The Holy Roman Emperor, Charles V was also King of Spain and Lord of the Netherlands (a title he made up himself, but it basically meant he was ruler of various lands that make up today’s Low Coutries plus part of France). But at the time he inherited Spain, it wasn’t actually a country. Instead he inherited Castile and Aragon. Aragon in turn was more of a confederation of kingdoms, a number of which were in present-day Italy. So he was ruler of lands in many parts of Europe.
So how many coronations did he have? Did he have to be crowned in all the kingdoms he ruled? I imagine he could skip a number of the smaller ones.
And how about his son Philip II? Charles abdicated Spain and Netherlands in his favor, but not the HRE (Charles’ brother Ferdinand got that). Philip also inherited Portugal and for a while was King Consort of England. How many coronations did he have?
The reason I’m asking is that these guys seem to have ruled over more kingdoms, principalities, counties, and duchies than any other people I can think of. So I figure they probably have the record number of coronations. But perhaps there’s someone else who had more.
I know nothing of the politics, but the genealogical connections of Charles are fascinating.
Charles inherited Austria and the Holy Roman Empire from one grandfather, and Aragon from the other grandfather. He inherited Burgundy (itself a large empire then) from one grandmother, and Castile and Leon from the other grandmother. And, from his wife he acquired a claim to Portugal acted upon by his son. His sister-in-law, heiress of Bohemia and Hungary brought those dominions into the Hapsburg family; perhaps that’s why Charles gave Austria and Germany to his brother the King of Bohemia – to unite the eastern domains. Finally, Charles’ son married the Queen of England. It might be interesting to speculate how the history of Europe would have developed if that couple hadn’t been childless.
I don’t know how many coronations Charles had, but he was the last Emperor to be coronated by the Pope: subsequent Emperors were technically just “Emperor-Elect.”
In a sense, he had two coronations as Holy Roman Emperor, first at Aachen in 1520 and then at Bologna by Clement VII in 1530. Yes, the first was only as ‘King of the Romans’ but this was treated as a de facto imperial coronation.
But most of his other territories, including those in Spain, had no traditions of coronations in this period. So none was necessary there. Some towns in the Low Countries did have a sort of accession ceremony in the form of the joyeuse entrée, when, on visiting for the first time, the ruler was formally acknowledged in return for a confirmation of privileges. Charles V had quite a few of those.
No doubt this is true for Castile and Leon, but not for the Crown of Aragon. The latter had a tradition of a coronation at Zaragoza. There also seems to have been a coronation in Valencia. Perhaps there were others.