Skip to main content

Isabel de Farnesio Biography

Isabel de Farnesio

(Parma, present-day Italy, 1692-Aranjuez, Spain, 1766) Queen of Spain (1714-1746).Daughter of Edward III, Duke of Parma, in 1714 she became the second wife of Philip V.Endowed with great culture and undoubted attractiveness, despite suffering the consequences of smallpox, she knew how to win the king's will and impose his own criteria in court.Thus, he managed to exert great influence on Spanish politics: he removed pro-French elements from the court and sponsored the rise of Giulio Alberoni and Johan Willem Ripperdá.His foreign policy was centered, above all, in Italy, where he struggled to locate his children.In this way, Carlos (the future Carlos III of Spain) obtained Naples, and Felipe, Milan and Parma.After the death of her husband, she managed to maintain her influence in Italian politics, and came to exercise the Spanish regency when her stepson Fernando (Fernando VI) died without succession in 1759, waiting for her son Carlos to arrive from Naples to occupy the throne.

Isabel de Farnesio

Isabel de Farnesio was twenty-one years old when in 1714 she married Philip V by proxy in Parma.moved by sea to Spain, where he had to arrive by Alicante.But showing signs of initiative, he stopped in Genoa and decided to change his plans and travel by land, stopping to pay a visit in his French retirement to his aunt Doña Mariana de Neuburg, the widow of Carlos II of Spain.In Pau, in November, the two queens met.Later, in Pamplona, ​​Isabel de Farnesio would meet Alberoni.The king was waiting for her in Guadalajara and the hitherto very influential Marie-Anne de la Trémoille, princess of the Ursinos, came forward to Jadraque to welcome her.

On the night of December 23, at the old castle of Jadraque, the long-awaited meeting between the princess of the Ursinos and Isabel de Farnesio took place.It is not known what happened between the two ambitious women in their first and last interview that took place alone, but the end was stormy.According to the account of Louis de Rouvroy, Duc de Saint-Simon, "the queen immediately began to say offensive things, to shout, to call, to ask for the officers of the guard to come and to order Madame of the Ursinos, in an insulting way, to remove himself from their presence.The princess wanted to speak and defend herself from the reproaches she received; the queen, redoubling her fury and threats, began to shout to throw that crazy woman out of her presence and your home ".And so it was done immediately."At eleven o'clock at night, amid frightful snow, wind and cold," as the princess herself recalled, she was taken without further delay to the French border, with a strong armed escort.

That one abrupt and fulminating end had the immense power that the princess of the Ursinos had enjoyed in Spain during the crucial years of the beginning of the reign of Felipe V.Isabel de Farnesio was not willing to tolerate rivals.The Marquis of San Felipe attributed the decision to the queen's "ambition to rule", and Finance Minister Jean Orry wrote: "This action must be considered simply as the queen's decision to take advantage of the first opportunity to exercise her dominion.about the king."

Isabel de Farnesio left Jadraque for Guadalajara to meet Felipe V, who was waiting for her in the beautiful Plateresque palace of the Dukes of Infantado, impatient to celebrate Christmas Eve with his royal wife.As Saint-Simon wrote: "The king, having shaken hands with the queen, led her at once to the chapel, where the weddings were expeditiously ratified.From there to his room, where they immediately got into bed before six o'clock in the afternoon, so as not to get up except for the mass of the rooster ".

Felipe V was satisfied in everything with the provisions of his wife.The princess of the Ursinos dismissed, her misfortune dragged her collaborators.On February 7, 1715, Orry's mission at the head of the Hacienda ended.On the same day, Melchor Rafael de Macanaz was removed from office and sent into exile.Father Robinet was replaced as royal confessor by Father Daubenton.The only survivor of the fallen government was the Marquis de Grimaldo.

On the other hand, characters previously out of favor with the court regained their position, as happened with Cardinal Giudice, a friend of Alberoni.The cardinal took advantage of his new influence to take revenge on his old enemy.In August 1715 he ordered Macanaz to be prosecuted by the Inquisition, who was in exile in Paris.In October 1716 he was convicted and his property confiscated.The Macanaz trial was one of the most scandalous examples of the Inquisition's political use.If Macanaz's was an expressive case of how slippery power is, Giudice would soon experience again the fickleness of fortune.Giudice was exiled in 1717 and Macanaz remained outside of Spain until in 1748 he was ordered to return, but not to improve his lot, but to be imprisoned, until in 1760 he regained his freedom.

