René II, Duke of Lorraine
53-432: The War of the Burgundian Succession took place from 1477 to 1482 (or 1493 according to some historians), immediately following the Burgundian Wars . At stake was the partition of the Burgundian hereditary lands between the Kingdom of France and the House of Habsburg , after Duke Charles the Bold had perished in the Battle of Nancy on 5 January 1477. Charles the Bold had no male successor. Mary of Burgundy
106-463: A broader strategy in encouraging the Burgundians' internal opponents, which successfully forced Maximilian to split his forces in different directions, abandon plans to recapture territories and search for new allies. The efforts of Maximilian and Margaret of York led to the rupture between Edward IV and Louis XI. After the battle, Maximilian began to recruit mercenaries and to train them in
159-735: A commander under Charles the Bold but defected to the French side after the latter's death in 1477), were defeated by the Burgundians , led by Archduke (later Emperor) Maximilian of Habsburg . The battle was the first in which the innovative Swiss pike square formation was used by a power that was not natively Swiss. Charles the Bold , the last Duke of Burgundy , had been killed at the Battle of Nancy on 5 January 1477. King Louis XI immediately adjudicated his territories to be recovered fiefs of
212-430: A counter-attack, which forced the French to retreat at 8:00 p.m. towards Hesdin. The Burgundian knights rode back on the battlefield and took revenge on their French counterparts, who fled the battlefield. According to Delbruck, Maximilian did not fight with the knights but stood with his pikemen from the beginning. These nobles were positioned in the first ranks of the squares. The writings of de But and others make
265-564: A format that took inspiration from the Swiss model. From 1482, they gradually became known as the Landsknechte. Also, the fact that he had fought together with the infantry in the first ranks during the battle and thus obliged his nobles to do the same was also considered revolutionary. The Landsknechte was not considered just a supporting arm since an esprit-de-corps developed and distinguished them from other mercenaries. In 1482, Maximilian
318-638: A period of about 100 years, in establishing their rule as a strong force between the Holy Roman Empire and France. The consolidation of regional principalities with varying wealth into the Burgundian State brought great economic opportunity and wealth to the new power. A deciding factor for many elites in consolidating their lands was the relatively safe guarantee of making a profit under the economically stable Duchy of Burgundy. Their possessions included, besides their original territories of
371-534: A point that the pikemen were the primary factor in the repulse of the French attack, with Maximilian's personal bravery playing a notable role. Delbruck opines that the flank protection accomplished by the knights on at least one side of the squares played a role as well. According to Verbruggen, the French strong cavalry at first repelled the Burgundian cavalry, which consisted of 825 lances. Maximilian then dismounted, together with 500 of his nobles, who fought with
424-551: A reputation of being nearly invincible, and the Burgundian Wars marked the beginning of the rise of Swiss mercenaries on the battlefields of Europe. Although Bern and other Swiss cities invaded and controlled large swathes of Savoyard territories, the Confederacy maintained only Grandson, Morat and Echallens as notable cities. Inside the Confederacy itself, however, the outcome of the war led to internal conflict since
477-565: The Franche-Comté and the Duchy of Burgundy , the economically-strong regions of Flanders and Brabant as well as Luxembourg . The dukes of Burgundy generally pursued aggressive expansionist politics, especially in Alsace and Lorraine , seeking to unite their northern and southern possessions geographically. Having already been in conflict with the French king, Burgundy had sided with
530-700: The Alsace in the Treaty of Saint-Omer as a fiefdom to the Duke of Burgundy for a loan or sum of 50,000 florins, as well as an alliance with Charles the Bold , to have them better protected from the expansion of the Eidgenossen (the Old Swiss Confederacy ). Charles's involvement west of the Rhine gave him no reason to attack the confederates, as Sigismund had wanted, but his embargo politics against
583-629: The Battle of Guinegate . Thereafter, Maximilian was occupied with the Netherlands, where he fared better in combatting the Guelderians. Eventually, France and the Habsburgs signed the Treaty of Arras (1482) . Maximilian recognised the annexation of the two Burgundies and several other territories. France retained most of its Burgundian fiefdoms except for the affluent County of Flanders , which passed to Maximilian (but soon rebelled against
