Неаполь Королінің тарихы: Фердинанд II

the 15th century King of Naples

Ferdinand II (; 26 June 1467 – 7 September 1496) was King of Naples from 1495 to 1496. He was the son of Alfonso II of Naples and the grandson of Ferrante I of Naples. At the start of the Italian Wars in 1495, Alfonso abdicated in favor of his son, Ferdinand, when a French army led by Charles VIII threatened Naples. Unable to effectively defend the city, Ferdinand fled with a small retinue to the island of Ischia. Charles quickly occupied the city, then split his army, leaving half of it to garrison Naples, and taking the other half to return home. By May 1495, with fresh troops and the support of Aragon allies, Ferdinand returned to the peninsula and with the assistance of the Spanish general Gonzalo Fernández de Córdoba, expelled French soldiers from the entire kingdom. He died soon thereafter on 7 September 1496 and was succeeded by his uncle, Frederick.

On 26 June 1467, Ferrandino was born in Castel Capuano, a residence that King Ferrante had given to his son Alfonso and his wife Ippolita Maria Sforza as a wedding gift. Her mother, Ippolita, found herself alone to give birth, as her husband was engaged on the war front in Abruzzo to fight against the Florentines, while her father in law was in Terra di lavoro. The prince's birth was nevertheless immediately greeted with great joy, as the kingdom had had its rightful heir. He was baptized on 5 July and was given the names Ferdinando, in honor of his grandfather, and Vincenzo, for his mother's devotion to San Vincenzo Ferreri. Thus entered into life the one who was to become the unhappy king Ferrandino. Welcomed with great joy by King Ferrante, by his family, by all Neapolitans, no pain was spared during his brief existence [ ]|Alessandro Cutolo, La nascita di Ferrandino d'Aragona. The letters of his mother dating back to this early period describe him as a healthy, beautiful, and capricious newborn; in fact, it is Ippolita herself who disconsolately informs her mother, Bianca Maria Visconti, that Ferrandino is "beautiful as a pearl" but "pleasant with every person except with me; I have hope in short days we will have to be domestic and friends".

He had as tutors, but also as advisors and secretaries, Aulus Janus Parrasius, Gabriele Altilio and Chariteo, who followed their pupil with dedication and loyalty even when he, still a teenager, was called to try his hand at the art of war. Already at the age of fourteen, he had the opportunity to demonstrate his readiness in war, when his grandfather Ferrante put him at the head of a military expedition directed to Abruzzo, as a lieutenant of the king, with the task of defending the coasts from the attacks of the Venetian fleet, when, after the reconquest of Otranto, a new war front opened between Venice and Ferrara (Salt War,1482 1484) and Ferrante had to intervene in defense of his son in law Ercole I d'Este. In the following years, Ferrandino continuously defended the kingdom, fighting against the rebellious barons during the second baronial revolt that, between 1485 and 1486, put King Ferrante in great difficulty. This was still nothing, however, compared to what would have awaited the young Ferrandino in the years of the descent of Charles VIII. Although the story is far fetched, there is news from the ambassadors of his ruinous fall from his horse in the summer of 1486: initially the prince seemed to have done nothing, in fact he did not want to be medicated, but then he was assailed by a great fever and was in danger of life. Since he was now considered dead and with no hope of healing, it was "opinione de tucto lo populo" that it was the "infinite orationi made the Ill. ma madamma duchessa his mother" to free him from evil. As an ex voto, his father Alfonso had a silver image of the prince made and donated it to the church of Santa Maria di Loreto,where he had gone to request grace. At the death of his younger brother Pietro, which occurred due to illness in 1491, he remained the last hope of Naples and of his old grandfather Ferrante, who by dying already foreshadowed the terrible war that was about to strike the kingdom. The sovereign died on 25 January 1494, Alfonso II ascended to the throne of Naples and did not hesitate a single moment before declaring war on Ludovico il Moro, occupying as the first act of hostility the city of Bari, a fief of the duke. Alfonso thus came to the rescue of his daughter Isabella, wife of Gian Galeazzo Maria Sforza, nephew of Ludovico, to whom his uncle had usurped the Duchy of Milan. Ludovico responded to the threat by giving the green light to the monarch French Charles VIII to descend to Italy to reconquer the kingdom of Naples, which the latter believed usurped by the Aragonese to the Neapolitan Angevins. Those of Bertenoro and Cesena did not want to give him more provisions: where the Duke of Calabria and he were reluctant. Now note, reader, that certainly the Duke of Calabria behaved honestly in these lands and countries, and he did not do what he could have done having become our enemy. And when he was our friend he never wanted them to be damaged either in the vineyards or in the branches, and his camp was free and those who brought him provisions wanted them to be well paid, protected and honored, and I never know of a dishonesty of that. encampment: he certainly has a good reputation for it. But we have given him well credit, for people were sent after him to steal and take away horses, weapons and robes.|Leone Cobelli, "Cronache Forlivesi"

The sources describe him always impatient to clash with the French and to test his war skills. In fact, when he was still near Imola, on 16 September 1494 "with the helmet on his head and throwing it on his thigh" he went down to openly challenge the French, and seeing that the enemy did not leave the camp "he sent some crossbowmen to invite him up to half a mile below; and no one ever showed up". Two days later, not happy, he sent a herald to the enemy captain, Gianfrancesco Sanseverino d'Aragona, Count of Caiazzo, to ask him "if he wanted to come and break some spear", with a negative result. He then repeated the challenge to the captain French, Robert Stuart d'Aubigny, and the French this time accepted, but the Count of Caiazzo prevented the test from being held and Ferrandino, disappointed, had to settle for small skirmishes.

Unlike his father and grandfather, Ferrandino did not usually keep fixed lovers with him, and in fact the existence of his illegitimate children is not known, however, like his grandfather and father he had very free sexual customs. As proof of his physical prowess as well as the favor he enjoyed among women, an episode is known to have occurred during September 1494, while Ferrandino, then Duke of Calabria, was encamped at the city of Cesena. The event is reported in a letter dated 4 October by Bernardo Dovizi from Bibbiena to Piero il Fatuo:Ferrandino was approached one evening by a "good man" named Mattio, who made him understand that he had to talk about a matter of enormous importance. Received by the duke the next day, Mattio reported to him that there was a "noble and beautiful woman [ ] for nobility and beauty, the first girl in all of Romagna" who having admired four years ago a portrait of Ferrandino and having heard praise for his countless virtues, had fallen madly in love with him and with her own risk and had come to Cesena only to be able to see him; moreover, having seen him, she had become so inflamed of him that "she finds no rest or place or thing that brings any relief to so much its fire". Mattio therefore prayed that he would deign to "have compassion on those who die for you", and that he wanted to satisfy her in his desire, because otherwise "the life of the miserable would soon be missing". Ferrandino, as is reasonable, initially remained in doubt that it could be a plot against him and that the woman wanted to poison him through coith, especially since he came from enemy territory, and therefore made her wait a few more days, meanwhile inquired about his identity, before being convinced that it was foolish on his part to doubt some danger and to consent to the meeting. Therefore, pretending to go out hunting, he went in great secrecy to a country house where the woman was waiting for her and where "he consumed the holy marriage with great sweetness of one side and the other". This woman, indicated in the letter with the name of Caterina Gonzaga, was perhaps a Gonzaga of the Novellara branch and perhaps daughter of that Giorgio Gonzaga who died in 1487 and therefore sister of that Taddea who married Matteo Maria Boiardo. Dovizi, who is very sceptical about the sincerity of the love professed by the woman, does not fail to write his impressions in this regard to Piero il Fatuo, judging that Caterina must perhaps have heard of the considerable size of Ferrandino's manly member, whom he describes in enthusiastic terms as "very honorable", and that therefore more than by love he was driven by lust. Although Ferrandino has not then "for his conscience" revealed to anyone the relationship if not to a few people, including precisely the Dovizi (with whom he used to speak "freely of everything") and the Marquis of Pescara Alfonso II d'Avalos, the fame of the great beauty of this Catherine came to the ears of Ludovico il Moro who at that time was in Asti in the company of the King of France, who was always eager to have beautiful women around him. Ludovico then sent a put to Catherine inviting her to go to Asti to please the king and offered her in return the sum of over 3500 ducats that should have been used to pay for the trip. Caterina, however, outraged by the proposal, prayed to Ferrandino that he would help her to invent a good excuse to decline the offer, because "she neither wants nor can leave". He then decided, to the laughter of his friends, that Caterina promised the Moro to go and accept the offer in money, but that he instead stole the duchies from the man who would bring them to him and stay with him in Cesena. Nevertheless Ferrandino, since he had been told that Piero il Fatuo had tried to obtain the woman without succeeding, showed himself very willing to lend it to him, saying: "I want these women's things, like the others, to be common among us". Dovizi replied by saying that the exchange offer to Piero would certainly not be agreed, as Piero had lovers with him while Ferrandino did not, he also judged that his availability was due to the fact that in truth he did not like Caterina's "meat", something that Ferrandino assured him not to be true, claiming "that he likes everything about her" and that indeed before leaving "he wants another feast". From a subsequent letter from Dovizi, dated 9 October, we learn that Piero il Fatuo then sent certain letters to the camp with a portrait of Caterina herself, demonstrating that the woman had already been his lover. Dovizi reports that Ferrandino, after reading the letter with him, "laughed so much and so heartily that I could not say any more, and I swear to you that I have not seen him nor do I think I can ever see him in such joy as he was then", and he wanted it to be re read several times even in the presence of the Avalos. Ferrandino then confessed that he had lied in saying that he liked the woman, believing that neither Piero nor Dovizi knew her, while in truth he had not liked it at all, if not for "a little manners", and that he was "more out of boredom than the devil". He also adds that if Caterina still wants him, then she will have to come herself to the military camp to find him, "otherwise she can scratch it so much that she coves the desire by herself", since he "will not move a step", and that "if she does not come to the camp, she can be hanged for him, who no longer plans to see him again, and if he came to the camp he would prove how heavy the Marquis weighs", or if he showed up in the military camp Ferrandino would offer it as much to his friend Alfonso d'Avalos. Dovizi concludes the matter by saying that Ferrandino also offered him to try the woman, but that he would never have allowed himself to lie with a woman with whom he had already lay his lord Piero, in fact "where the master has gone he would beware as much as the fire and the devil himself go there". The letters of Dovizi of this period, overly stuffed with obscenity and double meanings, since the nineteenth century have been abundantly censored in all the works and essays that deal with the subject, however they are still preserved at theMedici state archive in Florence and digitally usable. Certainly Ferrandino was aware of his physical qualities and did not exploit them only for his own personal gain, but also for those political diplomatic issues that could benefit the state: in fact, he always writes the usual Dovizi, who in presenting himself in Forlì to countess Caterina Sforza, of whom he sought the alliance in the war against the French, Ferrandino "went tight and beautifully dressed in the Neapolitan style". In fact, he knew that Countess Catherine had a real passion for good looking men and probably hoped to win their friendship. The attempt, perhaps, had a certain success, as Dovizi, in a specially enigmatic language, goes on to say that although Ferrandino the countess was not physically liked then very much, nevertheless "they shook hands scratching and at the same time noticed a lot of sparkling eyes", also the castellan Giacomo Feo, then a young lover of the same countess, showed himself quite jealous, in fact Ferrandino and Caterina "they stayed about two hours together but under the eyes of all, since the Feo wants she for himself".

The character Ferdinand in William Shakespeare's play The Tempest is based on the historical figure of Ferdinand. In the 2011 2013 Canadian television series The Borgias, Ferdinand is theoretically played by the Swedish actor Matias Varela, though the character shown in the series has nothing in common with the historical figure of Ferdinand other than the name.