Soon the king had adopted Villiers as his 'son' and the king became his 'dear Dad' the only way forward for Charles was to join this new extended family as a junior member, which is what he did in 1618 as 'baby Charles'. Charles was now, more than ever, a bystander at court, his father's attention completely captured by his new love. Worse still was the fact that in 1614 the king's eye fell upon a new favourite, George Villiers, who accelerated himself into James's affections capturing them completely by early 1616. James made little effort to involve him in the governance of the land and Charles had no political influence. When they left, England Charles was left to his own devices at St James's palace where he continued to receive a princely education devised for him by the king. He had been robbed of his elder brother, Henry Prince of Wales, in 1612 and, the following year, his beloved sister Elizabeth had married Frederick IV, Elector of the German Palatinate, one of the seven princes who chose the Holy Roman Emperor. It was noted that the royal palace was 'furnished with many excellent pictures, all the good ones made by Italians or come out of Italy'.ĭespite embodying the future hopes of king and country, in his teens James I second son, Prince Charles was a lost figure at court. It must have been an exotic and exciting time because the Spanish laid on magnificent entertainments: a triumph, bull fights, a tournament, a parade, masques and feasts. On the street front was a great festival hall overlooking a square in which the principal events of the reception were held. It was far smaller than Hampton Court or Greenwich, but familiar in the arrangement of rooms graduating from the public to the private quarters of the king. But what the English visitors saw was a double-courtyarded residence in an early Renaissance style similar to many of Henry VIII's houses. Philip III's palace remains, but much altered from its early 17th century state, and it is now a military headquarters. The royal palace was originally a private mansion built between 15 in 1600 it was acquired by the Duke of Lerma, who sold it to Philip III the following year. As the capital of Castile, it was a fine place with an ambitious but unfinished 16th century cathedral and many large houses, churches and colleges. They assembled at Valladolid, the Castilian city to which King Philip III had moved his court in 1601. A trip to Spain was a visit to the centre of the European world, the capital of Europe’s largest and most powerful empire and, as the English wagon train of 800 mules made their way across the sun-scorched landscape, the cream of the Jacobean court were exposed to a novel set of cultural influences. Their vast embassy to the court of King Philip was the most splendid and extravagant appearance of the English court abroad for nearly a century. James I signed in London but the plan was for King Philip III to ratify it in person in Spain in the presence of Charles Howard the earl of Nottingham and around 500 English courtiers. Negotiations for the peace had taken place in London at Somerset House in series of protracted meetings commemorated, at their conclusion, by a large painting showing all the participants. Many luxury goods that were common in Paris and Madrid struggled to make their way into the Port of London and, in many ways, England was cut off from the cultural currents of contemporary Europe. Spanish territories spread across more-or-less the whole of Europe including most of Italy and, although France was not formally at war with England, travel abroad by the English was dangerous and ill advised. The treaty of London, signed in August 1604, ended the war that had dominated English politics for almost two decades. Protestant England had been isolated from the Catholic powers of Europe ever since Elizabeth I's excommunication by the Pope in 1570 and England had been a war with Spain for nineteen years. The story actually starts in the second year of the reign of King James I. My lecture tonight tells the story of that madcap adventure and reveals why it was so important in shaping the culture of Early Stuart England. It was a mad and incredibly dangerous thing for the only surviving son of a king of England and Scotland to do. As a 23-year-old, wearing a wig and dodgy false beard, and taking the name of Mr Smith, he rode across the whole of France with three companions and arrived in Madrid completely unannounced. But the first time, when he was Prince of Wales, is much less well known. The second time we know about, on a scaffold in 1649.
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