Things are progressing smoothly on this next chapter! I was going to write it all together, but I felt like this section met a natural end: so I've decided to publish it and maybe finish it off in the next part. Enjoy!
Chapter 44. The Fürstenkrieg — The Italian War of 1555-1562; Part 1.
1551-1556; Germany & France.
“Should not in this best garden of the world,
Our fertile France, put up her lovely visage?
Alas, she hath from France too long been chased,
And all her husbandry doth lie on heaps,
Corrupting in its own fertility.”
— Burgundy in “Agincourt” by Pat Purton[1]
Musical Accompaniment: Je suis Déshéritée
Landscape of the Fall of Icarus, Pieter Bruegel the Elder; c. 1558.
The
Fürstenkrieg exploded in 1555 and was a heavy conflict with several other names. In France, the conflict is commonly lumped into the perennial disputes between the houses of Habsburg and Valois. Because of its Italian component, it is occasionally known as the Italian War of 1555-1559.
“The seeds of the Italian War of 1555—the final Italian War between the Habsburg and Valois were lain with the death of King François I of France,” one eighteenth-century historian wrote in their treatise on the conflict.
“François I was succeeded by his eldest son, François II. François II’s concerns lay not in Italy but across the border in Burgundy. As his father had succeeded in taming Italy, François saw it as his mission to expand France’s territories along its environs. His life’s obsession was the fiefs of Artois and Franche-Comté, which had been promised to him as a dowry when he wed his wife, the Burgundian princess Isabelle of Austria…” Though François II succeeded as his father when royal finances were burdened, he did all he could to right the ship, knowing that France would need all the resources he could muster when the time came. The early years of François II’s reign were known somewhat for their innovation—he introduced financial reforms to the
Maison du Roi. He established the
Cour des Monnaies as a sovereign court to prosecute currency-related crimes, such as coin-clipping and counterfeiting, which became punishable by death. At the same time, François championed the establishment of new mints in Nantes (1550), Toulouse (1552) and Marseille (1555).
Though the Treaty of Compiègne had settled the conflict between the King of France and the Holy Roman Emperor, it could only hold so long as both sovereigns were willing to hold it together. By the mid-1550s, cracks had already begun to appear in the edifice; Charles V was in failing health, while François II had set his gaze upon those Burgundian provinces that had been denied to him for nearly two decades.
“Privately, it consumed the king’s focus,” Henri de Secondat, the king’s secretary, wrote in his journals.
“He looked upon the conquests of the late king, his father, with ‘dismay’… in his mind, what glory or worth might be wrought from Milan and Naples? They now lay in the hand of other princes—French princes… but others, nevertheless.” Other issues, such as the Council of Lucerne, loomed large. François II had agreed to send a token delegation to attend the council, headed by François of Bourbon—son of the Constable of Bourbon and known as the Cardinal-Duke of Bourbon. The Cardinal-Duke, the founder of the
Isèrian Order, took a dim view of reconciliation with the Lutherans and used his authority among the French prelates and other conservatives to frustrate the proceedings.
“The Cardinal de Bourbon is a rascal,” one prelate wrote in a letter to an associate.
“He need only speak, and his voice fills the entire room with steam.” When the French finally departed from Lucerne in 1555, it was met with a mixture of relief and dismay—relief that work might truly begin—followed by dismay when the Protestants left. This was soon followed by François II’s declaration of war against Maximilian, who declared himself a patron of the Protestant German princes.
France’s alliance with the German Protestants did not come out of thin air; work towards an alliance began as secretly as 1551—when Anna of Cleves, the Dowager Electress of the Palatinate and regent for her young son Friedrich III, made overtures to the French court. In this, Anna used her brother, the Duke of Cleves, as a proxy, whose wife Victoire was a younger sister of the French king. In the meantime, the Electress used her position to mobilize support among Protestant princes throughout northern and central Germany, opposed the political reforms championed by Charles V at the Diet of Augsburg in 1548, as well as his interim religious plans pending the Lutheran reunification with the Catholic faith. A fresh German alliance was ratified through the
Treaty of Gotha in 1551—signatories included the Electoral Palatinate, the Duchy of Cleves-Jülich-Berg, the Duchy of Prussia, Pomerania, and Brandenburg-Ansbach. Philipp-Ludwig, son of Philipp of Hesse, also expressed interest, alongside Sybille of Cleves—wife of Johann Friedrich, the deposed Elector of Saxony. The alliance forged at Gotha proclaimed their intent to defend the Protestant faith and
Teutonic Liberty—the freedom of the imperial princes to govern as they saw fit without unnecessary imperial oversight. This new alliance, the
League of Gotha, was also colloquially known as the
Fürstenbund.
