good intentions had been sufficient to gain Henry III the love of his subjects. His life had been a tragedy

Once it was clear to Charles that British terms were nonnegotiable, then the Bourbon Family Compact of 1761, a mutual-defense treaty with France, was a piece of realpolitik, signed by the “Anglophile” Ricardo Wall.

The consequence of such an alliance was involvement in the Seven Years’ War—too late to save France.

The Treaty of Paris (1763) concluded the Seven Years’ War and destroyed France as an American power.

The Family Compact was therefore an immediate military failure, and it was only the revolt of the North American colonies against Britain that enabled Spain to recover the ground it had lost; the successful alliance with France to aid the colonists resulted in the Treaty of Versailles (1783), which gave back Sacramento, the two Floridas, and Minorca.

In 1788 Charles III, who had been the “nerve” of reform in the sense that he loyally supported able ministers, was succeeded by his son, Charles IV, a weak, amiable man dominated by a lascivious wife, María Luisa.

The volume of Spanish goods in the American trade increased 10-fold in 10 years, prompting British concern at the Spanish revival.

The problems of imperial defense were thus temporarily solved by British weakness after 1765. The positive side of Charles III’s imperial policy was an attempt to create an efficiently administered colonial empire that would provide the crown with increased revenues and with a closed market for the exports of an expanding Spanish economy, a program known as the “Bourbon Reforms.”

The main attack of the regalists fell on the Jesuit order.

The question arises of the extent to which the policies of Charles III resulted from the acceptance by his servants of the precepts of the Enlightenment.

When the French Revolution exposed the dangers of progressive thought, the traditionalist cause was immensely strengthened, and the Inquisition appeared to the crown itself to be a useful instrument to control the spread of dangerous ideas

the French revolutionary and Napoleonic wars put unbearable pressures on a weak power. Reform was now dangerous. Neutrality was impossible; alliance with either France or the anti-revolutionary coalitions engineered by Britain proved equally disastrous

Spain had no alternative but to declare war on France after the execution of Louis XVI in 1793. The war was popular but disastrous; in 1794 the French armies invaded Spain, taking Bilbao, San Sebastián (Donostia–San Sebastián), and Figueres (Figueras).

Napoleon had lost all faith in Godoy and Spain as an ally; the “dirty intrigues” of Ferdinand, prince of Asturias and heir to the throne, against his father and Godoy led Napoleon to consider drastic intervention in Spanish affairs

compelled the abdication of Charles IV and the dismissal of Godoy. Napoleon summoned both the old king and Ferdinand VII to Bayonne, where both were compelled to abdicate. The Spanish throne was then offered to Joseph Bonaparte, Napoleon’s brother.

Philip’s failures were proving costly in money and political support.

Edward III renounced his homage and again laid claim to the crown of France, starting the period of conflict that would come to be known as the Hundred Years’ War.

But that prospect, like the war itself, evaporated when the Black Death struck Europe late in 1347, destroying life, fiscal resources, and resolve for several years thereafter.

Austria refused to recognize Philip, a Bourbon

a Bourbon king in Spain would disrupt the balance of power in Europe in favour of French hegemony

Spain under a Bourbon king as a political and commercial appendage of France

He wished to regenerate and strengthen his ally by a modern centralized administration

the allied armies of Britain and Austria invaded Spain in order to drive out Philip V and establish the “Austrian” candidate, the archduke Charles (later the Holy Roman emperor Charles VI), on the throne

An efficient administration had to be created in order to extract resources from Spain for the war effort and thus relieve pressure on the French treasury

Castile was ferociously loyal to the new dynasty throughout the war. The support of Castile and of France (until 1711) enabled Philip V to survive severe defeats

Spanish lawyer-administrators such as Melchor de Macanaz

They were supported by the queen, María Luisa of Savoy

The opponents of reform were those who suffered by it

Catalonia, Aragon, and Valencia

a Castilian centralizing imposition in conflict with the local privileges, or fueros

the church, whose position was threatened by the ferocious and doctrinaire regalism of Macanaz

The disaffection of all these elements easily turned into opposition to Philip V as king

war taxation and war levies drove Catalonia and Aragon to revolt

When Philip V tried to attack Catalonia through Aragon, the Aragonese, in the name of their fueros, revolted against the passage of Castilian troops

When the archbishop of Valencia resisted attempts to make priests of doubtful loyalty appear before civil courts, the regalism of Macanaz was given full course

This was the last direct triumph of the reformers. With the death of Queen María Luisa in 1714

Macanaz was condemned by the Inquisition

the fueros were abolished and Catalonia was integrated into Spain

The “Italian” tendency was influenced by Philip V’s second wife, Isabella, and her desire to get Italian thrones for her sons.

