Myth or Evidence: Juana the "Mad"? 

I love how Juana’s possible jealous violence against her husband’s mistresses was viewed as evidence of her “madness”, while Henry VIII executed two wives for their supposedly adulterous behaviour, and nobody called him crazy, at least not then!

"She was mad/a witch/possessed/touched/hysterical/neurotic" should usually be translated as "she was inconvenient to some prick." Outstanding as usual! Thank you for your work.

I never thought Queen Juana was mad. Claiming that your wife is mad has been the excuse of many husbands (especially rich ones) for sending off their wives to a place to be cared for, while being able to take over all of the wife's assets. I believe Juana may have had a short episode (probably from all the loss in her life), that these men used to their advantage. If she was truely mad, they would not have had to play all these tricks on her to keep her looking mad and feeling helpless.

A truly hearthbreaking tale, Juana deserved much better.

If I may be a bit silly, I think you argue that Juana was the "Britney Spears" of her day. Both were placed into institutionalization more for the men in their life’s benefit than their own (and the treatment probably made their preexisting mental issues worst!) it’s interesting to see the parallels of how two women with extreme wealth and mental health problems were treated across more than 400 years

She sounds like someone who was in massive distress, in need of help and found nothing but abuse and more trauma. Glad to see a deep dive into her side of things, beyond the fame she received. Love this video! Amazing work! 🥺❤

If Juana were mad, her family drove her to it. I now like Charles V even less than I did before.

On the point of Henry VII’s willingness to marry her, I think it’s perfectly plausible that he would be content to marry Juana and lock her up just like her last husband did. He had been a widower for years and from all accounts a joyless and bitter man. It’s possible he could have fully believed in her insanity and been perfectly willing to marry her just to establish a connection to Spain.

Poor Juana! It was so easy for men to have inconvenient women in their power declared insane and locked away.

My heart has always bled for this tormented woman...

The way every man in her life completely used and abused her is horrible! Loyalty to family was so deeply ingrained in the women of that family and I don't think it served any of them well (it certainly didn't help Catherine either). In my opinion, Juana may have suffered from bouts of depression, but I don't think she was mad during most of her life. If she did have a mental break, it was probably caused by being locked up for so long and the lies her son told her. That poor woman deserved so much better.

Thank you for a thoughtful, incisive overview of Juana. She may have suffered from post-partum depression, but Juana strikes me as a woman who was disgracefully abused by the men around her. Juana's son Charles V was chronically short of money, so he ordered his servants to raid Juana's chests of silverware & to replace the contents with bricks (so that the chests would not become suspiciously light). Charles consistently mistreated his mother, just as he did many of the other female relatives in his life. Juana didn't stand a chance....

Born and raised spaniard- i never believed she was mad. She was used, heavily, by everyone around her. Thanks for covering her life!

The cruelty and greed of every man in her life who should have protected her is heartbreaking. Dr. Kat, I learned new things from you today about her captivity in Castile that only convinces me further that she was never “la Loca” at all. God rest her soul.

Ive always been fascinated by her story and never thought she was "mad", it always appeared to me like a story concocted by the men around her to keep her from having any sort of power and agency

I have heard many stories of Juana la loca. Being of Spanish/Mexican descent, there were so many stories. Her family and husband were horrible to her.

For those of us who learn the history of British Monarchs, it's easy with the benefit of modern sensibilities and the successful reigns of queens to look at Henry VIII's obsession with having a male heir as being vanity, but when your childhood is filled with the stories of Empress Matilda and the fact that Juana would have started her imprisonment at about the time he took the throne, it takes on new context. Regardless of if he really thought she was mad or not, he could clearly see a Queen Regnant having her power usurped by the men in her life, and had to wonder if that would be Mary's fate if the succession was left to her. Especially since she's Juana's niece. Would the pressures of rule cause her to go mad as her aunt did? Or even if he didn't believe she was mad, would Mary's future husband try to usurp her power by claiming she was also mad? What role did this play in the lives of the upcoming queens regnant of England and Scotland? Juana was still alive when Mary Tudor came to her throne for her short reign, and Mary Queen of Scots was already on the throne at the time. Did the fear of men locking up their queen and stealing her power play into their calculus for their own reigns? Elizabeth in particular I think was influenced heavily by the fate of Juana.

Both Juana and Catalina had such sad, sad lives. Betrayed by those closest to them.

