Christopher Columbus died in Valladolid, Spain on May 20, 1506 at the age of 55. His death occurred after remaining ill for more than eighteen months in the Villa of Valladolid in the care of his family, during the reign of Fernando II of Aragon and Isabel I of Castile (Britannica, The Encyclopædia Britannica, 2007).
While in Valladolid, Christopher Columbus anxiously waited for the official recognition, money, and privileges that were promised to him. Even months before his death, he moved from Valladolid to Segovia with difficulty, to speak with King Fernando II, who was mainly evasive on the subject.
he tomb of Christopher Columbus, in the south arm of the transept of the Cathedral of Seville, (Spain).
After months of agony and suffering, on May 20, 1506, Christopher Columbus suddenly worsened and his sons Diego and Fernando, his brother Diego and some fellow sailors were with him in Valladolid until the moment of his death. A mass was celebrated in his name and the spirit of the explorer was entrusting to God.
After the funeral held by the Catholic church in Valladolid, the body of Christopher Columbus was buried in the monastery of the Cartuja de Santa María de las Cuevas in Seville. In 1542, the body was exhumed and taken to Santo Domingo in the Caribbean, where it remained until the island was ceded to the French in 1790 (Minster, 2016).
In 1790 the body of Christopher Columbus was moved again to Havana, Cuba. In 1988 Spain lost the Cuban colony and the explorer's remains were transferred back to Spain. Currently they remain in the Cathedral of Seville (Today, 2006).
History of Valladolid
The history of Valladolid is linked to some of the most important figures in the history of Spain, among them Christopher Columbus.
The Villa de Valladolid was founded in the 11th century by Count Pedro Ansúrez, who built the church of Santa María de la Antigua and the Puente Mayor over the Pisuegra River, transforming Valladolid into a bureaucratic center.
During the next two centuries the Villa de Valladolid grew significantly, becoming the settlement place of the Crown of Castile. In the thirteenth century, thanks to the kings Fernando III and Alfonso X, Valladolid lived its most glorious times.
It was in this Villa, in the Palacio de los Vivero where Ferdinand II of Aragon and Isabel I of Castile (the Catholic monarchs) were engaged in marriage to unite two of the largest kingdoms of the time (Britannica, 1998).
It was the same kings of Spain Fernando and Isabel who sponsored Christopher Columbus's trips to America (without knowing that he had arrived in America) and later questioned Christopher Columbus's mental health while he was in Valladolid. They denied him the official recognition, money, and privileges that had been promised to him before going on his expeditions.
It is said that Christopher Columbus was not the only important person in the history of Spain who died in this municipality. Miguel de Cervantes also spent his last years of life in Valladolid, where his home can still be seen.
After the death of Christopher Columbus, Valladolid saw the birth of Felipe II and Felipe III, who moved to the court of Madrid in the seventeenth century, withdrawing the political power of Valladolid.
It was at this time that the city began to decline, and during the 18th century, the population of the city had been reduced by 80%, conserving only twenty thousand inhabitants of the one hundred thousand who once inhabited this territory.
Valladolid overcame the French invasion in the 19th century and the Spanish civil war, experiencing spectacular economic growth later, thanks to the development of the automobile industry.
Currently, Valladolid is a modern city with a population of approximately 400,000 inhabitants, being the capital of Castilla y León, the largest autonomous region in Europe (Spain, 2017).
Valladolid in the 16th century
During the stay of Christopher Columbus in Valladolid, Spain was characterized as one of the most prosperous regions in Europe. The wealth of Valladolid at this time had no equal, a condition that made it one of the most attractive places for the richest merchants in the world to settle there.
In the 16th century, Europe faced the backwardness of the Middle Ages and Christianity, which recognized poverty as one of the greatest virtues. For this reason, poverty was evident in several regions where the church's message had been heeded.
Approximately ten years after the death of Christopher Columbus, the Court of Valladolid made an effort to control poverty, confining beggars and the poorest people to inhabit its villages, prohibiting them from entering the Villa (Moses, 1983) -
After the death of Christopher Columbus, in 1550 Valladolid was the site of an event known as the Debate, defined as the first moral debate held in the history of Europe around the rights and treatment that people should be given. colonized by the colonizers.
The Valladolid Debate was a moral and theological debate that discussed the colonization of the Americas and justified that colonized people should be converted to Catholicism, thereby establishing the type of relationship that should exist between the European colonizers and the natives of the The new World.
In Valladolid, multiple points of view were presented that ensured the existence of other ways of approaching Native Americans other than religion. It was argued that the natives could be integrated into colonial life without the need to forcibly convert them to Christianity, imposing certain rights and obligations on them.
The final verdict of the Valladolid Debate was to assume that Native Americans should be converted to Christianity, with the aim of correcting crimes committed by them against nature, such as the sacrifice of innocents and cannibalism.
It is noted that this debate was the moral manifesto around issues related to justice and the power that could be exercised by the settlers in the new world (Ojibwa, 2011).
References
- Britannica, TE (July 20, 1998). The Encyclopædia Britannica. Retrieved from Catholic Monarchs: britannica.com.
- Britannica, TE (November 13, 2007). The Encyclopædia Britannica. Obtained from Valladolid: britannica.com.
- Minster, C. (2016 Aug 22). Co. Retrieved from Where are the Remains of Christopher Columbus ?: thoughtco.com.
- Moses, B. (September 1983). The Economic Condition of Spain in the Sixteenth Century. Journal of Political Economy, pp. 513-515.
- (July 18, 2011). Native American Netroots. Retrieved from The Great Debate: nativeamericannetroots.net.
- Spain, T. (2017). Tour Spain. Obtained from History of Valladolid: tourspain.org.
- Today, H. (2006). Death of Christopher Columbus. History Today, Volume 56 Issue 5.