Felipe V had two obsessions, sex and religion.Giulio Alberoni expressed it with humor, affirming that the only thing the king needed was "a prie-dieu and a woman." The woman was first María Luisa Gabriela de Saboya and, from Christmas Eve 1714, Isabel de Farnesio.Felipe V gave himself to her without limit or measure.The French ambassador Saint-Aignon wrote in 1717: "The monarch is visibly destroying himself because of his excessive use of the queen.He is completely exhausted."

It was through this weakness of the king that the queen became powerful and influential, in the bedroom and in the kingdom.Isabel de Farnesio used pleasure in the service of her power design, of her ambition to command.But this control he exercised over the king, and through him over the power and government of the monarchy, to be even more effective, had to be exclusive, and thus he put into practice another typical device, isolating the monarch from all other possible influence..Queen Elizabeth, assisted by Giulio Alberoni, was also a master of the art of monopolizing Philip V, "keeping King Philip entirely to themselves and making him inaccessible to everyone else," as Saint-Simon observed.

This is how the king ruled in Spain and the queen in the king.Isabel de Farnesio, without possessing great political talent, enjoyed great power during the long years of her husband's reign.Energetic, willful, ambitious, her figure presides over half a century of the history of the Spanish monarchy.Queen Elizabeth had personality, but although some criticized her, others, like the Duc de Saint-Simon, who was a true expert on royalty, praised her: "She was really charming [...] with an air of grandeur and a majesty that they never left her."

Around the queen other characters influenced and participated in power.It was fundamental from 1715 Alberoni, who had the confidence of the queen and who acted as a true prime minister, with decisive influence on the orientation of Spanish foreign policy immediately after the treaty of Utrecht.Also important was the royal confessor, Father Daubenton, to whom the king constantly turned to consult him about his infinite religious scruples and also to ask him for advice on the most varied matters of state, because if in an absolute monarchy of divine right it is always difficult to distinguish the temporal realm of the spiritual realm, in the insecure and indecisive conscience of King Felipe V was almost impossible.

Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Hernando Tellez Biography

Hernando Téllez (Santafé de Bogotá, 1908-1966) Colombian writer and journalist.From a very young age, he showed his journalistic skills, as a contributor to the magazine Universidad directed by Germán Arciniegas, and as an assistant to Enrique Santos in El Tiempo . He was also deputy director of El Liberal and director of the magazine Semana .During the period between 1943 and 1944 he served as Colombian consul in Marseille and senator of the Republic, but he stood out above all for being one of the most complete writers of his time (he was a translator, commentator, short story writer, essayist and literary critic ). In his extensive essay work he dealt with issues of literature, society, politics and everyday life.Téllez was a poet of the essay, as well as profound; He was a great craftsman of the language, a teacher in a sober and effective handling of the language.He was a sensitive observer of daily life, an acute critic of the social and political life of the country...
Post a Comment
Read more

Iris Murdoch Biography

Iris Murdoch (Jean O.Bayley, Dublin, 1919-Oxford, 1999) English narrator and essayist.His childhood was spent in London.From 1938 to 1942 he studied philosophy and literature at Somerville College, Oxford where he learned Latin and Greek and modern languages.From 1948 to 1963 he taught philosophy at Oxford and between 1942 and 1944 he worked at the British Treasury and then in Brussels, at the United Nations. During the last part of his life he suffered from Alzheimer's disease.He wrote more than thirty novels, plays, and volumes of poetry.His first published book was Sartre, the romantic rationalist (1953), a study on the French philosopher and his system of ideas. Bajo la red (1954) was his first novel. Some novels of his first period, such as La campana ( The Bell , 1958) or The Red and the Green (1965), which takes place in the framework of the 1916 insurrection in Dublin, follow the historical and psychological tradition of the 19th century novel.Other works, o...
Post a Comment
Read more

Domingo Báñez Biography

Domingo Báñez (Valladolid, 1528-Medina del Campo, 1604) Spanish Dominican.He was a professor in Salamanca and confessor of Saint Teresa of Jesus (1561-1567), to whom he ordered the writing of The Way of Perfection .His views on effective grace pitted him against the Jesuit Luis de Molina.
Post a Comment
Read more

