Two Kings, A Queen, and William Who Was Quiet

In my last post, I wrote that I have finished my history book by Susan Wise Bauer. Today, I read the first two chapters of the next book in the series. This book is titled Volume 3: Early Modern Times. It covers the time from Queen Elizabeth the First until the Forty-Niners in California. Today, I read about two kings, one queen, and a Dutch man named William the Silent.

        The two kings were related to each other.They were, in fact uncle and nephew. The nephew was Charles the Fifth's son, Philip, and he ruled some of his father's land. The rest was given to his uncle, King Charles's brother, Ferdinand, a little before King Charles died. Bauer doesn't say much about him in this chapter.

      Philip was the ruler of Spain, the country where Christopher Columbus had gotten his money to go to South America from. When Columbus claimed "India", he claimed it for Spain. So now, King Philip was trying to use that land to his advantage. He sent other explorers there, and they discovered that the land was not India, it was a different continent. From India, merchants bought spices, cloth, and many other things. These things were not found in South America, but the "conquistadors" found something even better. Gold. The Native Americans wore gold jewelry, and they told stories of a king called El Dorado, who was so rich he could take baths in gold dust. King Philip wanted this gold, so he sent miners to mine South America. Soon, Spain became rich. Gold and silver poured out of the mines. Philip became the richest king in the world, and his people became rich, too. But the miners who did the actual mining, were not rich. They were South American slaves, and they were treated badly in their own country. So now you know the story of the two kings. Now, onto William the Silent.

But first, we have to go back in time a little ways. William the Silent came into the world when Philip was only around six years old. The boys were only a few years apart, but they were brought up in very different cultures and religions. Philip was brought up to be a devout Catholic, however, William's German parents taught him to stick to the Protestant faith. When William was only a teenager, he inherited two huge provinces from his cousin. This could make him a very important man when he grew up, and Charles the Fifth knew that it would not be good if he was a Protestant and opposed Catholics. So, he had William brought to court and taught him all the things that an important man should know, especially how to be a good Catholic. Soon, William became the King's favorite page, and then, his trusted adviser.

When Charles left his throne to Philip, the new king put Willaim in charge of a big portion of the Netherlands. But William didn't always agree with the ways Philip governed his kingdom. He made laws against Protestantism, and didn't ask the leaders of Netherlands their opinion. Even though, William was now a Catholic, he understood how the Protestants felt.

William the Silent got his nick-name when he was visiting the court of a French king . The king did not realize that William had not always been a Catholic, and he told him that Philip was planning to kill all the Protestants in Netherlands. William was very mad, but he didn't show his anger or any emotion to the king. He did not even answer back. That is why he is called William the Silent.

After William got back to the Netherlands, he still pretended to obey Philip. But in secret he helped raise a small army against Philip. They went to the castle and asked Philip to take back the laws against the Protestants. But Philip would not. The group called themselves the Beggars, and they went through the country destroying Catholic churches and smashing their statues. William became an enemy of the king. A great war followed. Finally, seven provinces in the Northern Netherlands announced their independence from Spain, and they made William the Silent their king. William was eventually assassinated on the orders of the king, but the provinces became their own country, Holland. Bauer says that the Queen Beatrix who now rules Holland is William's great, great, great, great, great, great, great, great, great, great, great granddaughter.

You remember Queen Mary of Scots, (the cousin of Queen Elizabeth,) who was the queen of Scotland. She inherited the crown when she was less than a week old, so her mother became her regent and ruled for her. But Mary's mother was Catholic, and many Protestant noblemen didn't want a Catholic ruler, so they put themselves in charge of ruling the country until Mary was old enough. Mary's mother wanted her to be a good Catholic, so she sent her to France, where there were many other Catholics. Mary never saw her mother again.

When Mary was 18, she traveled back to Scotland to begin her rule. She said that she would not make people change their religions, and she even married a Protestant, but despite Mary's peacefulness, her husband, Lord Darnley, wanted more power. He didn't like that Mary was still a Catholic, so he and some other lords began to plan to overthrow his wife and make Catholicism illegal. But Mary found out about this secret, and she ran away from the castle to make an army for herself. When Mary came back, the others in her husband's plot had fled, but Darnley, who was still there, blamed it all on the absent lords. Mary pardoned him, but only for the time being. Later, the house in which Darnley was in blew up, and many blamed it on Mary.

Queen Mary of Scots became less and less popular, and finally, she was forced to sign a paper making her son, James, the king of Scotland. (You remember that when Elizabeth the First died, James also became the king of England.) Mary fled to Elizabeth's court, but after a while, her own cousin had her executed. What a tragic end to her story!