Castelnuovo
Charles V meets with the Bey of Tunis, 1535. Both Habsburg and Ottoman power in North Africa depended in part on agreements with local clients. Here the size of the Imperial expedition of 1535 is...
View ArticleSpanish Defense Commitments – Navy
Submarines S-80 class submarines Displacement: 1,565 tons submerged Dimensions: 61.7 x 6.2 x ?? meters Propulsion: Diesel-electric, AIP, 1 shaft, 3,800 shp, 20 knots Crew: 32-35 The S-80 submarine’s...
View ArticlePortugal and the Changing Art of War
Portuguese kings needed more revenue by the late fourteenth century especially because of their escalating military costs. These cost increases were mainly a consequence of developments in the...
View ArticleOrder of Avis
The Order of Avis rose to ultimate authority in Portugal, setting its head on the throne in 1385 as Juan I, and ruling Portugal until 1580 as the Aviz dynasty. By the time the Third Crusade had begun...
View ArticleALMENAR 1710
From the surrender of Lerida until 1710, there were not any more large- scale military actions on the Eastern Peninsular front, because the Bourbon army was not able to launch major campaigns against...
View ArticleWhen Allah met Odin I
At about the same time as Harald Bluetooth was erecting his great monument to Viking Christianity at Jelling, and the Wessex dynasty was completing the first unification of England with the expulsion...
View ArticleThe Knight of the Black Eagle
If there is no way to avoid an engagement before I arrive, I cannot enjoin you too strongly to inform me post haste. PHILIP II ON THE EVE OF THE BATTLE OF SAINT QUENTIN War marked Europe in the late …...
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The English Armada: Battles at Sea II
Map: 25 May–20 June, Lisbon. 1.25 May. A council of war held off Peniche where it is decided to undertake an expedition on land, ruling out a naval attack on Lisbon on 26 May. Difficult disembarkation...
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The English Armada: Battles at Sea I
Engraving of the galley of the Adelantado of Castile, Royal Palace (Palacio Real), Madrid. A gentle breeze was blowing as dawn broke on Monday, 19 June, and so the Adelantado of Castile ‘set out that...
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Spanish 3rd Class Gunboats
Gunboats “General Blanco” and “Lanao” Gunboat “General Blanco” Gunboat General Blanco. Midsection cross-section frame (drawn by one of the crew) The Spanish Empire, once the greatest in the world,...
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FRANCO-SPANISH WARS (1526-1559) II
The Chevalier de Villegagnon Nicolas Durand de Villegagnon was born at Provins in the Seine-et-Marne region of France sometime in 1510. His father was a local magistrate, who was ennobled a few years...
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FRANCO-SPANISH WARS (1526-1559) I
Martim Afonso de Sousa This Portuguese courtier was born at Vila Viçosa toward the end of the 15th century. His father had been a loyal retainer in the household of Bragança, so young Martim was first...
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THE SPANISH ROAD
The ‘Spanish Road‘, linking Spain’s northern territories with those in Italy and the Peninsula. In an ambitious undertaking, Spain used the Spanish Road to reinforce her position in the Netherlands...
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Tarragona (1811)
By late December 1810 Marshal Jacques Macdonald had stabilised the situation in the north of Spain and was again able to support Louis-Gabriel Suchet’s attempts to capture Tortosa. Suchet therefore...
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Tilly against Mansfeld 1622
Count Ernst von Mansfeld proved a resourceful and tenacious opponent. Having failed to break through north-west Bohemia and join Jägerndorf in May 1621, he entrenched 13,000 men at Waidhaus on the...
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Spanish War of Succession: Iberia
Batalla de Almansa. Landscape by Filippo Pallotta, figures by Buonaventura Ligli Although the war revolved around the question of who would become the next king of Spain, the Iberian Peninsula was not...
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INVASION 1779 Part II
Capture of HMS Ardent by the frigates Junon and Chantil. Early on the 17th, when the French and Spanish ships were still off Plymouth, another alarm was sounded: ‘At four o’clock the alarm guns on the...
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INVASION 1779 Part I
The Westminster Magazine covered the events at one such camp held at Coxheath, near Maidstone, Kent, during the summers of 1778 and 1779. By all accounts, this camp was on a massive scale involving...
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Reconquest, Holy War, and Crusade II
Christians clearly were aware of the use of violence at God’s command in the Hebrew Scriptures, but they also knew that the fundamental message of the Gospel is peace. Jesus seemed to condemn all...
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Reconquest, Holy War, and Crusade I
Caliphate of Córdoba, circa 1000 When the crusaders assaulted and captured Jerusalem in July 1099 the struggle between Christians and Muslims in Spain had been in progress for nearly four hundred...
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