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El Escorial, September 1598.
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The corridors of the somber palace
lie in silence
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broken only by the whispers of physicians
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and the occasional moan
emanating from the royal chamber.
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Inside the room. upon a deteriorating bed,
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a man lies in agony.
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His once powerful body
is now ravaged by pain,
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his hands deformed by gout
resemble useless claws,
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his legs swollen with edema
have not supported him for weeks-
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The putrid odor that emanates
from his decomposing tissues
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is so intense that even
the most dedicated servants
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cover their noses
when entering the chamber.
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This man is not some common
criminal paying for his sins
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nor a commoner without access
to medical care.
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He is Philip II, the most powerful
monarch of his time,
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lord of an empire
where the sun never sets,
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king of Spain, Portugal, Naples,
Sicily, Duke of Milan
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and master of the vast territories
of the New World,
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the man who challenged Elizabeth,
the year of England,
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who built the magnificent Escoreal,
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who led the fight against
the Protestant Reformation,
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now succumbs to a slow
and excruciating death,
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abandoned by his own body.
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How did the most powerful
king in the world
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come to this tragic
and repugnant end?
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To understand the horror
of Philip II's final days
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we must travel back in time
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and meet the man behind the crown.
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Born on May 21st 1527, in Valladolid,
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Philip was the son of Emperor Charles V
and the Portuguese Princess Isabella.
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From an early age
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he was groomed to govern
the vast empire his father had built.
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Unlike Charles, who was a warrior
by nature,
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Philip proved to be
a meticulous bureaucrat,
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an administrator obsessed with details.
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He was known as El Rey de los Papeles
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— the king of papers —
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such was his dedication
to documents and writing.
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He spent hours in his study
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meticulously noting every aspect
of his empire's governance.
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When Charles V abdicated in 1556,
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Philip inherited the Spanish throne
and much of the empire.
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In 1580, amid the Portuguese
succession crisis
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following King Sebastian's disappearance
at the battle of Alcacer Quibir,
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Philip claimed his right
to the Portuguese throne
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as the grandson of Manuel I.
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With an army led by the Duke of Alba
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he defeated the forces
of Dom Antonio, Prior of Crato
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and was crowned Philip I of Portugal,
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uniting the two greatest world powers
under his crown.
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The king was a complex man.
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Deeply religious and a fervent
defender of Catholicism,
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he considered himself
God's armed hand on Earth.
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Under his command,
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the Spanish Inquisition reached its peak
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persecuting heretics and infidels.
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At the same time he was
a patron of the arts,
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a refined collector
and a visionary builder.
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His greatest architectural legacy,
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the monastery
of San Lorenzo de El Escorial,
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combined palace,
monastery and mausoleum,
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a perfect symbolism for a king
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who saw his power
as an extension of divine will.
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In his personal life,
Philip married four times.
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His first wife, Maria Manuela of Portugal,
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died giving birth to Prince Carlos
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who would later be imprisoned
by his own father for insubordination
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dying under mysterious circumstances.
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His second wife, Mary Tudor of England,
known as Bloody Mary,
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also died without giving him heirs.
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The third, Elizabeth of Valois,
gave him two daughters,
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before dying in childbirth.
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The fourth and last, Anna of Austria,
who was his niece,
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finally gave him his long desired heir,
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the future Philip III,
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along with other children,
although only five survived infancy.
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Despite the almost absolute
power he wielded.
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Philip II was never a healthy man.
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From his youth, he suffered
from recurrent attacks of gout,
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a painful disease caused
by excess uric acid in the blood
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which forms crystals in the joints,
causing intense inflammation
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Gout was known as the disease of kings
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as it primarily afflicted the wealthy
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who indulged in diets rich
in red meat and wine,
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exactly Philip's case.
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As the years passed, his gout attacks
became more frequent and severe
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In 1590, at the age of 63,
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the king's health began
to deteriorate significantly.
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Besides chronic gout, he began
to suffer from ???? fevers,
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Fevers spiked every three days,
a typical symptom of malaria.
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He also developed severe edema,
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an accumulation of fluid
that swelled his legs
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to the point of making them
unrecognizable.
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The combination of these diseases
gradually immobilized him.
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He who had once been called
the Prudent King
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was now a prisoner of his own body.
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The last two years of his life
were a true calvary.
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around 1596, Philip could barely write.
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His gout deformed hand
could hardly hold a pen.
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Ironically for a man
who had built his identity
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as an administrator and a bureaucrat,
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this represented a devastating loss.
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His body which had never been
particularly robust, began to fail.
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The king who controlled half the world,
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now barely controlled
his most basic bodily functions.
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In July 1598, Philip's condition
worsened dramatically
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The edema had spread throughout his body
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causing excruciating pain.
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Gout attacked not only his hands and feet
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but also his knees, elbows
and even his spine.
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The royal physicians, powerless
in the face of such suffering
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resorted to bloodletting and purges
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that only weakened the monarch further.
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The fever did not subside
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and Philip alternated between delirium
and moments of agonizing lucidity.
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It was during this period
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that his situation reached
the height of horror.
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Permanently confined to bed,
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the king developed deep bed sores
that quickly became infected.
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The open wounds on his back,
buttocks and legs
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became breeding grounds for infection,
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attracting insects
and creating an environment
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conducive to the proliferation
of parasites.
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Reports indicate that his mattress
had to be perforated
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to allow the king's bodily fluids to drain
without him having to move
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which would have been impossible
due to the excruciating pain.
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As if this were not enough,
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the monarch's weakened and immobile body
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became host
to a massive infestation of lice.
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The king himself, in one
of his last moments of lucidity
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is said to have commented
with bitter irony
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"See how this body that commanded
half the world,
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"now cannot even command
its own parasites."
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The closest courtiers witnessed
how the great Philip II
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was literally being devoured alive,
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unable to defend himself
even against the smallest
creatures the horror of this situation
was not merely physical for a deeply
religious man like Philillip the
degradation of his body also represented
a spiritual trial several accounts
indicate that in his moments of lucidity
the king viewed his suffering as an
anticipated purgatory an expeation of
his sins even before death one of the
clerics who attended him in his final
days wrote that his majesty endured the
pain with such patience and Christian
devotion that he seemed more like a
saint under trial than a dying monarch
at dawn on September 13th 1598 after 52
days of uninterrupted agony Philip II
finally met his end his last moments
were a mixture of feverish delirium and
8:44
extreme religious devotion with a
8:48
crucifix clutched in his deformed hands
8:50
he murmured his final words a prayer or
8:54
perhaps a plea for forgiveness no one
8:56
knows for certain
8:58
what is known is that when death finally
