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Miguel made a noble, if, at times, disinterested, effort to improve the socioeconomic situation of the three realms entrusted to him, but the developments made during his reign reflect an administration still beholden to a more medieval, and less continental or global, approach to state-building and international trade. None of this is to say, however, that Miguel’s reign was a failure domestically. There were numerous, sizeable landholding blocs in Spain that had heretofore prevented the Iberian monarchs from more effectively organizing their kingdoms and playing a direct role in improving them, but two were the most influential - the nobility and the Church.

In regards to the nobility, while Miguel succeeded in keeping the noble families in the subordinate position they had been forced into by the Catholic Monarchs, little was done to effectively break up or co-opt the exceedingly vast amounts of wealth and land held by Spain’s particularly outsize noble class. By replacing the nobility with royal appointees in administrative positions, the Crown had almost entirely shut them out of the royal government, and made them incapable of holding considerable sway over the Crown of the like they possessed in previous centuries. However, this de-nobilization of the government worked against the realm in many ways. For one, shutting out the nobility may have ended dangerous court intrigue, but it also forced a sizeable chunk of Castilian society and an even more sizeable chunk of its economic resources to be more or less uninvolved in the progressive welfare of the realm. Following this, the alienation of the nobility made them even more determined to preserve and enhance their untouchability - whether in law or otherwise - whereas a nobility kept at arm’s length at court might eventually be cowed into subservience and thus forced to go along with royal initiatives. The Spanish Crown would need to find some way to both invite the noble houses back into the administration while also keeping them weak enough to be kept firmly under the Crown’s thumb. Miguel achieved something to this regard when, in 1531, in his corollary to the Leyes de Oviedo (originally passed in 1502), he circumvented the custom prohibiting hidalgos to work by clarifying that this implied manual labor, while also restricting the sale of titles by adding a clause that required any further purchaser of a hidalguía to work as a tax-collecting corregidor. Likewise - with royal coffers becoming unprecedentedly full from the quinto real - the sale of titles became less and less necessary to maintain Spain’s fiscal well-being. Consequently, Miguel suspended the sale of hidalguías in 1524, with an exception made for those who both purchased the title and formally entered the Órdenes Militantes (and either elected to fight in North Africa and Southern Italy or opted out through the payment of the required exemption fee and sponsored the training and equipment of two knightly pages to take his place on the battlefield). Nonetheless, such measures could only stem the tide. The “segundones,” sons shirked of any inheritance by the practice of primogeniture, were constantly percolating into Spanish society (especially with the noble houses combining their properties through marriage), and - while offering Spain a reliable supply of usually well-educated and well-mannered men eager to serve the Church or the Crown - the hidalgos segundones were responsible for bloating the Crown’s already sizeable bureaucracy and removing themselves - a significant portion of Spain’s working-age male populace - from contributing to the more fundamentally important of Castile’s industries, such as banking or freehold farming, both desperately lacking. While the overseas colonies and the wars in the Maghreb served as a much needed outlet for their martial talents, landless and often outright vagrant hidalgos who would not deign to put their hand to the plow (and could not legally be required to) would continue to be a troublesome element in Spanish society. Fortunately, the Crown did succeed in convincing many hidalgos to take up commerce instead of soldiering or priestly orders, thereby building up Spain’s much needed native merchant class - although such was still considered more of a hobby than a livelihood, and a disdainful one at that.