At least one lesson of poor Juana's life is that loyalty (and submission) should be reciprocal, and carefully given.

Juana, “more sinned against than sinning” or mad. The behavior of her relatives towards her, and especially of her son Charles, all contributed to her mental instability, and her confinement and the lies told to her there would have affected negatively even the strongest personality. I have long been saddened by her story and have a strong admiration for her tenacity in surviving to old age in spite of it all.

I think poor Juana was a pawn in the games of her father, husband and son. Her son should have had more regard for the well being of his mother than he did. Such a shame that her life was a misery.

There is a line in the movie "Steel Magnolias" when Shirley McLean's character Wheezer, claimed that she not crazy, she's just been in a very bad mood for the last 30 years. I believe that Juanna suffered from both what is known today as.clinical and situational depression. If.a heavy dose of Royal inbreeding is factored in, I think that is pretty much a wonder that this sort of behavior was anything more than a normal day to day experience in most of the Royal houses of the time. Seems that no one was really happy during this time and the only reason that misery enjoys company is to involve or even create others that are more miserable than you just so you can feel better.

I don’t believe any of the stories perpetuated against Juana to indicate her “madness”. Knowing a bit more about her sister Catherine’s behavior, I don’t believe she ever had public, violent arguments with anyone, especially her somewhat intimidating, highly respected mother, or used vile language. She no doubt was deeply depressed and grieving after the death of her husband, but deep grief is not insanity, it would have resolved in time and not necessarily hampered her ability to rule. This was nothing but a power grab by the men who surrounded her, including compliant Catholic clergy, who would have done anything asked of them to get a new cathedral or palace built for them in return for their lies. This particular nasty trick, “madness” of the woman, had been used frequently throughout history and I think the more capable and independent a woman was, the more likely it was to be used against her. Compliant or less-capable women would have been allowed to maintain the title and dignity of sovereign with the true power held by the men who ruled “in her name”. As the ancient saying goes: quo bono? Look to who gained what and there’s the answer.

Betrayed by both father and son, dragging her husband’s decaying body along with her. No wonder they chose to conveniently lock her up as “mad”. I have nothing but contempt for Ferdinand of Aragon, lying to his dying wife and stealing his daughter’s inheritance ! Thank you Dr. Kat for speaking for the marginalized!

Thank you for your work, Dr. Kat. Queen Juana is my 14th great-grandmother. I do not see madness in the accounts of her life, only machinations. Deep in my cellular memory I feel innate outrage for the crimes perpetrated against a thousand years of my female ancestors. So many were women of wisdom and strength used as pawns by the power hungry men in their lives. They were the mad ones.

Thank you, Dr. Kat, for correcting the 'popular,' patriarchal record about another woman oppressed and undone by the men around her. I am reminded of so many of your previous talks, for example talks about Queen Mary I, Anne of Cleves, and so many others. Thank you for your truthful, feminist, revisionist, and necessary historical corrections. 💜

I think depression is certainly on the table. She lost a LOT of loved ones in a short space of time, coupled with losing a husband that she was madly in love with. The poor woman was broken, and treated so poorly by her power-hungry father

I’m so excited for this episode. Super strong feelings about how her father and her son took advantage of the history of what we now call mental illness in her maternal lineage but I’m dying to hear your take!

Psychology is complicated. Hearing Juana’s story, and all the various diagnoses that were hurled her way, it seems that many key things were missed. The issue of her environment must be considered and how she was treated by those who locked her up. That in itself would lead to trauma and could, in turn actually have with it some psychological issues. These could have been addressed in our time, but we can’t look back in time and judge a person for not having treatment that wasn’t available. We will never know for sure, but with certain clues being there, like the trip to England, I do not see a clear cut case for a debilitating illness. At most something that was brought on by the very people who were declaring her unfit to begin.

Thank you for this! I had not heard of the “gaslighting” on the part of Denia and Carlos V, but this only solidifies my contempt for all of the men in her life. None of Isabel’s children escaped early death or tragedy. Again, thank you for this post.

Just like Erzebet (Elizabeth) Bathory and her serial killing story, I’ve always wondered how much of this story is true for Joanna/Juana. It’s so wild to think in a time where women had so few rights vs men, and her then being from a family that had more equal women ruling figures , that she ended up with a shite man who needed to do away with her in many ways just to gain control. Ick. I see so many parallels between the king in Erzebet Bathory story (aside from murders piece) where the king may have staged a story to take the power of the money and estate of a woman. I think from what I’ve studied over the last years that Juana probably had SOME form of being “out of line/out of control” but to lock her away just doesn’t seem right or ok and had a lot more to do with men and power than what Juana truly was. There are examples of her being Lucid that seems many found her to be fine.

