ISABELLA (1451-1504), la Catolica, queen of Castile, daughter of John II. of Castile, by his second wife Isabella, granddaughter of John I. of Portugal (thus being through both parents a descendant of John of Gaunt), was born at Madrigal on April 2 2, 1451. On the accession of her brother, Henry IV. (1454), she was withdrawn by her mother to Arevals, where her early education was conducted in the deepest seclusion. Removed by Henry to the court, her hand was sought in application by many suitors, among whom were Alphonso of Portugal, Pedro Giron, and Ferdinand of Aragon, whom she ultimately married at Valladolid on Oct. 19, 1469. An offer of the crown of Castile was made to her by the revolutionary leaders in the civil war; she declined it and in 1468 was recognized by her brother as lawful heir. On his death, she was proclaimed queen of Castile and Leon (Dec. 13, Spain undoubtedly owed to Isabella's clear intellect, resolute energy and unselfish patriotism much of that greatness which it acquired under "the Catholic sovereigns." The moral influence of the queen's personal character over the Castilian court was incalculably great; from the debasement and degradation of the preceding reign she raised it to being "the nursery of virtue and of generous ambition." She did much for letters in Spain by
founding the palace school and by her protection of Peter Martyr d'Anghiera. The very sincerity of her piety and strength of her religious convictions led her at times into great errors of State policy; her efforts for the introduction of the Inquisition into Castile and for the proscription of the Jews are cases in point. It was a happy intuition that led her to give credence to the scheme of Columbus and to finance his undertaking, offering in a generous impulse to pawn her personal jewels if the Treasury funds proved inadequate. She died at Medina del Campo on Nov. 24, 1504.
See W. H. Prescott, History of the Reign of Ferdinand and Isabella . . . (5837) ; Baron de Nervo, Isabelle la Catholique . . . (Paris, 1874; Eng. trans. by Lieut.-col. Temple-West, 1897).