Ferdinand VII of Spain

Ferdinand VII of Spain, called "the Desired" and "King Felon" (San Lorenzo de El Escorial, 14 December October 1784-Madrid, September 29, 1833), he personally occupied the Spanish throne between March and May 1808 and, after the departure of the "intruder king" José I Bonaparte from Spain and his return to the country, again from May 1814 until his death, except for a very brief interval of a few days in 1823 in which his functions were assumed by a Council of Regency in accordance with the provisions of the Constitution of 1812.

Son of Carlos IV and María Luisa de Parma, he acceded to the throne after the mutiny of Aranjuez in March 1808, promoted by his supporters, who forced his father to abdicate in him, being proclaimed as king with the title of Fernando VII. Two months later, pressured by Napoleon, he renounced his rights to the Spanish Crown in Bayonne, returning it to his father, and the latter in favor of the French emperor, who appointed his brother José Bonaparte as the new King of Spain.. He was confined in the Valençay castle where he spent the entire War of Independence. Despite this, Fernando continued to be recognized as the legitimate king of Spain by the various Government Juntas, the Central Supreme Junta and his successor, the Regency Council, and the Cortes of Cádiz. They proclaimed that they held national sovereignty and by virtue of this principle they elaborated and approved the Constitution of 1812. In this context, the Spanish-American Wars of Independence began.

After the defeat of the Napoleonic armies and the abandonment of Spain by Joseph I Bonaparte, Napoleon recognized him as King of Spain in the Treaty of Valençay in December 1813. Despite the fact that the Treaty was not ratified by the Regency nor Through the Cortes, Napoleon let him go and Fernando VII, his brother Don Carlos and his uncle Don Antonio entered Spain on March 22, 1814 through Gerona. After passing through Zaragoza, he went to Valencia, where he planned the coup d'état of May 1814 that was carried out in Madrid on May 11 by the troops of General Francisco de Eguía. In the May 4 Manifesto, also known as the Valencia Decree, he abolished the 1812 Constitution and all the work of the Cádiz Cortes, restoring absolutism and the Old Regime. He entered Madrid on May 13, two days after the triumph of the coup. In that same year, in a later act, Carlos would again abdicate his rights to the Spanish throne in his son Fernando VII, on October 1, 1814, signing the agreement in Rome, where he remained in exile.

Soon, the Desired, revealed himself as an absolutist sovereign and, in particular, as one of those who least satisfied the wishes of his subjects, who considered him an unscrupulous, vengeful and treacherous person. Surrounded by a clique of sycophants, his policy was oriented, to a large extent, towards his own survival.After six years of war, the country and the Treasury were devastated, and successive Fernandino governments failed to restore the situation.

In 1820 a pronouncement began the so-called liberal triennium, during which the Constitution and the decrees of Cádiz were restored, producing a new confiscation. The liberals were divided into moderates and exalted and during that time the king, who appeared to abide by the constitutional regime, did not stop conspiring to restore absolutism, which was achieved after the intervention of the One Hundred Thousand Sons of San Luis in 1823.

The last phase of his reign, the so-called Ominous Decade, was characterized by a ferocious repression of the liberals, accompanied by a moderate absolutist or even liberal-doctrinaire policy that provoked deep discontent in "ultra-absolutist" circles, which formed a party in around the king's brother, the infante Carlos María Isidro. To this was added the succession problem, laying the foundations of the First Carlist War, which would break out after the death of Fernando and the accession to the throne of his three-year-old daughter Isabel II, not recognized as queen by the "Carlists".. The Regency was assumed by the widow of King María Cristina de Borbón.

In the words of a recent biographer, Rafael Sánchez Mantero:

If something characterizes the image that Fernando VII has left to posterity is in the unanimous negative judgment that has deserved the historians of yesterday and today who have studied his reign (...) It is logical to understand that liberal historiography was immeasurable with the one who tried to put an end to the triumphant principles and laws in the Cadiz Courts (...) Historiography on Fernando VII has evolved in such a way that recent studies have abandoned the nineteenth-century diatribes to present a more balanced picture (...) Recent History... considers Fernando VII simply as a king with very little capacity to face the times in which he became king. However, it is difficult to find a study, whether of the past or of the present, in which the figure of this monarch generates the slightest sympathy or attractiveness. Without a doubt, it has been the monarch who has received the worst deal from historiography in the history of Spain.

According to his most recent biographer, Emilio La Parra López:

From 1814 until his death, except the constitutional interval of 1820-1823, his policy consisted of the personal control of power, using the repression of all dissent and of some servants whose only pattern of behavior was the blind fidelity to his master. Fernando VII ruled in his own way, as a despota, listening to the advice that they agreed on each occasion, without conforming to any specific precedent and as no one would do it after him.

Biography

Childhood, education and family

Juramento del futuro Fernando VII como Príncipe de Asturias, realizado en la Iglesia del Real Monasterio de San Jerónimo de Madrid el 23 de septiembre de 1789. Work of Luis Paret and Alcázar, Museo del Prado, Madrid.

Fernando de Borbón came into the world during the life of his grandfather Carlos III, on October 14, 1784, in the Palace of El Escorial. He was baptized by Antonio Sentmenat y Cartella with the names of Fernando, María, Francisco de Paula, Domingo, Vicente Ferrer, Antonio, Joseph, Joachîn, Pascual, Diego, Juan Nepomuceno, Genaro, Francisco, Francisco Xavier, Rafael, Miguel, Gabriel, Calixto, Cayetano, Fausto, Luis, Ramón, Gregorio, Lorenzo and Gerónimo. He was the ninth of the fourteen children born to Prince Carlos, the future Carlos IV, and María Luisa de Parma. Of his thirteen siblings, eight died before 1800. He became Prince of Asturias when he was one month old, since in His older brother Carlos, only fourteen months old, died on that date. Fernando himself suffered a serious illness at the age of three and was in poor health throughout his life. As a child he was withdrawn and quiet, with a certain tendency to cruelty. After his father's accession to the throne in 1788, Ferdinand was He was sworn in as heir to the Crown by the Cortes in an act held at the Monastery of San Jerónimo in Madrid on September 23, 1789.

The prince's initial tutor was Father Felipe Scio, a religious of the Order of San José de Calasanz, a cultured and intelligent man who was already a tutor to the princesses. Renowned as a great educator, he taught the prince to read and write and Latin grammar. In 1795 Father Scio was named bishop of Sigüenza and his position was taken over by the canon of Badajoz Cathedral Francisco Javier Cabrera, who had just been appointed bishop of Orihuela. The prince that Cabrera presented to the king included deepening Latin and the study of "the other living languages that were to the Royal liking of V.M.", as well as the History of Spain, Geography and Chronology, but the fundamental thing would be education «in matters of Religion», «so necessary for the Government of the States and their subsistence» since «all the power of the prince over his subjects comes from God, and who has given him this power to prepare for them on earth the temporary happiness al, as a means of which is expected eternal». He also considered the practice of "those heroic virtues that make kings loved by God and his vassals" essential, a proposal that coincided with the educational ideal of the Spanish Enlightenment. The proposal that Bishop Cabrera be the substitute for Father Felipe Scio was the work of the favourite Manuel Godoy, who also placed another of his countrymen from Badajoz next to the prince, the also enlightened canon Fernando Rodríguez de Ledesma, entrusted with teaching him Geography and History, but this did not last long due to a serious attack of gout, and he was replaced by the canon Juan Escoiquiz, also at Godoy's proposal. Cabrera appointed the painter Antonio Carnicero as drawing teacher, and Latin and philosophy to the priest Cristóbal Bencomo y Rodríguez, who together with Escoiquiz was the prince's most appreciated professor, in addition to both becoming the people who exerted the most influence on him.

