Charles Cortes Failure
Summoned the following response from Cortes;
“The majority of Spaniards who come here are of low quality, violent and vicious.”
This ultimately led to Charles backing down in 1526 and allowing Cortes, and later Pizzaro, to issue temporary encomienda’s to their men.
It is therefore evident that whilst Charles did make attempts to tackle challenges specific to individual countries through diplomatic means, he was perhaps too preoccupied with tackling an array of other matters to possess genuine, universal authority. Consequently, issues were left unresolved and Charles’s power undermined.
Inherently, the enormity of Charles’s empire also served as provocation for Eastern and Western rulers who sought to expand their empire. Conflict over territory …show more content…
Whilst Charles succeeded in many battles over territory which consequently allowed him to maintain his empire, he failed to unify country’s interests and did not ultimately eliminate Francis, Suleiman or Martin Luther, nor was he able to form an intrinsic relationship with the papacy. However, his failure does not stem from this as much as it does from failing to acknowledge the limits of one’s power. With domains spanning nearly four million square kilometres, predetermined rivalries and the inability to communicate and evoke nationalist sentiments the way kings such as Henry VIII had done, it was virtually impossible for Charles to deal with challenges in their entirety, just as it would have been for any ruler. The shortfall instead lies with the offensive realist approach he took to ruling, whereby his imperial motto ‘plus ultra’ fundamentally meant he spread himself out too far which prompted ceaseless challenges to arise. He attempted to create modern policies whilst defending old policies, fuse Atlantic and central Europe on an epic scale and eliminate the Protestant reformation whilst making the Catholic counter-Reformation global. Therefore, in ruling his empire Charles failed to deal with challenges successfully, but with good reason. Instead, indefensible failure lied with his aspiration to be the most powerful emperor in the most powerful empire; an aspiration that created a series of challenges he was incapable of dealing
“The majority of Spaniards who come here are of low quality, violent and vicious.”
This ultimately led to Charles backing down in 1526 and allowing Cortes, and later Pizzaro, to issue temporary encomienda’s to their men.
It is therefore evident that whilst Charles did make attempts to tackle challenges specific to individual countries through diplomatic means, he was perhaps too preoccupied with tackling an array of other matters to possess genuine, universal authority. Consequently, issues were left unresolved and Charles’s power undermined.
Inherently, the enormity of Charles’s empire also served as provocation for Eastern and Western rulers who sought to expand their empire. Conflict over territory …show more content…
Whilst Charles succeeded in many battles over territory which consequently allowed him to maintain his empire, he failed to unify country’s interests and did not ultimately eliminate Francis, Suleiman or Martin Luther, nor was he able to form an intrinsic relationship with the papacy. However, his failure does not stem from this as much as it does from failing to acknowledge the limits of one’s power. With domains spanning nearly four million square kilometres, predetermined rivalries and the inability to communicate and evoke nationalist sentiments the way kings such as Henry VIII had done, it was virtually impossible for Charles to deal with challenges in their entirety, just as it would have been for any ruler. The shortfall instead lies with the offensive realist approach he took to ruling, whereby his imperial motto ‘plus ultra’ fundamentally meant he spread himself out too far which prompted ceaseless challenges to arise. He attempted to create modern policies whilst defending old policies, fuse Atlantic and central Europe on an epic scale and eliminate the Protestant reformation whilst making the Catholic counter-Reformation global. Therefore, in ruling his empire Charles failed to deal with challenges successfully, but with good reason. Instead, indefensible failure lied with his aspiration to be the most powerful emperor in the most powerful empire; an aspiration that created a series of challenges he was incapable of dealing