Venetian Report on France - 1538

The state of peace negotiations between Charles V and Francis I after the Italian War of 1536-1538

Background

Since the 1535 Report on France we just published, war has broken about between France and the Holy Roman Empire. The Italian War of 1536–1538 was fought over control of Northern Italy, particularly the Duchy of Milan (the previous report showed how likely such a war was). Marino Giustiniani, whose wrote the 1535 Report on France, was succeeded in the legation to France by Giovanni Basadona. Basadona, who returned to his homeland in 1537, was succeeded as ambassador by Capello, during whose mission the Republic, desirous of promoting a swift end to the hostilities that had renewed the year before between France and the Empire (an end all the more desirable for all of Christendom at that time, given how grave and imminent were the threats from the Turk), dispatched Francesco Giustiniani to the king for this purpose in the summer of that same year, 1537, although only (says Paruta) with the title of gentleman of the Republic and not of ambassador; who, after a brief sojourn at that court, returned quite comforted in the hope of peace, a peace eagerly solicited at the same time by Paul III, who, the following year, at the congress of Nice, personally completed the work begun by his legates.

Report

Most Serene Prince, most grave and most wise, my most honored Sirs, since Your Sublimity and Your Most Excellent Lordships, only a few days ago, received a true and detailed report on the affairs of the Kingdom of France from the most excellent Messer Gioan Basadona; if, now that, in order to observe the most sacred order of this Republic, I must render an account of the brief time I negotiated at that court in the name of Your Excellencies, I were to speak in order in this place of the revenues, the expenditures, the government, and the nature of the Most Christian King and of his kingdom (as is the custom of orators when they return from their ordinary duties), it would seem to me that I would be doing an injustice to Your Most Excellent Lordships, to the said most excellent Basadona, and to myself. Because, not having been ordinarily at that court, I would be taking upon myself more than is befitting me; I would seem to doubt that the said most excellent Basadona had failed to state everything in full, just as I do not doubt that His Magnificence has completely satisfied all points; and I would weary Your Most Excellent Lordships with the same things that they a short time ago, and which you keep fresh in your minds.

Therefore, having been employed by Your Serenity and by Your Most Excellent Lordships—more through your goodness than for any merit or valor of my own—solely for the persuasion of the Most Christian King to make peace with the Emperor; and this negotiation being, both for the greatness and extreme difficulty it entails, and more so for the most manifest benefit of the Christian world, and particularly for the preservation and security of this most excellent Republic, of such great importance as the prudence of Your Most Excellent Lordships clearly knows¹, I will strive only, with a brief discourse, to represent to Your Serenity and to Your Lordships, not how the said negotiation has proceeded (because from time to time the letters of the most excellent orator Capello and my own have demonstrated it), but the reason why peace has not followed between these two lords; then, what are the impediments to the settlement; and finally, what hope remains for us of peace, or of an accord, or even of new truces. In this discourse, I will say only so much of the nature, governance, and forces of the Most Christian King and his kingdom as will serve to make clearer and more well-founded the reasons that I shall use in this discourse.

I say, therefore, Most Serene Prince, most grave and wisest Lords, that the peace desired by the Holiness of the Pontiff², procured by Your Most Excellent Lordships with deeds and with heart, awaited with excessive need by Christendom, and negotiated³ by the agents of His Cesarean Majesty and of the Most Christian King at Locat, a place midway between Salses and Narbonne, has not succeeded between these two lords, because it is not judged to his benefit by the Emperor to give the state of Milan to the Most Christian King; nor can the Most Christian King, without Milan, make peace with the Emperor.

The harm that the Emperor may suffer by giving that state to His Most Christian Majesty, everyone in their prudence sees very well. First, against his nature, he would divest himself of a state that makes him great and secure in Italy. Afterward, he would invest with it his greatest enemy in the world. Third, that with that advantage, the King would bring war to the Kingdom of Naples, and to the state of Florence, which is also at his devotion. And in short, he would deprive himself of a great part of his own grandeur, to give it to one who, if not at present, certainly in time, would make his fortune from it, and perhaps take the rest from him. Wherefore, His Cesarean Majesty, being willing to leave the state of Milan, and wishing to secure himself against all these things, proposed to the Most Christian King the great conditions that Your Most Excellent Lordships have, through the letters of the most excellent orator Capello and my own, come to know, and perhaps also heard through other channels.