Opposition to Godoy

In 1799 Bishop Cabrera died, being replaced as tutor of the prince by Escoiquiz. This, along with the new tutor of Fernando's room, the Duke of San Carlos who had replaced the prince's first tutor the Marquis of Santa Cruz the year before, took care to upset Fernando with the favourite Godoy, who had just lost power, although two years later he would recover it — as soon as Godoy fell, Canon Escoiquiz, whom he had flattered to obtain the position he had in the education of the Prince of Asturias, hastened to write a harsh plea against that entitled Memory on the interest of the State in the election of good ministers. One of the false arguments that Escoiquiz used to denigrate Godoy was that after his marriage to María Teresa de and Vallabriga, the king's niece, aspired to occupy the throne after the death of Carlos IV. However, shortly after both Escoiquiz and the Duke of San Carlos were removed from their posts as teacher of the prince and tutor of his fourth, respectively, by order of King Carlos IV. The position of tutor passed to the Duke of La Roca, Godoy's trusted man.

Encouraged by his young wife María Antonia de Nápoles, whom he had married in 1802 when he was eighteen years old, Prince Fernando confronted Manuel Godoy and his mother, Queen María Luisa, with whom Princess María Antonia had a bad personal relationship —the animosity was mutual; María Luisa wrote to Godoy: "What shall we do with that diabolical serpent of my daughter-in-law and cowardly mako of my son?" It was not very difficult for María Antonia to win the will of her husband, among other reasons because she did not have any sympathy for Godoy, nor were her relations with her mother very good. This is how the so-called "party" arose at the Madrid court. Neapolitan" around the princes of Asturias and in which the ambassador of the Kingdom of Naples, the Count of San Teodoro, and his wife, as well as various important Spanish nobles, such as the Marquis of Valmediano, his brother-in-law the Duke of San Carlos, the Count of Montemar and the Marquis of Ayerbe. This "Neapolitan party" began to launch all kinds of snares against Godoy and against Queen María Luisa, who the queen mother of Naples, María Carolina, instigator of her daughter's actions, was in charge of spreading throughout Europe. Godoy's reaction was withering: in September 1805 he ordered the expulsion from the court of several nobles from the entourage of the princes of Asturias, including the Duke of Infantado and the Countess of Montijo. The final blow was dealt by Godoy months later when, among other measures, he expelled the ambassador from Naples and his wife from Spain, shortly after the kingdom of Naples was conquered by Napoleon at the end of December 1805 and Queen María Carolina was dethroned, thereby that the one that had been the main political referent of the princes of Asturias disappeared.

In May 1806, the Princess of Asturias died, but this did not prevent Fernando from continuing his political activity clandestinely, relying on his former tutor, Canon Escoiquiz, and the Duke of San Carlos, who led the large group of nobles who opposed Godoy. This was how the "Neapolitan party" became the "Fernandino party", which according to the historian Sánchez Mantero was heir to the old "Aragonese party". The discontented nobility tried to use the figure of the prince, ignored by Godoy, as grouping nucleus of the malquistos with the royal favourite. Although a large part of the nobles who supported the prince only wanted the fall of Godoy, the ambitions of Fernando and his closest circle were aimed at achieving the throne as soon as possible, regardless of the Lucky that King Carlos IV could run. For this reason, they continued with the smear campaign against Godoy and against Queen María Luisa, whom they considered the key obstacle to that plan, since she was Godoy's main supporter. With the full consent and participation of Prince Ferdinand, they continued with a vicious smear campaign against Godoy and the queen, which consisted of the production of two series of thirty full-color prints each, accompanied by texts that explain or complement the drawings, in which, in the words of the historian Emilio La Parra López, "in a lewd tone and based on slander the queen and Godoy were ridiculed to the unspeakable." The first series was dedicated to the rise of Godoy —nicknamed in the prints as "Manolo Primero, by another name Choricero" or as AJIPEDOBES (which should be read from right to left)— thanks to the favors of Queen María Luisa, who was presented as a sexual depraved devoured by lust.

The overthrow of the Neapolitan Bourbons by Napoleon and the death of the Princess of Asturias led to a reversal of the alignment of the Spanish factions with respect to the French emperor. The possibility that Fernando would marry a relative of his made the prince negotiate with Napoleon, who, for his part, stopped relying on Godoy, as he had done between 1804 and 1806. Fernando was willing to humiliate himself before the emperor with such to get his favor and his help to get rid of Godoy. The negotiations promoted by the French ambassador for Fernando to contract his second marriage with a Bonaparte lady coincided in 1807 with the worsening health of Carlos IV. The Prince of Asturias wanted to ensure the succession and annul the valid one. Godoy and the Fernandino party had their first confrontation. Due to a denunciation, the plot was discovered and Fernando tried in what is known as the El Escorial trial. The prince denounced all his collaborators and asked his parents for forgiveness. The court acquitted the other defendants, but the king, unfairly and clumsily in the opinion of Alcalá Galiano, ordered the exile of all of them.

The first accession to the throne: from the Mutiny of Aranjuez to the Abdications of Bayonne

Fernando VII as Prince of Asturias, the work of Goya

Shortly thereafter, in March 1808, in the presence of French troops in Spain (doubtfully backed by the Treaty of Fontainebleau), the court moved to Aranjuez, as part of a plan by Godoy to move the royal family to America from Andalusia if the French intervention required it. On the 17th, the people, instigated by Ferdinand's supporters, stormed the Godoy palace. Although Carlos IV managed to save the life of his favourite, action in the Fernando had a crucial role, he abdicated in favor of his son on the 19th, sick, discouraged and unable to face the crisis. These events are known as the Aranjuez riot. For the first time in the history of Spain, a king was displaced from the throne by the machinations of his own son with the collaboration of a popular revolt.

Fernando returned to court, where he was acclaimed by the people of Madrid, who celebrated not only his advent, but also the fall of Godoy. In other parts of the country the change of king was also celebrated, which was expected to straighten out the situation. Fernando hastened to form a new government, made up of his supporters, and to outlaw Godoy's followers. However, French troops under the command of Joaquín Murat had already occupied the capital the day before, March 23..

View of Bayonne Port from Boufflers Walk. Claude Joseph Vernet, 1755.
National Marine Museum, Paris.

The deposed king and his wife placed themselves under Napoleon's protection and were guarded by the troops of Murat, who, for his part, harbored hopes of being made king of Spain by the emperor. Napoleon, however, had other plans. He sent a highly trusted collaborator, General Savary, to inform Murat of his decision to grant the throne of Spain to one of his brothers and to bring the entire royal family and Godoy to France little by little.. It was Savary who convinced Ferdinand of the advisability of going to meet the emperor who was traveling from Paris to Madrid, to which the king agreed with the hope that Napoleon would recognize and endorse him as king of Spain. Before leaving, Fernando appointed a Governing Board that was to manage State affairs in his absence. Initially, the interview was to be held in Madrid, but Napoleon, citing unforeseen matters of great urgency, set places further north, to shorten the time on a trip from France: the Granja de San Ildefonso, Burgos, San Sebastián... Finally, Fernando VII went to Bayonne; to ensure that he would come, the French used the veiled threat of not recognizing the abdication of Carlos IV and of supporting him against Ferdinand. So, on April 20, he crossed the border. Although he did not know it yet, he had just fall prisoner. It was the beginning of an exile that would last six years. A concealed prison, in a palace from whose surroundings he could not leave and with the promise, always postponed, of receiving large amounts of money. Carlos IV had abdicated to Ferdinand VII in exchange for Godoy's release, and Napoleon had also invited him to Bayonne, with the excuse of getting Ferdinand VII to allow him to return to Spain and recover his fortune, which he had seized. Faced with the prospect of meeting with his favorite and interceding on his behalf, the kings and fathers requested to also attend said meeting. Escorted by French troops, they reached Bayonne on April 30. Two days later, in Madrid, the people would rise up in arms against the French, giving rise to the events of May 2, 1808, which marked the beginning of the Spanish War of Independence.