I've seen some questions raised before about Juana's alleged "madness". Really appreciate the level of depth you've gone into here, not just contextualizing the claims, but also talking about the biases of the different sources (and whether their claims were consistent with other actions at the time). Englightening and engaging video!

Great video. Great to have some non-British history. But such a sad story! Poor Juana!

Very fascinating, I never knew she was a real person! Growing up I always heard my grandmother (who was born in Mexico City but my family lives in the States now) use the phrase “como Juana la loca” but i always thought it was just an expression!! Now that we’ve seen in our lifetimes examples of women in positions of immense wealth and status be completely taken advantage of by her hangers-on and abused by people trying to advance themselves by doing so I think we have so much more an idea of all the times in the past we have heard stories of “crazy women” who “needed” to be kept basically hostage. So sad but so interesting to finally get a more nuanced take on this history, thank you so much for sharing!

I’ve wanted to hear the story of Juana “the Mad” and strongly suspected she was maligned by her detractors. Thank you!

I only found you recently through the Jane Austen "Balls" documentary and am enjoying your content. I love the questions you ask. I enjoy television dramas which make me inquire more deeply into history and The Spanish Princess introduced me to Juana. In 2019 I walked Camino Frances and spent a few extra days in Madrid where I went to the Prado and saw the famous painting...truly awe-inspiring in its size, and wondrous depiction of the scenes described from the journey.

Juana's obsession with her husband's corpse, refusing to bury the body and taking it everywhere with her was certainly odd. and rightly raised questions about her sanity. BUT there is great reason to believe her father was intent on continuing to rule Castile and had every reason to have her declared insane and she spent the next 30 years of her life in isolation in a castle in the middle of nowhere. So there's a bit of both. She submitted to interviews during the period of her enforced isolation but was still find to be sensible. So who knows.

I think you vindicated Juana and I’m very happy you did so. I hope somehow, somewhere..she knows!

Have always found the story of Juana fascinating. I'm not convinced she was mad, but clearly, anything is possible. She was extraordinarily bright and talented. I think the three significant men in her life were very suspicious. I'm glad you have chosen to cover her story. Thank you, Dr. Kat.

You could talk about Juan and his dog, Bruto. It's a sad and sweet story. Bruto was a very good boy.

Yey! Thanks, Dr. Kat for making this video! I loved it! Excellent Spanish pronunciation by the way. Enhorabuena!. Some thoughts: 1) I think Juana was very likely emotionally neglected since childhood, surely traumatized, and literally tortured by the people who were supposed to love her, so I am not a psychologist but is possible she developed PTSD, mental illness, or had a personality disorder that was amplified by the conditions she endured (Stockholm syndrome also comes to mind) Nowadays she will be treated with therapy, medication, and/or a change in her living conditions and relationships and perhaps have a reasonably normal and successful life. . 2) I think perhaps the problem of a woman ruling Castille and Aragon (united) was not as big in Castille (given her mother's precedent) as it was in Aragon where women couldn't inherit the crown of Aragon and that was a very complicated matter to resolve without causing a big crisis in Aragon. In fact, soon after Isabella's death, Ferdinand remarried and tried to have a male heir but died after birth. . 3) Legally I think that when Juana married Phillip nobody considered her an heir-to-be (because so many unimaginable tragedies had to occur for her to be the heir) so, perhaps there wasn't a proper agreement of marriage with Phillip taking into consideration the rights and the limits her husband as King consort of Castile and Aragon should have, i.e.: like the one Isabela and Ferdinand made regulating the King consort limits. 4) As to why didn't Ferdinand support his daughter Juana more: Also, why didn't Isabella support her daughter more? Is said that Isabella wasn't confident of Juana's capabilities, so maybe he was just following Isabella's last wishes? / Or maybe, in his mind, some women (like Isabella) were more equal to men than others? / Perhaps, he saw Phillip Hasburg as the root of all Juana's problems yet once Phillip was removed Juana didn't behave as expected? / Could it be that the character assassination of Juana went so far that rehabilitating her after Phillip's death was not possible? / Or simply Ferdinand didn't like his daughter? Did he resent her for surviving while his heir Juan died? Is not exaggerated for me to assume that Ferdinand II had grief transformed into anger directed at Juana. Again thanks for the video, fascinating subject

I’m so used to hearing her as “Juana La Loca,” it’s kinda weird to hear the English version lol.

