2026500th Anniversary of the Marriage of Isabella of Portugal and Charles V - Set

Daughter of King Manuel I of Portugal and his second wife, Queen Maria of Aragon and Castile, Infanta Isabella was born in Lisbon, at the Paço da Alcáçova, in 1503. Her elder brother, John, had been born in June of the previous year and would later succeed their father to the throne as King John III of Portugal. After Isabella came Beatrice (1504), Louis (1506), Ferdinand (1507), Afonso (1509), Maria (1511), Henry (1512), Duarte (1515), and António (1516). Before her death in 1517, at the age of 34, Queen Maria had borne Manuel I ten children, thus securing the continuity of the Portuguese royal house. Portugal was then enjoying a period of internal peace and prosperity, underpinned by the establishment of a transoceanic empire which, by the 16th century, extended across three continents, embracing the Atlantic islands, the Province of Santa Cruz, the dominions in the East, the African trading posts, and the Portuguese strongholds in Morocco.