Emperor: A New Life of Charles V

Offering the definitive account of Charles V (1500-1558), ruler of the first global empire, this is the first book to present crucial, newly rediscovered evidence about the first Holy Roman Emperor. Author Geoffrey Parker, among the top Hispanic historians in the world, found an archive unseen for a century, containing fifty-two boxes of documents and two holograph “Instructions,” a fifty-folio analysis of the defects of Charles’ ministers and the problems facing his monarchy, written entirely in his own hand in 1543.
Charles V, Duke of Luxembourg, became ruler of Spain, Germany, the Netherlands, half of Italy, and much of central and south America. Harnessing the totality of the sixteenth-century documentation, Parker is able to reinterpret the Charles’ life, providing a conclusive history of his achievements, capabilities, and flaws. This scholarly book analyzes how Charles administered an empire of unprecedented size in world history, bridging multiple cultural backgrounds.
Geoffrey Parker is Andreas Dorpalen Professor of History and associate of the Mershon Center at The Ohio State University. He won the 2012 Heineken Prize for History.