Royal Textile Factories in Spain, 1700–1800

Spain ascended to dazzling heights in world affairs during the sixteenth century, thrust there by her political, military, and economic might. Until the seventeenth century began, her position seemed unassailable. Then, with agonizing helplessness, she slipped into a humiliating cycle of decline which persisted until only a shell of her greatness remained one hundred years later. Viewing Spain in such depths of misery, few observers could have guessed that her melancholy drift had ended when Charles II (1665–1700) died and Philip V (1700–1746) succeeded him in 1700. Yet as the Austrian lineage thus came to an end and the Bourbon dynasty began, Spain entered a new epoch marked by the unusually enlightened participation of government in Spanish economic affairs.