Ferdinand V of Castile & II of Aragon the Catholic
(Spanish: Fernando V de Aragón "el Católico",
Catalan: Ferran II d'Aragó "el Catòlic", Aragonese: Ferrando II d'Aragón "lo Catolico"; March 10, 1452 – January 23, 1516) was king of Aragon (1479–1516), Castile, Sicily (1468–1516), Naples (1504–1516), Valencia, Sardinia and Navarre and Count
of Barcelona.
Biography
Acquiring titles
Ferdinand was the son of John II of Aragon by his second wife, the Castilian
noblewoman Juana Enriquez whose family was a cadet branch of Trastamara. He married
Infanta Isabella, the half-sister and heiress of Henry IV of Castile, on October 19, 1469 in Valladolid and became king consort of Castile when Isabella succeeded her brother as Queen of Castile in
1474. Isabella also belonged to the royal House of Trastamara. The two young monarchs were initially obliged to fight a civil war against
Juana, princess of Castile (also known as Juana la Beltraneja), the purported
daughter of Enrique IV, but were ultimately successful. When Ferdinand succeeded his father as King of Aragon in 1479, the Crown of Castile and the various territories of the Crown of Aragon were united in a personal union
creating for the first time since the 8th century a single political unit which might be called Spain, although the various territories were not properly administered as a single unit until the 18th century.
The first decades of Ferdinand and Isabella's joint rule were taken up with the conquest of the Kingdom
of Granada, the last Muslim enclave in the Iberian peninsula, which was completed by 1492.
In that same year, the Alhambra Decree was issued, expelling the Jews from both Castile and Aragon, and Christopher Columbus was sent
by the couple on his expedition which would ultimately discover the New World. By the Treaty of Tordesillas of 1494, the extra-European world was split
between the crowns of Portugal and Castile by a north-south line through the Atlantic
Ocean.
Wedding portrait of King Ferdinand II of Aragón and Queen Isabella of Castile.
The latter part of Ferdinand's life was largely taken up with disputes over control of Italy with successive Kings of
France, the so-called Italian Wars. In 1494, Charles VIII of France invaded Italy and expelled Ferdinand's
cousin, Alfonso II, from the throne of Naples. Ferdinand allied with various
Italian princes and with Emperor Maximilian I, to expel the French by
1496 and install Alfonso's son, Ferdinand, on the Neapolitan throne. In 1501, following the death of Ferdinand II of Naples and his
succession by his uncle Frederick, Ferdinand of Aragon signed an agreement with
Charles VIII's successor, Louis XII, who had just successfully asserted his claims
to the Duchy of Milan, to partition Naples between them, with Campania and the Abruzzi, including Naples itself, going to the French and
Ferdinand taking Apulia and Calabria. The agreement soon fell
apart, and over the next several years, Ferdinand's great general Gonzalo
Fernández de Córdoba conquered Naples from the French, having succeeded by 1504. Another
less famous "conquest" took place in 1503, when Andreas Paleologus, de jure Emperor
of the Eastern Roman Empire, left Ferdinand and Isabella as heirs to the empire, thus
Ferdinand became de jure Roman Emperor.
After Isabella
Aragonese, Valencian and Sicilian Royalty
House of Trastámara
|
|
|
|
Ferdinand I |
| Children include |
| Alfonso (future Alfonso V of Aragon, III of Valencia and I of Sicily
and Naples) |
| John (future John II of Aragon, Valencia and Navarre and I of
Sicily) |
| Eleanor, Queen of Portugal |
|
Alfonso V (III of Valencia and I of Sicily and Naples) |
| Ferdinand I of Naples (natural son) |
|
John II (I of Sicily and II of Navarre) |
| Children include |
| Eleanor, Queen of Navarre |
| Ferdinand (future Ferdinand II of Aragon, Valencia and Sicily, III of Naples, IV
of Castile and V of Leon) |
| Blanca |
| Joan, Queen of Naples |
| Charles IV of Navarre |
|
Ferdinand II (III of Naples, IV of Castile and V of Leon) |
| Children include |
| Isabella, Queen of Portugal |
| Joan, Queen of Castile |
| Juan, Prince of Asturias |
| Mary, Queen of Portugal |
| Catherine, Queen of England |
| Grandchildren include |
| Miguel da Paz, Crown Prince of Portugal and
Spain |
| Charles (future Charles I of Spain and V of the Holy Roman
Empire) |
|
After Isabella's death, her kingdom went to their daughter Joanna. Ferdinand served
as the latter's regent during her absence in the Netherlands, ruled by her husband
Archduke Philip. Ferdinand attempted to retain the regency permanently, but was
rebuffed by the Castilian nobility and replaced with Joanna's husband, who became Philip I
of Castile. After Philip's death in 1506, with Joanna mentally unstable, and her and Philip's son Charles of Ghent was only six years old, Ferdinand resumed the regency, ruling through
Francisco Cardinal Jimenez de Cisneros, the Chancellor of the
Kingdom.
Ferdinand disagreed with Philip's policies. In 1505, Ferdinand remarried to Germaine of
Foix, a grand-daughter of Queen Leonor of Navarre, in hopes of fathering a new
heir and so separating Aragon and Castile (denying Philip the governance of Aragon), and to potentially lay claim to
Navarre.
In 1508, war resumed in Italy, this time against Venice, which all the other powers on the peninsula, including Louis XII, Ferdinand, Maximilian, and
Pope Julius II joined together against as the League of Cambrai. Although the French were victorious against Venice at the
Battle of Agnadello, the League soon fell apart, as both the Pope and Ferdinand
became suspicious of French intentions. Instead, the Holy League was formed, in
which now all the powers joined together against France.
In November 1511 Ferdinand and his son-in-law Henry VIII
of England signed the Treaty of Westminster, pledging mutual aid
between the two against France. Earlier that year, Ferdinand had conquered the southern half of
the Kingdom of Navarre, which was ruled by a French nobleman, and annexed it to
Spain. The Holy League was generally successful in Italy, as well, driving the French from Milan, which was restored to its
Sforza dukes by the peace treaty in 1513. The French were
successful in reconquering Milan two years later, however.
Ferdinand died in 1516 in Madrigalejo, Cáceres, Extremadura.
Legacy
Ferdinand and Isabel had together made Spain the most powerful country in Europe. The succession of his grandson Charles, who
would inherit not only the Spanish lands of his maternal grandparents, but the Habsburg and Burgundian lands of his paternal family, would make his
heirs the most powerful rulers on the continent. Charles succeeded him in the Aragonese lands, and was also granted the Castilian
crown jointly with his insane mother, bringing about at long last the unification of the Spanish thrones under one head.
Ancestry
See also
References
External links
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