Philip of Spain.

Henry Kamen. New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 1997.26 pls. + xiii + 384 pp. $35. ISBN: 0-300-07081-0.

King Philip II of Spain (1527-1598) has cast a lengthy shadow over Spanish and European history for centuries. Though this might seem fitting, given that he was the first man to rule a truly global empire on which the sun never set, it is not entirely appropriate, for Philip's enduring fame stems not so much from his achievements, as it does from misconceptions about his character and legacy. Within Spain itself, Philip can still be remembered to this day as a brooding, reclusive workaholic, who, despite his best intentions, poised his nation and empire on the brink of a precipitous and inevitable decline. Beyond Spain's borders, Philip's shadow has long been perceived as exceedingly dark and menacing. After all, how many other monarchs can claim the unhappy role of top villain in one of Schiller's tragedies, or in a major opera, such as Verdi's Don Carlo, which set the gloomy myth to music? In the English-speaking world Philip reigned supreme for nearly three centuries as the ultimate embodiment of the Black Legend: a sinister figure, cruel and devious beyond measure, a religious fanatic who could only be viewed through the smoke of the Armada's cannons and of the Inquisition's pyres.

Is it fitting or ironic, then, that the three scholars who have labored most strenuously to blow away this smoke should write in English rather than Spanish? In the 1970s Peter Pierson and Geoffrey Parker produced biographies of Philip that revealed much more of the man and king behind the myth. Now, on the eve of the four-hundredth anniversary of the death of King Philip, Henry Kamen offers us another revisionist account of his life and accomplishments, one that seeks to dispel the smoke and gloom for good.

Kamen's Philip is a stunning achievement, not only because of its revisionist outlook and its use of sources, but also because of its style and structure. This is an exemplary piece of scholarship that reads very much like a good novel. Kamen sweeps the reader into his narrative, tracing the monarch's life chronologically from birth to death, and it is largely through his attention to detail that he is able to reconstruct a Philip who seems more humane, and more complex, than any we have seen before. Relying heavily on previously ignored state papers and correspondence from eighteen different archives in six countries, Kamen steadily reveals a Philip who cannot be easily reduced to the familiar caricature. Kamen's Philip is an emotional man, and a deeply sensitive one too, who tends not to think in stark black-and-white terms. This Philip is "utterly normal," lacking "neither humour nor vivacity." (222). He is also very much a man of the Renaissance, urbane and cosmopolitan, as much a connoisseur of the art of statecraft as of the art of love, equally adept at gathering good ministers and pretty ladies, not quite the humanist and scholar his tutors intended, but nonetheless a patron of learning and the arts. Kamen's Philip still comes across as a deeply religious man, but he is no fanatic: he collects books, paintings, and mistresses along with relics; he imposes Tridentine reforms on the Spanish church while he quarrels with a succession of popes; and he persecutes heretics not so much for their beliefs as for their challenge to established authority.

Kamen's Philip is not tolerant enough to be mistaken for an Erasmian, but Kamen argues that he did not really try to obliterate Erasmianism from Spain. In the same vein, Kamen also argues that Philip did not wholeheartedly support the concept of limpieza de sangre or the discriminatory civil statutes that stemmed from it. The private Philip and the public Philip are not really at odds here: it is not a case of inner conflict or duplicity, but rather of complexity. This Philip still has firm ideas about what is best for his realms, but he is wise enough and decent enough to be flexible. This is still the same Philip who enforced the censorship demanded by the Index of Forbidden Books, and the same Philip who tried to prevent Spanish youths from studying abroad, but Kamen marshals sufficient evidence to suggest that after 1559 banned literature still found its way into Spain, and Spanish students still enrolled in foreign universities. Though it differs in structure from William Bouwsma's John Calvin: A Sixteenth Century Portrait, which analyzed themes in Calvin's writings rather than the details of his life, Kamen's Philip does resemble that revisionist work in its aim. As Bouwsma sought to portray a bookish and lenient Calvin, who was more a Renaissance man than a Reformer, so does Kamen attempt to depict a humane and broad minded Philip, who was more a Renaissance prince than a Counter-Reformation tyrant. And as Bouwsma succeeded, for the most part, so does Kamen.

There is no disputing the evidence uncovered here: the quotes that are embedded in the narrative tell their own story persuasively. Even those texts that reinforce the old stereotypes, such as the letters of the Venetian ambassadors who despised Philip and Spain, betray themselves convincingly when Kamen places them side-by-side with less biased documents. Kamen is a master historian who excels at uncovering sources and at using them effectively to revise long-accepted views of the past. Though some (including this reviewer) may take issue with specific conclusions reached by Kamen, or even with the broader scope of his revisionist thrust, few, if any, will be able to contest his evidence, or question his gifts as a researcher and writer.

This biography brings us nearer to Philip as he saw himself, and as his close acquaintances saw him. Gone is the miscreant; here to stay, one hopes, is the king who could say at the age of fifty-one: "I don't know if they think I'm made of iron or stone. The truth is, they need to see that I am mortal, like everyone else." To claim, as the publisher does in the book jacket, that this is "the definitive portrayal of Philip II", is to go too far, though. No biography can ever be truly definitive in its own time, or much less, for ages to come. Kamen's Philip could be compared to some of the finest portraits of Philip painted by Sanchez Coello, Moro, or Pantoja de la Cruz, all of which expertly portray a man who happened to be a king, but none of which, by themselves, can reveal to us the "definitive" Philip. Eventually, the ultimate test of this book's impact will be the way in which it inspires others to probe further into the records left behind by this great king, and to reinterpret his life and legacy.

CARLOS M. N. EIRE Yale University