The men in her life wanted her power. They wanted her to be mad, it worked in their favor. Poor Lady!

Commenting before I watch, BUT in anticipation of another brilliant bedtime video (it's midnight here in malaysia), i wanted to ask; I recently watches your video on our misconceptions around literacy during the tudor period, and enjoyed it immensely, and wondered if you would consider doing a similar video on just how violent the life of the average person living in tudor England was? I think we are often presented with the idea that life was "nasty, brutish and short", with the threat of extreme violence around every corner (especially for women) but would the life of the average villager really be so lacking in peace? Right, now to settle in and watch this video!

Thank you very much for this insightfull and sympathetic video. Juana deserves a wider knowledge and recognition of her life story. And, in my humble opinion, you did her justice by pointing out this centurys old "Juana the Mad"-narrative. Personally, i think she was betrayed and so to say buried alive by her own Family, and not mentally ill.

Let us just say, that I believe wanna was terribly I'm hearing lots of self-protection measures being taken by her because she is in such a delicate position and should have power they don't want her to have.

It's amazing how long trauma has been misdignosed as mental illness. It's 2024 and we are finally recognizing this fact. Always enjoy your spin on history. I often come back and watch again and always learn something new. Thanks Dr. Kat. 👑

fantastic thanks very much I think Juana was way to smart for her own good at the wrong time and in the wrong place

If you get told something about yourself enough, you can come to believe it. If I were locked up like that, if everyone was telling me I was insane...if enough time passed... It would be easy to play at madness for political/marital reasons and then to have everyone else run away with it.

I really admire you. My eyesight is bad, it's not safe for me to walk down the street without my glasses, it's not that bad. I push myself through difficult situations because of you. I'm disabled but if this blind dude can surf, I can do this! TY 😻

Fascinating story, well told! I would purely love to see a movie based on your take on this story. Your research is exhaustive, your perspective is balanced; with a really good cast and an accurate costumier it would be a movie we'd watch over and over. Thank you! What a great start to our day!

Thank you thank you thank you so much for calling her Juana! The internet seems stuck on referring to her as Joanna and that really grinds my gears.

I'm so excited! She is my 14th great-grandmother...and as you can see, I'm named after. Her father...uuggghh!!! She was surrounded by men who viewed her as a means to an end of their being able to capture her power...for themselves. Men are not accustomed to powerful, intelligent women and have to resort to alluding the women are "crazy" in order to usurp their power, taking advantage of the woman's perceived physical weakness in obtaining their power.

Thank you for including Spain’s history in your channel. 😊

I am enjoying the conversation below and even though this was done five months ago I’m just seeing it now and want to offer my thanks for this channel. As a history minor and later, getting my PhD in religious history, I find these stories of historical figures that I had not heard of incredibly intriguing, and your coverage of them is perfect. Much like I encourage my students to think for themselves, you encourage us to weigh the evidence and think for ourselves. By the way in which you presented the evidence this particular time leads me to believe that she was not insane by any means. She may, however, have truly been grieving her husband and the life that maybe she wanted to have with him when she acted out against the women that he was involved with and then other courtiers, and so maybe it was somewhere in between? perhaps she was experiencing some depression and yet at the same time she was also being very careful within the confines that she was given to try and protect her self, her children, etc. I agree with someone who mentioned earlier that elizabeth may have learned from her. I’m sure many a Monarch heard the cautionary tale and decided to try a different tack because of it. I do see similar references to Mary queen of Scots as to her mental health, so it would not be unheard of that this tactic would be used regularly to control women even at the highest rank and ability. we certainly see enough diagnoses of hysteria in the 19th century and schizophrenia in the 20th century used to control women. Thank you again.

Absolutely fantastic video! I have read a lot about her and my opinion is that she was betrayed by her Father, husband and son. They wanted power and that was the only way to get it.

Really interesting. I see how treating her husband's body like that would have been a good way of reminding everyone of his and thus HER status. I'd never thought of that angle but actually that would be a clever PR move although if he was good looking and charismatic she probably did have strong feelings for him as well. Nowadays we are all being subjected to that sort of gas lighting.

