Don Fernando
Cardinal-Infante Ferdinand (circa 1610 - 1641) son of King of Spain, Philip III and Margaret of Austria (who was the sister of Emperor Ferdinand II). His aunt Isabella Clara Eugenia planned to make him her successor as governor of the Spanish Netherlands. He won a decisive victory at the Battle of Nördlingen (1634). Based in Brussels, he successfully captured a number of cities. However, in 1637 he lost Breda, followed by losses to the French. Spanish court rumours claimed that Ferdinand planned to become an independent ruler of the Spanish Netherlands with aid from Spain's enemy, France.
- In the 1632 series: Don Fernando successfully re-conquered most of the Low Countries aided by the League of Ostend in 1633. He besieges Amsterdam — advised by his aunt, the Infanta Isabella Clara Eugenia of Spain, and diplomat/painter Rubens. He came into contact with the USE and, after encouraged by Ambassadoress Rebecca Abrabanel Stearns and his aunt (willed her claim to her nephew), contemplated cutting a deal with the Prince of Orange to become a monarch and found a dynasty in the combined Low Countries. At the end of 1634: The Bavarian Crisis, he declared himself "king in the Netherlands". He marries his Austrian Habsburg cousin, the Archduchess Maria Anna.
Read more about this topic: List Of 1632 Characters
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“If music in general is an imitation of history, opera in particular is an imitation of human willfulness; it is rooted in the fact that we not only have feelings but insist upon having them at whatever cost to ourselves.... The quality common to all the great operatic roles, e.g., Don Giovanni, Norma, Lucia, Tristan, Isolde, Brünnhilde, is that each of them is a passionate and willful state of being. In real life they would all be bores, even Don Giovanni.”
—W.H. (Wystan Hugh)