SPAIN. 



SPAIN 



644 



and literary societies in Madril, Cadiz, 



V^villa- *! ojahsr lam CltlsSU 



MMiiB/uw d Oamnmml Thit government of Spain during the 



IM nt absolute, though, from the earlier development of 

 jrnlsf f<VT. UM poww of the kiug was more restricted than in any 

 HiToountry of fiurope. 



OMtiUa) aimed the Ant blow at Spanish liberty, by avoiding, a* t 

 a* pucsihU, the convocation of the Cortes. His lucoruur, Charle 

 tosopletod the ruin of the Cortes, by entirely disregarding 



Ferdinand the Catholio (Fernando V. of 



i much 

 Jharles V., 



_ their 



peiiUoM and defeating tha citizens who VOM in anna to* support the 

 SUM of national liberty. Spain continued to be ruled despotically 

 by tha kings of the home* of Auitria and Bourbon until the French 

 invasion in 1808, when the deputies of the several province* assembled 

 at Cadiz, and framed a new constitution, which was sworn to and 

 promulgated in 1318. Atthecloseof the war however, Ferdinand VII. 

 nfuatd to gire it his sanction, and be re-established the old forms of 

 government; but being compelled toon after (1820) by a military 

 mcurractton, to swear to the constitution of 1813, it again became the 

 law of the Und, until it was a second time put down with the assist- 

 ance of a French army. 



On the death of Ferdinand (1833), his widow, Queen Christina, 

 wishing to conciliate the liberal party, gave the nation a new charter, 

 and re-established the ancient Cortes, with certain restrictions and 

 modifications which rendered it of little or no value for the support 

 of popular rights. At length, in 1886, the revision of the constitution 

 was intrusted by the government to the two chambers of peers and 

 deputies, and the new constitution of the Spanish kingdom wag sworn 

 to by the queen-regent in June, 1837. Two chambers were instituted 



that of the Diputadoe and that of the Senadoree the members of 



which are invested with equal powers, but all bills relating to taxation 

 are to be presented in the first instance to the lower chamber. Both 

 chambers an elected by the people, the crown having the privilege 

 of choosing one out of every three senators presented by the electors 

 of the provinces. The new constitution has in most points been 

 assimilated to those of the other representative states of Europe. The 

 constitutional government however was gradually more and more 

 neglected and violated, till in 1854 military insurrections in Barcelona 

 and Madrid caused a revolution, and Espartero restored the consti- 

 tutional government. 



Ilittory. Spain was named 'Iffr/pla, 'Iffmvia, and Sirai-fo, by the 

 Greeks, Iberia and Hispania by the Romans. Hardly anything was 

 known of the country till the Carthaginians and afterwards the Romans 

 subdued and colonised it The Phoenicians had previously numerous 

 settlement! on the southern coast, and the narrow tract between the 

 sea-ehore and the Sierra Nevada was inhabited by a mixed race of 

 Iberians and Phoenicians called MI{O$>OI?(IC. The Uhodians and 

 Phocasana also seem to have had settlements on the eastern coast. The 

 Carthaginian general Hamilcar, about the year B.C. 237, began to 

 introduce colonies on the southern coast; and the Carthaginian power 

 continued to be extended under Hasdrubal and Hannibal tUl the 

 Carthaginians were conquered and expelled by the Romans in the 

 year B.C. 206. The Peninsula was then erected into a Roman province, 

 and a struggle commenced between the Romans and the native inha- 

 bitant's which lasted till the subjugation of the northern mountaineers, 

 the Oallaid, the Cantabri, 'and the Astures, by Augustus, about 25 

 years before the Christian era. 



The Peninsula was at first politically divided by the Romans into 

 two provinces, Hispania Citerior (Hither Spain) and Hispania Ulterior 

 (Farther Spain) ; Hispania Citerior comprising the eastern and north- 

 eastern districts, and Hispania Ulterior the southern districts, and 

 the western as far as they had been subjugated. Afterwards, when 

 the whole Peninsula had been conquered, it was divided into the three 

 province* of Tarraconensis (the eastern and northern districts), Bsotica 

 (the southern district, or Andalucia), and Lusitauia (the western dis- 

 trict, or Portugal, and certain portions of Spain). This political 

 division subsisted till the reign of Constantino the Great During this 

 period Spain was considered one of the most valuable and flourishing 

 provinces of the Roman empire. According to Pliny, it contained 

 300 large cities. The organisation of the Spanish provinces is fully 

 lUted by Pliny (ill, 1, &c.). 



About the beginning of the 5th century the Sueves, the Alans, and 

 the Vandals crossed the Pyrenees, and settled in the Spanish Peninsula. 

 They were succeeded by the Visigoths, who in A.D. 411 entered Cata- 

 lonia, and in a short time compelled the Alans and Vandals to quit 

 Spain for Africa. After a series of battles the Visigoths subdued the 

 Sueves, and retained the command of the Peninsula till the year 711, 

 when Tank Ibn Zeyad, after defeating the Gothic armies on the banks 

 of the Guadalcte, took their capital city, Toledo. In a very few years 

 the Moors obtained possession of the whole of the Peninsula, with 

 the exception of the mountainous districts of the north, where they 

 were successfully resisted. A series of battles gradually extended 

 the Gothic conquests and power southward [ARAUON], till at length, 

 in 1492, the Moorinh capital [GRANADA] was taken by assault by the 

 armies of Fernando and Isabel On the death of Isabel in 1506 the 

 crown of Cart ilia devolved on her daughter Joanna, wife of Philip, 

 archduke of Austria ; and on the death of the latter, on his son 

 Carlo* L, afterwards Charles V. and Emperor of Germany. Fernando 

 died January 23, 1816, after appointing Cardinal Ximenes regent of 



Castilla till the arrival of bis grand*on Carlos, who was then only 16 

 years of age. Ximenes governed the kingdom till 1518, when Carlos I. 