These conditions, because they took from the Most Christian King de præsenti his rights, and his forces, far more than the hope of the state of Milan gave to him; and His Most Christian Majesty finding himself with the advantage of holding the greater part of the state of Savoy⁴, Hesdin in Flanders, and of the war that the Turk wages against the Emperor (in which the Emperor, being occupied, will not be able to trouble His Majesty), he did not wish to buy peace at such a great cost to himself, as it seemed he would incur if he had ceded Burgundy⁵ to the Emperor, restored Hesdin, and the suzerainty of Artois⁶, Savoy to the Duke, and his state to the nephews of the late Monsignor de Bourbon⁷; and if he had ceded his claims to Naples⁸ and Milan, which are in the Treaty of Madrid; and finally (a thing which he reputed a great shame) if he had sent Monsignor d’Orléans his son to Spain as a hostage for three years, and had been forced to make war on the Turk for the benefit and greatness of the Emperor, and been constrained to the council by which he would lose the union of the princes and states of Germany and of other captains and Lutheran peoples⁹, all to hope in the faith of one who openly says that he has no faith in him in any matter.

Wherefore, for all the aforementioned causes, peace has not been concluded between these Majesties; which, although some believe it would have been made if a way had been found for one of these two lords to trust the other, I nevertheless, Most Serene Prince, my most wise Lords, from what I have been able to discern both from the King’s countenance (which is often wont to show the soul of a man), and then from his words and those of the Most Serene Queen of Navarre¹⁰, and of the other great men who are at this court, say that the Most Christian King would have trusted the Emperor if His Caesarean Majesty had waived some articles of the Treaty of Madrid. But because His Caesarean Majesty has stood firm in his opinion, the negotiation has been dissolved in the manner Your Lordships have learned, to the poor satisfaction of all Christians.

Now follow the other impediments to the settlement that is to be negotiated, which are many, and very great. Because Your Serenity and Your Most Excellent Lordships (who partly through learning, partly through custom and long practice, and your own excellent judgment, understand the ways of the world very well) know that just as friendships between private gentlemen are formed through the mutual correspondence of souls and the similarity of good habits, so among princes, friendships are made either for that same correspondence of nature, or by a judgment that it serves them well to be friends together, or truly by necessity and fortune, which against their will constrains them to remain united. Between these two lords (from what I have, in the short time I have been in France, come to know of the nature of the Most Christian King, and from what I have understood from various reports in this Most Excellent Council, and at the Court, and elsewhere of that of his Caesarean Majesty) I find there to be such and so great a discordance, that (as the Most Serene Queen of Navarre, who is the sister of the Most Christian King, a woman of great worth and great spirit who participates in all the councils, told me on this subject) it would be necessary for God to return to reform one of them in the image of the other, for them both to agree. Because, whereas the Most Christian King is loath to trouble himself with great thoughts or with business, and often goes hunting and to his pleasures, the Emperor never thinks of anything but affairs of state, and of making himself greater. Whereas the Most Christian King is simple, open, and most liberal, and quite ready to defer to the judgment and opinion of his counselors, the Emperor is very reserved, and tenacious of his own mind, and is hard in his opinions, governing more by himself than by any other. And so in all other things they are so contrary in nature, that the King himself said one day to the Most Excellent Ambassador Capello and to me, speaking on the matter of the truces, that he believed Caesar studied to be his complete opposite; because if he said that he wanted peace, Caesar would reply that he could not make it, but that he would make some settlement; and if he spoke of a settlement, he was answered that truces were better; so that they could never meet of one will. Whence one might conclude that, due to the different spirits and contrary natures of these two majesties, it is hard to believe that they will ever come to an agreement.

