Ferdinand II (Italian: Ferdinando II, also known as Ferrante II and Ferrandino; 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 IV.
Ferdinando was born on 26 June 1467 in Castel Capuano, a residence that King Ferrante had given to his son Alfonso and his wife Ippolita Maria Sforza as a wedding gift. Ferdinando's 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. The prince was baptized on 5 July and was given the names Ferdinando, in honor of his grandfather, and Vincenzo, for his mother's devotion to Saint 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 [...]
The letters of his mother dating to this 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 Ferdinando 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, after the reconquest of Otranto, a new war front opened between Venice and Ferrara (Salt War, 1482–1484) and King Ferrante had to intervene in defense of his son-in-law Ercole I d'Este. Ferrante put his grandson Ferdinando 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. In the following years, Ferdinando 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.
Giovanni Sabadino degli Arienti tells of a certain incident that took place on an unspecified day, but since the writer places it a few months before the death of Ippolita Maria Sforza, it has been traced back to when the young prince was about twenty years old. It so happened that Ferrandino "for greatness and prowess of spirit, I asked for a stout horse, that fell on him, so that he was taken away believing that he was dead". The young prince remained in a coma for 13 days until his mother Ippolita, crying and devoutly invoking the help of the Virgin with endless prayers, obtained that "the lost, or perhaps lost spirits returned to the lifeless body of the son". Although the story is far-fetched, there is indeed news from ambassadors of a ruinous fall from his horse in the summer of 1486: initially the prince seemed to have done nothing, and in fact 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 due to illness in 1491, he remained the last hope of Naples and of his elderly grandfather King Ferrante, who died on 25 January 1494. Alfonso II ascended to the throne of Naples and did not hesitate to declare 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, from whom his uncle had usurped the Duchy of Milan.
Ludovico responded to the threat by permitting the French monarch Charles VIII to enter Italy in order to reconquer the Kingdom of Naples, which the latter believed had been usurped by the Aragonese to the Neapolitan Angevins.
Ferrandino, although very young, showed promise as supreme captain of the army of the Kingdom of Naples. In October 1494, for example, he was fighting in Romagna against the French as an ally of Caterina Sforza, Countess of Forlì. To cause the break between the two was the so-called Sack of Mordano, which took place between 20 and 21 October: around the city of Mordano the French had gathered between fourteen thousand and sixteen thousand soldiers to encircle and besiege it and at the same time to trap Ferrandino, who, having fewer men, was almost certain to be defeated.
Therefore, understanding the situation and on his generals' advice, he decided not to respond to the countess's requests for help. Caterina, very angry, passed on the side of the French, who had devastated her lands and torn her subjects, breaking the alliance with Ferrandino, having learned the news, under a diverted rain was forced to leave Faenza with his men and to get on the way to Cesena. Although they were now enemies and despite the Neapolitan army being short of food, not having been well-supplied by the countess even when they were allies, notes Leone Cobelli, a chronicler from Forlì, that Ferrandino always behaved honestly and that vice versa Countess Caterina sent his men to rob him, albeit unsuccessfully:
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.
Sources describe him as 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 French captain, 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.
An attempt to stop the French fleet carrying the heavy artillery at Rapallo resulted in disaster. After leaving Romagna, Ferrandino went to Rome to exhort Pope Alexander VI "to be constant and firm, and not to abandon the king his father". But the Pope, reluctantly, finally yielded to the French, though, embracing the young Ferrandino weepingly, offered him safe conduct with which he could cross undisturbed the entire Papal States so as to return to Naples. By nature proud and heedless of the danger, Ferrandino indignantly refused the escort and on the last day of the year he left Rome by the door of San Sebastiano just as King Charles VIII entered from that of Santa Maria del Popolo with the French army.