 assumed the government of Spain. In the following year he was 

 elected Emperor of Germany. With him commenced the dynasty of 

 the house of Austria in Spain. After a reign of nearly 40 years he 

 resigned all his power and possessions to his son Felipe II., ami in 

 1557 retired to a monastery near Placencia in Katremodura, where he 

 died in 1658. During the reign of Felipe II. the Moors were com- 

 pelled by religious persecution to quit the kingdom, and to settle in 

 Africa. Felipe died in 1598, and was succeeded by his son Felipe III., 

 who died in 1621. He was succeeded by his son Felipe IV., whose 

 reign lasted till 1665, in which year he died. He was succeeded by 

 his son Carlos 1L, who died in 1700. Felipe V., who succeeded, was 

 the second son of Louis, dauphin of France, and the first king of 

 Spain of the house of Bourbon. He died in 1746, and was succeeded 

 by his son Fernando VI., who died in 1759, without issue. His suc- 

 cessor, Carlos III., was a son of Philip V. and king of the Two (Sicilies. 

 His death took place in 1788, when he was succeeded by his son 

 Carlos IV. In 1807 the French armies began to enter Spain for tho 

 purpose of obtaining possession of the kingdom. On the 19th of 

 March, 1808, Carlos IV. abdicated in favour of his son, Fernando VII. 

 In the following May Carlos IV. and Fernando VII. signed a convention 

 at Bayonne, by which they ceded the Spanish monarchy to Napoleon 

 Bonaparte. But the inhabitants of Portugal and Spain refused to 

 submit to the domination of the French. They rose almost universally 

 against the invaders, and having entered into alliances with Civat 

 Britain, the Peninsular war was commenced, and continued till 1814, 

 when the French were finally driven over the Pyrenees, and pursued 

 into Franca 



After the capitulation of Paris in March, 1814, Fernando VII. 

 regained his throne, and reigned till September 29, 1833, when he 

 died, having left by his will his infant daughter Isabel heir to his 

 throne. The queen-mother, Christina, was appointed queen-regent 

 (lleina Gobernadora). Immediately afterwards Don Carlos, the late 

 king's brother, laid claim to the throne on tho ground that by the 

 Salic law females were declared ineligible. A civil war ensued, which 

 lasted till September, 1840, when the partisans of Don Carlos were 

 finally defeated. 



Early in 1854, in consequence of the arbitrary and unconstitutional 

 measures of the Spanish government, insurrectionary movements 

 occurred in Barcelona and other places. On the 22ml of February 

 the whole kingdom was declared in a state of siege. On the 15th of 

 July the city and garrison of Barcelona issued a ' prommciamento ' (a 

 public declaration) against the government This was followed, 

 July 17, by an insurrection in Madrid. The streets were barricaded, 

 and the people fought against the soldiers till July 19, when the 

 ministry fled, the soldiers gave up the contest, and a National Junta 

 was established. Espartero was reinstated in power; the constitu- 

 tional government was re-established; and the queen-mother was 

 banished from the kingdom, August 28, 1854. 



Language. Of the languages or dialects spoken in the Peninsula 

 before it became a Roman province little or nothing is known. Strabo 

 (iii. p. 139, Casaub.) says that various dialects were in use in his time 

 among the inhabitants of the Peninsula. The Phoenicians and < 

 who settled in Spain must also have introduced their own languages, 

 whilst the Celts, who occupied the northern and western districts, 

 spoke their own tongue. During the long period of Roman domina- 

 tion all these languages seem to have made room for the Latin, except 

 in the northern part of the Peninsula, where the Basque language was 

 always and is still spoken. The northern nations who invaded Spain 

 in the 5th century made no effort to introduce their own tongues, but 

 adopted that of tho natives, and spoke Latin, which they corrupted 

 by making the nouns indeclinable, and extending the use of pre- 

 positions. 



Then came the Arabs, whose language at one time must have been 

 very generally spoken in the Peninsula. Nearly two centuries after 

 the taking of Toledo by Alfonso VL, Arabic was still spoken there in 

 preference to the Castilian, and most legal writings, even between 

 Christian parties, were made in Arabic. Up to the end of the 13th 

 century tho kings of Aragon were in the habit of signing their names 

 with the letters of the Arabic alphabet On the taking of Sevilla by 

 Fernando III., it was deemed necessary to translate the Gospels into 

 Arabic, in order to instruct the Christian population of that city in 

 the duties of religion, which, as well as their native language, they 

 had completely forgotten. 



Out of these heterogeneous elements the Castilian language, as the 

 modem Spanish is properly called, was originally formed, though it 

 would be difficult to say at what time it began to assume its present 

 shape. 



About the beginning of the 13th century three principal languages 

 were spoken in the Peninsula. The Castiliau (the Lengua Castellaua) 

 prevailed exclusively in the two Castiles and Leon ; tbo Catalouian, a 

 dialect resembling the Provencal, or Limosin, of the south of France, 

 was spoken in Catalonia, Aragon, part of Valencia, and the Balearic 

 Islands ; and, lastly, the Cantabrian, or Basque, still maintained its 

 ground, though greatly corrupted, along the northern side of the 

 Pyrenees. About the same time the Portuguese, which originated 

 in a mixture of the Galician dialect and the language spoken by the 



