The medieval history of Spain is marked by violent clashes not only
between Moors and Christians, but also between the rulers of the
various Christian kingdoms who occupied non-Moorish territories
on the Spanish peninsula. Cities and their surrounding countryside
changed hands with alarming frequency; wars were constant and
bloody. Towards the end of the fifteenth century the alignment of
powers centered around the two crowns of Aragon and Castile, with
the Moorish possessions lying outside both. The marriage of Castilian
Isabella and Aragonese Ferdinand in 1467 united the two leading
Catholic powers. When, ten years later, Isabella succeeded to the
throne of Castile, and Ferdinand to the throne of Aragon, the stage
was set for Spanish national unity. By a series of astute moves these
rulers reinstituted the Inquisition as a purely Spanish office, expelled
the Moors from the peninsula, exiled the Jews, and emerged with a
unified kingdom which rapidly enriched itself through New World
conquests. By the time of Philip II ( 1556-1598), Spanish possessions
and power in Europe and the New World had reached their apogee.
The long decline throughout the whole of the next century reached
its end in 1700, when the War of the Spanish Succession put the
Bourbon Philip d'Anjou on the throne of Spain.

The greatest age of Spanish theatre parallels this political stream.
Secular drama, tentative and rudimentary at the beginning of the

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