[January 20] Juan II, king of Aragón

Parents: Ferdinand I, king of Aragón, and Eleanor of Alburquerque

Date of Birth: 29 June 1398

Royal House: Trastámara

Spouse: Blanche I, queen of Navarre, then Juana Enríquez

Reign: 1458 – 1479

Predecessor: Alfonso V

Summary: John II began ruling Aragón at an early age. During his youth, he ruled in the name of his brother, Alfonso, who was generally in Italy ruling over Sicily. In 1425, he also came into possession through marriage of the small kingdom of Navarre in the Pyrenees. Throughout his life, he would reign over this small kingdom despite the superior claims of his children over his own claim. From 1441 until his own death in 1479, John deprived the right to rule Navarre first of his son, the titular Charles IV, and then Blanche II, until Queen Eleanor finally outlived her father. This conflict between father and children was not helped by John's second wife, Juana, who sowed seeds of conflict between John and the children of his first marriage. It is thought that Juana herself may have been responsible for the death of Charles IV.

As king of Aragón, John also ruled the Catalan counties of northern Spain, the kingdoms of Sicily, Valencia, Majorca, and Sardinia, and the county of Roussillon in France. Conflicts over Roussillon, technically a French county, caused John to finally cede it to Louis XI in 1472. This did not pacify him, however, and he fought a long war with France over the Catalan counties until his death in 1479. Prior to his death, John had arranged the marriage between his only surviving son, Ferdinand II, and the heiress of Castile, Isabella. Isabella became queen in 1474 and Ferdinand succeeded his father in 1479, thereby uniting for the first time in history the kingdoms of Aragón and Castile (and their many appendages), setting the groundwork for the creation of the kingdom of Spain. John's daughter Eleanor ruled Navarre for all of two weeks before dying. The Navarrese crown then passed to John's great-grandson Francis Phoebus, count of Foix.

Date of Death: 20 January 1479

Successor: Ferdinand II

Other Monarchs Who Died Today:

• Fabian, pope of Rome (250)
• Frederick VI, duke of Swabia (1191)
• Rudolf II, Holy Roman Emperor (1612)
• Charles IV, king of Spain (1819)
• Minh Mang, emperor of Vietnam (1841)
• Christian VIII, king of Denmark (1848)
• Kalakaua, king of Hawai'i (1891)
• George V, king of the United Kingdom (1936)