Perez Antonio

Perez, Antonio (1539-1611), Spanish statesman, was the son of a secretary of state to Philippe II., and on the death of his father replaced him as minister. His intrigue, ambition, and his frequent indiscretions, however, effected his disgrace, and the discovery of his amour with a mistress of Philippe's led to his imprisonment, banishment, and torture by the Inquisition. He escaped into Aragon, thence to Beam, and afterwards to England, where he arrived in 1593. Philippe, who tried more than once to get him assassinated, was rendered even more furious by the account published by Perez in London (1594) of his relations with him. Perez went to France soon after, and died in poverty at Paris in 1611.