Harrison Ford Biography

Harrison Ford (Chicago, 1942) American film actor, one of the most charismatic faces in Hollywood in the 80's and 90's.Extraordinarily popular thanks to sagas like The War of the galaxies or Indiana Jones , is also an actor with deep technique and vast registers. Harrison Ford Harrison Ford made his first performances while studying at College, Wisconsin; after a brief stint in the theater, he moved to Hollywood, where he was hired first by the Columbia film company and then by Universal.He played supporting roles, mostly as cowboy , in various films from the late 1960s and on television series.His disappointment at the turn his career was taking led him away from Hollywood, and for a time he made a living as a carpenter. During those years he worked in television series such as The Virginian or Ironside , but his first appearance in the cinema was in Thief and lover (1966), by Bernard Girard.This was followed by other small roles, including that of the movie ...
Post a Comment
Read more

Josef Hoffmann Biography

Josef Hoffmann (Pirnitz, 1870-Vienna, 1956) Austrian architect, decorator and urban planner.He was a disciple of O.Wagner and participated, along with J.M.Olbrich and other architects, in the creation of the avant-garde movement of the Secession (1897).His work is characterized by the careful treatment of the surfaces achieved through geometric decorations; The Stoclet Palace in Brussels stands out for its calculated elegance of style (1905-1911).
Post a Comment
Read more

Ian Richard Kyle Paisley Biography

Ian Richard Kyle Paisley (Belfast, 1926) Ulster ecclesiastic and politician.Founder of the Free Presbyterian Church of Northern Ireland (1951), he opposed the rapprochement between Protestantism and the Vatican and was against the civil rights movement.Leader of the Democratic Unionist Party, he rallied Protestant extremists around him in his campaigns against the Catholics of Ulster.Member of the Assembly of Northern Ireland (1973-1974) and of the British Parliament since 1970.Founder of the paramilitary group Ulster Defense Association (1981), between 1990 and 1994 he boycotted the peace talks on several occasions with the British government.In 1999 he was elected MEP.
Post a Comment
Read more

Joseph H. Maclagan Wedderburn Biography

Joseph H.Maclagan Wedderburn (Forfar, 1882-Princeton, 1948) British mathematician.Professor at Princeton University, he was editor of the Proceedings of the Edinburgh mathematical society (1905-1909) and the Annals of mathematics (1912-1928).He stated a theorem ( Wedderburn's theorem ) according to which every finite field is commutative.
Post a Comment
Read more

Dwijendralal Ray Biography

Dwijendralal Ray (Also called Dwijendralal Roy, Dwijendra Lal Roy, D.L.Ray, Rèi Dvi-Endralal or Rai Dvigendralal; Krishnagar, 1863-1913) Indian poet and playwright.Born into a wealthy family (he was a member of the Brahmin caste, the first in the social ladder of India), he received a careful academic training. Dwijendralal Roy In his youth he became known as a writer through some satirical theatrical pieces; But his true recognition as a playwright came with the premiere of his historical dramas that, from a patriotic approach, seek to recover the main customs and customs of India, as well as its popular literary traditions. Part of its plot material comes from the Mahabharata , the huge epic poem that recounts, in Sanskrit, the confrontation between the forces of Good and Evil, embodied in the clans of the Pandavas and the Kauravas.His best-known plays are Mevarpatan , Durqadas and Candragupta . This love for the historical and cultural richness of India is also prese...
Post a Comment
Read more

Aldo carpi Biography

Aldo Carpi (Milan, 1886- id. , 1973) Italian painter.His work includes portraits and seascapes, political and religious works, the series of acrobats and bandits, the cycles of "the masks" and the watercolors of The Long March.
Post a Comment
Read more

Burton richter Biography

Burton Richter (New York, 1931) American physicist who received the 1976 Nobel Prize in Physics with Samuel Chao Chung Ting for his discovery of the subatomic particle Psi , previously described by Einstein. Burton Richter In 1948 he entered the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) to study chemistry and physics.Under the influence of Professor Francis Friedman he opted for physics studies.He graduated in 1952 and then undertook doctoral studies, which he completed at this center in 1956; Specializing in nuclear physics, Burton Richter began to experiment in the bombardment of atomic nuclei by particles of electrical charge. For his research he worked in particle accelerators, especially the synchrotron at the MIT laboratory, and for six months, in the proton accelerator at the Brookhaven National Laboratory.In 1956 he applied for a position as a research assistant at Stanford University; He developed his work at the High Energy Laboratory (HEPL) of said university, a...
Post a Comment
Read more