Excellent point about Juana's supposed madness not being serious enough that her husband, who otherwise lead the charge of proclaiming her mad, thought she was competent to handle sexual relations, pregnancy, and childbirth. I try to have sympathy for her son, since at 16 years old he was also likely a puppet for older, more experienced men to some degree or another, but geez was he a terrible kid. She really showed a mother's love to not support the rebels offering her freedom (or "freedom" since of course it'd have strings attached) in order to protect her son.

If hatred of your husband's mistresses is a sign of violent insanity, I have to wonder why mental hospitals aren't bursting at the seams! Intelligent, well-educated woman entitled to a great deal of power. Power-hungry men able to exert physical control of said woman. Did it matter whether she was mad or not?

a case can be made for all of the possibilities that you prepose while the romantic in me would love to pick the betrayed queen option i think the only right choice is not to pick any option and just enjoy the speculations and your video

Thank you so much! The struggle between love and power was obviously the largest factor of Juanas life, and a horrific abuse of her by those that she loved. Wonderful talk, Dr. Kat. I knew this was a subject you would be able to put some teeth on! Imo Juana was possibly fragile mentally but only because of trauma ,grief , and conflicting emotions about her abusers.

From my point of view, Juana suffered from an acute depression worsened by the death of her husband. In addition to his, his temper was the perfect excuse for Phillip to put her aside during his bid to take the crown and then also used by her father and her son. Her behaviour after Phillip's death has been so deeply manipulated and rewritten that, frankly speaking, I do not dare to try even to explain what happen then.

Great video! I'm Spaniard so I'm familiarised with Juana's story, legend, and speculations about her mental health. Her life was romanticised by a lot of Romantic writers. You should look into Galician noblewoman Inés de Castro. Her forbidden love with the then prince of Portugal Pedro I, her assassination, and his revenge against her killers once he was crowned king are book and film material. Her half sister, Juana de Castro "la desamada" (the unloved?) also had an "interesting" life. She married Pedro "The Cruel" of Castile but he was already married to Blanca de Borbon. Their marriage was declared invalid and Juana retired to a castle. She was lucky, tho. Blanca, on the other hand, was imprisoned and assassinated by her husband's orders. He was an ass.

I didn't know anything about Juana before, that is the magic of your videos... you make me care about historical figures who I had been previously unaware of. Thanks for the great content!

I definitely think Philip was a cold, cold man, possibly disordered himself. As for Juana, I have read a couple stories of her acting erratic (climbing the walls outside her parent's castle while screaming, frothing, etc., carving with a knife into the floor to get to the floor below when her husband locked her up in a room). If these stories are to be believed, she did seem at least to possibly have had a couple mental breakdowns at the very least, but this doesn't make you crazy, people in those days just didn't understand mental health, and the fact that she was a woman made her easier to throw away. However, according to the book Sister Queens by Julia Fox, Juana was not allowed to meet her sister or Henry VII for very long during her stay in England supposedly because Philip tried to keep her from them (either because she was mad or because he didn't want people to see she was sane).

Man, I love this channel and this, about a character I never thought much about, is the best yet. I want to learn more now about Juana

Wow, you've totally shifted my understanding of Queen Juana!! This was fascinating, thank you!!

I think her willingness to travel through Francis just a sign of being a brilliant politician I mean either she's able just to pass through or she's accosted and any and all support in her husband's court for France basically banishes instantly and if they detained her even nevermind anyting more serious than that likely that war would almost be immediately declared against them which would Aid her parents it sounds like she was far more politically astute than her parents were

My morning just got considerably better. Thanks Dr. Kat for my history fix!!!💜

Wow this is all so fascinating, I didn't know the half of it! I used to live in Spain for many years and first came across 'Juana La Loca' in James Michener's 'Iberia', in the chapter where he visits Tordesillas. The parade of fake coffins, dios mio, Spain truly is a land of the Gothic and the surreal! And it was years before I realised that Juana was Catherine of Aragon's sister. Dr Kat, I'm really enjoying your articulate and balanced talks on these historical topics, thank you.

I feel for her. Many have declared madness in a spouse to get ahead or just get rid of the other

I suspect she wasn't mad, but I believe she might have become depressed after all those years imprisoned, especially at the end of her life. Tragic

With some of your videos, like this one, my instant reaction is: 'Hey, you knew I'd wanted to know this before I did'.