It would be necessary, therefore, that with judgment they should see how much advantage both would derive from the union they might have together. Which judgment, just as I believe it to be great in each of them, so it is manifestly seen that it is spoiled and blinded entirely by the offenses that have occurred between their majesties, by the cruel hatreds, and by the passions, that do not let them see their own good. For leaving aside all the other offenses, the capture of the Most Christian King¹¹, the hostage of his sons, the capitulation of Madrid, the enterprise against France which was attempted two years ago by the Emperor, and lastly the opinion of the poison of the Most Serene Dauphin, from which infinite hatreds have been born¹²; which have so altered the spirit of His Most Christian Majesty, that he never speaks of any of such things without becoming all heated with passion, and with the ardor to avenge himself one day. And then the suspicion and envy that the one has for the other, lest he see the other become greater and more powerful, causes that, the Emperor knowing that the Most Christian King seeks with all his effort and ingenuity to reduce all of France under a single head, and that for this reason he is so fixated on the state of Milan (because by giving this to the Lord of Orléans¹³, he comes to place Brittany in the crown, which by obligation of dowry, the Most Christian King, having more than one son, he ought to give to the second son; and the peoples of that province with difficulty serve the crown, as they would wish to have a lord of their own; and this would bring the brothers into agreement and establish a foundation in Italy with the aforesaid state of Milan, which would be formidable to all), His Imperial Majesty seeks to disrupt these designs by refusing to give him said state; or, if he does give it, he seeks to have him leave Burgundy to Bourbon, which is like a ladder to pass from his own states and harass him in the Kingdom of France.¹⁴ On the other hand, the King, seeing how great the said Emperor has become, tries to secure himself on all sides; nor does he wish to relinquish anything he holds in Flanders, or in Piedmont, unless the Emperor gives him Milan, both to make himself equal in strength to the Emperor, and because any little thing he might relinquish would seem to him to add to the greatness of his enemy. The passions between them, therefore, do not let them see how much good it would do their Majesties to be united and at peace together, and what a benefit they would bring to Christendom if they jointly sought to relieve it from so much damage and misery that their discords and wars have brought upon it.

There remains the third part, which is fortune, or true necessity, which many times does what neither judgment nor nature have been able to do; as it did in the capture of the King, when that forced peace followed with the capitulation of Madrid, then the other of the accord of Cambrai, and at present the truces of Piedmont, which, both because of the necessity that the Imperials had, and because of the famine and need of all things that was in the camp of the Most Christian King, the said majesties were constrained to conclude.¹⁵ But to make a peace or composition at present between both of them, it is not seen that one or the other of these lords is necessitated to make it at a disadvantage. Because, leaving aside the Emperor with his fortune, the forces of the Most Christian King are now very united and very great. His Majesty has all of France from the Ocean sea to the Pyrenees, and to the Mediterranean sea; and furthermore all of Savoy, which is beyond the mountains; and also the greater part of Piedmont in his power and free dominion. In which [France] (as Your Most Excellent Lordships know), His Majesty appoints twelve governors, because it is divided into twelve provinces, from which he draws every year of ordinary revenue, between tailles, subsidies, the fourth on wines, salt, domain, gabelles, venal offices, and other minor revenues, the sum of fifteen million seven hundred fifty thousand francs, which is a little less than three million in gold. And although his majesty, in ordinary expenses for pensions to the Swiss, to England, to the German chiefs, and to the officials of justice of his entire kingdom, in guards for the castles, in the navy of the Levant and the West, in gifts, and expenses for ambassadors, in artillery, in hunts, in keeping a table, in household expenses, and in other unforeseen cases, and finally in two thousand five hundred lances which he continuously keeps paid, spends all the revenue or a little less; and although also in the enterprise which the emperor undertook against France, His Most Christian Majesty (according to the common voice of all that kingdom) spent more than three and a half million in gold, a good part of which he happened to have on hand, nevertheless the extraordinary mean that are always open to His Majesty are so great and of such a kind that whether with tailles or with gifts or with subsidies or with loans from the clergy (which is very rich in France, as is known to everyone), he always draws from them as much as he needs. So that for lack of money, it should not be believed that His Majesty would be forced to accept conditions of peace that do not seem to him useful and honest.

Nor should it be believed that, for fear that the Emperor might move war against him in France from the direction of Picardy or elsewhere, or indeed that the Most Serene King of England might be set upon him (who at other times has taken France from him and given him much to do), he would make the said peace. Because, besides the Flemings making war on France unwillingly, with whom they lose their commerce and consume their revenues, the Most Christian King keeps his frontiers of Picardy as well fortified as His Caesarean Majesty keeps his of Flanders, so that, from that quarter, there is not much advantage. From this side of Piedmont and Provence, the test that the Emperor made two years ago has indeed demonstrated clearly to all how hard and difficult is the passage. Then concerning the Most Serene King of England, His Majesty has no reason to fear him, because the English never crossed into France without the help and support of the Dukes of Brittany, or of some other prince of France, who are now gone, and all now reduced to the crown. There is, besides this, the close union and kinship that the Most Christian king has with the King of Scotland, which would always recall the King of England with war, and would disturb his designs, as it has done at other times, when he was not obliged to do so. To this is added the ancient constitution of France, which is that all the gentlemen of the kingdom never contribute to any tax or expense to be made by the Most Christian King, except when France is assaulted by war; in which case they are obliged to pay the entire expense made for the defense for three months. Whence it can be concluded that the Kingdom of France, reduced, as it is at present, to the obedience of a single head, is rather to be feared by everyone, than that it should have to fear the forces of others.

