Ferdinand II of Aragon

Ferdinand II of Aragon (Aragonese: Ferrando; Catalan: Ferran; Basque: Errando; Spanish: Fernando; Italian: Ferdinando; 1452 – 1516) was the King of Aragon, Sicily, Naples, Valencia, Sardinia, and Navarre. As the husband to Isabella I, he was King of Castile through marriage. After her death, he continued to serve as regent in Castile on behalf of their daughter Joanna for much of the rest of his life.

Biography

Reconquista

In 1478, Ferdinand and Isabella, seeking further religious unity, requested permission from the Pope to establish an inquisition. Pope Sixtus IV permitted them to appoint priests as inquisitors.

By 1491, members of both the Assassins and Templars had infiltrated Ferdinand and Isabella's close circle in attempts to influence the Spanish royal house: Ferdinand's finance minister Luis de Santángel and Isabella's treasurer Raphael Sánchez were Spanish Assassins, while the Spanish Templars' leading Master Templar Tomás de Torquemada was Isabella's personal confessor and had been close to her ever since her youth.

The following year, Ferdinand and his wife bore witness to an auto-da-fé of heretics in Seville, during which Torquemada ordered the Spanish Mentor Benedicto, Aguilar de Nerha, and María be burned at the stake. However, the latter two managed to escape their bonds and fight back, forcing Ferdinand and Isabella to quickly flee the scene.

Italian Wars

In 1503, Ferdinand hired Bartolomeo d'Alviano to help the Spanish Army defeat the French forces in the Kingdom of Naples. In 1504, Ferdinand and Isabella arranged with Pope Julius II to have Cesare Borgia locked up inside the Castillo de la Mota near Valencia.

Unbeknownst to the royal couple, the Assassins had secretly been poisoning the latter after Luis uncovered her ties to the House of Borgia. Due to Luis' death in 1498, a team of Italian Assassins sent from Rome completed his mission and enlisted the help of one of Isabella's servants to administer a lethal dose of poison, resulting in the queen's death in November 1504. The next year, Ferdinand took over the Kingdom of Naples, which became part of Spain.

In 1507, Ferdinand waged war with John III of Navarre to conquer the lands of Navarre. During the Siege of Viana, John III gave command over his forces to his brother-in-law Cesare Borgia, who had escaped from the Castillo de la Mota in the previous year. The Italian Assassins' Mentor Ezio Auditore da Firenze killed Cesare during the battle, greatly aiding Ferdinand's forces, although the Navarrese still won a pyrrhic victory.

Intending to curb the Venetian influence in northern Italy, Ferdinand joined fellow monarchs Louis XII of France and Holy Roman Emperor Maximillian I in the League of Cambrai created by Pope Julius II. The League was initially a success as an anti-Venetian alliance, but the friction between Julius and Louis caused it to collapse by 1510.

When Ezio Auditore went on his pilgrimage to Masyaf in 1511 seeking the Library of Altaïr Ibn-La'Ahad, Ferdinand allowed Ezio safe passage through the southern territories of Italy that he controlled to return the favor of killing Cesare Borgia.

That same year, the Templars planned to assassinate Ferdinand, believing that his death would divide the kingdoms of Aragon and Castile. The Assassins foiled the plot, and eradicated the leaders of the Templar network in Madrid to remove any future threat against the king.

Legacy

In 2012, the Assassin Clay Kaczmarek collected details on Ferdinand's life while Abstergo Industries held him captive at their Animus Project laboratory in Rome. He then hid the information within the Animus 1.28 in Glyph puzzles for his successor, Desmond Miles, to find. Sometime in early September, Desmond solved the puzzle set titled "Instruments of Power", in which Ferdinand was excluded from a list of historic individuals who wielded Staves of Eden. Later that year, Ferdinand was also included in a mnemonic set in Abstergo Industries' Project Legacy.

Behind the scenes

Ferdinand II is a historical figure first mentioned in the 2009 video game Assassin's Creed II: Discovery and pictured in the Glyph puzzles in Assassin's Creed II. After being mentioned in several other installments of the series, he made his first physical appearance in the 2016 film Assassin's Creed, portrayed by Thomas Camilleri.

Gallery

• 
  Ferdinand in Seville with his wife and Torquemada
• 
  Ferdinand in Grand Inquisition by Francisco Rizi
• 
  The Return of Christopher Columbus by Eugène Delacroix

Appearances

• Assassin's Creed II (first appearance) (painting only)
• Assassin's Creed II: Discovery (mentioned only)
• Assassin's Creed: Project Legacy (mentioned only)
• Assassin's Creed: Brotherhood (mentioned in Database entry only)
• Assassin's Creed: Brotherhood novel (mentioned only)
• Assassin's Creed: Revelations (mentioned only)
• Assassin's Creed: Revelations novel (mentioned only)
• Assassin's Creed: Recollection (indirect mention only)
• Assassin's Creed: Identity (mentioned in Database entry only)
• Assassin's Creed film (first appearance)
• Assassin's Creed: The Official Movie Novelization
• Assassin's Creed: Rebellion (mentioned only)