Ferdinand The Saint Prince - Siege of Tangier

Siege of Tangier

Dissatisfied with his meager domains, in 1436, Ferdinand asked his brother King Edward for permission to go abroad to seek his fortune in the service of a foreign king (reportedly, England). Ferdinand's request prompted the reluctant Edward to endorse the plan, long promoted by another brother Henry the Navigator, to launch a new Portuguese campaign of conquest against Marinid Morocco. Being still a bachelor, before departing, Ferdinand wrote out his will appointing Edward's second son Ferdinand (future Duke of Viseu) as his heir.

In August 1437, the Portuguese expeditionary force, under the leadership of Henry the Navigator, set out to seize Tangier. Ferdinand brought along his household and Aviz knights with him, choosing as his personal banner an emblazoned image of the Archangel St. Michael. The Tangier campaign proved a disastrous fiasco. Henry impetuously launched a series of assaults on the walls of Tangier with no success, while allowing his siege camp to be encircled by a Moroccan army rushed north by the Wattasid strongman Abu Zakariya Yahya al-Wattasi, governor of the Marinid palace of Fez (called Lazeraque by the Portuguese chroniclers). The besiegers now besieged, unable to break out, the Portuguese expeditionary force was starved into submission.

To preserve his army from destruction, Henry the Navigator signed a treaty in October 1437 with the Moroccan commanders, agreeing to restore Ceuta (which had been captured by the Portuguese back in 1415), in return for being allowed to withdraw his army intact (albeit leaving their weapons behind). By the terms of the treaty, Henry handed his younger brother Ferdinand over to the Moroccans as a hostage for the delivery of Ceuta. It was later reported that Henry personally volunteered to go as hostage instead of Ferdinand, but that his war council forbade it.