| Engelbert | |
|---|---|
| |
| Portrait of Eberhard II, 1544 | |
| Patriarch of the Lenzburgs | |
| Reign | 1506-1539 |
| Predecessor | Engelbert I |
| Successor | Ulrich VIII |
| Born | 13 January 1490 Novara, Republic of Novara |
| Died | 5 August 1539 Benevento, Papal States |
| House | House of Lenzburg |
| Father | Burkhard von Lenzburg |
| Mother | Katharina Zwingli |
| Religion | Roman Catholicism |
Eberhard II (13 January 1490 - 5 August 1539) was a patriarch of the House of Lenzburg and claimed "Duke in Exile" from 1506 until his death. He succeeded his grandfather Engelbert I, former Count of Württemberg and first non-ruling Duke, who succeeded his father Eberhard I, the first exiled Duke of Lenzburg and Eberhard II's namesake.
Eberhard was the son of Burkhard von Lenzburg, the future Engelbert I's second oldest son. Burkhard's brother Ulrich had already been married to a Saxon noblewoman named Maria de la Marck, and Burkhard similarly was expected to marry a prominent German noblewoman. However, following the Lenzburg-Premyslid War, the Lenzburgs were ousted from the Swiss Confederacy and fled into exile. After being wounded during the escape, Burkhard hastily married his mistress Katharina Zwingli without the approval of his grandfather, fearing that he would not live much longer. Weeks later Burkhard and his siblings were assassinated as part of a plot orchestrated by trusted family body guard Dolphus Thurn. Katharina escaped this tragedy, and it soon became apparent she was with child. She managed to escape into the wilderness along with four other women, becoming lost from the rest of the main Lenzburg contingent. Nevertheless she navigated the treacherous Alpine crossing into the city of Novarra, although three of her friends had died en route. January she gave birth to Eberhard in the city while in disguise.
The young Eberhard would not be reunited with the rest of his family until years later, initially being raised alone by the paranoid Katharina Zwingli. The family traveled around northern Italy, fearful of assassins, and carrying a series of secret Lenzburg artifacts to prove Eberhard's lineage. In 1500 the ailing Katharina died, but not before entrusting a family friend to travel with Eberhard to Urbino, where it was discovered the young boy's grandfather Engelbert was residing. Eberhard was welcomed in Urbino and raised like a son to Engelbert, who lost his own sons a decade prior. When it became clear that the fate of the main Lenzburg line rested in Eberhard, Engelbert declared him his heir and popularized the story of the fateful marriage in the Alps to promote Eberhard's legitimacy, although claims of his illegitimacy plagued Eberhard all his life. In 1506 Engelbert died, and the 16 year old Eberhard declared himself Duke in Exile.
Acquiring a modest inheritance from Engelbert, Eberhard II invested wisely and rose through the ranks of the Papal States as a cunning diplomat, statesman, and soldier. He married a distant branch of the powerful Farnese family, greatly improving the rank of his family, and he fathered numerous children. Eberhard gained a reputation as a womanizer and a drunk among Papal leadership, and he is known to have fathered over a dozen suspected illegitimate children. His most famous portrait would come from Leonardo de' Benci, which portrays Eberhard lusting after a young woman. In 1528 a man caught him having sex in the second story of the Santi Quattro Coronati basilica in Rome, and Eberhard jumped from the tower breaking his leg, requiring him to walk with a limp for the rest of his life.
Eberhard is known to have allied with a number of exiled Jews from Spain after their expulsion, although these matches were often disproportionally to Eberhard's favor. In 1533, after the expulsion of Jews from Naples, Eberhard supported wealthy Jewish merchant Samuel Usque and took guardianship over his estates. Eberhard then had Usque reported to Papal authorities and the inquisition, allowing Eberhard to claim these properties as his own. In 1535 Eberhard married a Jewish heiress similarly hoping to inherit a small fortune, although this partially backfired as Eberhard became slandered by his opponents for supposed closeness to a Jewish woman. He died in 1539 of disease, possibly syphilis, at the age of 49 and was succeeded by his son Ulrich VIII.
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