Alonso Pérez de Guzmán y de Zúñiga-Sotomayor, 7th Duke of Medina Sidonia, GE (10 September 155026 July 1615), was a Spanish aristocrat who was most noted for his role as commander of the Spanish Armada that was to attack the south of England in 1588. He was a great-great grandson of Ferdinand II of Aragon. Family Alonso's father was Juan Carlos Pérez de Guzmán, who died in 1556. This was two years before the death of his own father, Juan Alfonso Pérez de Guzmán, 6th Duke of Medina Sidonia, meaning that Juan Carlos failed to inherit the ducal title and died merely as the 9th Count of Niebla His paternal grandmother, who died in 1528, was Ana de Aragón y de Gurrea, an illegitimate daughter of Alonso de Aragón y Ruiz de Iborra, Archbishop of Zaragoza, himself an illegitimate son of king Ferdinand II of Aragón. In 1518 Ana de Aragón had married in succession two Dukes of Medina Sidonia. The first marriage was to Alfonso Pérez de Guzmán, 5th Duke of Medina Sidonia, who was to die childless in 1548. He was declared insane ("mentecato"), which invalidated the marriage and vacated the succession to the title. The bride was then married, in the same year, to the 5th Duke's brother, Juan Alfonso, the 6th Duke, born on 24 March 1502. He would survive his bride by three decades, dying at Sanlúcar de Barrameda, in the province of Cádiz, Spain, on 26 November, 1558. Alonso's mother was Leonor de Zúñiga y Sotomayor, a most powerful and wealthy woman, herself daughter of the powerful duchess Teresa de Zúñiga, 2nd marchioness of Ayamonte, 3rd duchess of Béjar, 4th countess of Bañares, 2nd marchioness of Gibraleón, so it was her name Zúñiga, the one to be passed to the family, as she was married to a "Sotomayor" of a family less endowed with nobility titles, county of Belalcázar, something by no means unique in the high Spanish aristocracy of the time. As Alonso's father, Juan Carlos, had already died in 1556, it was on the death of his grandfather in 1559, that Alonso, only some nine years of age at the time, inherited the ducal title along with one of the greatest fortunes in Europe. Betrothal and marriage The 7th duke was betrothed in 1569 to Ana de Silva y Mendoza, who was then four years of age, the daughter of the Prince