ABSTRACT
For many historians the accession of the first Bourbon king of Spain, Philip V, in 1700 ended a century or more of Spanish decline, and triggered both a much needed modernization of Spain's institutions and a revival of its fortunes. Philip V wished to overturn a peace settlement — primarily the treaty concluded at Utrecht in 1713 — which he believed had been imposed upon him and which did not therefore bind him. Philip V made some efforts to ensure a continued Spanish presence in Flanders by securing a sovereignty there for his and his first wife's favourite, the Princess des Ursins, in the peace negotiations between 1712 and 1714. The success of Spanish arms in Italy, particularly in Sardinia and Sicily between 1717 and 1720, in Naples and Sicily in 1734 and 1735, and in Milan in 1745–46, also owed something to a residual loyalty to Spain, after centuries of rule from Madrid.
