'Le lion enfin couronné’. Pensée politique et imaginaire royal au cours des premiers voyages espagnols des princes de la Maison de Bourgogne-Habsbourg

In the beginning of the 16th century, the princes of the House of Burgundy-Habsburg,
Philip the Fair and his son Charles, travelled several times to Spain. These travels
radically transformed the scope of their political possibilities. Philip became king
consort of Castile, along with his spouse Joanna, while Charles, as heir to the Catholic
Kings, seized the crowns of all the Spanish Kingdoms. At least since the second half of
Philip the Good’s reign, the main political objective of the rulers of the Low Countries
was the acquisition of a royal title, dignity, and power. This paper examines how, at
a time when such a crown was in their reach, the courtly authors of Philip the Fair
and Charles of Habsburg wrote elaborate travel accounts of their masters’ journeys to
Spain. In their narrations, they created a royal figure and image that legitimated their
masters’ place in their new function. They also established a new distinctive model of
monarchy, which they inscribed at the crossroads of the political actions of the Dukes
of Burgundy and those of the Catholic Kings. Furthermore, they connected this type of
kingship to what they considered to be the main political forces of Spain: the Grandees
and the Spanish Cortes. Lastly, their narratives capture a time of intense reflection
on monarchical politics in the Low Countries shortly before the Imperial Election of
Charles v redesigned the political landscape.