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#1732772427174636-510: The Battle of Nancy had been provided by the Lower League . Among the troops was a sizable contingent of Swiss soldiers, which had been a part of the victorious army of Lorraine, and its salient characteristic was its method of fighting. Formed up in pike squares , the Swiss mercenaries made themselves and their method of warfare felt far beyond their borders. The notable characteristic of
689-576: The Duchy of Burgundy itself and the Free County of Burgundy (Franche-Comté), Picardy , and the County of Artois . By having Mary married to his son and heir presumptive , he could secure all Burgundian hereditary lands. However, the heiress was put under pressure by the States General to not deliver the provinces to France. To rally foreign support and calm the unrest at home, Mary granted
742-600: The French Kingdom and campaigned in the Counties of Artois , Flanders and Hainaut and the Duchy of Burgundy . Nevertheless, Charles' only heir, Mary of Burgundy , on 19 August had married Archduke Maximilian, who, determined to protect the Burgundian inheritance, organised troops in the Burgundian Netherlands and marched against the French army. Many of the troops who had been victorious at
795-658: The Great Privilege to the States General on 11 February. Besides the French candidate, there was also the captive Guelderian duke, Adolf of Egmont , who was released by Flemish rebels in Ghent on the condition that he would liberate Tournai from the French. This way, Mary's party could strike two blows in one move: achieve peace between Burgundy and rebelling Guelders, and forge an alliance between both powers against France. The Siege of Tournai (1477), however,
848-460: The 20-year-old Maximilian was still young, inexperienced and in the territories of his wife, it was Romont, the Swiss count, who formed up the Flemish infantry in the Swiss manner. Also, in the same area, a formation similar to that of the Swiss had been used by Flemish rebels against the French knights successfully in the 1302 Battle of Courtrai, but at Rosebeke in 1382, the combat method failed in
901-548: The Bold , was defeated three times on the battlefield in the following years and was killed at the Battle of Nancy in 1477. The Duchy of Burgundy and several other Burgundian lands then became part of France, and the Burgundian Netherlands and Franche-Comté were inherited by Charles's daughter, Mary of Burgundy , and eventually passed to the House of Habsburg upon her death because of her marriage to Maximilian I, Holy Roman Emperor . The dukes of Burgundy had succeeded, over
954-409: The Bold lost the support of his lords, who were losing men and profit, and a rebellion soon began, led by René II, Duke of Lorraine . As the revolt continued, René used his land's strategic location between northern and southern Burgundy to cut off communication and to disrupt war capabilities. The internal conflict only made the war with the Swiss more difficult and pulled Charles's attention away from
1007-704: The Bold's Lombard mercenaries. That raised concern to the Bernese as they began to call on their Swiss allies for assistance in the conflict with Burgundy. The aggressive actions of Charles the Bold would eventually culminate in the Swiss giving him the nickname, "the Turk in the West", and make Burgundy as fierce a rival as the Ottomans in the East. Initially in 1469, Duke Sigismund of Habsburg of Austria pawned his possessions in
1060-401: The Burgundian artillery drawn up on that flank. The Burgundian left flank under the command of Nassau was in a perilous state. In addition to being attacked from the front, it was also drawing fire on its flank from the captured artillery. However, instead of following up their advantage on the left flank, the French knights on the left chased after the Burgundian knights who were fleeing from
1113-758: The Burgundian Jura ( Franche-Comté ) by winning the Battle of Héricourt in November 1474. King Louis XI of France joined the coalition by the Treaty of Andernach in December. The next year, Bernese forces conquered and ravaged Vaud , which belonged to the Duchy of Savoy , which was allied with Charles the Bold. Bern had called out to its Swiss allies for expansion into the Vaud region of Savoy to prevent future aggression by Charles near Bernese lands that were geographically closer to Burgundy than those of
