Europe · Reformation to revolution
Kingdom of Spain
1479/1516–present
Reino de España; España. The dynastic union of the Catholic Monarchs — Isabella I of Castile and Ferdinand II of Aragon (married 1469; ruling their crowns jointly from 1479) — is conventionally taken as the origin of Spain, though Castile and Aragon remained legally distinct until the 18th century.
- Existed
- 1479/1516–present
- Shown on the map
- 1516–1581, 1640–1872, 1877–1931, 1976–2024 (4 periods)
- Peak area
- 1.3M km²
- Region
- Europe
Names
Reino de España; España. The dynastic union of the Catholic Monarchs — Isabella I of Castile and Ferdinand II of Aragon (married 1469; ruling their crowns jointly from 1479) — is conventionally taken as the origin of Spain, though Castile and Aragon remained legally distinct until the 18th century. 1492 saw the fall of Granada, the expulsion of the Jews, and Columbus's first voyage. Their grandson Charles I (Emperor Charles V) inherited both crowns (from 1516) plus the Habsburg and Burgundian lands, inaugurating a global empire. The Habsburgs (to 1700) were followed by the Bourbons, whose Nueva Planta decrees (1707–1716) centralized the state. The Napoleonic invasion (1808) and Peninsular War, 19th-century liberal revolutions and Carlist wars, the loss of empire (1898), the Second Republic, the Civil War (1936–1939) and Francoist dictatorship (1939–1975), and the transition to democracy followed. The Constitution of 1978 established a parliamentary constitutional monarchy; the current king is Felipe VI (since 2014).
Common questions
- What was the Kingdom of Spain?
- Reino de España; España. The dynastic union of the Catholic Monarchs — Isabella I of Castile and Ferdinand II of Aragon (married 1469; ruling their crowns jointly from 1479) — is conventionally taken as the origin of Spain, though Castile and Aragon remained legally distinct until the 18th century.
- When did the Kingdom of Spain exist?
- The Kingdom of Spain existed 1479/1516–present. On this map it is drawn 1516–1581, 1640–1872, 1877–1931, 1976–2024.
- How large was the Kingdom of Spain?
- At its greatest extent drawn on this map, the Kingdom of Spain covered about 1.3 million km². That is the largest area the border data gives it across the years it is drawn, not necessarily its greatest extent in history.
Sources
This compendium cites its sources once for the whole document rather than per territory. Its bibliography names the English Wikipedia articles for al-Andalus, the taifas and the Christian kingdoms as the primary basis, with Encyclopædia Britannica, the World History Encyclopedia and academic work on the historiography of the Reconquista and the taifa period (García-Sanjuán). The article this entry is anchored on:
- Wikipedia — Spain en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spain
This entry was last updated .
This entry was researched and drafted with AI from the sources above, and has not been reviewed by a historian. How entries are made
Text available under CC BY-SA 4.0: reuse it with a credit to The World Through Time and a link to this page. Passages drawing on the Wikipedia articles listed above are also licensed CC BY-SA 4.0 by their contributors.
Border geometry for the map itself comes from Cliopatria v0.12 (Seshat Global History Databank, CC-BY-4.0).
See the Kingdom of Spain in its world
Open the atlas at 1756 and every neighbour, rival and successor is on screen with it — then drag the slider and watch what happens next.
Open the map at 1756 →