“Almost immediately, the members of the Fürstenbund set their sights upon securing the release of both Philip of Hesse and Johann Friedrich of Saxony,” one historian wrote.
“The Electress Anna of Cleves played a prominent role in the deliberations of the bund through her familial connections… she became its head in name and action.” 1551 also marked the beginning of the rise of influence of the House of Cleves within France, with the Clèves-Nevers branch that held the Duchy of Nevers being singled out for special royal favor. In 1551, François II not only recognized François, the Duke of Nevers, as a
Prince Étranger, but the king also played a vital role in arranging his marriage to Princess Françoise-Fébé of Navarre—heiress to the Kingdom of Navarre.
François, Duke of Nevers & François Fébé, Princesse de Navarre; AI Generated.
With the support of the league’s princes, Anna dispatched Franz von Spaen, the Baron of Spaen, to France as their envoy in the summer of 1553.
“By the time of von Spaen’s arrival in France,” one French courtier would write.
“The king was ill-disposed towards the emperor and the Council of Lucerne. Though no friend to the Protestants within his own domains, he saw the possibility that the German Lutherans might be of more political use to him.” François II eagerly took the baron into his confidence, believing that the new league, with proper support, could aid him in his attack upon Burgundy. François II and von Spaen formally signed the
Treaty of Saint-Germain in September 1553. François II promised financial aid—some £11,000 per month—alongside providing provisions for the Protestant armies when the time came. In exchange, the German princes promised not only to support French claims in both Artois and Franche-Comté but to agree that the King of France should assume the vicariate of certain cities along the Franco-Imperial border, namely Cambrai, Toul, Metz, and Verdun. In effect, the princes opened the door for France to annex these territories through legal fiction—a fiction that François II was pleased to sign. Plans would be put into place throughout the remainder of 1553 and 1554.
“It is my intention that we should strike when we shall have the most benefit,” François II stated in a meeting before the
Conseil Privé.
“I shall have what is rightfully mine, and none shall be able to deny it.”
When Charles V passed away in June 1555, the die was cast. By that autumn, François II demanded that Maximilian turn over Artois or Franche-Comté—or risk the potential loss of Flanders.
“Maximilian spat upon his brother-in-law’s offer,” one member of the Burgundian court wrote in their memoirs.
“When he sent away the French envoy who brought the insulting offer, he boldly declared before all who would listen: ‘As there is no honor among thieves, I must suppose that there is no honor among brothers, either.’ He refused to be cowed by France’s empty threats and prepared what must be done.” By September, French troops under the command of Anne de Montmorency flooded across the border.
“We marched into Flanders under the command of the Baron of Montmorency,” one French officer wrote in his diaries.
“With 30,000 men and two hundred cannons—seeking gloire as our fathers did in Italy…” Cambrai fell after a token siege, followed soon after by Arras. By mid-October, Montmorency’s troops had occupied the whole of Artois. They proceeded into Flanders and Hainault, where Lille was under siege alongside Nieuport—while French troops also closed the distance towards Namur, where Philip of Hesse and Johann Friedrich of Saxony had been held since 1547. For his quick victories, François II awarded Montmorency with a dukedom. France’s quick offensive into Artois and Flanders allowed the French to establish control over the territories surrounding the English Pale of Calais—with the years of 1555-1559 being known as the
lean years within the pale due to a collapse of trade across the border.
