READING HALL

THE DOORS OF WISDOM

A HISTORY OF MODERN EUROPE : A.D. 1453-1900

CHAPTER IV.

AFFAIRS OF ITALY. SPANISH HISTORY DOWN TO THE CONQUEST OF GRANADA. AFFAIRS OF HUNGARY, THE HOUSE OF AUSTRIA TILL 1492

No sooner was Pope Sixtus IV delivered from the apprehensions inspired by the presence of the Turks in Italy, than he determined to recommence the prosecution of his ambitious designs for the aggrandizement of his nephew, the Count of Imola. In order to provide funds for his extraordinary expenses he monopolized the sale of wheat in the States of the Church; he rendered venal all the offices of the Apostolic Court, and openly advertised them for sale, with the prices affixed; nay, he even sold, though rather more secretly, a good many benefices, and some Cardinals’ hats.

He established colleges, the offices in which were sold for 200 or 300 ducats a-piece. Some of these bore the most singular titles, as for instance, the “College of a hundred Janissaries”. He intrigued with the Venetians in order to rob Ercole d'Este, Duke of Ferrara, of his dominions, and to divide them between Venice and his nephew; and war was declared against the Duke in May, 1482. Hereupon the King of Naples, the Duke of Milan, and the Florentines, who had in vain endeavored to dissuade the Pope from this step, recalled their ambassadors from Rome, and declared in favor of the Duke of Ferrara.

The Venetians took Rovigo with its Polesine (the islands formed by some river on the north east of Italy) together with several other Ferrarese towns, and were approaching Ferrara itself, when they were suddenly deserted by their ally. This conduct of the Pope was partly occasioned by the altered views of his nephew, who had been gained over by the magnificent promises of the Courts of Spain and Naples, and partly by his own apprehensions respecting the good faith of the Venetians, whom he suspected of a design to retain Ferrara for themselves. Through the mediation of Ferdinand of Aragon a peace was concluded towards the end of the year between the Pope and the Duke of Ferrara’s allies, and thus at the beginning of 1483 nearly all Italy was arrayed against Venice. The Duke of Calabria was now enabled to relieve Ferrara by passing with his army through the Papal territories; and the Pope, as the Venetians would not listen to his exhortations to lay down their arms, did not scruple to excommunicate them for pursuing the very same course in which he had before encouraged and assisted them. But the Venetians, unlike the Florentines, disregarded these censures, and appealed from the Pope to a future Council, before which Sixtus was summoned to appear by the Patriarch of Aquileia; they forbade their clergy even to open the Papal bulls, and punished such ecclesiastics as refused to perform divine service.

The attention of Sixtus and his nephew was distracted by dis­turbances in the Papal States, while a misunderstanding between Ludovico il Moro and the Duke of Calabria enabled the Venetians to detach Milan from the league. Their fleet took several Neapolitan towns, and even laid siege to Taranto; and at length, in spite of all the efforts of Sixtus to prevent it, they succeeded in effecting a peace at Bagnolo (August 7th, 1484) with all the belligerents, except the Pope himself and Ferdinand of Naples, and all northern Italy was thus reduced to tranquility. The Venetians were the only gainers by this treaty, which secured to them Rovigo and its Polesine.

Sixtus IV died a few days after, it is said of vexation that nothing had been done for his nephew and for the maintenance of the Papal authority. This successor of St. Peter took a pleasure in beholding the mortal duels of his guards, for which he himself sometimes gave the signal. He was succeeded by Cardinal Gian Battista Cibò, a Genoese, who assumed the title of Innocent VIII. Innocent was a weak man, without any decided principle. He had seven children, whom he formally acknowledged; he did not seek to advance them so shamelessly as Sixtus had advanced his nephews, yet he endeavored to procure some advantages for his family from the disturbances which broke out about this time at Naples. Alfonso, the heir to the throne, who was universally hated for his luxury and pride, had persuaded his father to impose new burdens on the nobles; whereupon the barons revolted, and appealed to the Pope as Lord-paramount. Innocent accepted the appeal, demanded the tribute formerly payable by the Crown of Naples, instead of the palfrey with which his predecessor had been content, and cited King Ferdinand to appear at Rome. 

A war now broke out between Rome and Naples, in which the Venetians and Genoese supported the Pope, while Florence and Milan joined Ferdinand. But the Duke of Calabria carried his arms to the walls of Rome and shut up Innocent in his capital, who, in these straits, was glad to accept the mediation of Ferdinand of Aragon, Lorenzo de' Medici, and other potentates. The King of Naples was desirous of peace in order to put down his rebellious barons, and he therefore listened to the conditions proposed, with the secret determination not to observe them. A peace was patched up August 12th, 1486, after which Ferdinand began to take vengeance on his nobles, whom he had engaged to spare; and most of them became his victims, except the Prince of Salerno and the sons of the Prince of Bisignano, who escaped to the Court of France.

Ferdinand also neglected to fulfill the conditions which he had stipulated with the Pope: the latter for some time contented himself with remonstrating, till in 1489 he formally excommunicated the Neapolitan King and deprived him of his realm. Ferdinand appealed to a Council, and preparations for war were made on both sides; but Innocent proceeded no further, and Lorenzo de' Medici, who was the friend of both parties, mediated between them. Lorenzo, who had experienced much inconvenience from the enmity of the late Pope, had courted the friendship of Innocent, whose son Franceschetto Cibò was given in marriage to Lorenzo’s daughter Maddalena; and the Pope in 1488 bestowed a Cardinal’s hat on Lorenzo’s son John, afterwards the celebrated Pope Leo X. But as John was then only twelve, the investiture was deferred till 1492.

During the intervening years Italy was in the enjoyment of peace, for which she was in a great degree indebted to the policy of Lorenzo, whose connection with the Pope had established his power on new foundations. In foreign affairs he used it with justice and moderation. He had become as it were the balance point of the Italian States; and as he repressed the jealousies and aggressions of the petty but ambitious Princes by whom he was surrounded, so likewise he himself abstained from any attempt to extend the Florentine dominion at the expense of his neighbors. He was much respected by several foreign Sovereigns, with whom he corresponded on affairs of state, and especially Louis XI was his particular friend. With Matthias Corvinus he maintained a correspondence, chiefly on literary subjects. But with regard to domestic affairs, his conduct was not so commendable. He aimed at making himself the absolute tyrant of the State. This view was aided by the conspiracy of the Pazzi, which, as is often the case with unsuccessful attempts of that kind; served to strengthen his power by binding old friends closer to him and procuring for him new ones. He reduced the government to a small number, entirely dependent on himself. Democracy is often the best ally of tyranny, and Lorenzo’s plans were aided by the Florentine populace, which suffered not from his oppressions; and as the means of life were abundant, they were pleased with the splendor of the Medici, which seemed to reflect itself on the city. It was chiefly the higher and richer class that suffered, as well in their pecuniary affairs as in their domestic life. Lorenzo’s power enabled him to interfere in their private affairs. He did not like that any citizen should grow too rich, or court popularity by fetes and banquets; and he prevented marriages between the higher families which might have a political tendency and threaten his power. The lofty and ambitious views of Lorenzo led him to neglect trade, while at the same time his expenditure was profuse. Hence enormous losses and deficiencies, which he supplied by laying his hands on the public money.