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#17327724271741166-399: The Confederacy to deal with the more pressing matter of René's revolt. Charles the Bold raised a new army but fell during the Battle of Nancy in 1477 in which the Swiss fought alongside an army of René. The military failures of Charles the Bold are summarized by a common contemporary Swiss quote: "Charles the Bold lost his goods at Grandson, his bravery at Morat and his blood at Nancy." Near
1219-781: The English in the Hundred Years' War but then the Yorkists in the Wars of the Roses , when Henry VI sided with France. The conflict had left the regional powers of France and England in a weakened state and allowed for the rise of the Burgundian power, alongside its fierce French rivals. The repercussions of the Black Death also continued to affect Europe and assisted in maintaining a diminished society. According to some historians,
1272-565: The French armies, and the Habsburg dynastic forecasts were favourable. On 19 August 1477 the wedding took place, thereby joining the houses of Burgundy and Habsburg together. Archduke Maximilian then undertook intense efforts to retain as many of the Burgundian hereditary provinces, in which he had to fight off both France in the south and Guelders in the north, and simultaneously repress internal revolts, mainly in Flanders . The perseverance of
1325-555: The Habsburgs, especially Emperor Frederick III . According to a Cambridge publication on Swiss history, both the Swiss and the Burgundians had made aggression a significant impact on the region's foreign affairs. In the effort of consolidating the Swiss Confederacy and for independence from Habsburg rule, Swiss forces gained control of the Habsburg town of Thurgau in an effort to expand its borders and influence. The Bernese people were more frequently being attacked by Charles
1378-590: The Swiss confederates, which eventually was concluded in Konstanz in 1474 (later called the Ewige Richtung or Perpetual Accord ). He wanted to buy back his Alsace possessions from Charles, who refused. Shortly afterwards, von Hagenbach was captured and executed by decapitation in Alsace, and the Swiss, united with the Alsace cities and Sigismund of Habsburg in an anti-Burgundian league, conquered part of
1431-562: The Swiss, who refused to end the war unless Charles left the Duchy of Lorraine, whose lands were controlled by René II. It is evident through contemporary writings that espionage and censorship played an influential role in both Swiss and Burgundian actions throughout the war. Professional spies were hired by both sides to recover information of enemy movements and weak points. However, this profession proved to be extremely lethal, as some Swiss cities suffered heavy losses, and obtaining information of
1484-431: The Swiss. There, he had the capitulated garrison hanged or drowned in the lake. When the confederate forces arrived a few days later, Charles was defeated in the Battle of Grandson and was forced to flee the battlefield, leaving behind his artillery and many provisions and valuables. Having rallied his army, he was dealt a devastating blow by the confederates at the Battle of Morat . As Burgundian losses continued, Charles
1537-487: The archduke ). With the 1493 Treaty of Senlis , Maximilian would regain the County of Burgundy , Arras and Charolais , but the Burgundian heartland and Picardy were lost definitively to France. Burgundian Wars The Burgundian Wars (1474–1477) were a conflict between the Burgundian State and the Old Swiss Confederacy and its allies. Open war broke out in 1474, and the Duke of Burgundy , Charles
1590-463: The battlefield. However, the Gewalthaufen tactic used long spears to counter cavalry with remarkable success. That marked a key shift in military history and tipped the balance in favour of infantry troops over mounted soldiers. The results of the conflict would prove to have significant repercussions for the future of the Duchy of Burgundy and for the regional stability of Western Europe. With
1643-474: The cities of Basel , Strasbourg and Mulhouse , directed by his reeve Peter von Hagenbach , prompted them to turn to Bern for help. Charles's expansionist strategy suffered a first setback in his politics when his attack on the Archbishopric of Cologne failed after the unsuccessful Siege of Neuss (1474–75). In the conflict's second phase, Sigismund sought to achieve a peace agreement with
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1696-561: The city cantons insisted on having most of the proceeds as they had supplied the most troops. The country cantons resented that, and the Dreizehn Orte disputes almost led to war. They were settled by the Stanser Verkommnis of 1481. Battle of Guinegate (1479) The First Battle of Guinegate took place on 7 August 1479. King Louis XI 's French troops, led by Philippe de Crèvecœur d'Esquerdes (who had been