As Montmorency pressed into Flanders, the Count of Vaudémont led some 25,000 French troops into an offensive along the Rhine River. A detachment of 10,000 men was used to occupy Franche-Comté—engagements around Dôle and Besançon served as a baptism of fire for Nicholas and Antoine of Lorraine—younger brothers of Duke François of Lorraine[2]. The remaining 15,000 troops were used to ravage the territories around Verdun, Toul, and Metz. By November, Vaudémont was joined by 12,000 German
Landsknechts under the command of the Count Palatine of Neuberg, Otto Heinrich, where they ravaged the territories around Trier and Mainz before setting up their winter encampment near Worms. The Archbishops of Mainz and Trier were spooked by the French troops in proximity, and a tense winter unfolded throughout 1555, with iconoclastic riots breaking out in the southern Rhineland.
“I have received Your Majesty’s advice, and I intended to follow it,” the Archbishop of Trier wrote in a letter to Maximilian II.
“But the only route out of the city exposes my retinue to considerable danger. I have decided instead to take up residence at the castle of Helferstein across the river… There, we are safe and can withstand a siege if needed. I have instructed the treasury to bury this season’s revenues—some 10,000 thalers—in the graveyard near the cathedral…”
Sack of a town; Early 17th Century.
As the French surged along the Rhine, other members of the princely league used their position to move against imperial positions in southern Germany. Heinrich, the Duke of Württemberg, long confined to the enclave at Montbéliard, succeeded in reestablishing his position in his ancestral duchy. The Estates of Württemberg, convoked on Christmas Day at Böblingen, recognized Heinrich as Duke of Württemberg in exchange for his promise to abide by the Treaty of Tübingen that had granted the estates a vital role in the governance of the duchy. Heinrich’s restoration also saw Württemberg’s formal adoption of Calvinism—the first state within the empire to do so, as Heinrich had maintained a close relationship with Jean Calvin in his exile.
“I ask for your support in organizing our church code,” Duke Heinrich wrote in a letter to Calvin from 1556.
“You are the one who shall guide us,” Calvin responded by sending clergy to Württemberg, who could help organize the church within the duchy along similar lines in Geneva. Laws passed in 1556 abolished the episcopate within the duchy and confiscated monastic properties.
Maximilian was faced with a problematic situation as 1556 opened as French troops had pressed into his ancestral domains in Burgundy and along the Rhine, combined with rebel princes attacking imperial cities and allied territories throughout southern Germany. He leaned upon the Catholic Imperial Estates for support, with the electors (sans the Palatinate, in revolt against the emperor) agreeing to support the declaration of a
Reichskrieg against France and the League of Gotha. This allowed Maximilian to call up a muster of the
Reichsarmee, the empire’s circle troops, to augment his imperial forces—though this would take time. Maximilian could not necessarily look abroad for allies in foreign affairs: his uncle in Spain, now
Fernando VI, expressed little interest in getting involved in another protracted conflict with France.
“King Fernando VI, now secure upon his throne in Spain, saw little interest in getting involved in another war against France,” one historian wrote.
“Of what benefit might such a conflict be? Perhaps Fernando still nourished hopes of regaining Naples but given previous failures in that direction… it could be little surprise that he chose to declare neutrality instead.” Likewise, Queen Mary of England felt constrained by France. The rapid French advance into the area surrounding the Pale had spooked the English Queen—combined with her tenuous hold on Boulogne, she thought it prudent to remain aloof from continental affairs. This was readily exploited by François II through the
Treaty of Paris in late 1555—through which François arranged the betrothal of his eldest son, the Dauphin, to Queen Mary’s daughter, Isabella. It was agreed that Isabella would bring Boulogne to France as her dowry, a privilege François II was prepared to pay the English queen £150,000 for. The treaty represented a volte-face in France: François, the Dauphin, had been engaged to Anne of Scotland in 1548. That match was broken when Scotland pursued an English match instead. A French match had been revived in 1553 for the eldest Scottish princess following the death of the Prince of Wales, but the birth of a long-awaited son in 1554 rendered the match less beneficial for the French—with François quipping to his advisors:
“An English match serves us in ways that a Scottish one cannot—what use is the Scottish princess when she is not heiress to the crown?” Queen Charlotte of Scotland, reportedly infuriated at her brother’s duplicity, never forgave him.
