Instruments and Intrigue: Scientific Patronage and Collection at the Court of Carlos II of Spain

Science has often been categorized as the “handmaiden of empire” in the early modern Spanish world. This is the result of previous scholarly attention to Crown-sponsored institutions such as Philip II’s Academy of Mathematics, the Spanish Navy and large-scale scientific expeditions during the Enlightenment. But during the reign of Carlos II, influential Spanish aristocrats such as the royal bastard Juan José of Austria, and Juan Francisco de la Cerda, Duke of Medinaceli, engaged in mathematical study, collected instruments and gave scientific gifts to promote personal political agendas. Drawing on the inventory of Juan José’s mathematical instrument collection and the interactions between the Jesuit mathematician José Zaragoza and Medinaceli surrounding the manufacture of a gift for Carlos II, this paper will argue that aristocratic patrons were also signficant scientific actors in the Spanish context.