Eight shields of Fernando VII coined in Bogotá in 1809. Faced with the lack of a model for the king's bust, the blinds resorted to that of his father (as in the image) or designed other imaginaries.

Meanwhile, the situation in Bayonne was taking on grotesque overtones. Napoleon prevented the arrival of Godoy until everything was consummated, so that he could not advise the Spanish royal family, which proved to be extremely clumsy. He told Fernando VII that his father's resignation to the throne, produced after the mutiny in Aranjuez, was null and void since it had been done under duress, for which he demanded that he return his throne to him. His own mother, in his presence, had asked Napoleon to shoot him for what he had done to Godoy, to her and to her husband. Napoleon forced Carlos IV to cede his rights to the throne in exchange for asylum in France for him, his wife and his favorite Godoy, as well as a pension of 30 million reales per year. Since he had previously abdicated in favor of his son, he considered that he was not giving up anything. When the news of the Madrid uprising and its suppression reached Bayonne, Napoleon and Carlos IV pressured Ferdinand to recognize his father as legitimate king. In exchange he would receive a castle and an annual pension of four million reales, which he never paid in full. He accepted on May 6, 1808, unaware that his father had already resigned in favor of the emperor. Finally, Napoleon granted the rights to the crown of Spain to his older brother, who would reign as Joseph I Bonaparte. This succession of transfers of the Spanish crown is known as the "Bayonne abdications".

It wasn't just a dynastic change. In a proclamation to the Spanish on May 25, Napoleon declared that Spain was facing a regime change with the benefits of a Constitution without the need for a previous revolution. Next, Napoleon convened in Bayonne an assembly of Spanish notables, the Junta española de Bayonne. Although the assembly was a failure for Napoleon (only seventy-five of the one hundred and fifty notables expected attended), in nine sessions they debated his project and, with few rectifications, approved the Statute of Bayonne in July 1808.

The Bayonne abdications were not recognized by the “patriotic” Spanish. On August 11, 1808, the Council of Castile invalidated them, and on August 24 Ferdinand VII was proclaimed king in absentia in Madrid. The Cortes of Cádiz, which drafted and approved the Constitution of 1812, they never questioned the person of the monarch and declared him the only and legitimate king of the Spanish Nation. In America, autonomous Governing Boards were organized in some of its cities, which under the same revolutionary principles of representation and popular sovereignty, also recognized Fernando VII as monarch of their countries, and were unaware of any authority coming from Europe, both Napoleonic and of the Central Supreme Board, to later, in confrontation with the establishment of the Spanish Courts of 1810, form their own Constituent Congresses and declare their total independence from the Spanish Empire, thus giving rise to the development of the Spanish-American wars of independence.

Confinement in Valençay

Valençay Castle Room occupied by Fernando VII during his captivity.

Ferdinand saw how the emperor did not even bother to comply with the agreement and interned him, along with his brother don Carlos and his uncle don Antonio, in the castle of Valençay, property of Charles Maurice de Talleyrand, prince of Benevento, former bishop, then Napoleon's foreign minister, with whom he plotted the coup that brought him to power. There he received them on May 10. Valençay was a rustic property next to a town of about two thousand inhabitants, isolated in the center of France, about three hundred kilometers from Paris. Fernando would remain in Valençay until the end of the War of Independence. However, his captivity conditions were not very severe; The king and his brother received dance and music classes, went horse riding or fishing, and organized dances and dinners. They had a good library, but the Infante Don Antonio put all possible obstacles so that they did not read French books that could exert a bad influence on his young nephews. As of September 1, 1814, however, Talleyrand's departure and Bonaparte's refusal to comply with the stipulations regarding his expenses — four hundred thousand francs per year plus income of the castle of Navarre in Upper Normandy—, made their way of life increasingly austere, reducing servitude to a minimum. Ferdinand not only made no attempt to escape from captivity, but went so far as to denounce an Irish baron sent by the British Government to help him escape.

Believing that nothing could be done against the power of France, Fernando tried to unite his interests with those of Bonaparte, and maintained a servile correspondence with the Corsican, to the point that the latter, in his exile from Santa Elena, remembered thus the performance of the Spanish prince:

Fernando did not cease to ask me for a wife of my choice: he wrote me spontaneously to fill me whenever I got some victory; he issued proclamations to the Spaniards to submit, and recognized Joseph, what perhaps would have been considered a child of force, without being; but he also asked me for his great band, offered me to his brother Don Carlos to send the Spanish regiments that went to Russia, things all that he had in no way. Finally, I was strongly urged to let him go to my Court in Paris, and if I did not lend myself to a show that would have called the attention of Europe, thus proving all the stability of my power, it was because the gravity of the circumstances called me out of the Empire and my frequent absences of capital did not give me occasion.

His servile humiliation reached the point of organizing a lavish party with toasts, a banquet, a concert, special lighting, and a solemn Te Deum on the occasion of the wedding of Napoleon Bonaparte to Marie Louise of Austria in 1810. When the emperor reproduced the correspondence that Ferdinand sent him in Le Moniteur, so that everyone, especially the Spanish, could see his performance, he was quick to thank Napoleon for having made such a public In one of the letters, addressed to the Governor of Valençay and published in Le Moniteur on April 26, 1810, Ferdinand expressed his wish to be Bonaparte's adoptive son:

My greatest desire is to be the adoptive son of S.M. the emperor our sovereign. I believe I deserve this adoption that would truly make the happiness of my life, both for my love and affection for the sacred person of S.M., and for my submission and entire obedience to his intentions and desires.

However, the condition of Napoleon's prisoner created in Ferdinand the myth of the Desired, an innocent victim of “Napoleonic tyranny”.

The return of "the Desired"

Portrait of Fernando VII. Francisco de Goya. Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art of Santander and Cantabria.

In July 1812, Arthur Wellesley, the future Duke of Wellington, led an Anglo-Portuguese army into Spain from Portugal and defeated the French at Arapiles, driving them out of Andalusia and threatening Madrid. Although the French counterattacked, a new withdrawal of French troops from Spain after the catastrophic campaign in Russia at the beginning of 1813 allowed the allied troops to finally expel King José I Bonaparte from Madrid and defeat the French at Vitoria and San Marcial. Joseph Bonaparte left Spain, and Napoleon prepared to defend the southern border from him until a way out could be negotiated.

According to Sánchez Mantero, Fernando, seeing Bonaparte's star finally beginning to decline, arrogantly refused to deal with the ruler of France without the consent of the Spanish nation and the Regency, but fearing that there would be a revolutionary outbreak in Spain, he agreed to negotiate. By the Treaty of Valençay of December 11, 1813, Napoleon recognized Ferdinand VII as king, who thus recovered the throne and all the territories and properties of the Crown and its subjects before 1808, both in national territory and abroad; in exchange, he agreed to peace with France, the eviction of the British and his neutrality in what was left of the war.He also agreed to pardon the supporters of José I, the afrancesados.

Although the treaty was not ratified by the Regency, Ferdinand VII was released, granted a passport on March 7, 1814, left Valençay on the 13th, traveled to Toulouse and Perpignan, crossed the Spanish border and was received in Báscara, a town located between Figueras and Gerona, by General Copons eight days later, on March 24. Fernando returned to Spain without a clear political plan, expectant of the situation that would be found after his long absence, but with a clearly contrary attitude. to the reforms embodied in the Constitution of 1812 that, although they reserved the exercise of executive power, deprived him of the legislative power —which was reserved for the Cortes— and of sovereignty —which was attributed to the nation and not to the monarch.

Representation of Fernando VII praying for his people before the patriarch Joseph.

Entrance of Fernando VII in Valencia on May 14, 1814. Fernando Brambila's painting at the Cervellón Palace.

