Ferdinand's older brother earned for himself the sobriquet 'the Pius' for his melancholy demeanor, his ardent attachment to prayer and meditation, and, more obviously, for his eschewal of hunting, dancing, and other frivolities that dominated social life in a 16th-century court. Albert had supported whole-heartedly the Catholic Counter-Reformation Jesuits were entrenched at the Jesuit College of Ingolstadt, and had raised his children accordingly. Sending a teen-aged boy into the hot-house of Medici intrigue might have seemed questionable to the sober-minded Wittelsbachs. The groom's mistress, whom he married after the death of his wife in 1579, was already well-established in 1565: this was a political marriage, and an extravagant one, and cost Duke Cosimo, father of the groom, over 60,000 ducats, a phenomenal sum. Johanna's marriage to the Medici was a politically expedient one: she was expected to produce heirs. In 1565, the 15-year-old Ferdinand made a widely publicized journey to Florence, to attend the wedding of his maternal aunt, Johanna of Austria, to Francesco I de' Medici, and to visit with other maternal aunts in the city. Ferdinand is also known for the two extraordinary diaries he kept, one as fifteen-year-old boy on a journey from Munich to Florence, for his aunt's wedding, and a second journey to Florence, this time as young and experienced man of affairs.

He was the second surviving son of Albert V, Duke of Bavaria, and his wife Archduchess Anna of Austria, and consequently was prepared for a military career.

Medal of the brothers Ernst, Wilhelm and Ferdinand of Wittelsbachįerdinand of Bavaria was born 20 January 1550, in Landshut, in the Duchy of Bavaria, and died 30 January 1608 in Munich, at the age of 58.

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