From all the aforementioned things (founded upon what I have come to know at the court of France, and upon my own weak and small judgment) although it may perhaps seem to Your Serenity and to Your Most Excellent Lordships that no hope remains for the need of Christendom, that these two princes might come to an agreement with a universal peace (which, if it were to succeed, one would have to say Domino factum est istud, et est mirabile in oculis nostris¹⁶, as the King himself said when he heard that His Caesarean Majesty had said he wished to give him the state of Milan, and make peace completely) nevertheless the necessity of the present times, and the good nature of His Most Christian Majesty, who feels with the utmost displeasure the damages and the ruin of the Christians, and then the persuasions of the Most Illustrious Constable¹⁷ (who just as he can do all with His Majesty, and just as he moves and governs that entire kingdom, alone, as it pleases him, nor wants any companion, so he knows that with peace he can be preserved in this his greatness, because peace is equally desired by all, both great and small, in France, who are now weary of the expenses and the toils of war, contrary to the nature of the French); and also the dexterity that His Holiness the Pontiff may perhaps presently be able to employ with the very persons of their majesties;¹⁸ and finally that light which is to be hoped that our Lord God will send before their eyes to show them the path to the preservation of his faith, will bring it about that even if universal peace should not succeed, at least some accord or composition may be made. For, the Most Christian King having, with the truces of Piedmont, and with the negotiation of peace, lost much favor that he could hope for from the Turk and from the Most Serene King of England (both of whom have most manifestly understood that His Most Christian Majesty would make an agreement with the Emperor even to their detriment, if the state of Milan were given to him); and His Majesty seeing that neither the King of England nor the Turk can any longer place any hope in his union, he, knowing himself to be left without these supports, it is to be believed that he will easily proceed to the composition, even with some disadvantage to himself.

And from what the reverend nuncio of the Pontiff told me one day¹⁹, it is certainly to be believed that if the Emperor were to remit some articles of the capitulation of Madrid, which seem too harsh to His Most Christian Majesty, he in all else would trust His Majesty. For, the said nuncio telling him one day that it seemed to him that peace was not succeeding between their majesties because they would not trust one another, wherefore it would be good if the fortresses of Milan were deposited either in the hands of His Holiness the Pontiff or in the hands of this Most Excellent Republic, until the other promises were fulfilled, His Majesty told him that, as His Holiness was too old, and upon dying could ruin any good work that had been started; and as Your Serenity was too powerful in Italy to be entrusted with this state, he wished to trust the Emperor, provided that he relax a few of the conditions he was proposing. And upon my departure from the Court, as I was taking my leave of the Most Reverend Cardinal of Lorraine, who is a most gentle lord and by nature devoted to peace, his most reverend Lordship told me that by means of a secretary of the Emperor, who brought to the Most Christian King the confirmation of the truce, he had sent word to His Caesarean Majesty in his own name, that if he would be content to abandon some of his harshness, he promised it would bring him peace.

To these things are also added two considerations that greatly move the spirit of the Most Christian King to make some accord with the Emperor. The one is, that the Swiss are unwilling to consent that His Majesty, by keeping for himself the state of Savoy, should draw so near to them that they must fear that he in time will want from them many places they hold from the aforesaid state, and the Duchy of Chiabletz (Chablais), in which there are very many lands, such as Lausanne, Thonon, Viviano (Vevey), Cologny, Geneva, which are places that the Swiss have occupied from Savoy but a short time ago. Nor would it do the King much good to be so near them, because he would either have to endure many injuries that the Swiss always inflict upon their neighbors, or he would have to make war with them, which would be of great harm to him, for he would be deprived of the service of that nation, without which His Majesty can hardly undertake any enterprise—having especially found the legionaries of France, once instituted with so great a name, not to succeed in that kingdom, both for being peasants born and raised in continual servitude, and without ever having seen, let alone used, arms, and because from them arose what must needs arise from swift changes made from one extreme to the other; for as from extreme servitude, they were at once placed in the license and liberty of arms and of war, they no longer wished to obey their masters, so that the gentlemen of France have complained to the Most Christian King many times, saying to His Majesty, that by giving arms to the peasants, and by making them exempt from the customary taxes, he has caused them little by little to lose their obedience and their privileges, and that in a short time the former will make themselves gentlemen, and they themselves peasants. Wherefore, both for this reason, and because in truth they were not good for any enterprise, the said legionaries are every day diminishing; and His Majesty, deprived of his own arms, is forced to have recourse to foreign and mercenary soldiers, among whom the Swiss, through so many experiences of times past, are always the most certain and best company he has.

