First of all, the title Portrait of a Spanish Price (Probably Philip II) is misleading.

It's more probable that this portrait is of Philip III the son of Philip II. There is quite a bit of evidence that supports this, the chief element being another portrait or Philip II housed in the Prado National Museum. It was made by the same person a decade prior, and in it Philip II looks to be around forty. So either he caught an aggressive case of Benjamin Button Disease, or someone was just bad at numbers. However it is still an excellent portrait, and while it was not technically part of the Italian Renaissance it was at one point moved to Italy, the place it was likely mislabeled.

It is actually rather ironic that this emerald munchkin was mixed up with his father, as the two were total opposites. As far as Kings of Spain go, Philip III was unique in the fact that he spent much of his rule entertaining himself while never quite slipping into debauchery. In fact if you enjoy the adorable nature captured by the little man’s portrait, then you can take heart in knowing that beyond growing one of those killer old timey mustaches, he never really changes. Philip III was known to be a uniquely pious man, and this combined with the fact that he left the job of ruling his kingdom to his Chief Minister, he likely retained his childlike innocence to the grave.

If you think that this might make for bad kingship, you wouldn’t be wrong, as many found Philip to be a negligent monarch, including his father. However, it should be noted that he wasn’t actually meant to be king. Philip III had an older brother named Don Carlos, who was everything Philip was not. He was oddly malformed, had a violent temper, and was power hungry. He was the kind of megalomaniac who regularly rode his horses to death and ordered the houses of his subjects set on fire. At one point he himself tried to usurp the throne by allying with his father’s enemies in the Netherlands. Luckily for Spain he did not become King, and instead died alone in a dungeon.

Taking that into consideration, I feel like his little brother did just fine.