Thank you. Clearly this woman was horribly framed. I like to think her story along with the reality of her capabilities would inspire the future Elizabeth the First. (I doubt the corpse-kissing has any veracity at all.)

dr kat i just want to say thank you for everything you do🫶🏻 this video and all your others are presented in such a way that even someone like me, who has really severe adhd, can easily take in every word and digest it. i dont need the information to be written down or beaten into my head, but just presented in a concise, well-paced and interactive manner. i cant even imagine what a great teacher you’d be irl. i always agree with everything you say, and when you bring up your dyslexia, it just reminds me that all of us neurodivergent girlies can be and ARE just as brilliant and well put together as you are. again, thank you for these videos. they keep me sane ❤️❤️❤️❤️

I see some important similarities between Juana's life experience and what happened to the Empress Mathilda. Both were on the receiving end of plots to sideline them. In both cases the continual emotional turmoil had to cause injuries. In the case of the Empress, she had nobles who for years went to battle for her. Juana had no real battle hardened warriors loyal to her. Both ended their lives basically sequestered.

Wanted to learn more about my great grandmother ❤ bless her strength that I may be walking today!!

Sounds like a continuous game of gaslighting which would have Juana second guessing herself constantly.

I am leaving. Not because I dislike your channel, far from it. It has given me hours of immense joy and plenty of intellectual fulfillment. It just doesn't work for me any more. I owe you great gratitude, because you found it in you to hear me out when very fiew else would. Don't fret, this is not a suicide note, I'm just entering a new phase right now. Thank you for everything, Dr Kat!

Poor Juana was deeply unlucky in her male relatives: Ferdinand, Philip and Charles, but she also seems - through a mixture of family conditioning and insecurity - to have been unable to summon up more than passive aggression to combat them. She does not seem to have learned much about earning male respect from her forceful and independent mother. This lack of "grip" may have led her to experience considerable cognitive dissonance. It would have been conducive at the very least to depression and a lack of self-belief. Apart from her very odd behaviour with regard to Philip's body, there seems to be a lack of convincing unbiased evidence that she was truly mad, at least not on the scale of her descendant (grandson?) Prince Carlos. Poor lady!

I enjoy watching you, Dr Kat. It feels like time spent with a friend you want to hear more from about what they are interested in.

Purple definitely suits Dr Kat. Very regal 👑💜👑

As an abuse survivor, I know the strategy of submission for survival. Juana was highly compliant and, I suspect, felt completely helpless in a world designed to keep her in an ivory tower with men in charge of her person and assets. I think she felt hopeless and powerless, and the men in her life kept her that way. It's ironic that she lived 75 years when everyone else in her family died fairly young. What difference would she have made if she had grasped power and been a stable ruling monarch in an unstable political world?

I was looking for a deep dive history channel featuring someone with a soothing voice, then i see that one of your most recent videos is about Juana of Castile…I don’t think I’ve ever clicked subscribe so fast! Would you ever consider making content about any of Juana’s descendants, the Habsburgs?

Gosh, this narative makes sense of course, because even in the 1800's and earlyish 1900's women were considered 'Hysterical' when they had PMS or depression (or disagree syndrome lol). This is the way it's been all through history. Great video! 🤓 I do not believe she started out mad, however it would be perfectly normal, I think, to go mad from all the abuse and isolation.

So glad I came across this episode. I took a walking tour just last month in Ghent and we discussed Juana, Phillip, and Charles as well as statues. ❤

Good evening, Dr. Kat! I've enjoyed your videos for a very long time. I was particularly pleased in the way you covered the history of Juana of Castile in a sympathetic light. Only one other historian, Townsend Miller, did so in his "The Castles and the Crowns." Miller stated that Juana was the most intelligent of her family but also somewhat finally tuned and her neurotic behavior began to manifest itself only after she had been sent to the Netherlands to marry Philip of Habsburg. There, despite being in lust with her husband ( To quote William Cecil about the marriage of Robert Dudley and Amy Robsart, "A marriage begun in lust and ended in sorrow"), she was isolated politically, economically ( as part of the double marriage between herself and Philip and her brother and Philip's sister, no dowries were exchanged) and socially. Philip's frequent love affairs did not help her achieve peace of mind, either. Both Philip and her father portrayed her as mad to keep power in their own hands and when her father finally imprisoned her in Tordesillas, her jailers sought to drive her mad. On the other hand, Juana's older sister Isabel suffered from melancholy after her first husband's death and Isabel the Catholic's own mother spend the last decades of her life in confinement because of her mental derangement, so Juan came by her neurotic behavior quite honestly. Thanks for sharing!