Regarding the Constitution of 1812, the decree of the Cortes of February 2, 1814 had established that «the king will not be recognized as free, nor will he be obeyed, until within the national Congress he gives the oath prescribed in article 173 of the Constitution". Ferdinand VII refused to follow the path marked out by the Regency and in Reus he diverted to Zaragoza where he spent Holy Week invited by Palafox. From the Aragonese capital he went to Teruel and entered Valencia on April 16. The Cardinal Archbishop of Toledo, Luis de Borbón, president of the Regency and favorable to the liberal reforms of 1812, was waiting for him there. A representation of the absolutist deputies of Cortes de Cádiz chaired by Bernardo Mozo de Rosales, in charge of delivering to the king a manifesto signed by sixty-nine "servile" deputies, which was what the liberals called supporters of the absolute monarchy. It was the so-called Manifesto of the Persians, which advocated the suppression of the Chamber of Cadiz and justified the restoration of the Old Regime. On April 17, General Elío, in command of the Second Army, placed his troops at the king's disposal and invited him to recover his rights. It was the first pronouncement in the history of Spain, according to Stanley G. Payne.

On May 4, 1814, Ferdinand VII signed a decree, drafted by Juan Pérez Villamil and Miguel de Lardizábal, which reestablished the absolute monarchy and declared the 1812 Constitution and all the work of the Cortes of Cadiz. The Decree, also known as the May 4 Manifesto, was the first step in the May 1814 coup d'état that restored his absolute powers and would not be published until May 11, when the coup was over. he had triumphed.

Derogation from the Constitution of 1812 by Fernando VII in the palace of Cervelló.

... my real spirit is not only to swear or to accede to that Constitution, nor to any decree of the Courts... but to declare that Constitution and those decrees null and void of any value or effect, now or in any time, as if they had never passed such acts and were removed from the midst of time, and without obligation in my peoples and subjects of any kind and condition to fulfill them or keep them.

Modesto Lafuente (1869), General History of Spain, take XXVI, 2.a ed.

After recovering from a gout attack, the king left Valencia on May 5 for Madrid. He had named Francisco de Eguía, a staunch absolutist, who had been commissioned by the king to carry out the coup d'état, captain general of New Castile. On May 11, he organized the repression in the capital, arresting the deputies of the Cortes and clearing the panorama for the triumphant entry of the monarch. Members of the Regency, ministers and supporters of national sovereignty were arrested, the coup de State was consummated in the early hours of May 11 with the dissolution of the Cortes demanded by Eguía and executed without opposition by its president Antonio Joaquín Pérez, one of the signatories of the Manifesto of the Persians.

On May 13, Ferdinand VII, who had remained in Aranjuez since the 10th waiting for the coup to succeed, finally entered Madrid triumphantly.

Reign

Gold coins of the absolutist and constitutional periods of Fernando VII.

1815. The legend, in Latin, affirms that Fernando VII is "king of the Spains and the Indias" "by the Grace of God" (Dei Gratia).

1823 (Liberal Court). The legend, in Spanish, proclaims Fernando VII "king of the Spains" "for the Grace of God and the Constitution".

First six-year absolutist term

Official search of Fernando VII, by F. Elías (Real Academia de Bellas Artes de San Fernando, Madrid).

During the first stage of the reign, between 1814 and 1820, the king restored the absolutism prior to the constitutional period. The task that awaited Fernando was extremely complex. The country's economy had suffered great damage and to this had to be added the political division of the population. The country was in poverty and had lost all its international importance. The nation, which had lost a million inhabitants out of the twelve it had at that time, had been devastated by the long years of fighting. deflation, caused mainly by the war against the French and the war for the independence of the American territories. The loss of these had two main consequences: worsening the economic crisis (due to the loss of American products, metal for currency and the market that they meant for Iberian products) and strip the kingdom of its political importance, relegating it to a position of second-order power. Despite having contributed its Essentially to Napoleon's defeat, Spain played a secondary role in the Congress of Vienna and in the Treaties of Fontainebleau and Paris. Ferdinand would have had to rely on exceptionally capable ministers to bring order to a country devastated by six years of war, but he barely had a couple of statesmen of a certain stature. He himself did not prove to be up to the task of dealing with the very serious problems that afflicted the country. The instability of the government was constant, and the failures to adequately solve the problems determined the continuous ministerial changes.

Fernandina deflation. Price developments (100=1812) According to Sanchez Mantero, p. 89.

The implementation of protectionism to try to promote the national industry favored the spectacular growth of smuggling, which was carried out on all the borders and, especially, in the Gibraltarian one. In addition to the decline in trade, the poor situation of agriculture and industry. One of the reasons for agricultural backwardness was the structure of land ownership —in addition to the ravages of war—, which did not change during the reign of Ferdinand. Farming methods did not improve either. Production, however, it recovered quickly in general, although agricultural prices did not, which caused hardships for the peasantry, forced to pay onerous rents and taxes. At this time the cultivation of corn and potatoes spread. It had also been badly affected by the war and the sheep herd fell significantly, which in turn affected the textile industry, which also lacked capital. This industry also lost its main source of supply. or cotton when the American territories became independent, which also deprived the tobacco company of raw materials. Economically, Fernando's reign was characterized by prostration and crisis, also favored by government immobility, which barely applied certain fiscal touches.

Principal populations in the reign of Fernando (in thousands of inhabitants) According to Sanchez Mantero, p. 95.1Madrid2Barcelona3Sevilla4Valencia5Grenada6Malaga7Cadiz8Córdoba9Zaragoza

Despite continued economic hardship, the population grew, albeit very unevenly. It is estimated that in the first third of the century it increased by at least one and a half million inhabitants, despite the effects of wars. With a sparse population, compared to other European nations, it was also concentrated in urban centers, with almost deserted rural areas, a situation that shocked foreign observers. There was, however, no profound transformation of society or the implementation of the theoretical equality before the law. During the reign of Fernando, the social structure of the Old Regime and the division of the population into estates that were characteristic of it were fundamentally maintained. The nobility and the clergy were numerically reduced and the bulk of the population was made up of the few middle and middle classes. the abundant peasantry. More than half of the population was dedicated at that time to farm work and barely a tenth to crafts and industry. During the reign of Ferdinand, the number of artisans was reduced, the guilds disappeared and the industrial proletariat began to appear.

The first six-year term of the reign was a period of persecution by the liberals, who, supported by the Army, the bourgeoisie and secret organizations such as Freemasonry, tried to revolt several times to restore the Constitution. Their attempts repeatedly failed, because at that time the liberals were few and had little strength. They did, however, count on the collaboration of numerous guerrillas, discharged or postponed in the reduced post-war Army. The support of the bourgeoisie was due, for their part, to the desire for social and economic reforms that would propitiate the rise of the Spanish market once the American colonies were almost given up as lost; the flourishing of internal demand was considered essential to relaunch industrial and commercial activity. The scarce bourgeoisie therefore advocated the reform of peasant property, to bring the countryside out of ruin and for farmers to replace the lost sources of demand; this was opposed to the conservatism of the king, who intended to maintain the situation of 1808. Despite the fact that Fernando VII had promised to respect the afrancesados, as soon as he arrived he proceeded to banish all those who had held positions of any kind in the administration of José I. By decision of the monarch and behind the government's back, the country joined the Holy Alliance.

During the period, the free press, constitutional councils and councils disappeared, and universities were closed. The union organization was reestablished and the properties confiscated from the Church were returned.

Temporary triumph of the liberals and constitutional government

In January 1820 there was an uprising among the expeditionary forces stationed in the peninsula that had to leave for America to suppress the insurrection of the Spanish colonies. Although this pronouncement, headed by Rafael de Riego, did not have the necessary success, the government was not able to put it down either, and shortly after a succession of uprisings that began in Galicia spread throughout Spain. Ferdinand VII was forced to swear the Constitution in Madrid on March 9, 1820. The next day he pronounced the historic sentence:

Let's march frankly, and I'm the first one on the constitutional path.

