Isabella of Asturias

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Isabella of Asturias (1470–1498) was the Queen Consort of Portugal and the eldest daughter and heiress presumptive of King Ferdinand II of Aragon and Queen Isabella of Castile.

In 1490 Isabella married Afonso, Infante of Portugal, the heir of John II of Portugal, who died afterwards in a hunting accident in 1495. She then in 1497 married King Manuel I of Portugal (who was Afonso's uncle and John II's successor to that throne). At the 1497 death of her only brother, John, she became Princess of Asturias as she was recognized as the heir of Castilian kingdom. In 1498 while giving birth to Miguel da Paz, heir to the kingdoms of Spain and Portugal, she died (Miguel died two years later). Manuel's chance to become king-consort of Spain vanished with Isabella's death, and main hope of uniting all Iberian kingdoms vanished at Miguel's death.

So, after 1500, Joanna of Castile (Isabella's next sister and Miguel's aunt) became the heiress of Spain, eventually bringing those kingdoms to the Habsburgs. However, the Iberian Union took place about a hundred years later, in 1580, when the Habsburg king, Philip II of Spain, grandson of Joan the Mad and of Manuel of Portugal, acquired Portugal and its dominions.

Isabella's sister, Maria of Aragon, then married Isabella's widowed husband and gave birth to eight children.