Charles V
Holy Roman Emperor · King of Spain · Archduke of Austria
1500 – 1558
Biography
Ruled over an empire "on which the sun never sets," spanning Europe to the Americas. Exhausted by constant wars with France and the Ottoman Empire, he abdicated his thrones and retired to a monastery.
Events
- Conflict
Spanish Conquest of Tenochtitlan
1519 – 1521· as Habsburg monarch who authorized the conquestA two-year campaign by Hernán Cortés and roughly six hundred Spaniards, aided by smallpox and tens of thousands of indigenous allies who hated Mexica rule, destroyed the Aztec Empire. Moctezuma II received Cortés peacefully in Tenochtitlan in November 1519 and was held captive there; he died in disputed circumstances during the Mexica uprising of 1520. The eighty-day Spanish siege ended on 13 August 1521 with the capture of the last tlatoani, Cuauhtémoc.
Also there: Moctezuma II, Cuitlahuac, Cuauhtémoc
Between 1554 and 1556 Charles V, exhausted by four decades of universal war, partitioned the empire he had inherited intact. His son Philip received Spain, the Indies, the Italian possessions, and the Low Countries; his brother Ferdinand received Austria, Bohemia, Hungary, and ultimately the imperial title. The split divided the Habsburgs into Spanish and Austrian branches that would remain cousin powers for the next century and a half. Charles retired to a monastery in Yuste and died there in 1558.
Also there: Ferdinand I, Philip II of Spain
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