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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 05 August 2009
On the second of May in the year 1808, an event took place in Madrid which was to be of momentous consequence not only in the history of Spain but of revolutionary and Napoleonic France as well. As the last of the Spanish royalty departed from the capital for Bayonne and exile, outraged feelings gave way to an armed uprising against French rule. The revolt was speedily crushed by Murat's troops, but despite the grave restrictions imposed by his order of the day, Spain refused to be quieted. Juan Pérez Villamil, fiscal of the Supreme Council of War, issued a call to arms: “The country is in danger. Madrid is perishing, a victim of French perfidy. Spaniards, hasten to save her. May 2, 1808.” The response was immediate; irregular bands of troops sprang up, mob violence was visited upon those accused of being afrancesados (that is, pro-French), and many officials paid with their lives for their apathy in organizing the resistance. Everywhere was heard the cry of the patriots, “i Viva Fernando VII y mueran los franceses!” A few months later the regular Spanish armies were to administer to the troops of imperial France their first defeat. At last the principle of nationalism, so long a vital force in the success of the French revolution and Napoleon, had been turned against France.
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5 Letters Written during a Journey in Spain and Portugal (London, 1808), I, 209.Google Scholar
6 The best available accounts of education in late 18th century Spain are in Menéndez, y Pelayo, , op. cit., VI, 269 ffGoogle Scholar. and de la Fuente, Vicente, Historia de las universidades, colegios, y establecimientos de enseñanza en España (Madrid, 1889), IV, 154 ffGoogle Scholar. Both, it should be pointed out, are conservative.
7 Almagro, Melchor Fernández, Origines del régimen constitucional en España (Barcelona, 1928), pp. 32–33Google Scholar. Abate José Marchena (1768–1821) was a philosopher-clergyman who, condemned by the Inquisition, eventually fled to revolutionary France and became a friend of Marat, whom he assisted in editing L'Ami du Peuple. He was imprisoned, and later released by Robespierre, served on the Committee of Public Safety, and eventually returned to Madrid as secretary to Murat.
8 Historia política y parlementaria de España, I, 123.Google Scholar
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10 Lafuente, Modesto, Historia general de España, 2nd ed. (Madrid, 1864), XIII, 439Google Scholar. The population figure seems exaggerated; the census of 1797 put it at 10,534,985.
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14 “Exposición del Consejo de Regencia de España e Indias a las Cortes generales y extraordinarias del Reino sobre sus operaciones gubernativas en la época de su mando, 1 octobre de 1810,” p. 45Google Scholar. (Document No. 20 appended to Quadrado, Francisco de Paula y de Roo, , Elogio histórico del Excmo. Sr. D. Antonio de Escaño, Madrid, 1852.)Google Scholar
18 Op. cit., 6.
16 Op. cit., I, 176–177.
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19 (Sevilla, 1809).
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22 This was made quite evident when the Cortes, on the proposal of the Mexican deputy Mejía, assumed the style of “Majesty,” leaving the Regency to be called simply “Highness.”
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27 Vida literaria, quoted in Comenge, Rafael, Antología de las Cortes, 2 vols. (Madrid, 1912), I, 245.Google Scholar
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29 It is interesting to note that radicalism was strongest among the substitute deputies (suplentes). The Catalan delegation, for example, which contained the largest number of regular deputies, was the stronghold of conservatism.
30 Cf. August, 1811, sessions in the Diario and Villanueva, , op. cit., 271 ff.Google Scholar
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32 On the military situation see the Diario, I, 161, 391–392, 416–418, 532–536Google Scholar; IV, 2727; V, 4000; also Villanueva, , op. cit., pp. 154–170, 257–258, 358Google Scholar, and the Semanario Patriótico for 01 24, 1811.Google Scholar
33 This large number is somewhat deceiving, since many lasted for but a few issues, and most of them had such a small circulation as to be relatively unimportant; yet they do illustrate the many and varying shades of public opinion in Spain at the time.
34 Pp. 17, 55–56.
35 Diario de las Sesiones, IV, 2799.Google Scholar
36 No. 35, Dec. 6, 1810, pp. 58–59.
37 Op. cit., II, vii.
38 One of these plazas still survives in St. Augustine, Florida.
