§ 3 Last War Between France and Spain
Paul IV. allies himself with France against Philip. July 1556.
The wish of Charles to secure a few years’ peace for his successor was not fulfilled. It was thwarted by the Duke of Guise, the representative of the war party in France, and by his brother the Cardinal of Lorraine, but more especially by Paul IV. That fiery prelate, who was now in his eightieth year, although a leader in the Catholic reaction, had throughout his life been a strenuous opponent of the Spaniard in Italy. A member of a Neapolitan family (the Caraffa) which had always supported the Angevin party in that kingdom, he had early incurred the displeasure of Charles, who had caused his name to be struck off the Council of Government, and resisted his nomination to the archiepiscopal see of Naples. Under these circumstances it is not surprising that, as Pope, he should adopt that anti-Spanish policy which had now become almost traditional with the Papacy. He remembered the days of Italian freedom, and considered the Spaniard the most dangerous of its enemies. ‘The French,’ he said, ‘may easily be dislodged hereafter; but the Spaniards are like dog-grass, sure to strike root wherever it is cast.’ Prompted by these motives, he had, in December 1555, made a secret treaty with France, with the object of driving the Spaniards from Italy, and now he urged Henry II. to break his truce with Spain. The Guises threw their influence on the side of war; and in July, 1556, in pursuance of a fanciful scheme of reviving the French claim to Naples, a treaty was made by which that kingdom was to be torn from Philip and conferred on one of Henry’s sons, with the exception of some portion of the northern frontier, which was to fall to the Pope as his share of the spoil.
Duke of Alva invades the Papal States. Sept. 1556.
French invade Naples, but are recalled by defeat of St. Quentin. Jan.–Aug. 1557.
Paul comes to terms with Alva.
Paul had not waited for this alliance to commence hostilities, or to punish the Colonnesi, who supported the imperial cause. In answer to this, the Duke of Alva, who had just been appointed Governor of Naples, entered the Papal States (September), and, in the absence of the French, occupied the chief places in the Campagna. Indeed, had it not been for the scruples of the Duke, or rather of his royal master, Rome itself might have been taken; but Philip’s orders were that he should bring the Pope to terms rather than ruin him. Alva accordingly listened to the insincere offers of the Pope, and delayed further operations until the advance of the French army under the Duke of Guise, at the beginning of the new year, forced him to retreat southwards. Alva now played a waiting game, and, refusing to meet the French in a pitched battle, gradually wore them out, as Gonzalvo had done in 1503. The Duke of Guise, frustrated in his attempt to take the town of Civitella (May 15), and wearied by these tactics, was forced to evacuate the kingdom of Naples, and shortly afterwards was recalled to France (August 15), by the news of the defeat of St. Quentin, ‘having done little for his King, still less for the Church, and nothing for his honour.’ Paul, deserted by his allies, was forced to accept the terms offered him, which, however, were so advantageous that, as Alva bitterly remarked, ‘they seem to have been dictated by the vanquished instead of the victor.’ The territories of the Church were to be restored intact; the remaining French troops were to be allowed a free passage to France; the affair of the Colonnesi was to be submitted to the arbitration of Philip and the Pope. The Duke of Alva was actually to ask pardon, and receive absolution from the Pope, for having dared to take up arms against him.
Sicily, Naples, Milan, finally secured by Spain.
This, the last war for the possession of Italy for many a long day, is noticeable for the strange contradictions it presents. Not only does the most bigoted of the Popes oppose the most bigoted of Kings; he even calls to his assistance the Infidel and the Protestant mercenaries of Germany; while his opponent, at the command of his master Philip, wages war on the Pope with every expression of reverence, and, when dictating peace, does so, as a suppliant, on his knees. Yet, in spite of his haughty demeanour, Paul had failed. The French henceforth ceased to struggle for Italy; Sicily, Naples, and Milan remained in the hands of the Spanish Hapsburgs until the extinction of their line in the year 1700.
Campaign on the eastern frontier of France. Spanish victory of St. Quentin, Aug. 10.
Calais taken by the Duke of Guise. Jan. 1–8, 1558.
The French defeated at Gravelines. July 13, 1558.