I think Juana's greatest misfortune was to be born a woman among a group of power hungry, conniving men. Her father Ferdinand, if I remember correctly, dragged his feet about paying his daughter Catherine's dowry to Henry Tudor and she had to beg for money for basic needs. I don't know anything much about Juana's husband Phillip but assume he was probably cut from the same cloth. Also unfortunately for Juana, she was intelligent and well-educated. That would have made it difficult for her to be entirely submissive. Again, looking to her sister Catherine in England, these two women were not door mats when it came to the machinations of the men around them. A number of the claims of madness seem fabricated. And there would be little she could do to defend herself. Thank you so much for offering up this interesting and intriguing perspective on a poorly used Queen.

Simply brilliant, as usual. Thank you for such an excellent discussion.

It's interesting to me how both Juana and Catherine had male members of their families that used them both for their own benefit. Was this a sign of the times or was this a dysfunction within the family itself? Did Catherine have the same kind of relationship with Isabella that Juana did? If i remember correctly Catherine didn't have help from her family either when she asked for it.

Some tips on Spanish pronunciation (Castillian): A is pronounced as the A in our Ah, or the O in our On, and the I is pronounced like our EE sound, as in tree; E pronounced as that of our get, let, but tends toward the A in late, gate, in the Americas, either is used here (California). The Qu in Torquemada is pronounced as K; D is pronounced as our softer TH, as in the or thee (except if it’s the first letter in a word). J is pronounced as our H. This is the first one visitors to Southern California learn, to pronounce El Cajon (El CAH-hone) and Tejon Pass (Teh-HONE). So Torquemada is Tor-Keh-MAH-thah.

Thank you for your in-depth look at this fascinating woman. Like her mother, Isabel, she was a threat to the men around her. I appreciate the breadth of information you provided for this long misunderstood and misrepresented woman.