The attempt to recover the possessions in Italy involved Spain in an unsuccessful war with Austria, which was now the great power in Italy

Nevertheless, Isabella’s persistence was rewarded when her son, the future King Charles III of Spain, became the duke of Parma in 1731 and king of Naples in 1733, relinquishing his claims to Parma

The “Italian” and “Atlantic” tendencies existed side by side in the late years of Philip V’s reign

It made possible an alliance of France and Spain against Austria, giving Isabella the opportunity to settle her second son, Philip, in an Italian duchy

Ferdinand VI (1746–59) was concerned with the domestic recovery of Spain rather than the extension of its power in Europe

the treaty merely strengthened Spain’s position in Italy when Philip became duke of Parma, Piacenza, and Guastalla. The Atlantic tendency became dominant under Ferdinand VI

Because Britain was Spain’s most significant enemy in the Americas (as Austria had been in Italy), Spain’s “natural” ally was France

hence a series of family pacts with France in 1733 and 1743

The American interest was reflected in increased trade

Charles III, Ferdinand’s successor, implemented dramatic reforms that followed along the path set by Ferdinand.

Rivalries within the royal family lay at the heart of English politics between the reigns of Edward III (1327-77) and Henry VII (1485-1509), not least the Wars of the Roses. This was also the case in France and Scotland in the second half of the sixteenth century. The Habsburgs provide the exception: with only a few lapses, they were almost the model of family loyalty

As an heir of Henry VII, Mary could not challenge the legitimacy of the Tudor line as a whole

If Anne Boleyn was as promiscuous as was charged, then Henry VIII’s paternity was in doubt

Illegitimacy was used to justify the removal of Elizabeth and Mary from the succession in Edward VI’s settlement of the crown on Lady Jane Grey in 1553. This was of major significance. If the events of 1553 united Mary and Elizabeth in common defence of their rights as heirs to Henry VIII, they also brought the Queen of Scots to the fore as a rival to both. The basis of Mary Stuart’s claim from this point on was that she was the one descendent of Henry VII untainted by either illegitimacy or heresy

The Wars of the Roses effectively destroyed the male members of the House of Lancaster (the descendants of John of Gaunt) and Henry VII and Henry VIII completed the process. By Edward VI’s death in 1553 all the main claimants to the English crown were women, and such men as had a claim owed it to a female descent. This was the case with Henry VII himself, and moreover his mother (Lady Margaret Beaufort) was descended from John of Gaunt’s illegitimate family

Philip of Spain had a strong claim as descendant of the legitimate daughters of Gaunt’s second marriage

The events of 1553 made Elizabeth’s place in the succession an international issue.

Elizabeth’s ability to turn to France on her accession was hampered by Mary Stuart’s position as Dauphine and, after July 1559, Queen of France. Until her death in 1587, Mary was the pole around which Elizabeth’s foreign policy revolved

The furthest concession Elizabeth appears to have made to Mary was to offer a new settlement that would have circumvented the treaty of Edinburgh in the months following James VI’s birth in June 1566.

The revelation of Mary’s understanding with Philip II and their plans for Elizabeth’s deposition marked the next stage in Elizabeth’s foreign relations

Elizabeth’s alienation from Philip also inspired a reconciliation with France that effectively lasted for the rest of her reign

Elizabeth’s hesitation over the Netherlands was overcome by the arrival of Don Juan of Austria as the new Governor General in late 1576

Throughout the ensuing negotiations she made no secret of the fact that what she really wanted was an alliance with Henry III. What she could not control was the decision of William of Orange in the winter of 1579-80 (partly on the strength of the marriage negotiations) to break with Spain and offer the lordship of the Netherlands to Anjou

Enterprise of England she could not allow Philip II to regain the Netherlands, whatever Henry III did

She now had the opportunity to form a new relationship in defence of his claim to the succession

Navarre was heir to the childless Henry III under the Salic Law, but bitterly opposed on account of his religion. This – it was now appreciated in England – was something that Henry III was trying to circumvent. In 1589 the two kings allied and following Henry III’s assassination in July, Navarre succeeded him as Henry IV

Throughout the 1590s, even if the war with Spain was not as successful as was occasionally hoped, defeat was not an issue

Henry IV may have converted and then made a separate peace with Philip II in 1598, but he remained an ally

If there was an ironic aspect to Elizabeth taking Mary’s place as James’s mother, this was also the case with Essex

However, Elizabeth, James and Henry formed a triumvirate of monarchs

She is a haughty woman, falling easily into rebuke, and above all when any speak of the king [Henry IV] whom she considers for a long time to have been greatly beholding to her

