This is one of the most important figures in European and world history. Like anyone or anything human, she had good aspects and bad ones. The good seems to outweigh the bad. Her Wikipedia article has these paragraphs (mildly edited by gogm): "Isabella I (Spanish: Isabel I, 22 April 1451 – 26 November 1504), also known as Isabella the Catholic, was queen of Castile and León (Crown of Castile). She and her husband, Ferdinand II of Aragon, brought stability to the kingdoms that became the basis for the political unification of Spain under their grandson, Holy Roman Emperor Charles V. After a struggle to claim her right to the throne, she reorganized the governmental system, brought the crime rate to the lowest it had been in years, and unburdened the kingdom of the enormous debt her brother had left behind. Her reforms and those she made with her husband had an influence that extended well beyond the borders of their united kingdoms. Isabella and Ferdinand are known for completing the Reconquista, ordering conversion or exile of their Muslim and Jewish subjects and for supporting and financing Christopher Columbus' 1492 voyage that led to the opening of the Americas. Isabella was granted the title Servant of God by the Catholic Church in 1974."
This paragraph resonates as the world economy, notably Spain, continues to suffer from the after-effects of the misdeeds abusive businessmen who are above the law and like-minded central bankers, "Lucio Marineo Sículo: "[The royal knight Alvaro Yáñez de Lugo] was condemned to be beheaded, although he offered forty thousand ducados for the war against the Moors to the court so that these monies spare his life. This matter was discussed with the queen, and there were some who told her to pardon him, since these funds for the war were better than the death of that man, and her highness should take them. But the queen, preferring justice to cash, very prudently refused tham; and although she could have confiscated all his goods, which were many, she did not take any of them to avoid any note of greed, or that it be thought that she had not wished to pardon him in order to have his goods; instead, she gave them all to the children of the aforesaid knight."
She had five children, including Juana (la loca) and Catalina (Catherine of Aragon) unfortunate first wife of Henry VIII.