The other consideration is the Holy League, decided by Your Serenity against the Turk²⁰, which has given you in the Court of France so much reputation and such a name, that, if our Lord God gives you equal fortune (as is to be hoped), there never was a prince or republic in the world more glorious than this one. And in truth, Most Serene Prince, when, after the dissolution of the convention at Narbonne, the news came to this court that Your Serenity had refused the peace with the Turk, and had decided on war with the League (because the opinion of the wise and good government of Your Most Excellent Lordships is, as much as it can be, held in great repute in that court), it seemed that everyone turned their eyes towards the Most Christian King, and said that as much praise as should be given to Your Serenity for such a thing, so much blame should fall upon His Majesty, if with his name and his forces he did not aid so fine an enterprise. So that, both the most illustrious Constable and the King himself, when we then communicated the news to them, were taken aback, and were almost ashamed to say that they could not join with Your Most Excellent Lordships, because they could not come to an agreement with the Emperor. Whence it is to be believed that His Most Christian Majesty, seeing that during the time this Holy League will be occupied in making war on the Turk, if he were to trouble His Caesarean Majesty either in Italy or elsewhere (which would be to recall him from the said enterprise), it might happen that he would perhaps bring this League down upon himself, but he would certainly incur the hatred of the Supreme Pontiff and of this Most Excellent Republic, and finally of all princes and good Christians; and that, if any harm were to befall the aforesaid League, the whole world would believe that he is not worthy of the name he bears of Most Christian King, by giving the infidels the occasion and means to strike and ruin the Christians; and His Majesty, also seeing that if the League, with divine aid, were to obtain victory, the Emperor would become much greater than he is at present (who, being very powerful and victorious, would thus be greatly held in account by His Majesty, were he not at peace or in a truce with him), for all these reasons, and for many others besides which are very well understood by Your Most Wise Lordships, it is to be hoped, or rather to be certainly believed, that some agreement must be made between these two lords, which, although it might augment the states and forces of both, would nevertheless be nothing but useful and good for the present need of Your Most Excellent Lordships. Because on this occasion, and with your customary most wise provisions, and much more with the arm of our Lord God (who is the one who has ruled and governed this republic until now), you would be freed from the continual scourges that the infidels have inflicted and do inflict upon you at all times.

But should this accord not succeed, I can affirm to Your Serenity and to Your Most Excellent Lordships (I say affirm because I know it for certain), that the Most Christian King, for the same respects that I have stated above, will content himself with a truce of one year, or of whatever more shall please His Caesarean Majesty. Who, although he knows that it is to his benefit for the Most Christian King to remain at expense at the same time that he himself is at the expense of the war with the Turk, nevertheless, His Caesarean Majesty wishing to attend to this enterprise with a secure mind, and with all his forces united, I believe that he cannot nor should deny the Most Christian King to make it, being especially solicited by His Holiness the Pontiff and by Your Highness, for the common benefit of said League. Whence my conclusion is that if the Emperor does not stand firm in the confirmation of the capitulation of Madrid, peace could easily come to pass. But should he stand firm, the King will not fail to make some accord with some part of the state of Savoy. Then, should this accord not be made in this parley in Provence, certainly the King himself will make a truce for as long as it shall please the Emperor, and will not disturb the enterprise begun against the Turk.

I truly, Most Serene Prince, most grave and most wise Lords, knowing my duty, and the need of Your Serenity for a good peace between these two lords, have striven with all the strength of my small wit to make the Most Christian King be content to overcome, in so worthy a matter, the harsh difficulties that opposed the settlement. And finding His Most Christian Majesty disposed in the manner that, through letters from the most distinguished Capello and myself, Your Most Excellent Lordships have several times understood; I have also not failed in every suitable office with the Most Serene Queen of Navarre, with the Most Serene Dauphin (who, however, is not of great vivacity or aptitude for affairs), and with the Most Reverend Cardinal de Tournon (who is of the Grand Council, and of great repute), with the Lord Chancellor, and then with the Most Reverend Cardinal of Lorraine, with the Most Illustrious Lord Constable (who is the one that, as I have said above, manages all the affairs of that kingdom), and finally with Monseigneur d’Orléans, who, with peace, expects to be Duke of Milan—and he is well worthy of it for his virtues, because he is all activity, graceful, and gives great hope of becoming an excellent and valiant lord.

