Prince of Asturias
| Princess of Asturias Princesa de Asturias |
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| Style |
His/Her Royal Highness Doña |
| Residence | The Prince’s Pavilion at the Zarzuela Palace |
| Appointer | The King of Spain |
| Term length | Life tenure or until accession to the throne |
| Inaugural holder | Henry III of Castile |
| Formation | 1388 |
Prince or Princess of Asturias (Spanish: Príncipe/Princesa de Asturias), was the title of the heir of the Kingdoms of Castile and Leon and later the main title used by the heir of the Kingdom of Spain. According to the Spanish Constitution of 1978:
Article 57 [...]
2. The Crown Prince, from his birth or since the event that gives rise to the appeal, will have the dignity of Prince of Asturias and other titles traditionally linked to the successor of the Crown of Spain.
The title originated in 1388, when King John I of Castile granted the dignity – which included jurisdiction over the territory– to his first-born son Henry. In an attempt to ended the dynastic struggle between the heirs of Kings Peter I and Henry II of Castile, the principality was chosen as the highest jurisdictional lordship the King could grant that had not yet been granted to anyone. The custom of granting unique titles to royal heirs had already been in use in the Kingdoms of Aragon (Prince of Girona), England (Prince of Wales), and France (Dauphin de Viennois). The title, therefore, had two purposes: to serve as a generic title to name the heir of the Kingdom of Castile, and as a specific title to apply to the prince who was first in the line of succession when the King transmitted to him the territory of the principality, with its government and its income.
With the formation of the dynastic union between the Kingdoms of Castile and Aragon under the Catholic Monarchs, the title was incorporated to the generals of the Hispanic Monarchy, the crown prince accumulating the titles of "Prince of Asturias, Girona, Spain and the New World", and being titled already since the times of the House of Habsburg "Prince of these Kingdoms, Prince of the Spains and the New World" (Príncipe de estos Reynos, príncipe de las Españas y del Nuevo Mundo). In 1705, with the advent of the House of Bourbon on the Spanish throne, the title was further promoted following the decisive help of Castile to the French in the War of the Spanish Succession. At the beginning of the 19th century, the Spanish Constitution of 1812 consecrated the title to the heir of the Crown, but in the following Constitutions, the synonymy between the title and position as heir to the Crown was eliminated; in the successive Constitutions, was used in the second half of the 19th and in the first half of the 20th century, and finally with the restoration of the monarchy (this time parliamentary) in 1978.
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