This is my first time watching a video of yours & I really enjoyed it. you ask great questions to consider in the conversations that haven’t been asked enough. it triggers my personal passion for behaviour & emotion reading so here's my rambling logic In my personal opinion, this is a narcissistic abuse situation for that time period. The decisions made & reactions are just so precise to this particular pattern, I have a hard time not viewing it as this. Plus there’s the social fundamentals of the time as well, sexism & self importance & social hierarchy which cast a filter on how the information is presented & digested. Here are some shared patterns for the people involved in these situations: Juana, the main victim: 1. Intense devotion while being love bombed 2. Intense confusion when love become contradictory & painful 3. Anger issues after prolonged pain 4. Emotional immaturity after prolonged pain 5. Brainwashed behaviour, loving someone who you know brings you pain because there’s nothing else that you’ve been given purpose for 6. Complete devotion to their children, a purpose in life that is undeniably connected to her existence (value) 7. Patterns of emotional immaturity 8. Previous role models in her developmental years appear to have the same type of behaviour (father, brothers, owners, masters, husbands) 9. Complete mistrust & distancing from others 10. Disagreeable/unlikeable martyring behaviours 11. Mirroring/reflecting of narcissistic behaviours 12. Is highly isolated when they don’t want to be 13. Will choose isolation when the situation changes because isolation is the most familiar feeling after prolonged endurance of it 14. Impaired socialization. Could be too talkative, accusational, angry, giddy, awkward, etc. The isolation limited her social setting so it limited her social interactions & experiences. 15. Compassion fatigue & then guilt cycle 16. Close people retaliate & lash out on her behalf Child of the narcissistic abuse relationship: 1. Ends up resenting the victimized parent & will begin distancing behaviour where possible. Most notable when the child gets to an age of independence 2. At young ages children will relate most to the parent who has the most influence on them. No matter how loving & nurturing or hateful & neglectful, a violent temper or painful damage will be more overpowering to a child. Then they’ll usually appeal & submit to the biggest threat they perceive, so if there’s intense pain in their environment, they’ll be reacting to the cause of the pain the most. Usually a good abuser identification tool that’s become weakened with overuse for an under experienced person using this tool. It’ll break & the user will be too young to repair it, then usually a parental narcissistic abuse relationship gets joined by a romantic narcissistic abuse relationship. The child will either become the narcissist & the victim of a narcissist, or they’ll just be a continued victim of narcissism 3. Children usually relate to the parent with the same gender as them first 4. Emotional regulation issues 5. Compassion fatigue & confusion Narcissist: 1. Love bombs to captivate 2. Attracted to emotional people who display emotions they normally aren’t comfortable/familiar with 3. Becomes competitive with the authentic person’s emotional displays either by frustration for weakness or negativity associated with the emotions or jealous of the authentic person’s comfort with the uncomfortable or strength to endure it. Lashes out & mistreats the person 4. Realizes how much they crave the attention or resource the authentic person offers them & love bombs them again. Will deepen & pressure the feeling of love as much as needed, shamelessly & often violently in one if not multiple ways (emotionally, psychologically, socially, physically, financially, sexually, etc) 5. Devotes time & effort to a smear campaign to make memories of the victim appear to be more problematic than they actually are while simultaneously trying to hide themselves 6. Intense self victimization without emotional or compassionate growth or maturity 7. Relishes in both power & victimhood simultaneously even when it’s contradictory 8. Refusal to make personal sacrifices. Usually manifests as the other person being severely put down for the compensation to take place. Often shows as health issues from the prolonged stress in the victims 9. Has multiple victims & will have them do their bidding by framing their own perpetrating behaviour as someone else’s fault somehow, so the anger gets deferred to someone else. Pits people against each other. 10. Will send people after the victim to harass & intimidate them. The less the love bombing works, the more intense the harassment & the accusations will be 11. Threatens & bullies easily & often, though it might not often be in front of more than a few people at a time. This keeps others from criticizing & contradicting in a way that might reveal their lies & bad behaviour I could go on quite a bit. The main decider for me is a person that’s truly “mad” or mentally broken doesn’t have the strength to resist. They could’ve convinced, abused & coerced her into a lot of useful ventures & signatures if she was mentally dependent. But the shift from intense dependency on him while maintaining intense independent self control in front of him until she was really breaking with hormones & being worn down is big for me. Then the refusal to obey & come back, even when they started out nice & diplomatic & described her of sound mind even if it was transactionally….it’s giving emotional reactivity when they changed it. She seems pretty resolute throughout imprisonment too. The types of mental illness they describe display instability far quicker than it seems like she has in situations like imprisonment. If she was acting out a lot, they would’ve had a ton of publication with unique events that were ammunition to slander. They don’t, they have a lot of publication with little uniqueness so they’re repetitive as if no one learned anything from the first times it was happening. My hypothesis for the smear campaign is if she was such an interesting case study during the time of publishing the gossip & news, there would’ve more consolidated archives of more detailed & unique examples from repeated exposure to their claims. Hormones & health issues definitely don’t help either. Especially pregnancy ones, where there’s constant reminders of personal & bodily sacrifice by someone else who may not even value your bodily & sexual consent if they’re already removing all your social consent & disregarding your humanity. During a time with high childbirth mortality for women. A lot of emotions to go around with very few solutions, that’s not madness that’s a typical response to an overpressurized situation. the contents of the situation tend to explode

by the sound of it the only sign of "insanity" (as opposed to probably crushing depression and anxiety she otherwise had to live with due to actions of her family) was her treatment of her husband's corpse. If true, she may have had mental breakdown, and the pregnancy may have exaggerated her symptoms. This does not mean she was "mad" - a lot of people would probably struggle in this situation

Loved this video 😊 I had always heard about Juana la Loca. A few months ago I came across RU-vid clips of La Corona Partida. This was a Spanish novella that went into the lives of Isabel and Ferdinand Castille and Aarogan and then the life of Juana. This was actually a pretty good TV series. The series aired in 2016 and does have English subtitles.

Just goes to show what power and greed can do to people, the lengths they will go and the people they will hurt to get it. The closest men to Juana, her father, husband and son used, abused and betrayed her to obtain power and keep hold of it. Very sick, very sad

For all the lies and power grabs that kept Joanna imprisoned, I don't think she would have lived such a long life if she was out and about. Kind of a "blessing in disguise", I guess.

It seemed easy enough for each one, Husband, Father, and Son, to continue the narrative that was already in place. They all used her and she loved them all enough to allow it.

I found a super fascinating series that features Juana and most of the main characters of her family called Dynasty it’s in Spanish but they did have from what I recall English subtitles for anyone interested thanks again for the great work Dr. Kat ❤💛🇪🇸

I think it’s just like the takedown of Elizabeth of Bathury. Nice video.