The collapse of the absolutist regime was due more to its own weakness than to the strength of the liberals. In six years, it had been unable to modernize state structures and increase financial resources without changing social structures or abolishing privileges, an objective that had been proposed after the coup d'état of May 1814. Thus began the Liberal or Constitutional Triennium. Fernando's submission to the Constitution and to the power of the Liberals was, however, contrary to his will, and his rejection of them was accentuated during the three-year period in which the two parties had to share power.

Equestrian portrait of Fernando VII by José de Madrazo (1821), Museo del Prado.

During the Triennium, absolutism was put to an end and, among other measures, the Inquisition was suppressed. However, although the king appeared to abide by the constitutional regime, he secretly conspired to restore absolutism (uprising of the Royal Guard in July 1822, put down by the National Militia of Madrid; Regency of Urgell). He also used constitutional powers to hinder the approval of reforms that the liberals wanted to implement. The king's objective was, throughout this stage, to recover the absolute power lost in 1820.

According to Sánchez Mantero, the liberals showed their inexperience in state affairs and an erroneous confidence that the restoration of the Constitution would put an end to the desire for independence in America. With the king they maintained a constant relationship of mutual distrust Within it, divisions soon arose between the moderates and the exalted; The former, according to Sánchez Manterio, tended to have more experience, age and culture, while the latter had played a leading role in the liberal triumph of 1820. The former were content with lesser reforms and were more willing to collaborate with the old classes. dominant, while the latter longed for greater changes. This division complicated the governmental task of the liberals. Again according to Sánchez Mantero, another obstacle to their work was the inclination towards absolutism of the bulk of the common people, mostly illiterate. The main adversary of the constitutional government, in addition to the ecclesiastics, was a part of the peasantry, which constituted seventy-five percent of the Spanish population, attached to traditions and old institutions and harmed by some measures of the liberals. The absolutists They organized the royalist parties, guerrilla movements similar to those that had existed during the war against the s French, and also carried out some uprisings, as poorly planned and just as failed as those of the liberals of the previous six-year term. The royalist parties, which multiplied in 1822, adopted a fundamentally reactionary position and harassed the regular army during the Royalist War.

According to Sánchez Mantero, in terms of the economy, the liberal governments were not more fortunate than the absolutist ones, both because of the shortness of their duration and because of the "utopian" nature of the measures they tried to apply.

Intervention of the powers and absolutist restoration

José Aparicio's painting depicting Fernando VII's disembarkation in the Port of Santa María after being "liberated" from his "cautious" in Cadiz. It is received by the Duke of Angulema, commander of the One hundred thousand Sons of Saint Louis who have invaded Spain to “retreat him”, and the Duke of the Infantado, president of the absolutist Regency appointed by the French.

The monarch urged the European powers, mainly France and Russia, to intervene in Spain against the liberals. After the Congress of Verona, the powers actually asked the Spanish government to modify the Constitution, a request that was categorically rejected. This rejection finally decided France, which had initially sought a political and not a military solution, to invade Spain in a well-planned operation to avoid the requisitions and looting of the earlier Napoleonic invasion. Command was handed over to the Duke of Angouleme, nephew of the French sovereign. Finally, the intervention of the French army of the "One Hundred Thousand Sons of Saint Louis" reestablished the absolute monarchy in Spain (October 1823). The French campaign, which began in April, was relatively quick and only found bitter resistance in Catalonia by the army commanded by Francisco Espoz y Mina. The king was "dragged" by the liberals in their retreat to the south and, faced with his opposition to leaving Seville and going to Cádiz, he became temporarily incapacitated. In August the French siege of Cádiz began, which capitulated on September 30, after the royal promise of security for those who had defended the Constitution. The king did not keep his promise and began a harsh repression against the liberals, many of whom had to go into exile to avoid persecution. Fernando VII abolished all the changes of the liberal Triennium, with the sole exception of the suppression of the Inquisition, and proclaimed that during the three years that he had had to share power with the liberals he had not enjoyed "freedom". Fernando returned to Madrid in a triumphant march that repeated, in reverse, the path that he had followed forced by the Liberal government. Paradoxically, the French, who had restored absolute authority to him, from then on played a moderating role in Ferdinand's policy and urged him to grant certain reforms. more. To guarantee Ferdinand's throne, the French maintained a set of garrisons in the country, which also had a moderating effect on the king's absolutism.

Absolutism and moderate reformism

Thus began his last period of reign, the so-called "Ominous Decade" (1823-1833), in which there was a harsh repression of the liberal elements, accompanied by the closure of newspapers and universities (spring of 1823).. A victim of this repression was Juan Martín Díez, the & # 34; Empecinado & # 34;, who had fought in favor of Fernando VII during the war of independence, who was executed in 1825 for his liberal position. The Royal Decree of August 1, 1824 "absolutely" prohibited Freemason societies and any other secret societies in Spain and the Indies. Paradoxically, one of the first measures of the new absolutist Government was the creation of the Council of Ministers, which in the early years it showed little cohesion and power, but it was a novelty in the system of government.

The liberal attempts to regain power, which occurred in the last stage of the reign (in 1824, 1826, 1830 and 1831), failed. Along with the repression of the liberals, however, there was also a series of moderate reforms that partially modernized the country and that heralded the end of the Old Regime and the establishment of the liberal State, which was consummated after the death of Fernando. The creation of the Council of Ministers was joined, in 1828, by the publication of the the first state budget. To promote the increase in national wealth and the meager income of the State, the Ministry of Public Works was created, with little success. July 1824 put a brake on the reforms. The following year saw an accentuation of the persecution of the liberal opposition, the formation of royalist volunteer corps and the creation of the first faith boards, substitutes for the disappeared Inquisition. ón. In November 1824, however, the universities reopened, which were endowed with a common teaching plan. Primary education was also regulated. The moderate attitude of the French and the temperance of Cea Bermúdez they disappointed the most extremist monarchists, who were disenchanted with the situation after the liberal defeat in 1823 and began to form an opposition to the Government from 1824. There were absolutist uprisings instigated by the clergy and by supporters of the infante Carlos María Isidro, Fernando's brother, who was shaping up to be his successor. The various conspiracies in favor of the Infante Don Carlos failed, and the investigations into the plots always avoided investigating the King's brother.

The virtual disappearance of the Spanish Empire was also consummated. In a process parallel to that of the peninsula after the French invasion, most of the American territories declared their independence and began a tortuous path towards liberal republics (Santo Domingo also declared its independence, but was occupied by Haiti shortly after). Only the Caribbean islands of Cuba and Puerto Rico, along with the Philippines, the Marianas (including Guam), and the Carolinas in the Pacific, remained under Spanish rule.

In 1829 an expedition set out from Cuba with the intention of reconquering Mexico under the command of Admiral Isidro Barradas. The company was finally defeated by the Mexican troops.

In 1827 he had to put down a revolt in Catalonia. The discontent of the monarchists over the distribution of positions and favors after the absolutist restoration of 1823, the drop in agricultural prices that fueled the discontent of the peasants and the rejection of the presence of French troops in the region joined forces to favor the cause of the pretender Don Carlos. Most of the rioters were simple people, fed up with the abuses of the administration, which was used by the ultra-conservatives. Although late, the government response was effective. In September 1827, the Count of Spain received command of an army of twenty thousand soldiers to crush the revolt and Fernando prepared to visit the region. At the end of the month, he arrived in Tarragona and in October the rebels had handed over their weapons. In the following weeks, the French units evacuated the territory and on December 3 Fernando arrived in Barcelona. He remained there until spring; in April he returned to Madrid, visiting various cities in the northeast of the country on the way.

