ABSTRACT
Of the nine Spanish Habsburg queens and queens consort-beginning with Isabel of Portugal (1503-1539), wife of Emperor Charles V, and ending with Maria Anna of Neuburg (1667-1740), the second wife of Carlos II, the last Habsburg king-only Anna of Austria (1549-1580), fourth wife to Philip II, was born in Spain; and she left the peninsula when she was only four. These “Spanish” queens were in fact foreigners who had spent their formative years in other lands, often speaking a language other than castellano. Although they formed part of a pan-European family network with shared kinship and bloodlines, the concept of a national identity is tenuous and anachronistic when applied to early modern royal women.1
After all, their national identity and title could change with the signing of a treaty and the successful negotiation of a marriage contract. Once an eligible princess was betrothed, she began a process of changing geopolitical (and sometimes, dynastic) identities and roles, culminating with a literal crossing of national borders.