Philip II’s last years were embittered by disparaging comparisons

These last twenty-one years that the queen of England has spent in the service of the world will be the most outstanding known of in history

His religious devotion was accompanied by a blameless personal life and a chaste loyalty to the memory of his wife, Maria Amalia of Saxony, who died in 1760. On the other hand, he was so highly conscious of royal authority that he sometimes appeared more like a tyrant than an absolute monarch

Charles III improved the agencies of government through which the will of the crown could be imposed. He completed the process whereby individual ministers replaced the royal councils in the direction of affairs

He particularly resented the Jesuits, whose international organization and attachment to the papacy he regarded as an affront to his absolutism

But Charles’s opposition to papal jurisdiction in Spain also led him to curb the arbitrary powers of the Inquisition, while his desire for reform within the church caused him to appoint inquisitors general who preferred persuasion to force in ensuring religious conformity

Fearing that a British victory over France in the Seven Years’ War would upset the balance of colonial power, he signed the Family Compact with France—both countries were ruled by branches of the Bourbon family—in August 1761

By the end of his reign, Spain had abandoned its old commercial restrictions and, while still excluding foreigners, had opened up the entire empire to a commerce in which all its subjects and all its main ports could partake

Within these limits he led his country in a cultural and economic revival, and, when he died, he left Spain more prosperous than he had found it

After Walpole’s fall over his handling of the war with Spain in 1742, which George II had very much opposed, the King backed John, Lord Carteret only to be forced to part with him twice: in 1744 and 1746

The Hanoverian ambitions of both kings made their British ministries vulnerable to domestic criticism and Hanover itself to foreign attack, but they learned, however reluctantly, to accept the limitations of their position.

As the monarch remained the ultimate political authority, his court remained the political centre, since it provided access to him

While it is true that George II’s closet was not as powerful as Henry VIII’s privy chamber, the insignificance of the Hanoverian Court has been overdone.

George I and George II both detested the Tories as the party whose ministry had negotiated the Peace of Utrecht in 1713, which ended the War of the Spanish Succession (in which George II had fought), and abandoned Britain’s allies, including Hanover. George I and George II both suspected the Tories of Jacobite inclinations and were alienated by Tory opposition to their commitments to Continental power politics

This forced both kings to turn to the Whigs, limiting their ability to break away in the event of a dispute. The rulers had to make concessions in ministerial and policy choices. George I fell out with Walpole and his brother-in-law and political ally, Charles Viscount Townshend, in 1717 when the ministers opposed his Baltic policy and supported his son, George, Prince of Wales, in the first of those hardy perennials of Hanoverian royal politics, a clash between monarch and heir

Similarly, George II came to the throne in 1727 determined to part with Walpole, but he swiftly changed his mind when he realised that it was expedient to keep the minister if he wanted to enjoy parliamentary support, have the public finances satisfactorily managed, and retain the stability of Britain’s alliance system

Instead, much of the credit for Britain’s modern constitutional monarchy rests with those who redefined the royal position between 1689 and 1707, and then made it work over the following half-century

Cumberland’s eventually successful generalship at Culloden serves as a reminder of the extent to which Britain had to be fought for from 1688, just as Continental dynasties such as the Bourbons in Spain in 1704-15 had to fight to establish themselves in succession wars

The role of the Crown was still central. However constrained and affected by political exigencies, monarchs chose ministers. General Thomas Erle, a long-standing MP, wrote in 1717, ‘The King is certainly master of choosing who he thinks fit to employ’.

If monarchs needed to appoint and, if necessary, sustain a ministry that could get government business through Parliament, this was a shifting compromise, and one subject to contingency and the play of personality

Walpole was also expected to find money for George’s female German connections, and to spend time as a courtier, attending on the royal family, as on July 3rd, 1724, when he was present at George I’s review of the Foot Guards in Hyde Park. Similarly, Newcastle and even Pitt had, at least in part, to respond to George II’s interests and views

Both kings were pragmatists, who did not have an agenda for Britain, other than helping Hanover. In this they present a contrast with George III

Neither man sought governmental changes akin to those introduced by Peter the Great or by Frederick William I of Prussia. Neither George had pretensions to mimic the lifestyle of Louis XIV or the Emperor Charles VI. Instead, they presented themselves in a relatively modest fashion, although both men were quite prepared to be prodded into levées, ceremonies and other public appearances

George II had the Guards’ regimental reports and returns sent to him personally every week, and, when he reviewed his troops he did so with great attention to detail

Strong Lutherans, George I and George II were ready to conform to the Church of England. Although they sponsored a number of bishops whose beliefs were regarded as heterodox, they were not seen as threats to the Church of England as compared to that presented by the Catholic Stuarts

Neither George I nor his son did much to win popularity for the new order (certainly far less than George III was to do), but, far more crucially, the extent to which they actively sapped consent was limited. This was crucial when there was a rival dynasty in the shape of the Stuarts, with ‘James III’ a claimant throughout both reigns

Ultimately George I and George II survived because they displayed more stability, and less panic, in a crisis than James II and VII had shown in 1688

Both rulers also sought to counter Hanoverian vulnerability to attack from France or Prussia.

