Alfonso II of Naples
Alfonso II (4 November 1448 – 18 December 1495) was Duke of Calabria and ruled as King of Naples from 25 January 1494 to 23 January 1495.[1] He was a soldier and a patron of Renaissance architecture and the arts.
Alfonso II
25 January 1494 – 23 January 1495
4 November 1448
Naples, Kingdom of Naples
18 December 1495 (aged 47)
Mazara del Vallo, Kingdom of Sicily
Heir to his father Ferdinand I's Kingdom of Naples, Alfonso held the dukedom of Calabria for most of his life.[1] In the 1480s Alfonso commanded the Neapolitan forces in Tuscany in 1478–79. He helped reverse the Ottoman invasion of Otranto in Apulia in 1480–81, and against the Republic of Venice in 1484.[1] In 1486 Alfonso's repressive conduct towards the Neapolitan nobility prompted a revolt; the violent excesses of suppressing this uprising further discredited Alfonso and King Ferdinand. Under Alfonso's patronage the city of Naples was remodelled with new churches, straightened roads, and an aqueduct supplying fountains.[1]
Alfonso became King of Naples in 1494 on his father's death. Within a year he was forced by the approaching army of Charles VIII of France to abdicate; he was succeeded by his son Ferdinand II of Naples.[1] Alfonso went into an Olivetan monastery at Mazara del Vallo, on Sicily, where he survived until 18 December 1495.[1]
Loves[edit]
According to the Successi tragici et amorosi by Silvio Ascanio Corona, a seventeenth-century collection of novels in which the secrets of the members of the Aragonese court of Naples are collected – or at least it seems – Alfonso had many mistresses, thus not differing from his father Ferrante.[14]
His first mistress was Isabella Stanza, bridesmaid of his mother Isabella of Chiaramonte; the relationship, however, did not last long. As soon as the mother – a very chaste and very religious woman – had a hint of the relationship, she married Isabella to Giovan Battista Rota, a nobleman very fond of the Aragonese faction, and thus to distance her from her son.[14]
After her, Alfonso had his best-known mistress, Trogia Gazzella, whom he led to court. Tired of Trogia, he fell in love with Francesca Caracciolo, called Ceccarella, who, faithful to her husband, did not correspond with him. Alfonso had her kidnapped and, for several days, abused her at will until the woman's father and husband urged King Ferrante to persuade his son to release her. Ceccarella then retired to the convent of San Sebastiano, where shortly after, she died of pain. Alfonso, outraged, then had her father, Muzio Caracciolo, slaughtered, while her husband Riccardo, fearing for his life, took the monastic habit.[14]
An other mistress was Maria d'Avellanedo, a Spanish noblewoman and bridesmaid of his stepmother Giovanna, then married to Alfonso Caracciolo, knight of the seat of Capuana, then a nobleman of the Montefuscolo family, then married to Galeotto Pagano of the seat of Porto, and Laura Crispano, whom he had by force and who he then married to his waiter Angelo Crivelli Milanese.[14]
Alfonso's wife was Ippolita Maria Sforza, whom he married on 10 October 1465 in Milan.[19] His mistress, by whom he also had children, was Trogia Gazzella.
He had three children with Ippolita:
And two with Trogia :
By Maria d'Avellanedo he had two sons, Francesco and Carlo, both of whom died at a young age.[14]
From Laura Crispano he had a little girl who died in swaddling clothes.[14]
In popular culture[edit]
Alfonso II of Naples is portrayed by Augustus Prew in the Showtime series The Borgias, although he is portrayed as much younger and flamboyant than his historical counterpart was in the 1490s. Sancia of Aragon is portrayed as his half-sister rather than his daughter. In the European series Borgia written by Tom Fontana, where he is played by Raimund Wallisch, his portrayal is more historically accurate in terms of his age and Sancia being his daughter. In Da Vinci's Demons he is played by Kieran Bew and is depicted as a sadistic warlord, bitterly jealous of Lorenzo the Magnificent.
William Shakespeare's play The Tempest features two fictional characters: "Alonso, King of Naples" and "Ferdinand, son to the King of Naples" who may have been named after Alfonso II and his son Ferdinand II.[21]