XIMENES (Jiménez) de Cisneros, Francisco. - Born at Torrelaguna (Madrid) in 1436, died at Roa on 8 November 1517. After taking his degree in canon law he went to Rome and remained there from 1449 to 1465. Having returned to Spain, he came into conflict with the archbishop of Toledo, Alonso Carrillo, who had him imprisoned for six years. Then Bishop Mendoza took him under his protection and appointed him vicar general of Sigüenza. In 1484 X. entered the Franciscan Order, changing his name from Gonzalo to Francisco.
In 1494 he was appointed provincial of the Order and undertook the visitation of the convents of Castile; authorized by a brief of Alexander VI to reform the monasteries
(from the anastatic edition edited by R. Elwood, Berlin 1903, p. 2r)
WOODCUT BOOKS - Mirabilia Romae (2nd half of the 15th century), German version - Copy in the Library of Gotha.
Spaniards, he set to work with inflexible energy, and after he was named archbishop of Toledo in 1495, he continued his action, aimed at re-establishing the unity of the Franciscan Order, at restoring ecclesiastical discipline and hierarchy, and at spreading education. He founded the University of Alcalá, and with the collaboration of scholars from every part of Europe he oversaw the preparation and printed at his own expense the polyglot Bible. His harsh intransigence earned him many enemies who sought to harm him at court and with the Pope, but the sovereigns defended him against all his detractors. When Philip of Castile died in 1506, Ferdinand was in Italy. X. assumed the regency and gathered troops that held in check the nobles' rebellious ambitions. In 1507 he received the office of grand inquisitor, and Julius II named him cardinal. X. worked hard to convert the Moors of Granada to Catholicism. Finally he became a supporter of a new Crusade. Ferdinand would have wanted an expedition to India, but X., appealing to the last wishes of Isabella, obtained that it be directed to Morocco and set Oran as its objective, while the King aimed at the conquest of Tunis, which would have procured for him a strong strategic base in the Mediterranean. The enterprise was led by X. himself, who followed to Africa the army commanded by Pedro Navarro. After the occupation of Oran, disagreements arose between X. and Navarro, and the latter managed to obtain that the cardinal be recalled to his homeland. But a series of victories that carried the Spaniards as far as Tunis was followed by a defeat that made them lose all the territories they had conquered, with the exception of Oran. In 1516, when Ferdinand died, X. assumed the regency to which he had been designated by the King. During his brief government X. devoted every effort to preserving the unity of the State, constituted a national army that allowed him to maintain order, thwarted all the machinations of the grandees, and reorganized the finances. Having repelled an attempt by the Albret to reconquer Navarre, he had all the fortresses of that province razed to the ground, with the exception of Pamplona. An expedition against the pirates of Barbarossa, on the other hand, had an unfavorable outcome.
Although Joanna was still living, X., yielding to the will of Charles, had him proclaimed king on 30 May 1516. But the new sovereign's first act was to relieve him of the government. When Charles went to Spain, X. was ill, and he died before he could meet him. In his activity as an ecclesiastic, X. anticipated the directives of the Catholic Reformation, with the strenuous defense of the faith against heresy and with assiduous work of moral purification and cultural improvement of the clergy. As a statesman, he set out internally to strengthen the monarchy and the State, and externally he aimed to secure Spanish predominance in North Africa.
Bibliography10 works
Roberto Palmarocchi