The failure of the uprising gave some stability to the Government, which then undertook a series of reforms: in October 1829 it approved the commercial code; That same year, a corps of coastal and border police officers was created to try to stop the abundant smuggling and Cádiz was granted the status of a free port, to compensate for the decline in its trade with America. the project for the creation of the San Fernando bank and the Organic Law of the Stock Exchange.

In October 1830, the royal troops thwarted a new liberal invasion attempt, this time from France, led, among others, by Espoz and Mina. The same thing happened with Torrijos' project from Gibraltar the following year.

During his reign, between titles of Spain and titles of the Indies, he granted one hundred and twenty-three titles of nobility, twenty-two of which were grandees of Spain.

Death and succession of Ferdinand VII

The death of Queen María Amalia on May 18, 1829, and the King's poor health seemed to favor the aspirations of his brother, Don Carlos, to the throne, which was desired by the most exalted monarchists. The infante was the heir. in case the king died without children. Fernando, however, chose to marry immediately for the fourth time, with his niece María Cristina, sister of his sister-in-law, Luisa Carlota, wife of his brother Francisco de Paula. The marriage It was celebrated on December 9, 1829. On October 10 of the following year, the heir to the throne, Isabel, was born. He had another daughter, the Infanta Luisa Fernanda, in 1832.

Fernando VII with the habit of the Order of the Golden Toy. Vicente López Portaña. 1831. Palace of Spain in Rome.

On March 31, 1830, Fernando promulgated the Pragmatic Sanction, approved on September 30, 1789, under Carlos IV, but which had not been made effective for foreign policy reasons. The Pragmatics stated that if the king had no male heir, he would inherit the eldest daughter. This excluded, in practice, the infant Carlos María Isidro from the succession, since whether it was a boy or a girl who was born would be the direct heir of the king. In this way, his daughter Isabel (the future Isabel II), born shortly after, was recognized as heir to the crown, much to the displeasure of the supporters of Don Carlos, the king's brother.

In 1832, when the king was seriously ill at La Granja de San Ildefonso, courtiers in favor of the infante managed to get Fernando VII to sign a Decree repealing the Pragmatics, in what were called events at La Granja With the improvement in the king's health, the Government of Francisco Cea Bermúdez, which immediately replaced the previous one and supported both the liberals and the reformists, put it back into force at the end of the year. His main work it was to ensure the succession of Isabel and frustrate the hopes of the infant Don Carlos. To ensure royal authority, Fernando, still convalescing, delegated it to his wife on October 6. After that, Don Carlos went to Portugal. Meanwhile, María Cristina, appointed regent during the king's serious illness (the heiress Isabel was barely three years old at the time), began a rapprochement with the liberals and granted a broad amnesty for the exiled liberals, foreshadowing the political turn towards liberalism that would occur at the death of the king. Attempts by his brother's supporters to seize power, in late 1832 and early 1833, failed. The monarch had his daughter Elizabeth sworn in as heir to the crown on 20 On June 29, 1833. After a surprising but brief recovery in early 1833, Fernando died childless on September 29. He had been ill since July. He was buried on October 3, in the monastery of El Escorial. The Infante Don Carlos, together with other royalists who considered that the legitimate heir was the king's brother and not his eldest daughter, revolted and the first Carlist war began. With this, Carlism made its appearance.

Legacy

Spain changed intensely during the reign of Ferdinand VII. The Old Regime, characterized by the almost absolute power of the monarch, was giving way to the liberal monarchy, despite Ferdinand's fierce opposition; the king's power was limited and sovereignty passed to the nation. Liberal ideology also began to affect the economy, until then quite rigid and controlled by the State. The bourgeoisie emerged as a thriving social group and economic engine.

The country lost almost all the American territories and with them its role as main power. The king's attitude was that of vain opposition to the reforming and revolutionary currents of the time. His economic, political and social immobility increased the serious crises that afflicted the country during the reign. He also failed to reconcile the supporters of radical changes and those who preferred to preserve the old customs, which were increasingly at odds.

Marriages and offspring

The first candidate to marry Prince Ferdinand would have been Maria Augusta of Saxony but it did not materialize.

Ferdinand VII married four times:

• In 1802 he married his cousin Marie Antonia of Naples (1784-1806), daughter of Fernando IV of Naples and Mary Carolina of Austria. The wedding, held in Barcelona on October 4, 1802, was a double link between the two branches of the Bourbons of Spain and Naples. At the same time, the Infanta María Isabel de Borbón married the Crown Prince Francisco de Naples. According to historian Emilio La Parra López, "the marriage of Fernando with Maria Antonia was a suggestion, or rather a requirement, of the Neapolitan court to allow the other link [...] In the end, the dynastic reason prevailed and the Spanish monarchs accepted the 'imposition' of Maria Carolina de Naples because they aspired to form a solid block with the two Italian kingdoms of the family [the one of Naples and the one of Etruria, whose sovereign was married to María Luisa de Borbón, daughter of Charles IV]. This block could count on the help of England and thus Spain would be willing to counter Bonaparte's ever more onerous demands." Maria Antonia suffered two abortions and there was no offspring. He died of tuberculosis on 21 May 1806.
• In 1816 Fernando was married in second marriages with his niece María Isabel de Braganza, Infanta of Portugal (1797-1818), daughter of his older sister Carlota Joaquina and Juan VI of Portugal. It was neglected by Fernando, who kept during marriage with her abundant love affaires. He gave birth to a daughter, Maria Luisa Isabel, who lived just over four months. Soon after, when she was again pregnant, she died because of a badly done caesarean, which neither saved the daughter. Modesto Lafuente says that he died of a ferocity attack and was the first to echo the rumors to which the event originated: "making in advanced state of gestation and supposing her dead, the doctors proceeded to extract the fetus, at which time the unfortunate mother gave a sharp cry of pain that demonstrated that she was still alive."
  • María Luisa Isabel Fernanda (21 August 1817-9 January 1818).
  • An abortion (December 26, 1818).
• In 1819 he married Maria Josefa Amalia of Saxony (1803-1829), daughter of Maximilian of Saxony and Carolina of Bourbon-Parma. They had no offspring.
• Finally, in 1829, he married another of his nephews, María Cristina de las Dos Sicilias (1806-1878), daughter of his younger sister María Isabel de Borbón and Francisco I de las Dos Sicilias. They had two daughters:
  • Isabel II (1830-1904), Queen of Spain (1833-1868).
  • Luisa Fernanda (1832-1897), an infant of Spain, married to the Duke of Montpensier.

Ancestors

Personality

Appearance and physical problems

Portrait of Fernando VII of the painter Vicente López, carried out in 1828 by the Bank of San Carlos. This is described by historian Emilio La Parra López: "A general captain's dress, with all the important decorations and the sceptre on the right hand, the king is seated, an unusual posture in the Spanish history of the royal portraits, with the left hand sitting on a book placed on a table. On the roof of one of them read: 'R. S. FERNANDO's BANCO. Obesity and the defendants in the hair are well manifest. This canvas, said J.L. Díez, offers 'doubtlessly the most sincere image of the monarch aborate in his mature age'. It is also that of the reformist king, worried about boosting the economy of the kingdom."