Cosmo had first mixed up his private affairs with the Monte, or book of the public debt; but his business flourished, and he sometimes aided the State with his own money. Lorenzo not only used the funds of the Monte del debito but also those of the Monte delle Doti—an institution erected to supply marriage portions—and thus prevented the marriage of many young women. In 1490 a sort of national bankruptcy ensued. The interest of the public debt was reduced from three to one and a half per cent, many religious foundations were suppressed, and the coin was debased in order to rescue the bank of the Medici from ruin. In 1492, Lorenzo, who though still in the prime of life was subject to ill health, began to think of retiring from public affairs; but whilst he was meditating this scheme a more violent access of his disorder, which seems to have been unskillfully treated by his physicians, carried him off at his villa at Careggi, April 8th, in the forty-fourth year of his age. He had a versatile and vivacious genius and considerable learning. He wrote at once religious poems and songs for the carnival; courted the society of priests and monks, and was at the same time involved in amours. From his devotion to art and literature, his house became a sort of museum or studio, frequented by Politian, Ficino, Pico della Mirandola, Luigi Pulci, Michelangelo, and other eminent men. With the genius of an artist he had the soul of a prince, and was the last great man of an era which was drawing towards its close. For these reasons posterity has preserved for him the title of “Magnifico”, which, however, in his time was a common one for all above a private station. It is these qualities which still form his chief claim to our admiration; for as a ruler he destroyed the liberties of his country.

Peter, the eldest of Lorenzo’s three sons, succeeded to his father’s power at the age of twenty-one. His tall, strong, and active frame qualified him for those robust exercises in which he delighted, and in which his pride chiefly lay. Under the tutorship of Politian he had made such advances in classical learning as his faculties permitted; he had a good address, a facile elocution, an harmonious voice, and the gift of poetical improvisation, so common among the Italians, and rendered so easy by their language. But his understanding was weak; he was proud and overbearing, and could brook no opposition. He applied himself but little to public business, though he pretended that the State should blindly follow his directions.

ACCESSION OF POPE ALEXANDER VI. 

Pope Innocent VIII did not long survive his friend and ally Lorenzo. He died July 2oth, 1492—a Pontiff who, if not distinguished by eminent ability or virtue, was at least exempt from the blind nepotism and the atrocious crimes by which some of his predecessors and followers were characterized. The great defect of his administration was want of vigor. If he did not commit crime himself he tolerated it in others, and under his reign Rome became a scene of robbery, violation, and murder. According to the contemporary Journal of Stefano Infessura, Innocent endeavored to prolong his days by transfusion of blood, and three boys who had been used for that purpose died under the operation.

Pope Innocent VIII was succeeded by the atrocious Cardinal Rodrigo Borgia, a Spaniard of Valencia, where he had at one time exercised the profession of an advocate. After his election he assumed the name of Alexander VI. Of twenty Cardinals who entered the Conclave, he is said to have bought the suffrages of all but five; and Cardinal Ascanio Sforza, whom he feared as a rival, was propitiated with an enormous bribe. Alexander’s election was the signal for flight to those Cardinals who had opposed it. Giuliano della Rovere, the future Pope Julius II, retired to his bishopric of Ostia, where he fortified himself for a siege; and afterwards, by way of greater security, he proceeded into France, while the youthful Cardinal Giovanni de’ Medici, then only in his seventeenth year, retired to Florence. Pope Alexander had by the celebrated Vannozza, the wife of a Roman citizen, three sons: John, whom he made Duke of Gandia, in Spain; Caesar, and Geoffrey; and one daughter, Lucretia, whose morals would have better entitled her to the name of Messalina.

Italy, which now seemed so peaceable, prosperous, and happy, was on the eve of becoming the scene of those foreign invasions which long deluged her fields with blood, and ended by placing some of her most fertile provinces under transmontane domination. The Prince whose counsels brought this misfortune on his country became deservedly one of the chief sufferers by them. The marriage which had been long arranged between Gian Galeazzo, the young Duke of Milan, and Isabella of Aragon, daughter of Alfonso, Duke of Calabria, took place in 1489. As Gian Galeazzo Sforza, though now arrived at the age of manhood, was of so weak a capacity as to be totally incapable of governing, his uncle, Ludovico, continued to engross all the power of the State; nay, according to the testimony of a contemporary historian, he scarcely allowed the young Duke and his consort the necessaries of their station. But Isabella, a woman of spirit and ambition, though aware of her husband’s incapacity, considered herself at least entitled to rule in his place; and she complained of the bondage in which he was held to her father, Alfonso. The latter persuaded King Ferdinand to send an embassy to Milan to remonstrate with Ludovico, who, alarmed at the hostility which he foresaw from Alfonso after he should have succeeded to the throne of Naples, an event which might be soon expected, as well as at a league entered into between Ferdinand and Peter de’ Medici, began to concert measures of defense. With this view he arranged an alliance with Pope Alexander, through his brother Cardinal Ascanio Sforza, the Roman Vice-Chancellor, which the Venetians were also induced to join (April 21st, 1493). In the same year the Pope married his daughter, Lucretia Borgia, to Giovanni Sforza, Lord of Pesaro.

Ludovico also treated with Maximilian, who succeeded his father Frederic III in August, to procure for himself the title of Duke of Milan, to the exclusion of his nephew, Gian Galeazzo; and to draw the bonds of connection closer, he concluded a marriage between Maximilian and Bianca, sister of Gian Galeazzo, which was celebrated at Milan, December 1st. But not content with these precautions, Ludovico dispatched, in 1493, an embassy to Charles VIII of France, exhorting him to claim the Crown of Naples, and assuring him of success in such an enterprise through the support of Milan, Venice, and the Pope; and Alexander VI is said to have joined in soliciting Charles to attack King Ferdinand. The French monarch was easily persuaded to revive the pretensions of the House of Anjou; but before we relate the results of his expedition we must bring down to the same period the histories of Spain and Germany, which countries bore no inconsiderable part in the events which ensued.

SPANISH HISTORY RESUMED

Henry IV, of Castile, commonly called the Impotent, was if possible, still weaker than his father, and was governed as absolutely by Don Juan Pacheco, Marquis of Villena, as John II had been by Alvaro de Luna. After divorcing his first wife, Blanche of Navarre, by whom he had no children, Henry espoused, in 1455, Joanna, sister of Alfonso V of Portugal, a young, handsome, and lively princess, but who, like her husband, has incurred the charge of shameless profligacy. No issue appeared from this marriage till 1462, when Joanna was delivered of a daughter, of whom Beltran de la Cueva, Joanna’s reputed paramour, was very generally thought to be the father. So strong was the belief in the illegitimacy of the babe, who obtained the name of La Beltraneja, from her putative father, that the nobles who had banded together for the redress of grievances, refused the oath of fealty which Henry required them to take to her, as heir presumptive, and demanded that Henry’s half-brother, Alfonso, should be acknowledged as successor to the throne, and committed for safe keeping into their hands.

The King complied with this demand, but on condition of Alfonso’s future marriage with the child, whom he regarded as his own daughter. Henry also named a committee of five nobles for the reform of abuses; but they carried their plans so far that Henry was persuaded to disavow their acts. Hereupon the nobles proceeded to depose their Sovereign, after the theatrical fashion described by Spanish historians. An image of the King, clothed in his robes of state, and seated on a throne, was placed on a lofty scaffold erected near the town of Avila: the figure was publicly arraigned from a written manifesto, and as each article was read, was despoiled of some part of its paraphernalia. The Archbishop of Toledo tore the crown from its brow; the Marquis of Villena, so lately the King's chief favorite, wrested the scepter from its hand; the Count of Placencia snatched the sword of justice from its side, and the image was at last hurled headlong from the throne. Don Alfonso was then installed in the vacant seat, and received the homage of the assembled nobles (1465).

