Alfonso V "the Magnanimous",
King of Aragon 1416-1458 and Naples, (1394-1458)
Born circa 1394
Died 27 June 1458
Married 12 June 1415 Valencia
Maria of Castile, daughter of Enrique III 'the Infirm',
King of Castile and Leon 1390-1406 and Catherine of
Lancaster
Born 14 November 1401 Segovia
Died 4 September 1458 Valencia
Child by (a) Margarita de Hijar, daughter of Juan Fernandez
de Hijar, 1.Duque de Hijar, 1.Duque de Aliaga and Catalina
de Beaumont
Children by (b) Giraldona Carlino
King of Aragon from 1416 after he had defeated Louis III of Naples,
Queen Joanna II of Naples adopted him in 1421. They quarrelled and, after
her death in 1435, Alfonso had to contest the throne of
Naples with a rival claimant, Rene of Anjou. In 1442 he defeated Rene
and remained in Naples for the rest of his life.
He earned his epithet of 'the Magnanimous' by refusing to be told even
the names of those involved in an abortive plot against him at the time
of his accession, so that they went unpunished. He was more interested
in his Italian realms of Naples and Sicily than in Aragon, where he left
his Queen, Maria of Castile, as Regent. She proved herself an able administrator,
but became estranged from the King after a fit of jealousy. Being childless
herself led her to cause his pregnant mistress, one of her own ladies-in-waiting,
to be strangled. Alfonso never forgave her or saw her again for the remaining
twenty-six years of their marriage, though strangely they died within a
few months of each other in 1458.
A leading figure of the early Renaissance, he favoured men of letters.
Also his devotion to the classics was such that a reading from Quintus
Curtius is said to have cured him of a severe illness.
Source: Leo van de Pas |