In regards to the Church, Miguel and his predecessors had achieved enough in the way of monetary concessions that, by the time of Miguel’s death, it was no longer a significant drain on or obstruction to royal coffers by any means. The impending conquest of the Muslim kingdom of Granada had induced Pope Innocent VIII to grant the Catholic Monarchs the right of “patronato” (“patronage”) over the Church in this to-be-conquered realm (partially in exchange for assistance in Italian affairs), allowing the future kings of Spain absolute royal authority over all ecclesiastical foundations there. Similarly, after some deft diplomatic maneuvering on Fernando of Aragon’s part, a papal bull in 1501 granted the Crown of Castile a patronato over all the Indies, while Manuel of Portugal similarly obtained a “padroado” over the entirety of Portugal and its overseas possessions in 1517. The patronato granted the right of royal “presentation” to ecclesiastical offices (as close to royal investiture as is possible without direct decree) - giving the Spanish monarchy the ability to keep the large, lucrative episcopal sees and holdings out of foreign hands - and also conceded in perpetuity all tithes levied within the patronato to royal coffers - all in exchange for paying maintenance and undertaking evangelical initiatives. The provisions of the patronato would be further rounded out by the “tercias reales” - one third of the tithes collected in Castile paid directly to the Crown - affirmed by Alexander VI in 1494, followed by a similar concession in Aragon in 1518 (acquired under Miguel) [1]. While the patronato secured a hefty portion of the Spanish Crown’s revenue, another considerable money-maker was the Bull of the Crusade, the “Cruzada.” Originally designed to finance the Reconquista, a Cruzada bull allowed the Crown to sell indulgences - at a fixed rate for every man, woman, and child - presumably to fund action against the Moors. This was a bull which had to be constantly renewed via the Pope’s assent (although he was always game to grant it), prompting Miguel to extend it to include an additional one-tenth of all Church tithes in Portugal, Castile, and Aragon for a ten year period following approval from each kingdom’s respective Cortes. The money fleeced from these arrangements grew less important over the course of the first half of the 16th century, due to the fact that the Crown still had to recoup the Church’s expenses (making the collection of the Church’s money almost circular) and given the outrageous amount of raw wealth that began to flood in from the Americas. However, the patronato and the like remained very important in the long run, with the Crown avoiding the economic jealousy that led other rulers to embrace Protestantism and disentail Church property, as well as allowing the Crown to use Church land as either much-needed collateral or (more charitably) as grants to smallhold farmers.

The Church under Miguel was also gleaned and reformed in much the same manner as was done by his grandparents: absentee parishes and sees were re-filled, the superfluous lands held by the absentee bishops, abbots, and priests were confiscated, clergymen found in common law marriages were defrocked, the mendicant orders were favored heavily, and dozens of hospitals and schools of theology were opened and succored with royal coin (the ardent and austere Cardinal Francisco Jiménez de Cisneros, first Archbishop of Granada, was as effective in this campaign as he had been under Fernando and Isabel). However, perhaps one of the most decisive reforms pushed by Miguel was his support of a vernacular bible. While substantially flustered by the ignorance of some downright heretical lay brotherhoods, what really caused Miguel to make up his mind was the obstinance of his Muslim subjects. Alonso Manrique de Lara, Grand Inquisitor of Spain and Cisneros’ successor, stated in 1528 that the Moors brought under Spanish hegemony (whether in Iberia or in North Africa) “treat the priest and the authority of his office” as “at best, … alien and imperious; at worst, as eccentric and foolish.” Although a vernacular bible authorized by both the Holy Office of the Inquisition and Rome would only come to fruition in 1548, Miguel’s intense desire for an aggressively evangelical Church would provide the necessary pressure.


Some of these more problematic developments were the result of a lack of creativity, initiative, or interest, but others were caused simply by ignorance. For instance, Miguel and his administrators could not have predicted the disastrous hyperinflation that the gold and silver of the New World would cause for Spain, especially considering the fact that Europe had spent centuries deprived of a substantial amount of bullion and therefore considered “too much gold” to be an impossibility. The bullion content of the real, the primary unit of Spanish currency, increased dramatically with the influx of precious metals from the Americas. At the turn of the 16th century, the common real de vellón (“half silver”) was worth 8 copper maravedís (the lowest Spanish currency unit) [1], whereas by the 1530s it had increased in value 32-fold, and increased another two-fold by the 1550s - leading to the creation of the real de plata (90% silver). Improved access to gold allowed Spanish currency to heighten its topline, with the minting of the gold escudo (worth 16 reales) and doblón (worth 2 escudos) beginning in 1532. The purchasing power of Spanish coinage became so tremendous that virtually every luxury good imaginable became available in Spain via import. However, this caused a dearth of growth in Spain’s fragile manufacturing sector, and would lead to crippling inflationary issues over time.