The majority of the nation, however, and even some of the nobles, disapproved of this act and sided with the King. For a while Henry and Alfonso both maintained their respective Courts, and exercised all the functions of royalty; till after a few years a furious civil war which had ensued was checked by the sudden death of Alfonso, at the early age of fifteen (July 5, 1468). His party now proclaimed his sister Isabella, Queen of Castile; but as she steadily refused to accept that title so long as her brother Henry lived, it became necessary to effect an accommodation. Henry consented without much difficulty to grant a general amnesty; to send back to Portugal his Queen Joanna, whose unchastity was notorious; and to confer on Isabella the Principality of the Asturias, the appanage which gave title to the heir apparent of the monarchy. At an interview between Henry and Isabella at Toros do Guisando in New Castile, September 9th, 1468, the King solemnly recognized his sister as his successor, and the nobles tendered to her the oath of allegiance. The splendid prospect now opened to Isabella naturally attracted to her numerous suitors; among whom are mentioned a brother of Edward IV of England, probably Richard, Duke of Gloucester; the Duke of Guienne, brother of Louis XI of France; and her own kinsman Ferdinand, son of John II of Aragon and Navarre. The addresses of the last were viewed with most favor by Isabella, as well from the political advantages of such a match, as from the personal qualities of Ferdinand, who was then in the flower of his age. But to some of the nobles, and especially to the Marquis of Villena, who had now rejoined Henry IV and regained his former influence, a union of the Crowns of Castile and Aragon was regarded with aversion; and they entered into the views of their weak monarch, who was still bent on the succession of his reputed daughter Joanna. In order to defeat the projected marriage between Ferdinand and Isabella, King Alfonso of Portugal was invited to demand Isabella’s hand; but her refusal was supported by the sentiment of the nation, and the attempt only urged Isabella and her adherents to hasten on the marriage with Ferdinand,—an event ardently desired by John II, who with the view of rendering his son more worthy of Isabella’s hand, had already made him King of Sicily and associated him with himself in the government of Aragon. On January 7th, 1469, a marriage contract was concluded, by which Ferdinand, in order to conciliate the Castilians, relinquished to his consort all the more essential rights of Castilian sovereignty. But Ferdinand was obliged to seek his betrothed under circumstances of considerable danger. His father being engaged in a war with the revolted Catalans, headed by John of Anjou, could not spare an adequate force to escort Ferdinand into Castile, who therefore resolved to proceed thither in disguise. With six attendants, who assumed the character of commercial travelers, he threaded his way through a country patrolled by the Castilian cavalry, and studded with castles belonging to the opposite faction; having, for better concealment, assumed the disguise of a servant, and performing at the inns all the menial offices attaching to that character. After various adventures he arrived in safety at Dueñas in Leon, October 9th, and a few days after had an interview with Isabella. His future bride was in the neighboring city of Valladolid, whither she had been carried by the Archbishop of Toledo, in order to protect her from a plan formed by Villena to seize her at her residence at Madrigal. The marriage was performed on the 19th of October; and these joint heirs of Spanish monarchies were so poor as to be obliged to borrow money in order to defray the expenses of its celebration.

Ferdinand was now in his eighteenth year. His complexion was fair, his eye vivacious, his forehead lofty and ample; while his muscular and well-knit limbs were developed and invigorated by the sports and warlike exercises in which he delighted. His address was courteous, and his fluent words, uttered in a somewhat shrill and treble voice, might indicate to a shrewd observer a character afterwards noted for perfidy and dissimulation. Isabella was a year older than her husband. She too was fair; her auburn locks inclined to red, and her lustrous blue eyes expressed both feeling and intellect. In stature she exceeded the average of her sex. Her demeanor was dignified and reserved, and her taste had led her to cultivate literature, of which we find no trace in Ferdinand.

HISTORY OF DON CARLOS. 

The Prince who thus ultimately united the whole of Spain under one head had, originally and by birth, no prospect of so brilliant a fortune. He was born March 10th, 1452, and was the offspring of John II of Aragon and Navarre by his second wife, Joanna Henriquez, daughter of the Admiral of Castile and of the royal blood of that Kingdom. John, who was then only King of Navarre and Viceroy of Aragon for his brother Alfonso, had three children by his former wife, Blanche, daughter of Charles III of Navarre and widow of Martin I, King of Sicily; namely, Don Carlos, who, as heir apparent of Navarre, bore the title of Prince of Viana, and two daughters, Blanche and Eleanor.

Don Carlos is known by his virtues and his misfortunes. At the death of his mother Blanche he should have succeeded to the throne of Navarre; but John was by no means disposed to relinquish the title which he had acquired by marriage, and Carlos consented to be his father’s Viceroy. But even this dignity he was not permitted to enjoy unmolested. John having sent his Queen Joanna into Navarre to share the government with her stepson, Carlos, a civil war ensued; Carlos was supported by the faction called the Beaumonts, Joanna by that of the Agramonts. John hastened to the assistance of his consort, and defeated and captured his son near Aybar. After a captivity of some months the voice of public opinion rather than his own paternal feelings compelled John to reinstate Don Carlos in Navarre; but that Prince, to avoid encountering the factions which prevailed there, took refuge at the Court of his uncle Alfonso, King of the Sicilies and Aragon, and after the death of that monarch in 1458 retired into Sicily, where, in a secluded convent near Messina, he devoted himself to a life of study. But his father John, who by the death of Alfonso had now become King of Aragon, jealous of his son’s popularity with the Sicilians, lured him back to Spain with the fairest promises. John soon threw off the mask. Carlos having listened to the overtures of Henry IV of Castile for a marriage with his sister Isabella, John and his consort hastened to prevent an act which would have defeated their darling project in favor of their son Ferdinand. Carlos received an invitation to Lerida, and having unthinkingly accepted it, was arrested and confined in the mountain fortress of Morella, on the borders of Valencia. But the Catalans, by whom Carlos was as much loved as John II and his consort were hated and suspected, flew to arms; the insurrection spread to Aragon itself, and John found himself com­pelled to release his son, who, proceeding to Barcelona, was received by the people with joyful and triumphant acclamations. The Catalans now insisted that John should recognize Don Carlos as his heir, and make him Prince of Catalonia for life. But when fortune seemed at last weary of persecuting this excellent Prince, he was carried off by a fever, September 23rd, 1401, in the forty-first year of his age. Strong suspicions were entertained that his death was caused by a lingering poison administered to him by order of his stepmother, during his captivity. Don Carlos was highly accomplished. He was an artist, a musician, and a poet; but philosophy and history were his favorite studies, and his progress in them is displayed by a translation of Aristotle’s Ethics, published at Saragossa in 1509, and by a chronicle of Navarre from the earliest period to his own time, which still exists in manuscript. In Catalonia ho was regarded as a saint and martyr; for centuries miracles were said to be performed at his tomb, and a touch of his amputated arm was deemed capable of healing diseases. By the death of Don Carlos the succession to the Crown of Navarre devolved to his sister Blanche, the divorced wife of Henry IV of Castile; and that amiable lady now became an object of jealousy not only to her father but also to her younger sister, Eleanor, married to Gaston IV, Count of Foix, to whom John II had promised the reversion of Navarre after his own death. Gaston de Foix, the offspring of this union, had married a sister of Louis XI and it had been provided in a treaty between the French King and John II, that in order to secure the succession of the House of Foix to Navarre, Blanche should be delivered into the custody of her sister. John executed this stipulation without remorse. Blanche was brought to the Castle of Orthez in Béarn (April, 1462), where, after a confinement of nearly two years, she was poisoned by her sister Eleanor.

REVOLT OF THE CATALANS. 

