Spanish Armada
The Spanish Armada (Spanish: Grande y Felicísima Armada , literally "Great and Most Fortunate Navy") was a Spanish fleet of 130 ships that sailed from A Coruña in August 1588, under the command of the Duke of Medina Sidonia with the purpose of escorting an army from Flanders to invade England. The strategic aim was to overthrow Queen Elizabeth I of England and the Tudor establishment of Protestantism in England, with the expectation that this would put a stop to English interference in the Spanish Netherlands and to the harm caused to Spanish interests by English and Dutch privateering.
The Armada chose not to attack the English fleet at Plymouth, then failed to establish a temporary anchorage in the Solent, after one Spanish ship had been captured by Francis Drake in the English Channel, and finally dropped anchor off Calais 22] While awaiting communications from the Duke of Parma's army the Armada was scattered by an English fireship attack. In the ensuing Battle of Gravelines the Spanish fleet was damaged and forced to abandon its rendezvous with Parma's army, who were blockaded in harbour by Dutch flyboats.
The Armada managed to regroup and, driven by southwest winds, withdrew north, with the English fleet harrying it up the east coast of England. The commander ordered a return to Spain, but the Armada was disrupted during severe storms in the North Atlantic and a large portion of the vessels were wrecked on the coasts of Scotland and Ireland. Of the initial 130 ships over a third failed to return.[23] As Martin and Parker explain, "Philip II attempted to invade England, but his plans miscarried, partly because of his own mismanagement, and partly because the defensive efforts of the English and their Dutch allies prevailed."[24]
The expedition was the largest engagement of the undeclared Anglo-Spanish War (1585–1604). The following year, England organised a similar large-scale campaign against Spain, the Drake-Norris Expedition, also known as the "Counter-Armada of 1589", which was also unsuccessful.
Contents
- 2 Technological revolution
- 3 Legacy
- 4 Historiography
- 5 Panorama
- 6 In popular culture
- 7 See also
- 8 References
History
Background
Philip II of Spain had been co-monarch of England until the death of his wife, Mary I, in 1558. A devout Roman Catholic, he deemed his Protestant sister-in-law and successor, Elizabeth I, a heretic and illegitimate ruler of England. He is alleged to have supported previous plots to have her overthrown in favour of her Catholic cousin and heir presumptive, Mary, Queen of Scots; however these were thwarted when Elizabeth had the Queen of Scots imprisoned and finally executed in 1587. In addition, Elizabeth, who sought to advance the cause of Protestantism where possible, had supported the Dutch revolt against Spain.
In retaliation, Philip planned an expedition to invade England and overthrow the Protestant regime of Elizabeth, thereby ending the English material support for the United Provinces - the part of the Low Countries that had successfully seceded from Spanish rule – and cutting off English attacks on Spanish trade and settlements[25] in the New World. The King was supported by Pope Sixtus V, who treated the invasion as a crusade, with the promise of a subsidy should the Armada make land.[26]...