CARVAJAL, Juan de. — Cardinal, b. at Trujillo in Estremadura c. 1400, d. at Rome 6 Dec. 1469. As auditor of the Apostolic Chamber he was entrusted by Eugenius IV with the task of negotiating with the Emperor Frederick III and the German princes to withdraw them from the neutrality they had proclaimed between the Pope and the Council of Basle. To this end he took part in the Diets of Mainz (Feb. 1441) and Frankfurt (May-June 1442), and together with Tommaso Parentucelli in that of Frankfurt in Sept.-Oct. 1446, succeeding in preparing a rapprochement between Germany and the Pope.
Appointed bishop of Plasencia in Spain on 10 Aug. 1446, he was created cardinal on 16 Dec. together with Parentucelli and received the hat with him on 23 Dec., immediately upon his return to Rome. He set out again for Germany as legate on 15 Sept. 1447 to complete the work of religious pacification, which culminated in the Concordat of Vienna (17 Feb. 1448).
Another legation to Hungary was conducted by C. from 25 Sept. 1455 to 30 Sept. 1461, to support that nation in its struggle against the Turk, and in it he had as his companion St. John of Capistrano.
For the same purpose he was legate to Venice from 30 July 1466 to 17 Sept. 1467. He was bishop of Porto from 26 Oct. 1461 and camerlengo of the Sacred College from 11 Jan. 1469, when he died, leaving a reputation as a most able diplomatist and an austere ecclesiastic; he had moreover shown himself ardent in the struggle against the Hussites.