Immediately after the death of Carlos, John II caused the Aragonese to take the oath of allegiance to his son Ferdinand, as heir apparent; and he was brought to Barcelona by his mother in order to receive the same homage from the Catalans. But though that object was effected, the Catalans soon after displayed such symptoms of violence and insurrection, that Joanna found it expedient to fly with her son to Gerona, where they were besieged in a church tower in which they had taken shelter. In order to rescue his Queen, John II was obliged to have recourse to Louis XI, who, by treaties effected in May, 1462, engaged to come to his help with a considerable force; but required that the Catalan Counties of Roussillon and Cerdagne should be pledged to him for the expenses of the war. The approach of the French released Joanna from her dangerous situation; but their invasion brought matters to a crisis in the principality. The Catalans, renouncing their allegiance to King John and his son, declared their constitution to be a Republic, of which the Prince was only the first magistrate, elected by the people, and liable to be deposed by them. A civil war ensued which lasted some years. The Catalans elected for their Prince Dom Pedro of Portugal, a descendant of the House of Barcelona; and on his death, in June, 1466, they offered their country to René of Anjou, who by his mother, Yolande, was grandson of John I of Aragon. René delegated the enterprise to his son John, titular Duke of Calabria and Duke of Lorraine, who, with the approbation of Louis XI, entered Catalonia with 8,000 men (1407). A temporary loss of sight prevented the King of Aragon from taking an active part against his enemy, but his place was well supplied by his intrepid consort. John of Anjou, who had been proclaimed Prince at Barcelona, was carried off by a contagious disorder towards the end of 1470, and was interred in the sepulcher of the Princes of Catalonia amid the regrets of the people. The Catalans still continued their resistance, and it was not till 1472 that John II was able to re-enter Barcelona, which had been blockaded by sea and land.

It was during this civil war that Ferdinand effected his marriage with Isabella, as before told. After that event, Henry IV and his consort, in order to exclude Isabella from the throne, solemnly swore to the legitimacy of their daughter Joanna, and secured the assistance of France in her favor. She was affianced, though only in her ninth year, to the Duke of Guienne, the discarded suitor of Isabella. Louis XI readily entered into an arrangement which promised to rid him of his troublesome brother, and it was also approved of by many of the Spanish grandees, especially the Pachecos. The provinces of Biscay, Guipuzcoa, and Andalusia, and in the last the noble house of Medina-Sidonia remained, however, faithful to the cause of Isabella. She and Ferdinand kept their little Court at Dueñas; but so extreme was their poverty that they could hardly defray their ordinary domestic expenses.

Soon after the submission of Barcelona, Ferdinand was summoned from Dueñas to his father’s help. Roussillon and Cerdagne, indignant at the extortions of their new rulers, rose and massacred the greater part of the French garrisons in the principal towns (February, 1470) and revolted to their ancient sovereign John II; Salces, Collioure, and the Castle of Perpignan alone remained in French hands. John threw himself into the town of Perpignan, which was immediately invested by a large army under the Duke of Savoy; and, though it was exposed at once to their fire and to that of the castle, John, now near eighty years old, was constantly observed in the most exposed and dangerous places, armed cap-à-pie and on horseback, encouraging his men by his example and exhortations. The siege had already lasted between two and three months, when Ferdinand suddenly came down from the mountains at the head of a considerable army, which had joined his standard on his way through Aragon. At this unexpected apparition the French fled headlong, burning their tents and abandoning their sick and wounded. An affecting interview ensued between John and his son and deliverer, in presence of both the armies, after which they entered the town in triumph. An arrangement was now made between France and Aragon. Roussillon and Cerdagne were declared neutral, and placed under officers appointed by both Sovereigns, till John should have paid the sum for which they had been pledged; in default of which, within a year from September 17th, 1473, the provinces were to be permanently ceded to France. John having failed to make the stipulated payment, the provinces were seized by Louis XI in 1175, and remained in French possession till the treaty of Barcelona in 1493.

Meanwhile the cause of Isabella was making progress every day in Castile. The propriety and sedateness of her behavior, which formed so great a contrast to the indecorum of her brother’s Court, gained her many adherents, and even Henry IV himself seemed to have pardoned his sister’s marriage. In an interview at Segovia, contrived by the governor of that city (December, 1473), Henry led Isabella’s palfrey through the streets, and welcomed Ferdinand with tokens of goodwill. Henry died December 11th, 1474, without naming his heir, and with him expired the male line of the House of Trastamara. He was the last Prince who ruled Castile as a separate kingdom. His ill qualities as a King proceeded rather from weakness than wickedness; and he was perhaps on that very account all the more dangerous to his subjects. The objections to the legitimacy of Henry’s daughter Joanna were only presumptive; Henry had always acknowledged her as his offspring, and according to a maxim of the Roman law the nuptials indicate the father. But Isabella’s claim was founded on the stronger ground of the consent of the nation through the Cortes, who had done homage to her during the lifetime of her brother Henry, and now refused to swerve from their decision. Two days after Henry’s death she had accordingly been proclaimed, jointly with her husband Ferdinand, at Segovia, where she was then dwelling; and had been enthroned with great state in the principal square of the city. The example of Segovia was followed by most of the principal towns; the chief grandees, with few exceptions, tendered the oath of allegiance, and the Cortes, which assembled in the following February, gave their sanction to all these proceedings. But while the nation thus assented to Isabella’s accession, doubts were raised as to her title by her own husband and his family, who maintained that the Crown of Castile, like that of Aragon, could not devolve to a female, and that Ferdinand himself was the nearest male representative of the House of Trastamara. The establishment of such a pretension would have been fatal to Isabella’s independent authority. After careful inquiry, however, it was proved that the succession in Castile and Leon was not limited to males, and in a settlement founded on the marriage contract, provision was made for Isabella’s due share of authority. With this arrangement Ferdinand was highly dissatisfied, and it required all the sweetness and moderation of Isabella’s character to induce him to acquiesce in it.

Joanna had still some powerful supporters, who applied for aid to her uncle, Alfonso V of Portugal, whose victories in Barbary had obtained him the name of the “African”. Alfonso undertook this enterprise against the advice of his more prudent counselors; and, as the Duke of Guienne, to whom she had been promised, was now dead, it was arranged that Alfonso should marry his niece, then thirteen years of age. The French King was also enticed into the league, and invited to attack Biscay, by promises that the conquered territory should be ceded to him.

In May, 1475, Alfonso invaded Castile with an army of 20,000 men, and, directing his march towards Placencia, was there affianced to Joanna. They were then proclaimed Sovereigns of Castile, and an envoy was dispatched to Rome to procure a dispensation for their marriage. Into the details of the war which ensued it is not necessary to enter. Suffice it to say, that the exertions of Ferdinand and Isabella were favored by the dilatoriness of Alfonso, who was completely defeated by Ferdinand at Toro, in March, 1470. The Castilian malcontents now submitted; and on Ferdinand’s approach with his victorious army the French also retired. Alfonso afterwards tried to procure fresh help from Louis XI; but that wily monarch, after detaining him a whole twelvemonth at his Court, ended by making an arrangement with Ferdinand and Isabella. To console himself for his credulity, Alfonso undertook a pilgrimage to Palestine; but on his return revived his enterprise against Castile.

Donna Beatrix of Portugal, however, sister-in-law of Alfonso, and maternal aunt of Isabella, succeeded in mediating a peace; and by a treaty ratified by the Court of Lisbon September 24th, 1479, Alfonso renounced his pretensions to Joanna's hand, and to the Castilian throne. It was also agreed that Alfonso, Prince of Portugal, should marry the young Infanta of Castile. Thus ended the war of the Castilian succession. Joanna, disgusted with the world, and especially by the cruel irony of offering her the hand of the infant son of Ferdinand and Isabella, born in 1478, retired to the convent of St. Clare, at Coimbra. King Alfonso was preparing to imitate her example, at Veratojo, when he died rather suddenly at Cintra, August 28th, 1481. John II of Aragon expired at Barcelona, January 20th, 1479, at a very advanced age: a Prince alike distinguished in the cabinet and the field. Ferdinand now succeeded to Aragon and its sister lands; and thus the Crowns of that country and of Castile became subsequently united. Navarre devolved to John’s guilty daughter, Eleanor, Countess of Foix; but she only lived three weeks to enjoy her Crown.