It does not appear that the king was physically graceful. In the portraits of Ferdinand VII made by Goya and other artists —it is logical to think that the artists tried to favor those portrayed as much as possible— an obese man is seen, with a depressed upper lip, prognathous lower jaw, prominent forehead, large, fleshy, curved nose and small, squinting eyes. His contemporaries assigned him an "average" height, which for those years means about 165 cm. He suffered from gout (it is believed that he ate too much, especially red meat) and it is said that he also suffered from genital hypertrophy, a malformation that made intercourse very difficult. The first wife, María Antonia de Nápoles, wrote how, feeling cheated, she nearly fainted the first time she saw Fernando VII, when she was shocked to see that the rather ugly "boy" in the portrait it was actually little more than a monstrosity. The princess told her mother that the months passed and Fernando had not yet consummated his marriage. When, after almost a year, he finally did, Queen María Carolina wrote: "At last he is already a husband." According to Emilio La Parra López, “apparently, what really upset María Antonia and, therefore, her mother, was the prince's lack of affection and his sexual impotence. Fernando was an immature young man, affected by macrogenitosomy (excessive development of the genitals), the cause of the late appearance of secondary sexual characteristics; he did not shave until six months after the wedding. His pronounced shyness and his apathy, which bothered his wife so much, made him incapable of coping with an unforeseen situation." On the other hand, the king was also an inveterate cigar smoker, which made him it made my breath fetid.

His most recent biographer, the historian Emilio La Parra López, describes him as «a man of medium height, corpulent (in 1821 he weighed 103 kilos...) A great eater, his obesity increased over time, a circumstance that his favorite painter, Vicente López, could not hide. In the excellent portraits made by this artist, the growing obesity, the loss of hair and the premature aging of the monarch, whose appearance is increasingly bloated, can be observed. In all the images, whether by López or by other painters, Fernando's prognathism is evident, with many features that make it similar to the syndrome described by Crouzon as craniofacial dysostosis: elongated face and depressed upper jaws, which is the cause of the increased apparent size of the lower jaw (prognathism) and the lack of dental occlusion". part of the superior features”, which featured a disproportionately large nose. But he also said that he was very impressed by "the mixture of intelligence, arrogance and weakness in his gaze." A French officer who also met the king in person sensed "his harsh and even brutal character [behind that] unsympathetic physiognomy."

Character

It is more difficult to describe the monarch's psyche and its strengths and weaknesses. Except for the shamelessly flattering panegyrics, the general assessment of historians and chroniclers of the qualities of the Desired is very unfavorable, if not downright terrible. He was endowed with a normal intelligence, not without cunning and liveliness, but his character seems to have been subjected to cowardice, duplicity and a kind of hedonistic egoism. One of the most implacable critics of him was the diplomat and historian Marquis of Villaurrutia, who affirms that since he was little, the king showed himself to be insensitive to the affection of his parents or any other person, cruel and devious; and as king, and despite "never having been a more desired monarch", he was cowardly, vindictive, ruthless, ungrateful, disloyal, a liar, a womanizer and a slob... and in short, devoid of any aptitude to be king.

There are several contemporary testimonies of Fernando VII that speak of his spiteful and vengeful character. One of the main ones is that of the famous sailor Cayetano Valdés, who escorted the king and his family in the felucca that took them from Cádiz to El Puerto de Santa María on October 1, 1823, this brief journey being the final act of the Liberal Triennium and the definitive success of the invasion of the so-called One Hundred Thousand Sons of San Luis. Once they had all disembarked in El Puerto de Santa María, as the constitutional government about to dissolve had agreed with the Duke of Angoulême, the king turned to Valdés to give him "a look of those that threaten and terrify, to which they gave the countenance and eyes of that prince, full of evil expression, where the ferocious and the double appeared at the same time". According to a French witness of those events, the admiral read in that look "his sentence of death. Thus, remaining oblivious to the scene before him, in the midst of the acclamations that resounded on the shore, without greeting His Majesty or asking permission from anyone, he hastened to turn the felucca and put to sea with the stroke of oars. The hasty return of Valdés to Cádiz was prudently successful. Before the end of that same day, October 1, the king drafted a decree in which he retracted his commitments, put in writing, of moderation and clemency of the day before, repealed everything approved by the Cortes since 1820 and unleashed the repression of the liberals, beginning with the death sentence of the three members of the provisional regency appointed in Seville on the previous June 11, when the Cortes had temporarily suspended Fernando VII from his functions. One of those three regents was none other than Valdés, the other two being Gabriel Císcar, also a sailor, and General Gaspar de Vigodet. It is worth noting that practically up until October 1, the king had flattered Valdés several times, going so far as to tell him "that he esteemed him much more than he thought", and that that same day, just a few hours before, Fernando He had set as a condition to make the journey from Cádiz to El Puerto by sea that the boat be captained by Valdés, "telling him that with him he would not fear the passage of the boat." When his French ally —and Bourbon, like him—, the Duke of Angoulême, urged him to decree an amnesty, Fernando responded by urging him to listen to the cries of "Long live the absolute king and the Holy Inquisition!" that were uttered in the street, and adding that this was the will of the people. Upon hearing that, Angoulême left that first meeting with the Spanish monarch with a "little concealed disgust".

Portrait of Fernando VII

Authors such as Comellas or Marañón, who have worked to better understand the reign of Ferdinand VII and offer a fair vision of his actions and personality, do not differ much from previous opinions. Marañón says of the monarch that he was "if not intelligent, at least smart." Comellas, kinder with the portrait of the king, defines him as a vulgar person without imagination, "arrests" or brilliant ideas, and citing witnesses he points out that every day he dispatched with his ministers, although late in the afternoon; for this author he would be a simple, peaceful, good-humored and homely person (despite his continuous infidelities), capable of being moved by the need of the most humble and sensitive to atrocities such as torture (one of his first decisions as king was the confirmation of the abolition of torture decreed by the Cortes of Cádiz), qualities that were not even enough to replace the need that the nation had for a monarch very different from Fernando. The most recognized virtue, even by his enemies, was simplicity and good-naturedness, although often this simplicity fell into the merely coarse and tacky. It was closer to popular treatment and simple customs than to the rigidity of traditional courtly ceremony He lacked a solid education and intellectual curiosity, but he was fond of crafts, music, painting, reading and bullfighting.

However, despite the occasional displays of generosity with the most needy indicated by Comellas —and that fed the love that the common people felt for the Desired—, and despite the methodical way with which he dispatched with his cabinet, he is blamed for a lack of interest in state affairs, which he preferred to abandon in his ministers and which he subordinated to his greed or personal interest: Ángel Fernández de los Ríos points out that Fernando VII had before his death 500 million real deposited in the Bank of London, while the national debt had increased during his reign by 1,745,850,666 real.

The professor at the University of Valencia Isabel Burdiel writes that «his way of reigning always consisted of dividing and pitting those around him against each other, in such a way that he strengthened in all of them, through confusion and terror, the most abject subservience. Ladino, distrustful and cruel, given to coarse humor and nocturnal adventures, the king could be very manipulable if he knew how to attend to his wishes ».

Accepting the worst accusations, the psychiatrist and historian Luis Mínguez Martín, recognizes in Fernando VII a "superficial charm, smooth talk and a seductive and accommodating attitude" that hid a dissocial, antisocial or psychopathic personality, manifested in "contempt towards the rights and feelings of others, cynicism and deceit, lies and manipulation, lack of social responsibility and feelings of guilt, and projective mechanisms."

Accepting the worst accusations, the psychiatrist and historian Luis Mínguez Martín, recognizes in Fernando VII a "superficial charm, smooth talk and a seductive and accommodating attitude" that hid a dissocial, antisocial or psychopathic personality, manifested in "contempt towards the rights and feelings of others, cynicism and deceit, lies and manipulation, lack of social responsibility and feelings of guilt, and projective mechanisms."

As for his hobbies, Fernando was never a good horseman or interested in hunting like his father and grandfather were. Over time he became a good billiards player and his main hobby was reading and acquiring books, until he formed an important library. He loved to cut the sheets of untouched books. He also had the habit of writing with very careful calligraphy about the trips he made in the form of a diary, starting with the one he made with his parents between January 4 and March 22, 1796, to Seville, passing through Badajoz, when he was not yet twelve years old.