Miguel also oversaw the continued expansion of the Spanish kingdoms’ bureaucratic apparatuses, the strengthening of the Santa Hermandad (royal law enforcement), and also several infrastructural projects. However, Miguel’s infrastructural improvements were mostly intended to ease communication and the transport of supplies and troops between Portugal and Castile’s administrative centers and their southerly cities and ports. Apart from the “Caminho Real do Sul,” linking Lisbon with Lagos and Faro and constructed under Martim Branco’s supervision (it would later be referred to colloquially as the “Caminho do Branco,” or in some cases in Alentejo simply as “O Branco”), Miguel’s reign also saw the construction of “El Camino Real de Andalucía,” which stretched from Toledo to Cádiz, passing through Sevilla and Córdoba. This grand “Vía Andaluz” employed thousands of Castilian laborers and saw large quantities of American gold enter their pockets, but such projects - for all the good they did for Castile’s struggling lower class - were often hotbeds of jobbery, and put disposable income in the hands of those who lacked the financial acumen to invest it in something truly constructive in the long term. Likewise, while the Spanish bureaucracy could be all-seeing in size and capacity, the enforcement of the law could be impeccable, and the taxes could be gathered at peak efficiency, it would all be fruitless, ultimately, if the Spaniards being regulated, protected, and taxed were deeply impoverished. The Castilian tax codes and the corregidores that enforced them in particular were able to fleece the Castilian populace like clockwork, giving the Crown of Castile a quite comfortable disposable income - yet the private debt amongst Castile’s lower classes was mounting with ever greater speed, especially amongst the hardy Castilian freehold farmers, who found their enterprise rapidly disappearing and being replaced by the Mesta’s cañadas or gigantic latifundias owned by the nobility.

While the opinion of Miguel amongst modern Spanish historians is mostly positive while somewhat mixed, the memory of Miguel da Paz is one of great respect in the modern American and African countries of the Hispanosphere. The evangelization of the yet un-Islamified peoples of Africa, Asia, and the Americas was key to Miguel’s apocalyptic vision of geopolitics. For instance, when presented with the armed courtiers of the Congolese lord of Soyo, Miguel remarked later that a “kingdom of these stout and fearsome Africans, impassioned by the fire of Christ and rising up from the south, would be to the flank of the Moor as a lion is to an inattentive ewe.” In Miguel’s eyes, enslavement and other such cruelties ran contrary to this evangelization, leading him to prohibit, under pain of death, the taking of slaves from Senegambia or the kingdom of Congo, as well as to sponsor the anti-slavery campaigns of the likes of Bartolomé de las Casas and Bernardino de Sahagún in the Americas. While Miguel could do little to prevent the ruthless exploitation of many Indios or the shipment of thousands of African slaves to the Americas and the Atlantic islands, his insistence on gentle diplomacy and vigorous proselytization with the many pagan peoples his rapidly expanding empire accumulated or encountered earned him their undying affection - often creating a strange dichotomy in attitudes towards Spain amongst many of these peoples, summed up in the words of Duarte Pacheco Pereira, who served as the captain-major of the Portuguese Gold Coast and observed that “it is common amongst the chieftains of the Fante to relate that they hate the Portuguese, yet love our king, Miguel.”

Miguel had striven to maintain the tradition of an itinerant court established by his grandparents, which had allowed him a more comprehensive grasp on the condition of his realm and also allowed his subjects a witness to the authoritative grandeur of the royal presence. However, while Miguel may have always dreamed of being a great and capable warrior full of tireless energy, his constitution ruled otherwise. Miguel’s cut and dried worldview and approach to problems had been imbued with an irrepressible determination and singularity of purpose ever since surviving two near-death bouts of illness at the ages of 8 and 14. Mortality had never much worried or slowed down the extremely pious Miguel, and even the possible jeopardy into which he might put Spain if he were to die prematurely did not seem to bother him either. As was to be expected, Miguel’s exhausting pace caught up with him in 1536. Having been staying in Cartagena in order to receive news from the Turkish front, Miguel departed the city in October to travel to Sevilla to be present for the Christening of Juan Pelayo’s first son - named Gabriel, in the pattern of his grandfather. Despite Queen Claude’s objections to him travelling so late in the season, Miguel departed across the foothills of the Baetic mountains on the 23rd. The journey took longer than expected, and, on a misleadingly clear November morning, Miguel’s horse lost its footing on a particularly icy slope of the piedmont, tossing the king from his saddle and against a large rock, breaking his hip and fracturing his knee. Miguel’s cohorts raced him to Puente Genil, and from there to Córdoba, where his son would arrive a week later. It certainly did not help that Miguel had already been fighting a cold for the better part of his trip, to which would soon be added the further complication of sepsis. Miguel, confident in the future of Spain with North Africa subdued, the Turks repulsed, and, most importantly, a healthy son born to his heir, died in the presence of his royal confessor, Juan Pelayo, and Claude, in the evening of November 6th, 1536, at the still vibrant age of 38. Having been king of Castile since 1515, king of Aragon since 1517, and king of Portugal since 1520, the three crowns of Spain now passed from his threefold majesty Miguel and into the lap of young Juan Pelayo, who now had to face an increasingly volatile world.