This period was marked by the establishment of the Santa Hermandad, or Holy Brotherhood, and also of the Inquisition in Castile. The Hermandad was a body of about 2,000 police, armed and mounted, for the purpose, not only of putting down the robberies and violence which everywhere abounded, but also of forming a check upon the power of the nobility. The faith of the Jews supplied the pretext for establishing the Inquisition, but it was their wealth that afforded the motive. The prospect of a rich harvest of confiscations caused Ferdinand to lend a willing ear to the bigoted suggestions of the Dominicans for the erection of a severer tribunal, which the natural benignity of Isabella’s character led her to oppose; and it was only after the continued importunities of the clergy, backed by the persuasions and arguments of her husband, that she at length consented to procure the authority of Rome for the erection of the Holy Office in Castile. The cooperation of Pope Sixtus IV was obtained, and by a bull, dated November 1st, 1478, the Spanish Sovereigns were authorized to appoint inquisitors in the matter of heresy. The tribunal began its horrible mission early in 1481, and before the close of that year nearly 300 persons, many of them of estimable character and high station, had fallen victims in the autos de fe, or “acts of faith”—such was the revolting name—in Seville alone. In these acts, which were the public recantation of persons convicted by the Inquisition, and the burning of those who would not recant, the pale and spectral convict issued from his dungeon, clad in a coarse woolen coat, called sambenito, which bore on a yellow ground a scarlet saltire cross, and was embroidered with representations of flames and devils. The whole number of victims throughout Spain is reckoned at 2,000 burnt alive in that year, and more than the same number in effigy; besides whom, 17,000 were said to be reconciled; that is, the capital punishment was commuted for fine, imprisonment, or some other smaller penalty. The most trivial presumption sufficed to convict a man of Judaism; as wearing better clothes on the Jewish Sabbath, having no fire in the house on Friday evening, eating with Jews, and other things of the like nature. The inquisitors soon extended their researches from Jews to Christians suspected of heresy, what constituted heresy being of course left to the judgment of the Dominicans, who wore sometimes so ignorant as to condemn opinions which had been held by Fathers of the Church. The accuser was often a debtor of the accused, who found, through the tribunal, a compendious way of paying his debts. The modern Inquisition was finally established in Spain by two bulls of Pope Sixtus IV (August 2nd and October 17th, 1483). It was introduced into Aragon by Ferdinand in 1484, but it was not till the reign of Philip II that it obtained there the same unlimited power as in Castile.

The Spanish Inquisition has been commonly regarded as an ecclesiastical usurpation, and has been so described over by Llorente; but in fact it was the very reverse. Although armed with spiritual weapons, and having ecclesiastics for its ordinary officers, it was really nothing but a royal court, subject to the King’s visitations, who appointed and dismissed the judges; and when Cardinal Ximenes demurred to accept on the court a layman nominated by the King, Ferdinand told him plainly that the whole jurisdiction of the tribunal was derived from the royal authority. The confiscated property of the condemned went into the King’s treasury, and formed a regular source of his income. Besides robbing the rich, another object of the institution was to break the power of the great. No grandee, however powerful, could escape this tribunal. Even in the time of Ferdinand its jurisdiction was sometimes extended beyond heretical cases; Charles V subjected to it the bishops who had taken part in the insurrection of the communes; and Philip II brought under its cognizance questions of commerce, art, and navigation. Thus it was declared heresy to sell arms or ammunition to the French! In short, the tribunal formed part of those ecclesiastical spoils by which the Spanish government became so powerful, such as the nomination to bishoprics, the administration of the Grand Masterships of the Military Orders, &c. Rome, which had no similar institution till half a century later, regarded the Spanish Inquisition with a jealous eye, and offered to it every possible opposition.

Against another class of infidels, the Moors of Granada, Ferdinand began a nobler warfare. The Spaniards of the north had been for centuries pressing on the Moors. By the end of the eleventh century they had advanced, under the banner of the Cid, from the Douro to the Tagus; and though for a century or two afterwards the Moors were supported by fresh immigrations of their Mahometan brethren, the decisive victory of Navas de Tolosa, in 1212, gave a permanent check to their ascendency in Spain. Under James I of Aragon, and St. Ferdinand of Castile, Valencia, Murcia, and Andalusia wore successively wrested from them, and by the middle of the thirteenth century their dominion had shrunk to the Kingdom of Granada. That fertile country, however, abounding both in mineral and agricultural wealth, possessing excellent harbors, and enjoying an extensive commerce, embraced all the elements of a powerful kingdom, with a military force of 100,000 men. The Alhambra, whose ruins still attract and reward the curiosity of the traveler, overlooked and commanded the capital from the summit of one of its hills; and its light and fairy­like architecture, which displayed a great advance in art since the building of the celebrated mosque of Segovia, was said to be capable of sheltering 40,000 persons.

The Moors of Granada, by contact with the Christian Spaniards, had lost much of the Oriental cast of manners. An unreserved intercourse seems to have ob­tained between the two peoples in the intervals of their almost constant wars; and the Moorish cavalier was as famed as the Christian for honor, courtesy, and valor. Granada was defended by numberless fortresses. Its military force chiefly consisted of light cavalry, whose mode of warfare was of an irregular, guerilla nature, and the Moorish crossbowmen were famed for their skill. The use of gunpowder was early known among the Moors—some have attributed to them the application of it to warlike purposes—as well as the manufacture of paper, and many discoveries in medicine and chemistry.

The war which terminated in the conquest of Granada by the Spaniards, was provoked by the fiery hatred which the Moorish King, Muley Aben Hassan, bore to the Christians. Towards the end of 1481 Muley surprised the town of Zahara, on the frontier of Andalusia, and carried off the inhabitants into slavery. This feat the Christians soon after retaliated, by surprising in like manner the mountain fortress and town of Alhama, within eight leagues of Granada. The safety of the Moorish capital demanded the recovery of this place, and in March, 1482, the Moslem King appeared before it with a considerable army, but was compelled to raise the siege on the approach of the Duke of Medina Sidonia. It was, however, again invested by the Moors, and finally relieved by Ferdinand in person (May 14th, 1482). Meanwhile Isabella had prepared a fleet and army; but the dissensions of the Moors promised the Christians more success than the power of their own arms. The Sultana Zoraya, jealous of the favor displayed by the now aged King towards his off-spring by a Greek slave, stirred up a rebellion against him. Muley Aben Hassan fled to Malaga, and Xoraya’s son, Abu Abdallah, or, as he is called by the Spaniards, Boabdil, was proclaimed in his stead. in the spring of 1482 Boabdil was captured during an incursion which he had made towards Cordova; but the Spaniards soon afterwards released him, with a view to keep alive the quarrel between him and his father, who still held a part of Granada. The war dragged on several years without any important event. Queen Isabella often appeared among her troops on horseback, and clad in complete armor. In the Spanish service, besides a body of Swiss, was a band of 300 English archers, commanded by Earl Pavers, brother of Queen Elizabeth Woodville. The Moors, disgusted with a treaty which Boabdil had made with the Christians, substituted for him his uncle Abdallah “El Zagal”, or “the Valiant”; and Muley Aben Hassan dying shortly after, the Moorish kingdom was torn by the contending factions of uncle and nephew. Meanwhile the tide of Christian conquest flowed steadily onwards, in spite of the military talent of El Zagal and the many castle-crowned steeps which had to be reduced by arms. In 1487 Malaga surrendered, after a three months siege, and Ferdinand and Isabella made their triumphal entry, August 18th. The whole of the inhabitants were made slaves, and the depopulated city replenished with Christians attracted thither by grants of houses and lands. El Zagal soon after surrendered that part of Granada which he held, and received in return the district of Andaraz, with the royal title; but subsequently repenting of his deed, passed over into Africa, where he ended his days in indigence.