Georges I and II benefited from the degree to which, while not popular, they were at least acceptable

By the close of George II’s reign, Britain had smashed the French navy and taken much of the French empire, becoming the dominant European power in South Asia and North America

International comparisons are helpful. In Sweden in 1772, Gustavus III brought to an end the ‘Age of Liberty’.

Hereditary monarchy placed less emphasis on individual ability than did its ‘meritocratic’ counterpart, whether electoral (kings of Poland) or dictatorial (Cromwell, Napoleon); but it had an important advantage in the form of greater continuity and therefore stability

his form was to prove a durable one, and it provided a means to choose, an agreed method of succession, and a way to produce individuals of apparent merit. This system, however, had only been  devised in response to the unwanted breakdown of rule by the British Crown. Within Britain no such expedient was necessary, nor appeared so. The world of Georges I and II was one in which republicanism found little favour in Britain

Defeated at Stångebro (1598), Sigismund was deposed the following year and replaced by Charles as virtual ruler of Sweden.

By playing on the nobles’ fear of absolutist rule by an absentee monarch, Charles won their support in forcing Sigismund to accept the decisions of the Convention of Uppsala and to recognize Charles as regent in conjunction with the nobles’ state council.

Catholic Sigismund also succeeded to the Swedish throne in 1592

He was declared king in 1604

Charles’s overthrow of Sigismund led to hostilities with Poland

Charles’s forces then intervened in Russia, attempting to prevent a Polish conquest of the country and to install his son Gustavus (later king of Sweden as Gustav II Adolf) as ruler.

tried to rule by a diet subordinated to his will and a system of terror

The long reign of his successor, Sigismund III Vasa (1587–1632), raised hopes of a union with Sweden that would strengthen Poland’s standing in the north.

The victory at Klushino in 1610 by Hetman Stanisław Zółkiewski resulted in a Polish occupation of Moscow and the election by Moscow’s boyars of Sigismund’s son Władysław as tsar. Sigismund’s veto wasted this opportunity and instead left a residue of Russian hatred of Poland.

Although the royal forces triumphed in battle, both the king and the reformers were losers in the political realm to the magnates posing as defenders of freedom.

Transferred as a result of the Union of Lublin from the grand duchy of Lithuania to the more ethnically homogeneous Crown, Ukraine was “colonized” by both Polish and Ukrainian great nobles.

A bigoted Roman Catholic, Henry was rigorous in the repression of Protestantism, which was approaching the zenith of its power in France.

In foreign affairs Henry continued his father’s warfare against the Holy Roman emperor Charles V

He left four sons by his marriage to Catherine de Médicis: the future kings Francis II, Charles IX, and Henry III and François

Claude, who married Charles III the Great, Duke of Lorraine

Margaret, who married Henry of Navarre (the future Henry IV)

who had been their king (1704–09) when the Swedes had temporarily forced Augustus II to be deposed and who also had become connected to France via the marriage of his daughter Marie to King Louis XV

Lombardy, which remained a Habsburg possession

Don Carlos, the Spanish infante, led a Spanish army of 40,000 across Tuscany and the Papal States to Naples, defeated the Austrians at Bitonto (May 25, 1734), conquered Sicily, and was crowned king of Naples and Sicily as Charles III.

It provided for Augustus to remain king of Poland. In addition, Don Carlos was to retain Naples-Sicily but had to give Austria both Parma and Piacenza, which he had inherited in 1731,

But when a Russian army of 30,000 approached Warsaw, Leszczyński fled to Gdańsk, and another sejm of 3,000 delegates named Frederick Augustus as Poland’s new king, Augustus III (Oct. 5, 1733). France consequently formed anti-Habsburg alliances with Sardinia-Savoy (September 26) and Spain (November 7) and declared war on Austria (October 10)

Leszczyński renounced the crown

On Nov. 18, 1738, France and Austria signed the final Treaty of Vienna, in which the provisions of the preliminary agreement were confirmed and in which France also conditionally guaranteed the Pragmatic Sanction, by which Holy Roman emperor Charles VI named his daughter, the Austrian archduchess Maria Theresa, as the heiress to his Habsburg lands