The image of King Ferdinand before his subjects

Portrait of Fernando VII painted by Francisco de Goya in 1814 by order of the Municipality of Santander. This is how historian Emilio La Parra López described the painting: "[Goya] presented him in full body with the uniform of colonel of royal guards, supported on a pedestal in which a female figure crowned with the laurel of victory, representation of Spain, welcomes the monarch with open arms. He is the desired and necessary king. In the pedestal are the attributes of royalty (horn, sceptre and mantle) and at the foot of the king, a lion—the symbol of the monarchy—breaks with his faucets in attitude fiera the chains with which Napoleon intended to hold it.”

According to the historian Emilio La Parra López, "Fernando was always loved by the majority of his subjects" who saw in him the "innocent and virtuous prince", an image built during the War of Independence by the "patriots" who they fought in his name against Napoleon and against the Monarchy of José I Bonaparte. Hence the nickname "the Desired". «The exaltation of Fernando VII constituted the center of the intense activity aimed at creating an atmosphere of generalized belligerence, because the king symbolized the institutional aggression perpetrated by the French emperor. Consequently, Fernando was presented to public opinion as the opposite of the person responsible for the internal crisis (Godoy) and the one who wanted to change the dynasty (the tyrant Napoleon). Fernando embodied Good and the others Evil. From there, a fabulous image of Fernando VII was built ». This image endured after his return from Valençay's "captivity" even among the liberals whom he viciously persecuted and, although his popularity gradually waned, at the end of the reign he still aroused popular enthusiasm, as was demonstrated during his trip to Catalonia and northern Spain in 1827-1828 or on the occasion of his marriage to María Cristina de Borbón, in 1830.

Therefore, the image of Ferdinand VII before his subjects was always that of the brave king who faced the tyrant Napoleon, refusing to renounce his crown during the six years of his captivity (much kinder than the Spanish thought). This heroic attitude, despite being completely false (after all, it had not cost Napoleon anything to get Ferdinand to renounce the throne in the Bayonne abdications), seemed to be consistent with that of "the patriots" who were fighting in Spain. against the French, as if the young king pretended to be loyal to the loyalty of his subjects. But the truth was that Fernando wrote Napoleon numerous times congratulating him on his victories in Spain and even asking him to adopt him as his son.

Thus, the War of Independence established the myth of the “desired king” who would return to take charge of his long-suffering kingdom if the Spanish fought tenaciously for it. This myth, which would last throughout his reign, gave Fernando VII a popularity much greater than that of any of his ancestors among the people (not among liberals, especially emigrants), which remained broadly unchanged until his death., despite the disasters and political repression that in other circumstances would have been enough to disappoint the high expectations placed on him since the time of his confrontation with Godoy and his parents.

Ferdinand VII in the arts and sciences

King Ferdinand VII was lucky to have good painters and maintained the Bourbon patronage of artists such as Francisco de Goya, Vicente López Portaña or José Madrazo. According to Mesonero Romanos, in the last days of his existence he still "went, tremulous and tiring, to the solemn distribution of prizes from the Royal Academy of San Fernando". He encouraged artistic and intellectual activities and the improvement of primary education -mainly during the Liberal Triennium— and secondary school —during the Ominous Decade. The opposite occurred with the universities, which lost students and found themselves watched over by the Government, which considered them sources of liberalism.

Supported by his second wife, Isabel de Braganza, Fernando took up José I's idea of creating a Royal Museum of Paintings, and decided to convert the building that Juan de Villanueva had created as a Natural History Cabinet into such a museum. Thanks to Through his initiative and personal financing, the current Prado Museum was born, inaugurated in the presence of the monarch himself and his third wife on November 19, 1819. He was also fond of music.

Despite the supposed deterioration of Spanish science and the flight of important scientists during his reign, Fernando VII owed a series of capital initiatives. The flight of scientists was mainly due to political reasons: the exiles sympathized with the French or with the liberals. In 1815 he ordered the restoration of the Astronomical Observatory, badly damaged during the "francesada". The Royal Cabinet was also restructured at that time. de Máquinas in the so-called Conservatory of Arts. In 1815 the Museum of Natural Sciences and the Botanical Garden of Madrid were also created.

On the other hand, Ferdinand VII is the protagonist of some famous historical novels, such as Secret Memory of Brother Leviatán (1988), by Juan Van-Halen, and The Felon King (2009), by José Luis Corral.

Contemporary biographies of Ferdinand VII

Still while the monarch was alive, various biographical sketches were published, generally very contrary to it, all of which were prohibited in Spain. The Irishman Michael Joseph Quin was in Spain during the last days of the Liberal Triennium, and, apart from publishing this trip in 1823, in 1824 he printed his translation of an original in Spanish that Juan Bautista Vilar attributes to the liberal émigré José Joaquín de Mora, of some Memoirs of Ferdinand VII, translated that same year into French; it still had a third edition in Spanish in 1840, published by Joaquín García Jiménez and expanded with two historical essays by "Luis de Carné", undoubtedly the Count Louis-Marie-Joseph de Carné-Marcein (1804- 1876). Immediately banned was that of Charles Le Brun, Life of Ferdinand VII... (Philadelphia, 1826).

Orders

Kingdom of Spain

• Grand Master of the Order of the Golden Toy.
• Grand Master of the Order of Charles III.
• Grand Master of the Order of Elizabeth the Catholic.
• Great master of the military orders of Santiago, Calatrava, Alcántara and Montesa.
• Grand Master of the Royal Military Order of San Fernando.
• Grand Master of the Royal Military Order of San Hermenegildo.

Foreign

• 1814: Knight of the Order of the Holy Spirit. ( Kingdom of France)
• 1814: Knight of the Order of Saint Michael. (Kingdom of France)
• 1815: Knight of the Order of the Jarretera.United Kingdom)
• Knight of the Order of San Jenaro.Kingdom of the Two Sicilies)
• Big Knight of the Royal Order of San Fernando and the Merit. (Kingdom of the Two Sicilies)
• Great Knight of the Order of the Legion of Honor. ( Kingdom of France)
• Great Knight of the Order of St Stephen of Hungary. (Austrian Empire)
• Knight of the Order of the Elephant. (August 29, 1818, Kingdom of Denmark)

Anecdote

The monarch starred in numerous anecdotes, some of which have permeated the Spanish popular heritage:

• According to Pérez Galdós National EpisodeWhen Napoleon had escaped from the island of Elba and returned to France, the help of the camera, nervous, did not come to dress Fernando for the cabinet meeting called to deal with the problem, and the king said, "See me slowly, I am in a hurry."
• Mesonero Romanos says that in 1818, on the occasion of his visit to the Spanish Public Exhibition of Industry, when the Catalan fabric makers showed him his genre asking for protectionist measures, the king exclaimed: "Bah! All these are women's things." And he went for a walk around the Retreat.
• The king was a big pool fan, and he used to play with his members. litter. These, desirous of pleasing the sovereign, always sought to fail their blows and make the balls unbeatable for the monarch to do successive carambolas. Hence comes the phrase "Thus they put them on Fernando VII".
• Fernando VII of Spain maintained a great complicity with his confessor, the canary priest Cristóbal Bencomo and Rodriguez. This is deduced from the numerous titles granted to him by the king, among which stand out that of member of the council and chamber of Castilla, Inquisitor General of Spain (cargo rejected by Bencomo himself) and the Grand Cross of the Order of Charles III. In addition, when Fernando VII returned to Madrid after Bayona’s abdications, he claimed the presence in the court of his confessor and ordered to move to the island of Tenerife a warship with the sole purpose of transferring him back to court with all the pomp possible.

Succession

Predecessor: Carlos de Borbón	Prince of Asturias 1789-1808	Successor: Isabel de Borbón
Predecessor: Carlos IV	King of Spain 1808 (19 March-6 May)	Successor: José I (not recognized by the Courts)
Predecessor: José I (not recognized by the Courts)	King of Spain 1808 or 1814 -1833	Successor: Isabel II