Ferdinand VII of Spain
Ferdinand VII (Spanish Fernando VII, born October 14, 1784 in San Ildefonso, † September 29, 1833 in Madrid ) was King of Spain 1808 and from 1814 to 1833.
Life
Ferdinand VII was born the fifth son of Charles IV of Spain and his wife Maria Louisa of Parma and courtly educated under the direction of Manuel de Godoy.
On October 6, 1802, he married Princess Maria Antonia of the Two Sicilies, a daughter of the future King of the Two Sicilies, Ferdinand I., who died in 1806.
Part of hatred against Godoy, partly influenced by the disaffected and large, by the priest Escoiquiz and for fear of being excluded from his parents on the throne, Ferdinand established contact with François de Beauharnais, the former French ambassador in Madrid, and entered with self- Napoleon I in correspondence, which he announced in a letter dated 11 October 1807 to try to marry the eldest daughter of Lucien Bonaparte. These negotiations were betrayed (possibly from Beauharnais itself), and Lucien refused to give his consent. Ferdinand was arrested on October 18, 1807 in El Escorial and accused on 30 October in a royal manifesto of treason, to which he subjected himself and his accomplices betrayed.
As a result of the news of the escape plan of the royal family on March 18, 1808 a riot broke out and Charles IV abdicated on March 19, the crown in favor of Ferdinand, Ferdinand was welcomed by the people with joy as king. A few days later, however, Charles IV declared on the initiative of Murat his abdication for enforced. Napoleon objected to the recognition of Ferdinand as king, but invited him to a negotiation to Bayonne. There was Ferdinand after prolonged reluctance on May 6, return the crown to his father and placed himself under the protection of Napoleon, the Talleyrandsche Castle Valençay instructed him with an annual pension of one million francs as a residence. De facto, however, it was during this process to a capture of the royal family by Napoleon.
On Valençay Ferdinand brought about in the company of his brother Don Carlos over five years. In Spain he became a symbol for the rebellion against the alliance with Napoleon Charles IV was only towards the end of 1813 gave Napoleon Ferdinand the crown again. Pursuant to the Treaty of Valençay from December 11, 1813 Ferdinand returned in March 1814 returned to Spain, where he was received with enthusiasm. He pushed through a decree of 4 May to the Constitution of 1812 and built a bloody religious and political reaction with inquisition and torture. He then asked the absolutism in such an extreme form restores that he even lost the support of the other European monarchies. With the uprising of January 1820 Ferdinand was forced to restore the constitution of the Cortes of 1812 on March 7. In the following years he had to share with the various currents of the revolutionary movement into power. As the absolutist power was restored to Spain by the French invasion in 1823, Ferdinand returned to the old system.
On 11 December 1829 the married after the early death of his childless daughter from his second marriage Ferdinand for the fourth time, this time with his niece Maria Christina of the Two Sicilies, daughter of King Francis I of the Two Sicilies, the on October 10, 1830 future Queen of Spain, Isabella II, brought to the world.
At the instigation of Queen María Cristina Ferdinand VII realized the repeal in question by the Cortes in 1822 of the Salic law on March 29, 1830 by a so-called Pragmatic Sanction, which restored the old Castilian cognate succession and thus the possibility of female succession to the throne. This decision helped to destabilize Spain for decades, as his brother Carlos was looking at this as a robbery of his throne and immediately claims the first triggered after Ferdinand's death of several Carlistenkriegen to drive María Cristina and Isabella from the throne.
Gravely ill, the king entrusted the direction of public affairs, whereupon developed a liberal system of government in October 1832 his wife. The Carlin- table -minded Minister Calomarde, the almost unconscious king a decree that abolished the Pragmatic Sanction of 1830, had it signed, had to flee, and Ferdinand said on December 31 of that decree for surreptitiously. On January 4, 1833, he took over the government again himself, but he died on 29 September 1833.
Marriages and descendants
- Infanta Isabella Maria ( * October 10, 1830, † April 9, 1904 ), afterwards Queen Isabella II of Spain
- Infanta Luisa Fernanda ( born January 30, 1832 † February 2, 1897 ), afterwards Duchess of Montpensier
Others
On January 19, 1815 Ferdinand Ferdinand presented the medals restored.