[68] Brantôme notices a sobriquet which his countrymen had given to Ferdinand. "Nos François appelloient ce roy Ferdinand Jehan Gipon, je ne sçay pour quelle dérision; mais il nous cousta bon, et nous fist bien du mal, et fust un grand roy et sage." Which his ancient editor thus explains: "Gipon de i'italien giubone, c'est que nous appellons jupon et jupe; voulant par là taxer ce prince de s'être laissé gouverner par Isabelle, reine de Castille, sa femme, dont il endossoit la jupe, pour ainsi dire, pendant qu'elle portoit les chausses." (Vies des Hommes Illustres, disc. 5.) There is more humor than truth in the etymology. The gipon was part of a man's attire, being, as Mr. Tyrwhitt defines it, "a short cassock," and was worn under the armor. Thus Chaucer, in the Prologue to his "Canterbury Tales," says of his knight's dress,
"Of fustian he wered a gipon
Alle besmotred with his habergeon."
Again, in his "Knighte's Tale,"
"Som wol ben armed in an habergeon,
And in a brest-plate, and in a gipon."
[69] When Ferdinand visited Aragon, in 1515, during his troubles with the cortes, he imprisoned the vice-chancellor, Antonio Augustin; being moved to this, according to Carbajal, by his jealousy of that minister's attentions to his young queen. (Anales, MS., año 1515.) It is possible. Zurita, however, treats it as mere scandal, referring the imprisonment to political offences exclusively. Anales, tom. vi. fol. 393.—See also Dormer, Anales de la Corona de Aragon, (Zaragoza, 1697,) lib. 1, cap. 9.
[70] "Era poco hermosa," says Sandoval, who grudges her even this quality, "algo coja, amiga mucho de holgarse, y andar en banquetes, huertos y jardines, y en fiestas. Introduxo esta Señora en Castilla comidas soberbias, siendo los Castellanos, y sun sus Reyes muy moderados en esto. Pasabansele pocos dias que no convidase, 6 fuese convidada. La que mas gastaba en fiestas y banquetes con ella, era mas su amiga." Hist. del Emp. Carlos V., tom. i. p. 12.
[71] Opere, tom. ix. Lettere Diverse, no. 6, ed. Milano, 1805. His correspondent, Vettori, is still more severe in his analysis of Ferdinand's public conduct. (Let. di 16 Maggio, 1514.) These statesmen were the friends of France, with whom Ferdinand was at war; and personal enemies of the Medici, whom that prince re-established in the government. As political antagonists therefore, every way, of the Catholic king, they were not likely to be altogether unbiassed in their judgments of his policy.—These views, however, find favor with Lord Herbert, who had evidently read, though he does not refer to, this correspondence. Life of Henry VIII., p. 63.
[72] Opere, tom. vi. II Principe, cap. 21, ed. Genova, 1798.
[73] Martyr, who had better opportunities than any other foreigner for estimating the character of Ferdinand, affords the most honorable testimony to his kingly qualities, in a letter written when the writer had no motive for flattery, after that monarch's death, to Charles V.'s physician. (Opus Epist., epist. 567.) Guicciardini, whose national prejudices did not lie in this scale, comprehends nearly as much in one brief sentence. "Re di eccellentissimo consiglio, e virtù, e nel quale, se fosse stato constante nelle promesse, no potresti facilmente riprendere cosa alcuna." (Istoria, tom. vi. lib. 12, p. 273.)
See also Brantôme, (Oeuvres, tom. iv. disc. 5.)—Giovio, with scarcely more qualification, Hist. sui Temporis, lib. 16, p. 336.—Navagiero, Viaggio, fol. 27,—et alios.