But how much my service has satisfied Your Serenity and Your Most Excellent Lordships, I cannot know, except by mirroring myself in my own conscience, and in the grace and benignity of Your Most Excellent Lordships. Because the latter consoles me that I have not lacked, in such a business, that desire and that diligence which every good citizen must have and use, as much as he knows and can, for the benefit of his lords; the former gives me hope that if I had failed in anything through my little prudence or little knowledge, they, pardoning me this, will accept a spirit full of good will, and of ardent devotion towards them.

1. The first hostilities of the Turks, emboldened to new undertakings by seeing Charles V engaged in war with France, had been precisely against the Venetian possessions in the Ionian Sea and Dalmatia.

2. Pope Paul III, 1534-1549

3. In January 1538

4. Almost nothing remained to the Duke but Nice.

5. As in fulfillment of the related Article 2 of the Treaty of Madrid.

6. The kings of France claimed, for ancient and intricate reasons, the right of vassalage over this duchy and other places in Flanders; and Francis I, in January of 1537, perhaps believing he would triumph over his rival, in a solemn session of the parliament which he personally presided over, had Charles V cited by the royal advocate as guilty of felony for having, as Count of Flanders, declared war on his lord, and consequently declared him forfeit of the possession of those dominions, and these devolved by legitimate right to the crown of France. Well said he who named Francis “le roi fanfaron.”

7. It had been confiscated for the rebellion of the constable.

8. It is perhaps superfluous for us to repeat here that the claims of the Valois over Naples were founded on the supposed inheritance of the rights of the house of Anjou.

9. The Schmalkaldic League

10. Margaret his sister, known as a woman of great intellect.

11. After the Battle of Pavia, 1525

12. “Concerning the death of the dauphin, which occurred on August 10 of the year 1536, it has been much and variously discussed, although the circumstances that accompanied it « seem to us of a nature to exclude any arcane and extravagant supposition. The prince, a youth of delicate constitution, one day dripping with sweat from immoderate exercise of the ball, wished to drink some ice-cold water, which caused him an immediate inflammation of the chest, that in four days led him to the sepulchre. But through a suspicion natural to those times, the idea of poison prevailed, and Count Sebastiano Montecuccoli, his cupbearer, was accused of having administered it to him on that occasion. To discover the truth, the unfortunate man was put to torture, under the torments of which he asserted what the prosecutors were suggesting to him. He thus confessed to having been bought by Antonio di Leyva, general of Charles V, as well as instigated by the same Emperor to poison not only the Dauphin, but the King himself with all his family; the consequence of which deposition was a decree of October 7 of that same year which condemned Montecuccoli to be quartered alive by the hand of the executioner.” (Albèri, Life of Catherine de’ Medici, Period II.) Later on, Francis himself then showed that that supposition should not be held as acceptable.

13. The Duke of Orléans of whom he speaks in this place is no longer the second-born son of Francis I, that is, the husband of Catherine de’ Medici, but rather the third-born, to which rank the death of the Dauphin, indicated a little above, had brought them.

14. Charles V perhaps believed, due to the affair of the Constable, that he could expect the favor of the entire Bourbon family.

15. Alludes to the truce of Monzón, from the town of this name in Aragon, where it was established on November 16, 1537, for three months, and relating only to the armies of Piedmont, because for those of Flanders an equal one had already been signed at Bomy. Said truce was extended for a few more months at the aforementioned meeting of Leucate, until the solemn conclusion of Nice was reached.

16. “This was done by the Lord, and it is marvelous in your eyes”

17. Anne de Montmorency, created constable, as we have said elsewhere, on February 19, 1538. “He was the one in whose virtue, prudence, counsel and diligence, among all others, for the handling of his affairs, the king had more faith and hope.” (Du Bellay, B. VII).

18. Paul III had already made it known that he wished to come to the meeting which took place in Nice in the spring of 1538.

19. Cardinal Agostino Trivulzio.

20. If Giustiniani intends here to give Venice credit for the initial motion for the league of 1537 against the Turk, he is not sincere. The first and keenest promoter of it was Paul III from the very first days of his pontificate, who had, to this end, worked so hard to bring about peace between Charles V and the King of France. Indeed, according to the testimony of the Venetian Paruta himself, the Republic remained hesitant for some time, until, newly urged by the Emperor’s ambassadors, it joined the League; and the League was concluded in Rome between these three potentates at the end of 1535. Its articles may be read in Paruta, in the eighth book of the first part.