In the war which had meanwhile broken out on the eastern frontier of France, the exhaustion of that country was plainly visible. The feudal levies responded but feebly; the provincial legions of infantry, which had been organised by Francis I. in 1534, had never been successful; and of the French peasantry, the Gascons alone appeared in any numbers. France was thus forced to fall back on six thousand German mercenaries. Emanuel Philibert, the dispossessed Duke of Savoy, a man of twenty-nine years, who commanded the army of Philip, had a much larger force drawn from the various countries under Spanish rule, and was aided by a contingent of English, who with difficulty had been prevailed upon to aid the husband of their queen. The financial straits of the two combatants were much the same, but the energy of Charles in his retreat at St. Yuste succeeded in wringing from the Spaniards a considerable amount of money. On the approach of the Duke of Savoy, Coligny threw himself into the city of St. Quentin (August 2), a town of importance, as being the entrepot for trade between France and the Low Countries. But the rash attempt of the Marshal de Montmorenci, who was in supreme command, to relieve it with a far inferior force, led to his total defeat (August 10). The Marshal himself, many nobles, and thousands of the common soldiers, were taken prisoners; as many more were slain. France, in a word, had not suffered such a defeat since Pavia. ‘Is not my son in Paris?’ asked Charles, on receiving intelligence of the victory; and had Charles himself been in command, Paris might have fallen. But Philip, ever more fond of negotiation than of war, delayed till he should be master of St. Quentin. The city, defended by the energy and ability of Coligny, was not stormed till the 27th of August—and the delay saved Paris. Quarrels subsequently broke out in the Spanish camp, which led to the retreat of the English. The Germans complained of want of pay; many transferred their services to the French; and, after taking a few more places, the army of Philip went into winter quarters. In January, the surprise of Calais by the Duke of Guise reversed, at least in the opinion of the French, the disaster of St. Quentin. The English, in overweening confidence, had of late neglected the defences of that town, and in the winter were accustomed to withdraw a portion of the troops, because the marshes were then believed to be impassable. The Duke, informed of this, suddenly appeared before the walls, and took by assault the two forts of Newman Bridge, and Risbank, which defended Calais from the sea and from the shore respectively. Lord Wentworth, despairing of holding the city now that his position was commanded, capitulated on January 8. The recovery of this city, which had been in the hands of the English since the days of Edward III., very naturally caused boundless exultation in France. The taking of Thionville by the Duke of Guise followed in June; and in July, the Marshal de Termes, in command of the Calais garrison, secured Dunkirk and Mardyke. But the Marshal had imprudently ventured too far into the enemies’ country, and had left Gravelines unmasked behind him. As he attempted to retreat, he was caught between the garrison of Gravelines and a Flemish force raised by the Count of Egmont, and was completely routed, falling himself into the enemies’ hands (July 13).
This was the last action in the war. The renewal of hostilities had not been of Philip’s seeking, and he was now doubly anxious for peace. The difficulty of supplying money, always a serious matter, was now so great that Philip confessed to his ministers that he was on the brink of ruin. The death of his father, Charles, on the 21st of September, demanded his presence in Spain; and England was not to be trusted to continue the war, especially as Mary was very ill. Nor had France much to hope for from a continuation of the struggle, now that the Pope had made his peace with Philip. Her finances were exhausted, her people weary of a struggle which brought them no benefit. Besides all this, heresy had appeared both in France and in Spain. Henry II. therefore listened to the advice of Montmorenci and of the Cardinal of Lorraine. The first, as a captive and a rival of the victorious Duke of Guise, had personal reasons for desiring peace; the latter urged Henry to devote his attention to the extirpation of heresy.
Treaty of Cateau Cambrésis. April 3, 1559.
Negotiations were commenced in October, but were delayed by the death of Mary of England in November, and the refusal of Queen Elizabeth to acknowledge the surrender of Calais. Philip, hoping perhaps thereby to gain her hand, offered to stand by the English Queen and break off the negotiations, but only on condition that she would support him with all her power as long as the war should last. This did not suit the cautious and parsimonious Queen, and she finally consented to leave Calais for eight years in the hands of France. France was also allowed, by the Emperor Ferdinand, to retain the three Lotharingian Bishoprics, Metz, Toul, and Verdun, but had to surrender all her other conquests to Philip and his allies, except Turin, Saluzzo, Pignerol, and a few other places of importance in Piedmont. These she was to hold until Henry’s claim to that principality through his grandmother, Louise of Savoy, should be decided—a claim which he could hardly believe to be serious. Thus Philip regained the towns which France had taken in Luxembourg; Montferrat was restored to the Duke of Mantua; Genoa regained Corsica. On his side, Philip surrendered the few places he held in Picardy. The two Kings further bound themselves to do their best to procure the meeting of a General Council, which was necessary both for reformation of abuses, and for the restoration of union and concord to the Church. The treaty was to be ratified by a double marriage; Philip was to marry Elizabeth, the eldest daughter of Henry II., then a girl of thirteen, who had at first been suggested as the bride of his son Don Carlos; Margaret, the sister of the French king, was to espouse Emanuel Philibert, Duke of Savoy. In the tournament which was held to celebrate the marriage of Philip with the French princess, Henry II. received a wound from which he died, and was succeeded by his son Francis II., a youth of sixteen, who in 1558 had married Mary Queen of Scots.
