Ferdinand the Catholic II, of Aragon

FERDINAND THE CATHOLIC II (V), of Aragon (III of Naples, II of Sicily). - B. 10 May 1452 at Sos (Aragon), d. 23 Jan. 1516 at Madrigalejo (Cáceres). Son of John II of Aragon and Joanna Enriquez, F. was not destined for the throne, which fell to him after the death of the firstborn Charles of Viana. Having married in 1468 Isabella, heiress of the Kingdom of Castile, there arose from this a long dispute with Alfonso V of Portugal, which was brought to an end by the treaty of Alcáçovas (1479). Immediately afterwards the two sovereigns began the war against the Kingdom of Granada, the last bulwark of the Muslims in Spain, which lasted more than a decade, but at last, in Jan. 1492, Granada was conquered.

Having thus accomplished Spanish unity, F. had before him broader political horizons. His relations with Columbus (v.) are well known. After the discovery of the new lands there arose a controversy between Spain and Portugal over the possession of the American lands; F. turned to Alexander VI, who issued bulls by which the disputed territories were awarded to Spain. By these bulls Isabella and F. were also granted the exclusive evangelization of the new lands and the right of presentation for ecclesiastical dignitaries, a privilege that constituted the first step toward the Patronato de Indias, granted by Julius II in 1508.

The foreign policy of F. was determined by the aggressive French policy of Charles VIII and Louis XII, which aimed at the conquest of the Kingdom of Naples. Nor did the expulsion of the enemy from the Kingdom of Naples seem to reassure F., who wanted to force France back within its natural limits, opposing every imperialistic design. The King therefore did not grant his support to the Spanish cardinal Carvajal, who, seizing upon the need for a reform of the Church as a pretext, had convened a conciliabulum at Pisa with the help of Louis XII: the Spanish prelates, by contrast, took part in the ecumenical Council of the Lateran (1512). It is difficult to say whether the policy of F. was exhausted, in the monarch's intentions, in a coherent and continuous anti-French action, or whether it aimed, as Doussinague maintains, at realizing the great design of war against the infidels and the definitive elimination of the Turkish danger.

It is certain in any case that the personality of F. occupies a place of the first rank not only in the history of his own country, but also in that of the Europe of his time, and that the effects of his political action had a lasting character and constituted the foundations of the Spanish State in the modern age.

Silvio Furlani