The Fall of Spain and the Spanish Armada Today we are going to highlight how Spain’s ambition for Empire translated into a huge loss and how having too much silver can be a VERY bad thing…

A Powerful Spanish Empire has a new king, Phillip II of Spain:  Philip II is deeply religious (Catholic) and hard working, wants to unite all of Europe in one Empire that is Catholic…  Was very suspicious of most people and did not trust anyone, no alliances for him. On his own to unify all of Europe. Kind of hard to do, just sayin’.  When Portuguese king died without an heir, Philip seized Portugal for Spain which included what was left of its colonies in Africa, India, and the East Indies. Didn’t make him any friends  Spain was now even more powerful with colonies around the world and most of the wealth of the New World. England sees them as extremely dangerous and coming after them next! Spain has a new (not so friendly) King

 Each shipload of treasure brought into Spain was required to give the king between ¼ of cargo which allowed Spain to have army of over 50,000 soldiers, building for war…  Philip was a Defender of Catholicism by the Catholic Church, seen as the military leader of all Catholics.  Created the Spanish Armada in 1588 Huge Catholic fleet of Spanish warships, cost huge amounts of silver to do this, starts the economic problems for Spain. Plan was to punish Protestant England under Queen Elizabeth I, take their power and possibly colonies by invasion. Fleet was defeated by English tactics and by weather less than five yrs afterward. Armada was too expensive to rebuild, it was a huge loss to the Spanish. Result: Spain was seriously weakened by defeat of Spanish Armada but still had great wealth that would give Spain strength for a short while longer. The Spanish Armada and its Defeat

Philip II’s Spain vs. Elizabeth I’s England

The Spainish Empire would fall apart for 4 main reasons: 1)Inflation: a decline in value of money, increase in cost of goods.  Caused by a rise in population and new wealth, a rise in demand for goods allowed merchants to raise prices and people could afford it. Until they couldn’t.  Spain’s economy is destroyed by all the silver from the Americas. 2) Taxes:  Spain had expelled the Jews and Moors who were valuable artisans and business people (less collected in taxes) (Spanish Inquisition)  Spain’s nobles didn’t have to pay taxes, they made that rule themselves.   Tax burden fell to lower classes, which meant they stayed poor. Result: Spain never developed a middle class. Just rich and poor. Again. The Spanish Empire Weakens

3) Poor spending choices  Spanish cloth and manufactured goods were more expensive than those made elsewhere because of inflation.  Because the Spanish had so much wealth, imports were VERY expensive too. (Other countries want that silver=mercantilism) Spaniards purchased goods from France, England, Netherlands at a huge cost, and were spending money REALLY FAST.  Spain pays a huge amount for the Armada, which is gone in 5 yrs.   To pay for wars, Spanish kings borrowed from German and Italian bankers, loans were hugely expensive. ONLY MAKING IT WORSE! Result: Spanish wealth was not re-circulated within Spain, which allowed Spain’s neighbors to prosper. Most gold and silver that came in was shipped off to Germany and Italy to repay debts. Spain’s economy is crumbling. They were spending too much. The Spanish Empire Weakens

4) The Dutch Revolt (Independence of the Netherlands)  The Dutch revolt in Spanish controlled Netherlands, deciding they did not want Phillip II to be their king. This was unheard of at the time!  Dutch were Calvinists (Protestants) and Spain was Catholic, still all about religion.  Philip was enraged and raised taxes and sent troops in. Executed 1500 Protestants. This only made the Dutch more angry.  Dutch and Spanish fight for another 11 years and in 1579 the Dutch declared their independence.  Phillip II wanted to keep fighting, but the economy of Spain collapsed and they lost almost all their army. Because of the silver of the Americas, they allowed the Dutch to be independent. Result: Sets a dangerous prescient. (Something that others will see and do again and again) The Dutch have Enough: Revolution!

We see after the Dutch revolt against their sworn king, many other countries take notice and think about what that means. If you can say “NO” to a king and revolt, what does that mean for the countries that are having problems in Europe? Rulers now are going to have to deal with the possibility of having a revolt on their hands, and will take steps to try to make it so the country can not do without a king. The Dutch Revolt leads to the death of the all powerful monarchy. It doesn’t happen all at once, but it starts the idea that a king can be replaced or done away with completely. Result: Absolute monarchs would alter Europe’s future and eventually help bring about massive change such as the English, American, and French Revolutions. Revolution is now an option…