1749-531: The crown of France under King Louis XI . The Franche-Comté initially also became French but was ceded to Maximilian's son Philip in 1493 by Charles VIII at the Treaty of Senlis in an attempt to bribe the emperor to remain neutral during Charles's planned invasion of Italy. The victories of the Eidgenossen (Swiss Confederation) over what was one of the most powerful military forces in Europe gained it
1802-481: The death of Charles the Bold, the Valois dynasty of the dukes of Burgundy died out, and widespread revolts engulfed the Duchy, which soon collapsed under those pressures. The northern territories of the dukes of Burgundy became a possession of the Habsburgs when Archduke Maximilian of Austria , who would later become Holy Roman Emperor , married Charles's only daughter, Mary of Burgundy . The duchy proper reverted to
1855-514: The end of 1476, the Swiss Confederacy began receiving orders from Pope Sixtus IV , who called for an end of the war and the signing of peace between the Swiss and Charles. Although that seemed to be a peaceful resolution to the war, the Pope's aspirations for Charles to divert his attention away from the Swiss and onto the Muslims in a crusade began to show. The papal pressure was eventually ignored by
1908-474: The extremely profitable region of the Low Countries supplied the Duchy of Burgundy with sufficient funds to support their ambitions internally but especially externally. In this period of expansion, treaties of trade and peace were signed with Swiss cantons, and would benefit the security of each power against Habsburg and French ambitions. Charles's advances along the Rhine brought him into conflict with
1961-424: The field and thereby gave up their advantage. Meanwhile, on the other flank, commanded by Maximilian and Romont, the Burgundians held fast and slowly fought their way forward against the French, who directed their efforts against the main line of the Burgundians and turned their artillery pieces against them. The momentum of the French was lost. After a long duration of indecisive fighting, the Burgundian side launched
2014-509: The foot troops and provided the formation and leadership. In the battle, Maximilian risked his life to rescue Charles I de Croÿ from a perilous situation. Benecke and Querengässer note that Maximilian incorporated Hussite War tactics, with the use of wagon forts, into the battle. According to the French historian Bertrand Schnerb, the battle was not decisive in determining the Burgundy war. Despite winning, Maximilian had to abandon
2067-489: The heartland of the Burgundian empire turned out to be impossible: the States of Burgundy had already acknowledged the French annexation on 29 January. Maximilian first turned to diplomacy, reminding French king Louis of the 1475 Peace of Soleuvre in order to retrieve all French-occupied Burgundian territories. He even managed to get his father Frederick III, Holy Roman Emperor to threaten France with an Imperial war because of
2120-539: The momentum for military reform from their loss. According to the Belgian historian Jelle Haemers, after Guinegate, the war against France was no longer defensive in nature "but had instead become an offensive drive to recapture territory lost in 1477." The Estates in Flanders did not want to support Maximilian financially in that endeavour. Meanwhile, trying to avoid another direct military confrontation, Louis XI adopted
2173-466: The occupation of Cambrésis . Louis XI relented, agreed to a ceasefire and returned some border cities including the Imperial City of Cambrai in the autumn of 1477. However, the Duchy of Burgundy and the Free County of Burgundy – the Burgundian heartland – remained in French hands for the time being. In the winter of 1477–8, Maximilian failed to procure the aid of his father Frederick III (who
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2226-438: The opposing side continued to be a difficult task throughout the war. The Burgundian Wars also assisted in the shift of military strategy across Europe after the Swiss victories over the numerically-superior Burgundians. The Gewalthaufen proved to be an effective Swiss military strategy against the superior Burgundian forces. Until that point, battles had been dominated by cavalry, which could easily overpower infantry troops on
2279-683: The other Confederacy allies had no legal obligation to come to the aid of the Bernese. In the Valais , the independent republics of the Sieben Zenden , with the help of Bernese and other confederate forces, drove the Savoyards out of the lower Valais after a victory in the Battle on the Planta in November 1475. In 1476, Charles retaliated and marched to Grandson , which belonged to Pierre de Romont of Savoy but had recently been taken by
