Military access through the Papal States, graciously granted by the Holy Father himself (on advice of some of his more influential cardinals!), allows our troops to move freely from one end of our empire to another through Avignon.
The Empire:
But the ravages of war visited upon France have resulted in a startling – no, shocking! – reverse.
I am convinced that this is because I sent my cavalry all over southern France, looting cities and then moving on -- besieging them long enough to start the smoke, but not long enough to make the city fall.
As a friend once said about radios, "They don't work so well once you let the smoke out!" The same can be said of cities.
Milan’s 16 provinces are some of the most advanced in all of Europe, boasting no fewer than 4 universities.
Brunswick, for whatever reason, lost its head. It declared war upon neighboring Cologne in the fall of 1496. They found themselves at war with three of the ecclesiastical states of northern Germany, and it wasn’t long before they had Colognian troops in their capital.
Then, as if that wasn’t enough, Burgundy decided to get into the act!
Naturally, Brunswick was ripe for the picking by its more powerful neighbors, since it was having trouble coping with its weaker neighbors (probably because Brunswick had recently been weakened by a pointless war with Cleves and Wurzburg!).
I think Karl I must just have had a thing against Papal authority, because he kept picking fights with the most Catholic realms around. Perhaps that would all come to an end soon.
Soon after, Hesse jumped on the bandwagon.
In December, France made peace with Aragon. There was some significant trading of land. Aragon had previously annexed two French vassals – Armegnac and Foix (Bearn). In the peace settlement, Aragon ceded Bearn back to France.
So, all in all, France basically annexed one vassal, and lost another to Aragon (a gain of 1 province for Aragon, all told).
Add in the two provinces France lost to Milan, and they lost 2 provinces proper, and 1 vassal, for the gain of only one vassal who became a province. It would be very hard for the French to call that anything but a substantial loss. But don’t think they didn’t try!
For Christmas, 1496, King Lodovico did something which might be regarded either as strange, or clever.
He swallowed his resentment over the treachery of Wurttemburg in not following us to war with the French. All in all, Wurttemburg remained one of the friendliest powers to Milan in the whole world. Most others were jealous of Milan’s power, and relations had soured. The old campaign to become Holy Roman Emperor was stillborn – the money which would have needed to be invested was needed for other things.
Additionally, Wurttemburg now vied closely with Pommerania for the support of the Imperial Electors. Considering that we might soon have a Holy Roman Emperor living next door, we figured it might be best if he were an ally, and not an enemy.
Perhaps, if we asked nicely, the Holy Roman Emperor might even allow us to vassalize him! :rofl: