The War of the Eight Saints (1375–1378) was a war between Pope Gregory XI and a coalition of Italian city-states led by Florence that contributed to the end of the Avignon Papacy .
104-686: The causes of the war were rooted in interrelated issues, Florentine opposition to the expansion of the Papal States in central Italy (which the Avignon Popes had set as a condition for their return), and antipathy toward the Parte Guelfa in Florence. Specifically, Florence feared in the autumn of 1372 that Gregory XI intended to reoccupy a strip of territory near Lunigiana , which Florence had conquered from Bernabò Visconti , and that
208-415: A consolidated contract, and, when the ferma (service period) elapsed, the company entered an aspetto (wait) period, wherein the contracting city-state considered its renewal. If the condotta expired definitively, the condottiere could not declare war against the contracting city-state for two years. This military–business custom was respected because professional reputation (business credibility)
312-532: A gradual revival of the pope's temporal power in the Papal States. Throughout the 16th century, virtually independent fiefs such as Rimini (a possession of the Malatesta family) were brought back under Papal control. In 1512 the state of the church annexed Parma and Piacenza, which in 1545 became an independent duchy under an illegitimate son of Pope Paul III . This process culminated in the reclaiming of
416-547: A groom, and a boy); five lance composed a posta , five poste composed a bandiera (flag). By that time, the campaigning condottieri companies were as much Italian as foreign: the Astorre I Manfredi 's Compagnia della Stella (Company of the Star); a new Compagnia di San Giorgio (Company of St. George) under Ambrogio Visconti; Niccolò da Montefeltro's Compagnia del Cappelletto (Little Hat Company); and
520-551: A nonaggression pact with Hawkwood at a cost of 130,000 florins, a special commission of eight citizens was created to levy a one-year, forced loan on the clergy of Florence and Fiesole to cover the sum. A second council of eight men was later created to make the military and diplomatic arrangements necessary to carry on a war against the Pope. The group identity of the Eight Saints remains a controversial subject. The levy committee
624-585: A number of Italian cities. The cooperation between the papacy and the Carolingian dynasty climaxed in 800 when Pope Leo III crowned Charlemagne ' Emperor of the Romans '. From the 9th century to the 12th century, the precise nature of the relationship between the popes and emperors – and between the Papal States and the Empire – was disputed. It was unclear whether the Papal States were a separate realm with
728-573: A source of friction and conflict in papal towns. Florence formed an alliance with Milan in July 1375, immediately prior to the outbreak of the war, and the prosecution of the war was entirely delegated to an eight-member committee appointed by the Signoria of Florence : the Otto della Guerra . Florence incited a revolt in the Papal States in 1375. Florentine agents were sent to more than forty cities in
832-550: Is most widely accepted as the Otto Santi by scholars, though some argue that Otto Santi refers to the war council. The first historical reference to the Eight of War ( Italian : Otto della Guerra ) as the Otto Santi occurs in 1445 with the account of Florentine historian Domenico Buoninsegni; it does not appear in the accounts of contemporaries of the war such as Leonardo Bruni and Giovanni Morelli . Buoninsegni had applied
936-510: The Compagnia della Rosa (Company of the Rose), commanded by Giovanni da Buscareto and Bartolomeo Gonzaga. From the 15th century hence, most condottieri were landless Italian nobles who had chosen the profession of arms as a livelihood; the most famous of such mercenary captains was the son of Caterina Sforza , Giovanni dalle Bande Nere , from Forlì , known as The Last Condottiere ; his son
1040-721: The Compagnia della Colomba (Company of the Dove) in Perugia 's war against Arezzo . The first well-organised mercenaries in Italy were the Ventura Companies of Duke Werner von Urslingen and Count Konrad von Landau . Werner's company differed from other mercenary companies because its code of military justice imposed discipline and an equal division of the contract's income. The Ventura Company increased in number until becoming
1144-665: The départements of Tibre and Trasimène . Following the fall of the First French Empire in 1814, the Congress of Vienna formally restored the Italian territories of the Papal States, but not the Comtat Venaissin or Avignon, to Vatican control. Upon restitution of sovereignty to the Papal States, Pius VII decided to abolish feudalism, transforming all the noble titles (temporarily abolished during
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#17327721827891248-669: The Alberti bankers in Avignon , although the interdict was ignored by many, including Charles V of France . Hawkwood honored his agreement with the Florentines not to make war in Tuscany, limiting himself to putting down the various rebellions within the papal states; in 1377 Hawkwood abandoned Gregory XI entirely and joined the anti-papal coalition. Gregory XI's other condottieri also limited their activities to Romagna , notably
1352-604: The Arian suzerainty of Odoacer in 473, and in 493, Theodoric , king of the Ostrogoths . The Ostrogothic kings would continue to rule much of Italy until 554. The Roman Church submitted of necessity to their sovereign authority, while asserting its spiritual primacy over the whole of Christendom. Beginning in 535, the Byzantine Emperor Justinian I launched a series of campaigns to wrest Italy from
1456-542: The Byzantine emperors as their foremost temporal guardians for reasons such as increased imperial taxes, disagreement with respect to iconoclasm , and failure of the emperors, or their exarchs in Italy , to protect Rome and the rest of the peninsula from barbarian invasion and pillage. During the Renaissance , the papal territory expanded greatly, and the Pope became one of Italy's most important rulers as well as
1560-599: The Campagne and Maritime Province . Other titles like "Papal Vicar ", "Vicar General", and also several titles of nobility , such as "count" or even "prince" were used. However, throughout the history of the Papal States, many warlords and even bandit chieftains controlled cities and small duchies without having received any title from the Pope of the day. Historically the Papal States maintained military forces composed of volunteers , mercenaries (including Corsican Guard ) and Catholic military orders . Between 1860 and 1870
1664-586: The Duchy of Ferrara in 1598, and the Duchy of Urbino in 1631. At its greatest extent, in the 18th century, the Papal States included most of central Italy – Latium , Umbria , Marche , and the legations of Ravenna , Ferrara , and Bologna extending north into the Romagna . It also included the small enclaves of Benevento and Pontecorvo in southern Italy and the larger Comtat Venaissin around Avignon in southern France. The French Revolution affected
1768-575: The Duchy of Rome was completely cut off from the Byzantine Empire, of which it was theoretically still a part. The popes renewed earlier attempts to secure the support of the Franks . In 751, Pope Zachary had Pepin the Short crowned king in place of the powerless Merovingian figurehead King Childeric III . Zachary's successor, Pope Stephen II , later granted Pepin the title Patrician of
1872-604: The Italian Wars and the European wars of religion . Some authors have described the legendary Alberto da Giussano as the "first condottiero" and Napoleon Bonaparte (in virtue of his Italian origins) as the "last condottiero". According to this view, the condottieri tradition would span a huge diverse period from the Battle of Legnano in 1176 to the Battle of Waterloo in 1815. Most historians would narrow it down to
1976-620: The Kingdom of Italy . Only Lazio, including Rome, remained under the Pope's temporal control. In 1870, the Pope lost Lazio and Rome and had no physical territory at all, except the Leonine City within Rome, which the new Italian state refrained from occupying militarily, despite its annexation. In 1929, the Italian fascist leader Benito Mussolini , the head of the Italian government , ended
2080-452: The Levant , yet possessed woefully small armies. In the event that foreign powers and envious neighbours attacked, the ruling nobles hired foreign mercenaries to fight for them. The military-service terms and conditions were stipulated in a condotta (contract) between the city-state and the soldiers (officer and enlisted man), thus, the "contracted" leader, the mercenary captain commanding,
2184-672: The Manfredi in Faenza , and the Malatesta in Rimini all gave nominal acknowledgment to their papal overlords and were declared vicars of the Church. In Ferrara, the death of Azzo VIII d'Este without legitimate heirs (1308 ) encouraged Pope Clement V to bring Ferrara under his direct rule: however, it was governed by his appointed vicar, King Robert of Naples , for only nine years before
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#17327721827892288-691: The Ordelaffi of Forlì, the Montefeltro of Urbino and the da Polenta of Ravenna , and against the cities of Senigallia and Ancona . The last holdouts against full Papal control were Giovanni Manfredi of Faenza and Francesco II Ordelaffi of Forlì. Albornoz, at the point of being recalled, in a meeting with all the Papal vicars on 29 April 1357, promulgated the Constitutiones Sanctæ Matris Ecclesiæ , which replaced
2392-542: The Second French Empire at the Battle of Sedan deprived Rome of its French protector. King Victor Emmanuel II at first aimed at a peaceful conquest of the city and proposed sending troops into Rome, under the guise of offering protection to the pope. When the pope refused, Italy declared war on 10 September 1870, and the Italian Army, commanded by General Raffaele Cadorna , crossed the frontier of
2496-612: The Ubaldini might switch from Florentine to Papal allegiance. Gregory XI also harbored various grievances against Florence for their refusal to aid him directly in his war against the Visconti of Milan . When Gregory XI's war against Milan ended in 1375, many Florentines feared that the pope would turn his military attention toward Tuscany; thus, Florence arranged a nonaggression pact with the English condottiere John Hawkwood , who
2600-749: The " Prisoner in the Vatican " problem involving a unified Italy and the Holy See by negotiating the Lateran Treaty , signed by the two parties. This treaty recognized the sovereignty of the Holy See over a newly created territorial entity, a city-state within Rome limited to a token territory which became the Vatican City . The Papal States were also known as the Papal State (although
2704-591: The "art of war" ( military strategy and tactics ) into military science more than any of their historical military predecessors—fighting indirectly, not directly—thus, only reluctantly endangering themselves and their enlisted men, avoiding battle when possible, also avoiding hard work and winter campaigns, as these all reduced the total number of trained soldiers available, and were detrimental to their political and economic interest. Niccolò Machiavelli even said that condottieri fought each other in grandiose, but often pointless and near-bloodless battles. However, later in
2808-545: The "rule by harlots". In practice, the popes were unable to exercise effective sovereignty over the extensive and mountainous territories of the Papal States, and the region preserved its old system of government, with many small countships and marquisates, each centred upon a fortified rocca . Over several campaigns in the mid-10th century, the German ruler Otto I conquered northern Italy; Pope John XII crowned him emperor (the first so crowned in more than forty years) and
2912-782: The Avignon Papacy. Gregory XI arrived in Rome in January 1377, after a difficult journey (including shipwreck), and died there in March 1378. A peace conference met in Sarzana in February–March 1378 under the mediation of Bernabò Visconti . Besides the warring parties, the Holy Roman Empire and the kingdoms of France, Hungary, Spain and Naples sent representatives. Peace terms had been tentatively agreed when, on 31 March,
3016-624: The Bourbon Kingdom of the Two Sicilies in the south were both restored. Popular opposition to the reconstituted and corrupt clerical government led to revolts in 1830 and in 1848 , which were suppressed by the intervention of the Austrian army. The nationalist and liberal revolutions of 1848 affected much of Europe. In February 1849 a Roman Republic was declared, and the hitherto liberally-inclined Pope Pius IX had to flee
3120-607: The Church (Italian: Stato della Chiesa [ˈstaːto della ˈkjɛːza] ; Latin: Status Ecclesiasticus ), were a conglomeration of territories on the Italian Peninsula under the direct sovereign rule of the Pope from 756 to 1870. They were among the major states of Italy from the 8th century until the Unification of Italy , which took place between 1859 and 1870, and culminated in their demise. The state
3224-422: The Church by the secular government, and restore all property confiscated or looted from the clergy. The Pope, in return, was to repeal the interdict placed on Florence and mend the ecclesiastical community's diminished favor of Florence. The Eight Saints ( Italian : Otto Santi ) may refer to one, or both, of two eight-member Balìa appointed by the Signoria of Florence during the war. When Florence arranged
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3328-609: The French king Charles VIII 's royal army invaded the Italian Peninsula, initiating the Italian Wars . The most renowned condottieri fought for foreign powers: Gian Giacomo Trivulzio abandoned Milan for France, while Andrea Doria was Admiral of the Holy Roman Emperor Charles V . In the end, failure was political, rather than military, stemming from disunity and political indecision, and, by 1550,
3432-601: The Great , promulgated in 321, allowed the Christian Church to possess property and restored to it any property formerly confiscated; in the larger cities of this empire the property restored would have been quite considerable, the Roman patrimony not least among them. The Lateran Palace was gifted to the patrimony, most probably from Constantine himself. Other donations followed, primarily in mainland Italy but also in
3536-667: The Great Company. On the conclusion (1360) of the Peace of Bretigny between England and France, Sir John Hawkwood led an army of English mercenaries, called the White Company , into Italy, which took a prominent part in the confused wars of the next thirty years. Towards the end of the century, the Italians began to organize armies of the same description. This ended the reign of the purely mercenary company and began that of
3640-580: The Italian Kingdom, especially any proposal which required the Pope to become an Italian subject. Instead, the papacy confined itself (see Prisoner in the Vatican ) to the Apostolic Palace and adjacent buildings in the loop of the ancient fortifications known as the Leonine City , on Vatican Hill . From there it maintained a number of features pertaining to sovereignty, such as diplomatic relations since in canon law these were inherent in
3744-523: The Italian State and gave rise to the myth of the Breach of Porta Pia , in reality, a tame affair involving a cannonade at close range that demolished a 1600-year-old wall in poor repair. The defence of Rome was not however bloodless, with 12 dead and 47 wounded amongst the Papal forces and 32 dead plus 145 wounded of the Italian troops. Pope Pius IX ordered the commander of the Papal forces to limit
3848-454: The Italian territory recently regained by Byzantium. By the 7th century, Byzantine authority was largely limited to a diagonal band running roughly from Ravenna , where the emperor's vicar, or exarch , was located, to Rome and south to Naples , plus coastal exclaves. North of Naples, the band of Byzantine control contracted, and the borders of the "Rome-Ravenna corridor" became extremely narrow. With effective Byzantine power weighted at
3952-540: The Napoleonic occupation) into honorifics disconnected from territorial privileges. In 1853, Pius IX put an end to the centuries-old duality between the Papal nobility and the Roman baronial families by equating the civic patriciate of the city of Rome with the nobility created by the Pope. From 1814 until the death of Pope Gregory XVI in 1846, the popes followed a reactionary policy in the Papal States. For instance,
4056-417: The Ostrogoths which continued until 554 and devastated Italy's political and economic structures. Justinian established the Exarchate of Ravenna of which the Duchy of Rome , an area roughly coterminous with modern day Lazio , was an administrative division. In 568 the Lombards entered the peninsula from the north, establishing their own Italian kingdom, and over the next two centuries would conquer most of
4160-533: The Papal Army ( Esercito Pontificio in Italian) comprised two regiments of locally recruited Italian infantry, two Swiss regiments and a battalion of Irish volunteers , plus artillery and dragoons . In 1861 an international Catholic volunteer corps, called Papal Zouaves after a kind of French colonial native Algerian infantry, and imitating their uniform type, was created. Predominantly made up of Dutch, French and Belgian volunteers, this corps saw service against Garibaldi 's Redshirts , Italian patriots, and finally
4264-399: The Papal States, along with the rest of the Italian principalities, were effectively independent. From 1305 to 1378, the popes lived in the papal enclave of Avignon , surrounded by Provence and under the influence of the French kings. This period was known as the "Avignonese" or "Babylonian Captivity". During this period the city of Avignon itself and the surrounding Comtat Venaissin
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4368-426: The Papal States, and in February 1798 General Louis-Alexandre Berthier declared a Roman Republic . Pope Pius VI fled from Rome to Siena and died in exile in Valence in 1799. In October 1799, Neapolitan troops under King Ferdinant invaded the newfound republic and restored Papal States, ending the republic. French quickly drove the Neapolitans out and reoccupied the Papal States, but didn't bother restoring
4472-401: The Papal territory expanded greatly, notably under Popes Alexander VI and Julius II . The Pope became one of Italy's most important secular rulers as well as the head of the Church, signing treaties with other sovereigns and fighting wars. In practice, though, most of the Papal States were still only nominally controlled by the Pope, and much of the territory was ruled by minor princes. Control
4576-447: The Pope as their sovereign ruler, or a part of the Frankish Empire over which the popes had administrative control, as suggested in the late-9th-century treatise Libellus de imperatoria potestate in urbe Roma , or whether the Holy Roman emperors were vicars of the Pope ruling Christendom , with the Pope directly responsible only for the environs of Rome and spiritual duties. The Holy Roman Empire in its Frankish form collapsed when it
4680-454: The Protestants, troops loyal to Emperor Charles V brutally sacked Rome and imprisoned Pope Clement VII , as a side effect of battles over the Papal States. Thus Clement VII was forced to give up Parma , Modena , and several smaller territories. A generation later the armies of King Philip II of Spain defeated those of Pope Paul IV in the Italian War of 1551–1559 fought to prevent growing Spanish dominance in Italy. This period saw
4784-454: The Renaissance the condottieri line of battle still deployed the grand armoured knight and medieval weapons and tactics after most European powers had begun employing professional standing armies of pikemen and musketeers ; this helped to contribute to their eventual decline and destruction. In 1347, Cola di Rienzo (Tribune and effective dictator of the city) had Werner von Urslingen executed in Rome, and Konrad von Landau assumed command of
4888-442: The Romans . Pepin led a Frankish army into Italy in 754 and 756, defeated the Lombards, thus taking control of northern Italy, and made a gift of the lands formerly constituting the Exarchate of Ravenna to the pope. In 781, Charlemagne codified the regions over which the pope would be temporal sovereign: the Duchy of Rome, Ravenna, the Duchy of the Pentapolis , parts of the Duchy of Benevento , Tuscany , Corsica , Lombardy , and
4992-467: The Signoria on prelates who left their posts, the "most extensive liquidation of an ecclesiastical patrimony attempted anywhere in Europe before the Reformation ," may have been motivated to pay for the increasingly expensive conflict. The total cost of the war for Florence would reach approximately 2.5 million florins. As a result of Gregory XI's economic sanctions, merchants of the Florentine "diaspora" were hurt economically throughout Europe, particularly
5096-401: The acquisition of either property or safety. The others (those who possessed no state) being bred to arms from their infancy, were acquainted with no other art, and pursued war for emolument, or to confer honour upon themselves. In 1487, at Calliano , the Venetians successfully met and acquitted themselves against the German landsknechte and the Swiss infantry, the best soldiers in Europe at
5200-418: The administration of the church from imperial interference, the independence of the Papal States increased in importance. After the extinction of the Hohenstaufen dynasty , the German emperors rarely interfered in Italian affairs. In response to the struggle between the Guelphs and Ghibellines , the Treaty of Venice made official the independence of the Papal States from the Holy Roman Empire in 1177. By 1300,
5304-458: The appellation—used in August 1378 to refer to an eight-member group ( Gli Otto Santi del Popolo di Dio ) formed by the Ciompi Revolt , which ensued immediately after the War of the Eight Saints—to the Otto della Guerra . In contrast, the moniker is used in the March 31, 1376 bull of excommunication to refer to the Otto dei Preti (the levy committee, literally meaning "Eight of Priests"). The Otto dei Preti , appointed July 7, 1375 to carry out
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#17327721827895408-452: The citizens recalled the Este from exile (1317). Interdiction and excommunications were in vain because in 1332, John XXII was obliged to name three Este brothers as his vicars in Ferrara. In Rome itself, the Orsini and the Colonna struggled for supremacy, dividing the city's rioni between them. The resulting aristocratic anarchy in the city provided the setting for the fantastic dreams of universal democracy of Cola di Rienzo , who
5512-401: The city of Rome maintained the last Jewish ghetto in Western Europe. Italian nationalism had been stoked during the Napoleonic period but dashed by the settlement of the Congress of Vienna (1814–15), which sought to restore the pre-Napoleonic conditions: most of northern Italy was under the rule of junior branches of the Habsburgs and the Bourbons . The Papal States in central Italy and
5616-405: The city. The revolution was suppressed with French help in 1849 and Pius IX switched to a conservative line of government. Until his return to Rome in 1850, the Papal States were governed by a group of cardinals known as the Red Triumvirate . As a result of the Second Italian War of Independence , Piedmont-Sardinia annexed Lombardy , while Giuseppe Garibaldi overthrew the Bourbon monarchy in
5720-427: The conference learned that Gregory XI had died. Visconti nonetheless transmitted the terms to the principal parties, but the conference broke up. A peace treaty was finally concluded at Tivoli in July 1378, negotiated with Pope Urban VI . Under the treaty, Florence was to pay the Pope 200,000 florins (as opposed to Pope Gregory XI's original indemnity requirement of 1 million florins), repeal all laws placed against
5824-454: The contract by which the condottieri put themselves in the service of a city or lord. The term, however, came to refer to all the famed Italian military leaders of the Renaissance , Reformation and Counter-Reformation eras. Notable condottieri include Prospero Colonna , Giovanni dalle Bande Nere , Cesare Borgia , the Marquis of Pescara , Andrea Doria , and the Duke of Parma . They served Popes and other European monarchs and states during
5928-415: The decline of the condottieri. Although the mercenary forces were among the first to adapt to the emerging technologies on the battlefield, ultimately, the advent of firearms-governed warfare rendered their ceremonial fighting style obsolete. When battlefields shifted from chivalric confrontations characterized by ostentatious displays of power to an everyman's war, they were ill-prepared to adjust. In 1494,
6032-465: The defence of the city in order to avoid bloodshed. The city was captured on 20 September 1870. Rome and what was left of the Papal States were annexed to the Kingdom of Italy as a result of a plebiscite the following October. This marked the definitive end of the Papal States. Despite the fact that the traditionally Catholic powers did not come to the Pope's aid, the papacy rejected the 1871 " Law of Guarantees " and any substantial accommodation with
6136-432: The eastern two-thirds of the Papal States, cementing its hold on the south. Bologna, Ferrara, Umbria, the Marches, Benevento and Pontecorvo were all formally annexed by November of the same year. While considerably reduced, the Papal States nevertheless still covered the Latium and large areas northwest of Rome. A unified Kingdom of Italy was declared and in March 1861 the first Italian parliament , which met in Turin ,
6240-429: The fearsome " Great Company " of some 3,000 barbute (each barbuta comprised a knight and a sergeant). The first mercenary company with an Italian as its chief was the "Company of St. George" formed in 1339 and led by Lodrisio Visconti . This company was defeated and destroyed by Luchino Visconti of Milan (another condottiero and uncle of Lodrisio) in April 1339. Later, in 1377, a second "Company of St. George"
6344-425: The forces of the newly united Italy. The Papal Army was disbanded in 1870, leaving only the Palatine Guard , which was itself disbanded on 14 September 1970 by Pope Paul VI ; the Noble Guard , which also disbanded in 1970; and the Swiss Guard , which continues to serve both as a ceremonial unit at the Vatican and as the Pope's protective force. A small Papal Navy was also maintained, based at Civitavecchia on
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#17327721827896448-411: The government of Florence and placed the city under interdict on March 31, 1376, banning religious services in Florence and legalizing the arrest and enslavement of Florentines and the confiscation of their property throughout Europe. Initially, rather than attempting to disobey the interdict, Florentines organized extra-ecclesiastical processions (including flagellants ) and confraternities , including
6552-433: The greatest danger in the city's history. In 15th-century Italy, the condottieri were masterful lords of war; during the wars in Lombardy , Machiavelli observed: None of the principal states were armed with their own proper forces. Thus the arms of Italy were either in the hands of the lesser princes, or of men who possessed no state; for the minor princes did not adopt the practice of arms from any desire of glory, but for
6656-420: The head of Western Christianity . At their zenith, the Papal States covered most of the modern Italian regions of Lazio (which includes Rome ), Marche , Umbria , Romagna and portions of Emilia . The popes' reign over these lands was an exemplification of their temporal powers as secular rulers, as opposed to their ecclesiastical primacy. By 1860, much of the Papal States' territory had been conquered by
6760-483: The military service condotta had disappeared, while the term condottiere remained current, denominating the great Italian generals (mainly) fighting for foreign states; men such as Gian Giacomo Medici , Ambrogio Spinola , Alexander Farnese , Marcantonio II Colonna , Raimondo Montecuccoli and Prospero Colonna were prominent into the sixteenth and the seventeenth centuries. The political practice of hiring foreign mercenaries, however, did not end. For example,
6864-413: The mosaic of local law and accumulated traditional 'liberties' with a uniform code of civil law. These Constitutiones Aegidianae (as they are informally known) mark a watershed in the legal history of the Papal States; they remained in effect until 1816. Pope Urban V ventured a return to Italy in 1367 that proved premature; he returned to Avignon in 1370 just before his death. During the Renaissance ,
6968-477: The name used varied with the preferences and habits of the European languages in which it was expressed. For its first 300 years, within the Roman Empire , the Church was persecuted and unable to hold or transfer property. Early congregations met in rooms set aside for the purpose in the homes of wealthy adherents, and a number of titular churches located on the outskirts of Rome were held as property by individuals, rather than by any corporate body. Nonetheless,
7072-413: The northeast end of this territory, the pope, as the largest landowner and most prestigious figure in Italy, began by default to take on much of the ruling authority that the Byzantines were unable to exercise in the areas surrounding the city of Rome. While the popes legally remained "Roman subjects" under Byzantine authority, in practice the Duchy of Rome became an independent state. Popular support for
7176-412: The old capital of Piedmont, declared Rome the capital of the new kingdom. However, the Italian government could not take possession of the city because a French garrison in Rome protected Pope Pius IX. The opportunity for the Kingdom of Italy to eliminate the Papal States came in 1870; the outbreak of the Franco-Prussian War in July prompted Napoleon III to recall his garrison from Rome and the collapse of
7280-404: The papacy. In the 1920s, the papacy – then under Pius XI – renounced the bulk of the Papal States. The Lateran Treaty with Italy (then ruled by the National Fascist Party under Benito Mussolini ) was signed on 11 February 1929, creating the State of the Vatican City , forming the sovereign territory of the Holy See , which was also indemnified to some degree for loss of territory. As
7384-483: The papal states—including Bologna , Perugia , Orvieto and Viterbo —to foment rebellion, many of which had only been re-submitted to papal authority by the efforts of Cardinal Gil Álvarez Carrillo de Albornoz . Humanist Chancellor of Florence Coluccio Salutati disseminated public letters urging the cities to rebel against the "tyrannical" and "corrupt" papal rule, instead urging a return to all'antica Republicanism . Pope Gregory XI excommunicated all members of
7488-468: The papal territory on September 11 and advanced slowly toward Rome. The Italian Army reached the Aurelian Walls on September 19 and placed Rome under a state of siege. Although the Pope's tiny army was incapable of defending the city, Pius IX ordered it to put up more than token resistance to emphasize that Italy was acquiring Rome by force and not consent. This incidentally served the purposes of
7592-481: The people among whom they fought, and their disorderly conduct and rapacity seem often to have exceeded that of medieval armies. They were always ready to change sides at the prospect of higher pay—the enemy of today might be the comrade-in-arms of tomorrow. Further, a prisoner was always more valuable than a dead enemy. As a consequence, their battles were often as bloodless as they were theatrical. The age of firearms and weapons utilizing gunpowder further contributed to
7696-422: The perspective of military science, rather than as a matter of valour or physical courage—a great, consequential departure from chivalry , the traditional medieval model of soldiering. Consequently, the condottieri fought by outmanoeuvring the opponent and fighting his ability to wage war, rather than risking uncertain fortune—defeat, capture, death—in battlefield combat. The earlier, medieval condottieri developed
7800-854: The plural is usually preferred, the singular is equally correct as the polity was more than a mere personal union ). The territories were also referred to variously as the State(s) of the Church , the Pontifical States , the Ecclesiastical States , the Patrimony of St Peter or the Roman States ( Italian : Stato Pontificio , also Stato della Chiesa , Stati della Chiesa , Stati Pontifici , and Stato Ecclesiastico ; Latin : Status Pontificius , also Dicio Pontificia "papal rule"). To some extent
7904-462: The plural name Papal States indicates, the various regional components retained their identity under papal rule. The Pope was represented in each province by a governor, who bore one of a number of titles. These included " papal legate ", as in the former principality of Benevento , or at Bologna , in Romagna , and the March of Ancona ; and " papal delegate ", as in the former Duchy of Pontecorvo and in
8008-605: The pope relied mainly on diplomacy to achieve as much. In practice, these papal efforts served to focus Lombard aggrandizement on the exarch and Ravenna. A climactic moment in the founding of the Papal States was the agreement over boundaries contained in the Lombardic King Liutprand 's Donation of Sutri (728) to Pope Gregory II . When the Exarchate of Ravenna finally fell to the Lombards in 751,
8112-586: The popes in Italy enabled several to defy the will of the Byzantine emperor: Pope Gregory II excommunicated Emperor Leo III during the Iconoclastic Controversy . Nevertheless, the Pope and the exarch still worked together to limit the rising power of the Lombards in Italy. As Byzantine power weakened, though, the papacy assumed an ever-larger role in protecting Rome from the Lombards, but lacking direct control over sizable military assets,
8216-674: The profession, some masnade were less mercenaries than bandits and desperate men. These masnade were not Italian, but (mostly) Flemings , from the Duchy of Brabant (hence, Brabanzoni ), and from Aragon . The latter were Spanish soldiers who had followed King Peter III of Aragon in the War of the Sicilian Vespers in Italy in October 1282, and, post-war, remained there, seeking military employment. By 1333 other mercenaries had arrived in Italy to fight with John of Bohemia as
8320-500: The property held nominally or actually by individual members of the Roman churches would usually be treated as a common patrimony handed over successively to the legitimate "heir" of that property, often its senior deacons , who were, in turn, assistants to the local bishop. This common patrimony became quite considerable, including as it did not only houses etc. in Rome or nearby but also landed estates, such as latifundia , whole or in part, across Italy and beyond. A law of Constantine
8424-611: The provinces of the Roman Empire. However, the Roman Church held all of these lands as a private landowner, not as a sovereign entity. Following the fall of the Western Roman Empire, the papacy found itself increasingly placed in a precarious and vulnerable position. As central Roman authority disintegrated throughout the late 5th century, control over the Italian peninsula repeatedly changed hands, falling under
8528-722: The re-emergence of groups such as the Fraticelli , who had previously been deemed heretical . The edifice of the Florentine inquisition was destroyed, and the Signoria rolled back legal restrictions on usury and other practices frowned on by the (now defunct) ecclesiastical courts. However, in October 1377, the government of Florence forced the clergy to resume religious services causing Angelo Ricasoli, Bishop of Florence , and Neri Corsini, Bishop of Fiesole , to flee Florentine territory. The heavy fines and confiscations issued by
8632-512: The rebirth of ancient Rome was one that would not prevail." The Rienzo episode engendered renewed attempts from the absentee papacy to re-establish order in the dissolving Papal States, resulting in the military progress of Cardinal Albornoz , who was appointed papal legate, and his condottieri heading a small mercenary army. Having received the support of the archbishop of Milan, Giovanni Visconti , he defeated Giovanni di Vico , lord of Viterbo , moving against Galeotto Malatesta of Rimini and
8736-547: The republic, as they continued their invasion to Naples, where they established another republic . In June 1800, French Consulate formally concluded the occupation and restored the Papal States, with the newly elected Pope Pius VII taking residence in Rome. Yet, in 1808 the French Empire under Napoleon invaded again, and this time on 17 May 1809 the remainder of the States of the Church were annexed to France, forming
8840-566: The savage sacking of Cesena in February 1377 in what came to be known as the Cesena Bloodbath. In the spring of 1377, papal mercenaries recaptured Bologna, which up until that point had been a key Florentine ally. In 1377, Cardinal Robert of Geneva (future Avignon Pope Clement VII ) led the army of Gregory XI in an attempt to quell the revolt, and Gregory XI himself returned to Italy to secure his Roman possessions, de facto ending
8944-520: The semi-national mercenary army which endured in Europe till replaced by the national standing army system. In 1363, Count von Landau was betrayed by his Hungarian soldiers, and defeated in combat, by the White Company's more advanced tactics under commanders Albert Sterz and John Hawkwood. Strategically, the barbuta was replaced with the three-soldier, mounted lancia (a capo-lancia ,
9048-468: The south. Afraid that Garibaldi would set up a republican government, the Piedmontese government petitioned French Emperor Napoleon III for permission to send troops through the Papal States to gain control of the south. This was granted on the condition that Rome be left undisturbed. In 1860, with much of the region already in rebellion against Papal rule, Piedmont-Sardinia invaded and conquered
9152-460: The taxation of the clergy for the nonaggression pact included: The Otto della Guerra (war council) were appointed August 14, 1376 and consisted of four guild representatives and four members of the nobility. Papal States The Papal States ( / ˈ p eɪ p ə l / PAY -pəl ; Italian : Stato Pontificio ; Latin : Dicio Pontificia ), officially the State of
9256-658: The temporal territories of the Papacy as well as the Roman Church in general. In 1791 an election in Comtat Venaissin and Avignon was followed by occupation by Revolutionary France. Later, with the French invasion of Italy in 1796, the Legations (the Papal States' northern territories ) were seized and became part of the Cisalpine Republic . Two years later, French forces invaded the remaining area of
9360-402: The time. In time, the financial and political interests of the condottieri proved serious drawbacks to decisive, bloody warfare: the mercenary captains often were treacherous, tending to avoid combat, and "resolve" fights with a bribe—either for the opponent or for themselves. Towards the end of the 15th century, when the large cities had gradually swallowed up the small states, and Italy itself
9464-556: The two of them ratified the Diploma Ottonianum , by which the emperor became the guarantor of the independence of the Papal States. Yet over the next two centuries, popes and emperors squabbled over a variety of issues, and the German rulers routinely treated the Papal States as part of their realms on those occasions when they projected power into Northern and Central Italy. As the Gregorian Reform worked to free
9568-608: The west coast and Ancona on the east. With the fall of the Papal States in 1870, the last ships of the flotilla were sailed to France, where they were sold after the death of Pius IX. Condottieri Condottieri ( Italian: [kondotˈtjɛːri] ; sg. : condottiero or condottiere) were Italian military leaders during the Middle Ages and the early modern period . The definition originally applied only to commanders of mercenary companies, condottiero in medieval Italian meaning 'contractor' and condotta being
9672-439: The years from c. 1350 to c. 1650 , with a particular focus on the rise of the commanders of free companies ( capitani di ventura ) and their transformation into captain generals fighting for the major powers during the struggle for political and religious supremacy in Europe. In the 13th and 14th centuries, the Italian city-states of Venice , Florence , and Genoa were very rich from their trade with
9776-402: Was Cosimo I de' Medici, Grand Duke of Tuscany ; besides noblemen, princes also fought as condottieri, given the sizable income to their estates, notably Sigismondo Pandolfo Malatesta , Lord of Rimini , and Federico da Montefeltro , Duke of Urbino ; despite war-time inflation , soldier's pay was high: The condottieri company commanders selected the soldiers to enlist; the condotta was
9880-471: Was Gregory XI's main military commander, at a cost of 130,000 florins, extracted from local clergy, bishops, abbots, monasteries and ecclesiastical institutions, by an eight-member committee appointed by the Signoria of Florence , the Otto dei Preti . Hawkwood also received a 600-florin annual salary for the next five years and a lifetime annual pension of 1,200 florins. The transalpine mercenaries employed by Gregory XI against Milan, now unemployed, were often
9984-521: Was acclaimed Tribune of the People in 1347, and met a violent death in early October 1354 as he was assassinated by supporters of the Colonna family. To many, rather than an ancient Roman tribune reborn, he had become just another tyrant using the rhetoric of Roman renewal and rebirth to mask his grab for power. As Guido Ruggiero states, "even with the support of Petrarch , his return to first times and
10088-691: Was added to the Papal States; it remained a papal possession for some 400 years even after the popes returned to Rome, until it was seized and incorporated into the French state during the French Revolution . During the Avignon Papacy , local despots took advantage of the absence of the popes to establish themselves in nominally papal cities: the Pepoli in Bologna, the Ordelaffi in Forlì ,
10192-411: Was always contested; indeed it took until the 16th century for the Pope to have any genuine control over all his territories. Papal responsibilities were often in conflict. The Papal States were involved in at least three wars in the first two decades of the 16th century. Julius II, the "Warrior Pope", fought on their behalf. The Reformation began in 1517. In 1527, before the Holy Roman Empire fought
10296-434: Was drawn into the general current of European politics, and became the battlefield of powerful armies—French, Spanish and German—the venture captains, who in the end proved quite unequal to the gendarmerie of France and the improved troops of the Italian states, gradually disappeared. The soldiers of the condottieri were almost entirely heavy armoured cavalry (men-at-arms). Before 1400, they had little or nothing in common with
10400-533: Was everything to the condottieri; a deceived employer was a reputation ruined; likewise, for maritime mercenaries, whose contratto d'assento ( lit. ' contract of assent ' ) stipulated naval military-service terms and conditions; sea captains and sailors so-contracted were called assentisti . Their principal employers were Genoa and the Papal States , beginning in the fourteenth century, yet Venice considered it humiliating to so employ military sailors, and did not use naval mercenaries, even during
10504-726: Was formed under the leadership of Alberico da Barbiano , also an Italian and the Count of Conio, who later taught military science to condottieri such as Braccio da Montone and Giacomuzzo Attendolo Sforza , who also served in the company. Once aware of their military power monopoly in Italy, the condottieri bands became notorious for their capriciousness and soon dictated terms to their ostensible employers. In turn, many condottieri, such as Braccio da Montone and Muzio Sforza, became powerful politicians. As most were educated men acquainted with Roman military science manuals (e.g. Vegetius 's Epitoma rei militarii ), they began viewing warfare from
10608-419: Was legally established in the 8th century when Pepin the Short , king of the Franks , gifted Pope Stephen II , as a temporal sovereign, lands formerly held by Arian Lombards , adding them to lands and other real estate formerly acquired and held by the bishops of Rome, as landlords , from the time of Constantine onward. This donation came about as part of a process whereby the popes began to turn away from
10712-519: Was subdivided among Charlemagne 's grandchildren. Imperial power in Italy waned and the papacy's prestige declined. This led to a rise in the power of the local Roman nobility, and the control of the Papal States during the early 10th century passed to a powerful and corrupt aristocratic family, the Theophylacti . This period was later dubbed the Saeculum obscurum ("dark age"), and sometimes as
10816-567: Was titled the "Condottiere". From the eleventh to the thirteenth century, European soldiers led by professional officers fought against the Muslims in the Crusades (1095–1291). These crusading officers provided large-scale warfare combat experience in the Holy Land. At the Crusades' conclusion, the first masnada (bands of roving soldiers; pl. : masnade ) appeared in Italy. Given
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