*** Welcome to piglix ***

Ferdinand the Catholic

Ferdinand the Catholic
Michel Sittow 004.jpg
Portrait by Michael Sittow
King of Castile and León (jure uxoris)
Reign 15 January 1475 – 26 November 1504
Predecessor Isabella I
Successor Joanna I
Co-monarch Isabella I
Reign 20 January 1479 – 23 January 1516
Predecessor John II
Successor Joanna I and Charles I
Born (1452-03-10)10 March 1452
Sada Palace, Sos del Rey Católico
Died 23 January 1516(1516-01-23) (aged 63)
Madrigalejo, Extremadura
Burial Royal Chapel of Granada
Consort
Issue
among others...
House Trastámara
Father John II of Aragon and Navarre
Mother Juana Enríquez
Religion Roman Catholicism
Signature Ferdinand the Catholic's signature

Ferdinand II (Aragonese: Ferrando, Spanish: Fernando II, Catalan: Ferran) (10 March 1452 – 23 January 1516), called the Catholic, was King of Sicily from 1468 and King of Aragon from 1479 until his death. As a consequence of his marriage to Isabella I, he was King of Castile as Ferdinand V from 1474 until her death in 1504. He was recognised as regent of Castile for his daughter and heir, Joanna, from 1508 until his own death. In 1504, after a war with France, he became King of Naples as Ferdinand III, reuniting Naples with Sicily permanently and for the first time since 1458. In 1512, he became King of Navarre by conquest.

Ferdinand is today best known for his role in inaugurating the discovery of the New World, since he and Isabella sponsored the first voyage of Christopher Columbus in 1492. That year he also fought the final war with Granada which expunged the last Islamic state on Iberian soil, thus bringing to a close the centuries-long Reconquista. At his death he was succeeded by Joanna, who co-ruled with her son, Charles V, over all the Iberian kingdoms save Portugal.

Ferdinand was born in Sada Palace, Sos del Rey Católico, Kingdom of Aragon, as the son of John II of Aragon (whose family was a cadet branch of the House of Trastámara) by his second wife, Juana Enríquez. He married Infanta Isabella, the half-sister and heiress of Henry IV of Castile, on 19 October 1469 in Valladolid, Kingdom of Castile and Leon. Isabella also belonged to the royal House of Trastámara, and the two were cousins by descent from John I of Castile. They were married with a clear prenuptial agreement on sharing power, and under the joint motto "tanto monta, monta tanto." He became jure uxoris King of Castile when Isabella succeeded her deceased brother in 1474 to be crowned as Queen Isabella I of Castile. The two young monarchs were initially obliged to fight a civil war against Joan of Castile (also known as Juana la Beltraneja), the purported daughter of Henry IV, and were swiftly successful. When Ferdinand succeeded his father as King of Aragon in 1479, the Crown of Castile and the various territories of the Crown of Aragon were united in a personal union. For the first time since the 8th century, this union created a single political unit referred to as España (Spain), the root of which is the ancient name Hispania. The various states were not formally administered as a single unit, but as separate political units under the same Crown. (The legal merging of Aragon and Castile into a single Spain occurred under Philip V in 1707–1715.)


...
Wikipedia

...