ALFONSO II D'ESTE, Duke of Ferrara. - B. at Ferrara on 22 Nov. 1533 to Ercole II and Renata of France, daughter of Louis XII; d. there on 27 Oct. 1597.
Devoted with all his energy to the aggrandizement of the State and of the Este dynasty, whose decline he was unable to prevent, he gave splendor to the last days of the duchy of Ferrara. From his three marriages to Lucrezia de' Medici, daughter of Cosimo I (1560), Barbara of Austria, daughter of Emperor Ferdinand I (1565), and Margherita Gonzaga, daughter of Guglielmo duke of Mantua (1579), he had no offspring nor political advantages. He took part in the civil wars of France and in Maximilian II's campaign against the Turks (1566). For this campaign Torquato Tasso dedicated to him the Gerusalemme Liberata. He aspired, in competition with Emmanuel Philibert of Savoy, to the elective crown of Poland (1574-76) and to supremacy over the small Italian States, which was instead obtained by Cosimo de' Medici with his appointment as grand duke. Hence a long and noisy dispute. His loyalty to France, his mother's Huguenotism, and excessive taxation made him hated and suspect, although he guided his government by the anti-Machiavellian principles (loyalty and religion) set forth in the Principe of G. B. Pigna, his secretary of State. With his death Ferrara was devolved to the Holy See, which held the legitimate branch of the Este to be extinct. The heir he chose, his cousin Cesare, was only duke of Modena and Reggio.
ALFONSO II D'ESTE duke of FERRARA - Portrait, canvas by an unknown 16th-century artist - Rome, Galleria Doria.(phot. Alinari)Bibliography5 worksE. Callegari, La devoluzione di Ferrara alla S. Sede, in Riv. stor. ital., 1 (1895); A. Solerti, Ferrara e la corte estense nella seconda me
BIBL.: E. Callegari, La devoluzione di Ferrara alla S. Sede, in Riv. stor. ital., 1 (1895); A. Solerti, Ferrara e la corte estense nella seconda metà del sec. xvi, Città di Castello 1900; A. Lazzari, Le ultime tre duchesse di Ferrara e la Corte Estense ai tempi di T. Tasso, Firenze 1913; E. Callegari, I ricordi di governo di A. II d'Este, in Arch. stor. ital., 78 (1920), pp. 110-23; Pastor, X, XI, passim.
Pacifici, Vincenzo. “Alfonso II d'Este, duca di ferrara.” In Enciclopedia Cattolica, vol. I, coll. 858–859. Città del Vaticano: Ente per l’Enciclopedia Cattolica e per il Libro Cattolico, 1948. https://azioneromana.com/article/alfonso-ii-d-este-duca-di-ferrara.
MLA
Pacifici, Vincenzo. “Alfonso II d'Este, duca di ferrara.” Enciclopedia Cattolica, vol. I, Ente per l’Enciclopedia Cattolica e per il Libro Cattolico, 1948, coll. 858–859. Azione Romana, https://azioneromana.com/article/alfonso-ii-d-este-duca-di-ferrara.
BibTeX
@incollection{ec1_alfonso_ii_d_este_duca_di_ferr,
author = {Pacifici, Vincenzo},
title = {Alfonso II d'Este, duca di ferrara},
booktitle = {Enciclopedia Cattolica},
volume = {I},
pages = {858--859},
note = {Cited by column},
publisher = {Ente per l’Enciclopedia Cattolica e per il Libro Cattolico},
address = {Città del Vaticano},
year = {1948},
url = {https://azioneromana.com/article/alfonso-ii-d-este-duca-di-ferrara}
}
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