Isabella of England & Anne of Scotland, c. 1555; AI Generated.
In Italy, the news of the French invasion into the Low Countries and the empire was greeted favorably in some quarters. The French
Armée d’Italie, once a potent force in maintaining French domination over the Italian peninsula, had been systematically weakened throughout the 1550s by François II: by 1555, they numbered 11,000 men based in Alessandria, with the most veteran soldiers shifted into the French armies used in the invasion of Germany and the Low Countries.
“Morale is pitiful,” one French officer in Italy complained in a letter to the king’s
Counseil des Affaires.
“The men drink, whore, and gamble… many refuse to attend drills, and the ability to replace recruits has plummeted… the duke has now limited our recruitment within the duchy to the regions around Alessandria, proclaiming that men are needed for the esercito ducale most urgently. When our recruiters do trek outside of Alessandria, they are met with gloomy stares, if not outright hostility—two recruiters were murdered last year, and the duke continues to push the issue off…” Duke Filippo II Emanuele had many reasons to be cagey—with the support of his mother and stepfather, he sought to break away from French influence. In 1554, he had entered secret negotiations with Charles V to arrange an offensive alliance aimed at throwing the French out of Italy forever. Though the emperor was gone, his son and successor saw the potential in such an idea with the French surging across his borers—what was needed was a distraction.
That distraction would be the
League of Italy, ratified at
Lodi in January 1556—twenty-one years since Charles V’s defeat at the Battle of Lodi. Signatories included Maximilian II, the Duke of Milan, the Dukes of Ferrara and Florence, and the Marquis of Mantua. Pope Adrian VI, though dismayed at the outbreak of warfare, which served to shutter the Council of Lucerne, lent his support to the idea of the league.
“Though I despair of the clarion call of war,” Adrian VI wrote in a letter to Cardinal Morone.
“I know it is perhaps our only chance to be free—fully free—from the French.” Though all the princes would benefit from the end of French influence in Italy, the Duke of Milan sought to ensure that his position afterward would be the most important. Aside from the Treaty of Lodi, Filippo II Emanuele secretly signed the
Treaty of Cremona with Maximilian II—in it, Maximilian agreed to name the Duke of Milan as Imperial Vicar of Italy and to support Milanese territorial claims in northern Italy. This second point proved an important facet; Filippo Emanuele not only sought to lay claim to Parma and Piacenza but to revive Milanese claims to territories in Lombardy that had been lost over a century before, primarily Bergamo and Brescia, now controlled by the Venetian Republic.
“It is a small promise to make,” Maximilian wrote in his private journals.
“If it means defeating the French.”
Before the ink was dry upon the parchment signed at Lodi, Filippo Emanuele had brought together some 18,000 men into the ducal army—with 5,000 of them being Swiss mercenaries. 8,000 of these troops were employed in the
Farce of Alessandria—where Hieronimo Castiglione succeeded in overrunning the encampments of the
Armée d’Italie and placing the city under siege. Some 4000 French troops were captured in the farce, with the remainder trapped within Alessandria and immobilized from offering any resistance. The remainder of Milan’s army was led personally by Filippo Emanuele in an invasion of the Duchy of Parma. Piacenza fell after only a token siege—opening the road to Parma.
“Piacenza chose to open its gates rather than resist… I do not yet know what we shall do,” the Duchess of Plaisance wrote in an impassioned letter to her brother, the Duke of Valentinois.
“Ottavio says that to leave would be only to admit his own cowardice. Despite my remonstrances, he is adamant: ‘The sons of France fight. They do not flee.’ He is right, but I cannot bear it… the commander of the French garrison here, the Seigneur of Saint-Fargeau, is useless… he states that without direct orders from the king himself, he could not dare raise arms against the Duke of Milan…” Duke Ottavio of Parma ultimately ordered the French garrison to quit Parma, charging them with escorting his mother to Lucca, which had agreed to shelter the duchess. The Duchess of Plaisance’s cortege was overtaken by Modenese soldiers when she attempted to slip through the Duchy of Modena near Massa.