In April, 1101, Ferdinand sat down with a great army before the capital of Granada, then deemed the largest fortified city in the world. The war was conducted on both sides quite in the spirit of chivalry; personal combats frequently took place, and King Boabdil was generous enough to recompense with his own sword and a magnificent present a Christian knight who had given conspicuous proofs of valor. At length the Moors, alarmed at the Spaniards having converted their camp into a town of stone houses, which still bears the name of Santa Fe, surrendered, November 25th, 1401. By the capitulation arranged by Gonsalvo de Cordova the Moors were left in the enjoyment of their religion, laws, and property, and ships were to be provided for such of them as preferred passing over into Africa. But the news of the capitulation was received with displeasure by the people; symptoms of insurrection began to appear; and it was found advisable to anticipate the day fixed for the surrender by effecting it on the 2nd January, 1492. On that day Boabdil, issuing forth from his capital with a splendid retinue, presented Ferdinand with the keys of the Alhambra; and Granada was then entered by the Spanish troops, headed by the Grand-Cardinal Mendoza. Meanwhile the abdicated King proceeded on his route towards the Alpujarras, where a petty sovereignty had been assigned him, and from a rocky height, still called El ultimo Suspiro del Moro, or “the last sigh of the Moor”, bade a long farewell to the scene of his former power and grandeur. This unfortunate monarch shortly after passed over to Africa, and was slain fighting for a prince who was his kinsman.

Thus fell the Moslem rule in Spain, after it had lasted nearly seven centuries and a half. The tidings of the capture of Granada were received throughout Europe, and especially at Rome, with joy and thanksgiving, for the event was regarded as in some degree compensating for the occupation of Constantinople by the Turks. King Ferdinand, “whose manner was”, says Bacon, “never to lose any virtue for the showing”, in his letters to different European Courts, recounted at large “with a kind of holy ostentation” all the particulars of his conquest. He had displayed his usual religious punctilio on the occasion, and refrained from entering the city till he had seen the Cross erected on its highest tower, and the place thereby made Christian. By the conquest of Granada the whole of Spain, with exception of Navarre, was consolidated into one great Kingdom, and was thus prepared to take a leading part in those political affairs which were soon to engage the attention of Europe; while the long wars by which the conquest had been achieved had served as a training school for that redoubtable infantry and those famous captains who for a considerable period rendered Spain the first military Power in the world.

The Spanish Sovereigns, while still before Granada, blotted this fair chapter in their history by issuing a cruel edict against the Jews. The Inquisition, in spite of its activity, had failed to effect all that had been expected from it; the great mass of Jews still remained unconverted; and the clergy now revived against them all the odious accusations of sectarian bigotry, which were greedily swallowed by the multitude. The Jews offered to buy immunity with 30,000 ducats; and the Spanish Sovereigns were listening to the offers of one of their body when Torquemada, the High Inquisitor, burst into the room, and banishing aloft a crucifix, flung it upon the table, bidding them sell their master like Judas Iscariot. This insolent act excited nothing but superstitious awe in the minds of Ferdinand and Isabella, who, regardless of the impolicy as well as of the injustice of the measure, issued an order for the expulsion of the Jews from Spain, March 30th, 1402. Nearly the whole race departed rather than sacrifice their religion to their worldly interest.

It was not till near the end of May, 1492, that Ferdinand and Isabella quitted Granada. In the spring of 1493, while they were residing in Barcelona, Columbus arrived there after his return from the discovery of America, and was received by Ferdinand and Isabella with honors which that ceremonious Court had never before condescended to bestow on a subject of his rank. Columbus narrated his adventures before the Sovereigns; and the success of his voyage was attested not only by various products of those newly discovered countries, as gold dust, tropical plants, birds, and beasts, but also by some of the native islanders whom he had brought with him. Thus within a short period Spain was suddenly raised to a very high degree of power, not only by the amalgamation of its several Kingdoms, but also by the acquisition of a rich and almost boundless Empire on the other side of the Atlantic. A few more years and these vast dominions were to be still further increased by the addition of the Empire, of whose history, with that of its connected lands, we shall hero take a brief retrospect.

AFFAIRS OF BOHEMIA. 

The elevation of the heterodox Utraquist, George Podiebrad, to the Bohemian throne gave great offence to Pope Pius II, who endeavored to abolish the Compactata, or religious privileges of the Hussite party; but the Papal Legate, Fantino della Valle, having made an insolent harangue in the Diet, Podiebrad caused him to be imprisoned and kept on bread and water. Paul II, the successor of Pius, carried his anger still further. In June, 1465, ho issued a bull, deposing the Bohemian King as a heretic, and entrusted the Emperor with the execution of the sentence. As neither Frederick III nor the Gorman States seemed inclined to enter the lists against Podiebrad, the Pope next applied to Matthias Corvinus, who, dazzled with the prospect of the Bohemian Crown, accepted the authority of the Apostolic Chair as sufficient warrant for attacking his unoffending father-in-law.

For some time hostilities were covertly conducted on both sides; but early in 1467 Matthias made large preparations for open war, giving out that they were intended against the Turk. As Frederick had helped Matthias by allowing the Pope’s missionaries to preach a Bohemian crusade in Germany, Podiebrad declared war against him and invaded Austria (January, 1468); an act which brought on an alliance between Frederick and Matthias; and as the latter was now unmolested by the Turks, with whom he was even suspected of having concluded a treaty, and as the Pope had supplied him with 50,000 ducats towards the expenses of the enterprise, he resolved to invade Bohemia. He obtained the cooperation of his subjects by a trick unworthy of a great Prince. He caused two captured Turks, who had been carefully instructed in the part they were to play, to be introduced before his Council, where, in the name of their master the Sultan, they sued for a truce. Matthias acted his part to admiration. He declared that, as a Christian Prince, he could enter into no written treaty with Infidels; but he bade the pseudo-ambassadors take back his verbal promise of peace; and he closed the sitting with a hypocritical speech, in which he declared that, however repugnant to his private feelings, his duty as a good Catholic superseded his obligations towards George Podiebrad as a father-in-law, and justified the step he was about to take. The Council acquiesced in his views, and war was declared against Bohemia, April 8th, 1468. Podiebrad secured the neutrality, and at length the aid, of Casimir IV of Poland, by promising the Bohemian succession to the Polish Prince Wladislaus: a choice agreeable to the Bohemians, as Wladislaus was descended from their favorite monarch, Charles IV, and spoke their language; nor was he esteemed so unfriendly to the Calixtine doctrines as Matthias and Frederick.

In 1468 Matthias entered Bohemia and invested Spielberg. Near that town an interview took place between him and Podiebrad, which ended in the latter challenging his son-in-law to single combat; but as Matthias insisted on fighting on horseback the duel went off. Spielberg held out till February, 1469. After its fall Matthias marched on Kuttenberg; but in the defiles near Semtiseh, his army, consisting principally of cavalry, got entangled in some abattis, and being unable either to advance or retreat, he was compelled to propose a truce, which was concluded at Sternberg, April 7th. Matthias, however, almost immediately broke it. He resumed hostilities, overran Moravia and Silesia, and being elected King by a mock Diet of the Catholic party at Olmütz, was crowned by the Papal Legate (May 3rd).

Meanwhile Frederick being released by this war from all apprehension on the side of Bohemia, that weak and superstitions Emperor, who had neglected to provide Matthias with the succor he had promised, seized the opportunity to discharge a vow of a pilgrimage to Rome; and he arrived in the City about Christmas, 1408, with an escort of five hundred horse. Here he gave convincing proofs of his devotion to the Holy See. He fell twice on his knees as he approached the Pope, enthroned in St. Peter’s, and a third time when near enough to kiss Paul's hands and feet; he occupied a throne which had been prepared for him, but which was so low that his head just reached to the Pope’s feet; in the habit of a deacon, he exercised the Imperial privilege of intoning the Gospel; and when Paul mounted his palfrey he hastened to hold the Holy Father’s stirrup. All these petty humiliations have been carefully recorded in the annals of the Roman Church by sacerdotal pride. Frederick obtained on this occasion the Pope’s permission to erect the bishoprics of Vienna and Neustadt, and to bestow at his own pleasure the 300 prebends which he founded.

