Joachim II was born in
Cölln and received his education at the imperial court. His father, Joachim I Nestor, made Joachim Hector sign an inheritance contract in which he promised to remain
Roman Catholic. This was intended in part to assist Joachim Nestor's younger brother, the Archbishop-Elector
Albert of Mainz. Albert had borrowed huge amounts from the banking house of
Fugger in order to pay the
Holy See for his elevation to the
Prince-Bishopric of Halberstadt and for a
dispensation permitting him to hold both the
Archbishopric of Magdeburg and
Archbishopric of Mainz. This provided the Hohenzollerns with control over two of the seven electoral votes in imperial elections and many suffragan dioceses to levy dues. Joachim Nestor, who had co-financed this accumulation of offices, agreed to let Albert recover these costs by the sale of
indulgences to his subjects. Joachim's neighbor,
John Frederick I, Elector of Saxony, forbade the sale of indulgences, because Albert had outbid his candidate for the see of Mainz, but also on principle, being persuaded by his subject
Martin Luther. Thus repayment of the debt to the Fugger depended on the sale of indulgences to Catholic believers in Brandenburg. However, had Joachim Hector not agreed to this, he would likely have been passed over in the line of inheritance. His first marriage was to
Magdalena of Saxony from the ducal
Albertine line of the
House of Wettin. She died in 1534. In 1535 he married
Hedwig, daughter of King
Sigismund I the Old of Poland. As the
Jagiellon dynasty was Catholic, Joachim II promised Sigismund that he would not make Hedwig change her religious affiliation. under both kinds, the Bread and the Cup, in St. Nicholas' Church in
Spandau. With the deaths of his father Joachim Nestor (1535) and father-in-law Sigismund (1548), Joachim turned gradually to the
Protestant Reformation. On 1 November 1539, he received
Communion under both kinds in
Spandau's St. Nicholas' Church, an act that indicated a degree of sympathy with the new religious ideas. However, Joachim did not explicitly adopt
Lutheranism until 1555, to avoid open confrontation with his ally, Emperor
Charles V. Prior to this, Joachim promulgated a conservative
church order that was Lutheran in doctrine, but retained many traditional religious institutions and observances, such as the
episcopate, much of the
Mass in Latin,
religious plays and
feast days. In early 1539, at the
diet of princes of
imperial immediacy (
Fürstentag) of the
Holy Roman Empire in
Frankfurt, Lutheran spokesman
Philipp Melanchthon revealed to the gathered princes (among them Joachim) that the anti-Jewish
pogroms of 1510 in Brandenburg had been based on a feigned
host desecration. This pogrom had resulted in the expulsion of the
Jews from Brandenburg. The Jewish advocate
Josel von Rosheim, who was also in attendance, pleaded privately with Joachim to allow the Jews to settle in the Brandenburg again. Joachim acceded to this request on 25 June 1539. Joachim not only loved hunting in person, he also spent great sums on live lions, bears, wolves, and other beasts which he made to fight each other. He also maintained no fewer than eleven
alchemists at his court over a mere ten-year period. Because of these and other extravagances, although Joachim I had left the country's finances in satisfactory order, by 1540 Joachim II was over 600,000 thalers in debt, which he attempted to pay off by confiscating church property and raising taxes. His wife Hedwig's mother
Barbara Zápolya was a sister of
John Zápolya, who had claimed the vacant throne of
Hungary after King
Louis II was killed in battle against the
Ottoman Empire in 1526. However, Joachim supported
Ferdinand of Habsburg, who also claimed the crown and challenged the Turkish invaders. In 1542 Joachim assisted Ferdinand against the Ottomans at the
Siege of Buda (1541). He commanded an army of Austrian, Hungarian, German, Bohemian, Italian, and Dalmatian troops, but the Elector was not a seasoned warrior and eventually beat a retreat. He was defeated again by the Ottomans in the
Siege of Pest in 1542. As a part of the alliance, in 1545 Joachim held a gala double wedding celebration for his two children,
John George and
Barbara. They were married to
Sophie of Legnica and
George, both children of the
Piast Duke
Frederick II of Legnica in
Silesia. Joachim was a brother-in-law of King
Sigismund II Augustus of Poland. In 1569, he paid Sigismund for a deed of
enfeoffment which made Joachim and his issue heirs to
Ducal Prussia in case of the extinction of the Prussian Hohenzollern line. In 1571, Joachim died in the
Köpenick Palace, which he had built in 1558. == Marriages and children ==