The peace of Cateau Cambrésis, by which France ‘lost as many provinces as she regained cities,’ was far more disadvantageous than the military position, in spite of the defeats of St. Quentin and Gravelines, justified. It is therefore not unnaturally looked upon as a dishonourable one by most French writers. It reminds us once more of the taunt of Machiavelli that the French are not masters of diplomacy, and is perhaps not an unfitting close to that long struggle between the Houses of Valois and of Hapsburg, which commenced with the foolish expedition of Charles VIII., and in which France had continually been the aggressor. Her only permanent gains were those of Calais, and the three Lotharingian bishoprics; and these, balanced as they were by the loss of Spanish Navarre, were won at the price of an exhausted treasury and an impoverished people. She had no doubt taken a leading part in resisting the dangerous supremacy of the Austro-Spanish House, and in foiling the attempt of Charles to establish a universal monarchy in Europe. Yet it may be questioned whether she could not have done this more effectively if she had kept her hands off Italy, and had strengthened and extended her frontiers by winning Rousillon and Franche-Comté, and by pressing towards the Rhine. While playing the rival to the House of Hapsburg, she had not only contributed to the success of the Reformers in Germany, and to the advance of the Turk in Hungary, but had allowed Protestantism to gain a firm hold at home, and had fostered a military spirit among the smaller nobility, which was to give to the religious struggle in France some of its worst characteristics.
Throughout the long struggle nothing had been done to strengthen the government of France, or to develop constitutional life. The monarchy came out of the war bankrupt, and the government the prey of rival factions—factions which, if they did not cause the religious wars, most certainly prolonged them and France, torn by civil and religious strife, had to wait till the reign of Henry IV. before she could take that part in European affairs to which her central position, the ability of her people, and her magnificent natural resources entitled her.
Nor was Spain in much better plight. To outward appearances, indeed, the power of Philip seemed overwhelming. He was King of the whole Spanish Peninsula with the exception of Portugal;56 King of Naples and of Sicily, and Duke of Milan, a position which enabled him to control the politics of the Peninsula;57 Master of Franche-Comté and of the Netherlands. In Africa, he held Tunis and Oran, with places on the Barbary coast, and the islands of Cape de Verd, and the Canaries; while in the Pacific Ocean, the Philippines were under his sway. In America, Spain held a large part of the eastern coast, except Brazil, which belonged to Portugal, all the islands in the Gulf of Mexico and the Caribbean Sea, and the kingdoms of Mexico and Peru, which had been conquered during the reign of Charles. The Spanish infantry was considered the most formidable in Europe, and the treasures of the Indies were believed to be inexhaustible. Yet Spain had suffered seriously from the long-protracted struggle. Her resources were nearly as much crippled as those of France; her government, if better organised, was fully as despotic, and all religious liberty had been crushed out; and she was shortly to give evidence of her weakness in the failure to put down the revolt of the United Provinces, and in the defeat of the Armada by the puny ships of England.
The peace of Cateau Cambrésis, therefore, closes one epoch and begins another. New actors came upon the scene.58 The struggle for supremacy is stayed a while. Germany and Spain are for ever divided; the Turkish Empire soon ceases to be aggressive, and begins to suffer from internal decay. The remaining thirty-nine years we have to cover is chiefly taken up with the Counter-Reformation and the struggles to which that movement gave birth, with the religious wars in France, and with the revolt of the Netherlands against the religious and political tyranny of Spain.
1. Piedmont, in the hands of Emanuel Philibert of Savoy.
2. Genoa and Venice, independent republics.
3. Parma and Piacenza, under the rule of Ottavio Farnese; of these Parma had been restored to him by Paul III., and Piacenza by Philip II. in 1556.
4. Mantua, in the hands of Frederick, first Duke of Mantua, who also gained Montferrat from Charles V. in 1536, having married the heiress of William VII. (Paleologus), Marquis of Montferrat.
5. Florence, under Duke Cosimo dei Medici, who had just secured Siena, and assumed the title of Grand Duke of Tuscany in 1569.
6. The Duchy of Urbino, a papal fief, in the hands of Guidobaldo della Rovere.
7. The duchies of Ferrara, Modena, and Reggio, in the hands of Ercole II. of Este. On the extinction of the direct line in 1597, Ferrara was seized by the Pope, Clement VIII. Modena and Reggio went to Charles of Este, a collateral.
Notes
54 It had already been summoned in 1542, but had been postponed.
55 The question whether Charles had used the words, ‘nicht einiges’ (any), or ‘nicht ewiges (perpetual) Gefängniss,’ appears to be an afterthought. Cf. Armstrong, ii. 156.
56 For the character of the Spanish rule in Italy, cf. Armstrong, Charles V., II. p. 291 ff.
57 As we shall have to speak but little hereafter of Italy, it may be well to give concisely the names of the chief dependent or independent states:
58 Charles, and Mary Queen of England died in 1558, Paul IV. and Henry II. in 1559.