2332-547: The pike squares was the difficulty with which the traditional cavalry of the day had in penetrating it. The failure at Nancy and its reasons had not escaped Jacques of Savoy, Count of Romont , who had fought under the Archduke's father-in-law, Charles, at the Battle of Nancy. He was now fighting on the side of the Archduke and urged him to adopt a similar method of fighting with his 11,000 foot troops. According to Delbruck, as
2385-520: The plain terrain, as opposed to the Swiss mountainous terrain. Jelle Haemers and Gerhard Benecke on the other hand note that the Duke took personal control of military operations himself, like an impresario , although he got help from advisors, especially regarding financial matters, which he also controlled during the time of war. Both sides met at the village of Guinegatte in the County of Artois , and their armies gathered into formation. The cavalry
2438-542: The rest of the Swiss Confederation. However, the other Swiss cities had become displeased at the ever-growing expansionist and aggressive Bernese foreign policy and so initially did not support Bern. The Confederacy was a collective defense agreement between the Swiss members and ensured that if one city were attacked, the others would come to its aid. Because the military actions by Bern in Savoy were an invasion,
2491-473: The siege of Thérouanne and disband his army either because the Netherlanders did not want him to become too strong or because his treasury was empty. Nevertheless, the victory confirmed the position of Maximilian as the protector of Burgundian heritance. The battle was a critical point in military history, though, since the Burgundian pikemen were the precursors of the Landsknechte, and the French derived
2544-468: Was a failure, which complicated the reconquest of Artois and Picardy. Moreover, Adolf was killed in action (27 June), which eliminated the Guelderian candidate, and prompted the States of Guelders to ally themselves with France instead, continuing their uprising against Burgundy. Mary's eye was then captured by the Habsburg archduke of Austria , Maximilian I . He possessed the means necessary to repel
2597-517: Was at war with Hungarian king Matthias Corvinus ) and of his cousin Sigismund of Tyrol (who had financial problems and depended on a French pension, so remained neutral). In 1478, the provinces of Auxois, Charolais , and Beaune rebelled and tried to secede from the king, but they had to surrender again in 1479. Louis XI then attempted an invasion of Artois. On 7 August 1479, the French troops were defeated by an army of Flemish and Habsburg forces in
2650-559: Was commanded by Count Engelbert of Nassau , who had also fought under the Archduke's father-in-law at Nancy. The other square was commanded by the Count of Romont. Initially, it was Philip of Cleves , who was Mary of Burgundy 's cousin and Maximilian's right-hand man, who commanded the cavalry. When they were crossing the Lys though, Philip's horse got out of control, pushing him ahead of his man. Maximilian witnessed Philip's fall and thought he
2703-471: Was dead. In reality, both Philip and his horse survived. Philip's sumptuous attire and magnificent horse prompted the French to think that he was Maximilian. Consequently, Philip was chased by one hundred French troops for 9 km until they reached the Aire. Philip stayed there for that night. As the battle started, Lord des Cordes forced back the knights within the left infantry square and also captured
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#17327724271742756-436: Was stationed on the flanks, and the infantry was positioned in the centre. However, both sides otherwise diverged significantly in the character of their armies. The French, whose infantry consisted primarily of archers, positioned them between their cavalry, which was composed of gendarmes and coutiliers . The Archduke was employing Burgundians in his army and had formed his infantry into two deep large squares. One square
2809-541: Was the only child of the deceased duke, and many lords desired her hand in marriage to acquire the Burgundian inheritance. Amongst them was Charles , son of King Louis XI of France , who was formally the Burgundian duke's overlord. Louis sought to exploit the opportunity of Duke Charles' death, which triggered unrest and uprisings (such as the Guelderian War of Independence, 1477–1499) in the Burgundian lands, and sent his armies to occupy several territories, including
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