The election of Matthias just recorded drew Podiebrad and Casimir closer together. It was agreed that Podiebrad should give his daughter, Ludmilla, to Casimir’s son, Wladislaus, and cause him to be chosen King of Bohemia; in return for which Casimir was to support Podiebrad with arms, and to employ for him his influence with the Pope. On the other hand, Matthias sought the aid of Frederick III; and in February, 1470, he paid the Emperor, who had now returned from Italy, a visit at Vienna. Here the magnificence of the Hungarian King formed a strange contrast with the Emperor's narrow way of living; and Frederick was also outshone by the voluntary homage which Matthias, as the foremost champion of Christendom, received from various Italian States. The Florentines sent him a present of lions, the Ligurians of arms, the Venetians of silk stuffs, the Neapolitans of horses, the Pope subsidies from the Sacred College. The demands of Matthias rose with his good fortune. He required that Frederick should give him his daughter Cunigund in marriage, that he should renounce the Hungarian title and succession, and should return the 60,000 ducats he had received for the crown of St. Stephen: but the Emperor’s anger was roused by these demands; an altercation ensued, in which he reproached Matthias with his low birth, and the latter soon after stole away without taking leave.

The Bohemian war dragged on without much vigor, and on March 22nd, 1471, George Podiebrad died. In the following May the Bohemians confirmed the election of Wladislaus, who with a small army penetrated to Prague, where he received the Crown, August 22nd. In September, Casimir, second son of the Polish King, after publishing at Cracow a manifesto in which he claimed the Crown of Hungary in virtue of his descent from Elizabeth, second daughter of the Emperor Albert II and sister of King Ladislaus Postumus, and denounced Matthias Corvinus as a tyrant and usurper, invaded Hungary with a considerable force; but instead of meeting with the assistance which he expected from the malcontents, he found a large force arrayed against him, and was compelled to make a precipitate retreat. Meanwhile Frederick, though pretending to favor Matthias, secretly helped his rival Wladislaus; but his weakness obliged him to have recourse to the basest duplicity. He had promised to hold a Diet at Augsburg in 1470, in which he would invest Matthias with the Crown of Bohemia and recognize him as an Elector of the Empire; yet, so far from fulfilling his engagement, the affairs of Bohemia were not even mentioned in that assembly, and in the following year he concluded a formal alliance with Casimir of Poland. The King of Hungary, however, was able to make head against all his opponents. His troops made devastating incursions both into Bohemia and Austria, and penetrated as far as Augsburg, where the Emperor was residing; while Matthias himself with his Black Band advanced to Breslau, and established there a fortified camp, on which Casimir and Wladislaus could make no impression. He also dispatched his generals Zapolya and Kinis into Poland, who pushed on to the gates of Cracow, committing such devastations that Casimir sued for peace; and on December 8th, 1474, a truce of three years and a half was accordingly concluded.

In 1476 Matthias celebrated his marriage with Beatrix, daughter of King Ferdinand of Naples, to which we have already referred. Meanwhile covert hostilities were still carried on between the Hungarian King and the Emperor, which in 1177 again broke out into open war. Frederick now invested Wladislaus with the Bohemian Electorate; but his arms were no match for those of Matthias, who invaded Austria, laid siege to Vienna, and compelled Frederick to fly into Styria. Frederick, who was now anxiously engaged about the marriage of his son Maximilian with Mary of Burgundy, proposed a peace, and, by way of inducement, held out to Matthias the hope that he would aid his brother-in-law, one of the sons of Ferdinand of Naples, to wrest Milan from the Sforzas. By the treaty of Korneuburg, concluded December 1st, 1477, the Emperor, in spite of his former investiture of Wladislaus, engaged to invest Matthias with Bohemia; who, however, was to make good his own claim, and also to support the Emperor against any attacks which he might incur in consequence of his act. Frederick was also to pay 100,000 ducats for the expenses of the war; one half at Martinmas, 1478, and the remainder in a twelvemonth. Matthias now published the Emperor’s investiture in his favor, and the revocation of that of Wladislaus, and he attempted to reduce Bohemia; but the inhabitants made a strenuous resistance. This circumstance, as well as a formidable inroad of the Turks (August, 1478), turned his thoughts towards peace; especially as he was desirous of punishing the Emperor, who had neither kept his word with regard to Italian affairs nor made the stipulated payments. He therefore concluded what was called a “perpetual peace” with the Kings of Bohemia and Poland at Olmütz (July, 1479), reserving to himself the eventual right of succession in Bohemia, while Wladislaus ceded to him the Bohemian principalities of Lusatia, Moravia, and Silesia. His hands being thus at liberty, the Hungarian King declared war against Frederick. It was protracted several years, and was often interrupted by truces, but was devoid of important events, till in June, 1485, Vienna, from the effects of famine, was obliged to capitulate; and that capital was entered by Matthias and his Queen.

Frederick fled to Linz; but not feeling in safety there, began a wandering life in Germany, proceeding with a suite of eighty persons from convent to convent, and from one Imperial city to another, living at their expense and vainly entreating the aid of the States against Matthias. At length he obtained a small supply of troops, and prevailed on Duke Albert of Saxony, a captain of renown, to take command of them; but these succors arrived too late. Neustadt, the favorite residence of Frederick, had agreed to capitulate on the 16th of August, 1487, if not relieved before that day; and Duke Albert had not go further than Linz on the 14th, where he found neither money nor provisions to enable him to proceed. Matthias now completed the reduction of Lower Austria; while Duke Albert marched with his army into Styria. He was followed by the Hungarians; but after a few unimportant skirmishes negotiations were opened at Märgendorf, November 22nd, and a truce was concluded till a treaty of peace should be finally arranged.

AFFAIRS OF HUNGARY. KING WLADISLAUS

During this war Matthias caused the power and dignity of the Hungarian Palatine, which seem hitherto to have been very undefined, to be settled and ascertained by a law passed by the Diet (1485). It was arranged that if the King died without issue the Palatine should have the first vote in the election of his successor; in case the heir was a minor, the Palatine was to be his guardian; and during an interregnum, he was empowered to assemble the Diet: in short, by those and several other regulations, that magistrate was invested with an almost regal power. Matthias’s alleged reason for this step was, his necessary absence from his Kingdom on account of the affairs of Austria; though his real design was to appoint a man to this great office who after his decease should help his natural son, John Corvinus, to get possession of the Hungarian throne.

To promote the interests of that son had long been the object of all Matthias's efforts. Honors had been gradually heaped upon him; he had been created Count of Hunyad and Duke of Liptau; and it had even been contemplated to bestow Austria upon him. A marriage had also been negotiated for John with Bianca Sforza, sister of Galeazzo Maria, Duke of Milan, to which Ludovico il Moro gave his consent, though on condition that John Corvinus should be immediately declared successor to the Hungarian throne, with which Matthias could not comply; for though he had lived ten years with his consort Beatrix without having issue, yet the birth of an heir was still not impossible. Beatrix was naturally opposed to all these plans in favor of John Corvinus; her feelings were shared by many of the nobles, and a secret opposition was gradually formed against Matthias and his son, the former of whom had quitted Vienna in a very declining state of health.

Negotiations for peace with Frederick were continued; and it was agreed that the terms should be definitively settled at a personal interview at Linz, between Matthias and the Emperor’s son Maximilian, King of the Romans, which was fixed for the 10th September, 1489. The King of Hungary was too ill to keep this appointment; but he sent his minister, the Bishop of Grosswardein, to Linz, to express his great esteem for Maximilian, in proof of which he forwarded a present of 400 casks of wine, 400 oxen, and 12,000 ducats. He offered to restore Austria for 70,000 ducats, and thus put an end to the war; but though Maximilian strongly urged his father to close with this proposal, Frederick, reckoning on the speedy death of the Hungarian King, of which he was assured by astrological predictions, declined to enter into any stipulations, as it had been agreed that, in case of Matthias’s death, the conquered territories were to revert to Frederick without payment. Early in 1490, Matthias, summoning all his strength, proceeded to Vienna, in order to be nearer to Linz; where on Palm Sunday, April 4th, after an early visit to the church, he was struck with an apoplexy, which carried him off two days afterwards, in his forty-seventh year. Besides his distinguished abilities as a statesman and captain, Matthias Corvinus was a munificent patron of learning. He founded a University at Buda; invited to his Court the most learned Italians; employed many persons to collect and transcribe Greek manuscripts; and formed an extensive library, which, however, was for the most part destroyed after the capture of Buda by the Turks in 1527.

