OLD DUFFER'S
BOOK CORNER

Spanish Naval Power 1589 to 1665

David Goodman for CUP

For those of us whose Hispanic naval knowledge gets to the Invincible Armada or to Lepanto this book is an excellent introduction to the navy of the three Philips. As is so often the case with this period the perceived reality is far from being the facts. The English and the Dutch are so often seen as massively superior (which by 1665 they probably were but had fallen out amongst each other).

One forgets how close Olivares came to re-establishing Spanish power and how successful the Armada of Flanders was against the Dutch. Goodman is clear about one thing - doing anything positive in this period was a major act. Mike Siggins recounted the third party views of Azure Wishes game on the War of Devolution to me. The players were mightily put out because when they spent their hard earned livres upon raising a fleet they still had to dice for it, and sometimes they got nothing! (In my view the chart should have given them a Mistress or a Palace - "M. Fouquet, lovely tapestries, but about that fleet...."). One can understand their annoyance but so too would Philip III.

The whole problem of the period is that money is spent, supplies are produced and...... nothing much happens. Goodman explains why carefully and in a very interesting fashion. Firstly, we go through the problem most games handle - raising the money. The estimation procedure, the collection (and disbursement both legal and illegal) of these funds and their uses. Then we need to find the ships, and here we run into the problems of deforestation and the clashes with the local cortes over their fueros. Having got the timber the ships need to be built, fitted out and crewed. The problems of each are well explained together with the major overall difficulty - that one had to get the ingredients ready well in advance of the date when you wanted to do something. Getting them in the wrong order produced rotting stores, an excess of ships, and regular bankruptcies. A very interesting book.

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© Copyright 1997 by Charles and Teresa Vasey.
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