The Rape of the Sabine Women, Christoph Schwarz; c. 1573.
“A most glorious day,” Beatriz—the Queen Dowager of France and Duchess of Ferrara—announced proudly when the news was brought to her.
“The extravagance of Anne’s baggage train captured at Massa bewildered popular imagination—and still provokes thoughts today,” a chapter of
Anne & Beatriz: Rogues of Italy explained.
“She had left Parma with no less than five carriages: only one carriage held her small retinue, and the remainder was filled with traveling chests and trunks. Commentators of the period used it to attack her for her excesses—the Parmese saw her as the French whore who continued to live lavishly. While some portions of the duchess’s escape are certainly absurd—one chest alone was dedicated to her chemises, another to her famed silk gloves—she had contrived to escape with as much as possible in hopes of aiding her son. Indeed, Modenese troops discovered some £10,000 buried throughout Anne’s chests in Italian coinage, believed to be part of the Parmese treasury. Bills of exchange worth another £6000 were discovered, while the duchess’s jewelry and plate that she had carried with her were worth perhaps another £4000. Anne’s baggage and goods were seized by the Modenese troops, and she was placed under arrest. Beatriz ordered her closely confined at Canossa, near Reggio…” By April 1556, Ottavio of Parma surrendered after a short siege—leaving Parma and Piacenza firmly in Milanese hands.
The Italian League did not please all within Italy—both the Marquis of Saluzzo and the Marquis of Montferrat remained passionate adherents to the French cause. Likewise, the Venetians worried about Milanese ambitions, while the Sienese believed the Duke of Florence harbored designs upon their republic.
“The Italian League is no alliance of liberty,” The Doge of Venice wrote in a concerned letter to François II.
“It is merely a farce for those involved to expand their dominions at the expense of others.” François II, infuriated by the perfidy of his half-brother in Italy, could only help but agree.
“He is no brother to me, but a traitor… and traitors must die.” For all the troubles in Italy, François II remained focused on his gains in Germany. In the summer of 1556, imperial troops successfully defended their positions at the
Battle of Mons. Maximilian II set his sights on pressing back against the French along the Rhine—he personally commanded troops at the
Battle of Trarbach, where he scored a decisive victory that prevented the French from overrunning Trier and Mainz and linking up with the Protestant rebels. Despite these successes, Maximilian suffered a horrible defeat in the fall at the
Siege of Metz. Despite some 20,000 troops and nearly 150 cannons, the French succeeded in holding the city and their positions in the three bishoprics. The campaign season was not a total loss for the French, however: Montmorency seized Lille and occupied southern swaths of the Bishopric of Liège, which allowed him to threaten Namur: he demanded that the city release Philip of Hesse and Johann Friedrich into his custody, or else the city would be subjected to a barrage of artillery fire—a demand which they readily agreed too. The release of these two princes provided potent fuel to the League of Gotha and its signatories.
“We are the ones favored by Christ,” the Electress Dowager Anna wrote to her brother.
“We have endured setbacks and great victories this year… but now that the princes are free, we shall attain all we have failed in previously.” In this, Anna’s letter proved precipitous: soon after the release of the captives of Namur, Maximilian II sent envoys to parlay with the Protestant rebels—he signaled not only his desire to make peace with them but an openness to meet demands that had been refused to them during the reign of his father. Where the previous emperor had refused, the new one was now prepared to agree to offer official recognition of their faith and creed and toleration. He had but one request: they must break from France and support Maximilian’s war against them.
[1] Anno's Shakespeare. Credit goes to
@King of Danes who fully fleshed out this character, even creating some plays and lines for him! This line comes from the Historical
Henry V published by Shakespeare, but we shall have some unique in-universe plays as well. 😉
[2] Eldest son of Jean III, the OTL Cardinal de Lorraine.
I see you’ve changed the Agincourt play’s name to Henry V? I had named it Agincourt to work as a sister play to the Thérouanne play, but you are free to make some edits if you desire 