The competitors for the vacant Hungarian throne were the Emperor Frederick, his son Maximilian, Wladislaus of Bohemia, John Albert, his brother, and John Corvinus. During the last illness of her husband, Beatrix had employed all her eloquence, her sighs, and tears, to obtain from him her own nomination as reigning Queen and heiress of the Kingdom; but this Matthias refused, on the ground that the Hungarians would never submit to be governed by a woman. The power of nominating lay principally with Stephen Zapolya, who had been appointed Palatine by Matthias, and with Urban Dotzy, Bishop of Erlau, and John of Prossnitz, Bishop of Grosswardein. The last had under his command all the mercenary troops, and the Black Band in Moravia. Matthias had made a great mistake in selecting Zapolya as Palatine and guardian of his son's interests, who, assisted by the two prelates just mentioned, managed that the choice of the Hungarians should fall on Wladislaus, King of Bohemia (July 14th, 1490). Wladislaus was a weak Prince, and the internal dissensions in Bohemia, as well as the almost constant wars in which he was engaged with Hungary, had obliged him to concede a large share of independence to the landed aristocracy of Bohemia, as well as to the municipal towns. It was the former circumstance that had recommended him to the Hungarian nobility; who, after his election, proceeded to tie up his hands by all kinds of capitulations, and to render him in fact completely powerless.

Maximilian now attempted the recovery of Austria from the Hungarians—a task rendered easy by the hatred with which they had inspired the inhabitants. The Viennese admitted him into their city, August 10th, and he immediately proceeded to attack the citadel, which was garrisoned by 400 Hungarians. The first assault was repulsed, and Maximilian himself wounded; but a few days after the Hungarians capitulated. Maximilian, after recovering several more Austrian towns, even broke into Hungary, and took Alba Begia, or Stuhlweissenburg (November 19th), but ho was hindered by want of money from pushing his successes much further. His troops would not quit Stuhlweissenburg till they had received double pay for its capture; and though he advanced a few miles on the road to Buda, and caused it to be summoned, his messenger, the poet Ludwig Bruno, was haughtily repulsed. Maximilian therefore found it necessary to evacuate Hungary before the close of the year; and he returned into Germany with the hope of collecting a fresh army.

But the Diet, which met at Nuremberg in April, 1401, would grant him nothing. The Hungarians soon after retook Stuhlweissenburg, and as Maximilian's attention was also attracted at this period by the affairs of Brittany, he made proposals for a peace. A congress was accordingly held at Pressburg; and on November 7th, 1491, a treaty was concluded, which proved of remarkable importance for the House of Austria. By this convention, Wladislaus and his male heirs were recognized as Kings of Hungary, but in default of heirs, the House of Habsburg was appointed to succeed, subject, however, to the approbation of the Hungarian Diet. All the Austrian hereditary lands were restored to Frederick, who on his side gave up his conquests in Hungary and Croatia. Wladislaus further engaged to pay 100,000 ducats for the expenses of the war; and in case of failure of heirs of his own, to assist the House of Habsburg in obtaining the Crown of Bohemia. Wladislaus’s brother, John Albert, disgusted at being thus excluded from all prospect of the Hungarian Crown, resorted to arms, but was soon reduced to obedience: and the death of their father, Casimir of Poland, June 7th, 1492, afforded an opportunity to give John Albert some compensation. At the request of their widowed mother, Wladislaus renounced his claim to the Crown of Poland in favor of his brother, and aided in procuring his election.

Frederick III did not long outlive these events. After his return to Austria he abandoned the cares of government to Maximilian, and retired to Linz, where he died, August 19th, 1493, at the age of seventy-eight and after a reign of fifty-three years. He had previously sustained with great fortitude two amputations of the leg for cancer; but an inordinate indulgence in melons brought on a dysentery, which proved fatal. Frederick was in person tall and handsome, and of majestic presence. He was a man of small mind, and one of those characters whose good qualities are neutralized by bordering too closely on the neighboring vices. His religion, degenerating into superstition and bigotry, made him the slave of the Pope; his prudence was nearly allied to cunning, his foresight to suspicion, his firmness to obstinacy, his mildness to want of spirit. Under him the Imperial Crown reached perhaps its lowest point of degradation; yet notwithstanding his impotence as a Sovereign, he became by a series of lucky chances the founder of the predominant greatness of his House; to which, though he himself scarcely enjoyed a moment of security, he seems to have looked forward with a sort of prophetical confidence.

We cannot quit the history of the Empire under Frederick III without adverting to the establishment of the Swabian Confederation, effected towards the close of his reign. The object of this League was to put down private wars, and to support the Landfriede, or public peace. Some of these private wars were of the most absurd description. Thus the Lord of Prauenstein declared war against the city of Frankfort because the daughter of one of the citizens refused to dance with his uncle; the baker of the Palsgrave Louis defied the cities of Augsburg, Ulm, and Rothweil; and a private person named Henry Mayenberg even made a declaration of war against the Emperor himself; but when waged by powerful princes or nobles these wars occasioned great desolation and misery. The more immediate object of the Swabian Confederation was to repress the violence of the Bavarian Duke Albert II of Munich.

The Dukes of Bavaria had allied themselves with King Matthias in opposition to Frederick; and endeavored to separate themselves from the Empire; Duke Albert had married the Emperor’s daughter Cunigund without his consent, and had obtained from her kinsman Duke Sigismund the reversion of Tyrol as her dowry, which should have reverted to Maximilian. Albert had also seized Ratisbon, and was contemplating further acquisitions. To repress these violences, as well as to restrain all similar ones which might arise among themselves, by referring their differences to arbitration, many princes, nobles, and cities of Swabia, at the instance of Frederick, organized in 1488 the Confederation in question, which was soon afterwards joined by other powers, as Brandenburg, the Elector of Metz, &c. The number of Imperial cities that abounded in Swabia greatly facilitated the accomplishment of the scheme.

In the spring of 1492 the troops of the Confederation and of the Empire, commanded by Frederick of Brandenburg, assembled in presence of Maximilian on the Lechfeld, a broad plain between Augsburg and Tyrol, watered by the river Lech. At this threatening demonstration, Albert, deserted by his kinsfolk and at war with his own knights, found it prudent to submit. He surrendered Ratisbon, and reconciling himself with Frederick, finally joined the Confederation. This association remained in force till the year 1533, and is said to have destroyed one hundred and forty strongholds of knights and robbers.

As Maximilian had been elected King of the Romans some years previously, he succeeded at once to the Imperial throne on the death of his father Frederick. The defeat of a large body of Turks, who had penetrated as far as Laibach, by Maximilian in person, threw a luster on the beginning of his reign. A few months after, being now a widower, he married, as already related, the sister of the Duke of Milan; a match to which he seems to have been allured by the largeness of the dowry, and by the opportunity which it might afford him of acquiring influence in Italian affairs.

Having thus given a general view of the principal European States down to the period of the invasion of Italy by Charles VIII, we shall now proceed to narrate that expedition.

CHAPTER V

WARS OF CHARLES VIII AND LOUIS XII IN ITALY. PONTIFICATE OF ALEXANDER VI. INTERVENTION OF FERDINAND THE CATHOLIC IN ITALY