Report on the 1484-1486 war against Papal States.
The declaration of war by Papal States to Naples in January caught us with most of our forces in our Greek provinces, but since the Ottomans are at war against Moldavia, I don't foresee problems there. Carlec, on command of 6,000 Stradioti in Thrace boarded the seven galleys of King of Minors and they were ordered to proceed to Marche, where they were to meet the 12,000 cavalry of Hastu Neon, descending from Milan. Roberto Sanseverino with 8,000 infantry and 6,000 Stradioti in Macedonia boarded the 16 galleys of Pascal Barbarigo proceeding to the Gulf of Taranto, where they were to meet the main squadron of 20 galleys under command of Arturo Gandolfi coming from the lower Adriatic.
Gandolfi was the first to engage the enemy in February, and in the first battle at the Gulf of Tarento he sunk 1 galley and 7 transports, and in a second one he sunk 2 warships and 1 transport, completely destroying the Papal navy without losing a single ship, so when Barbarigo arrived in April, Roberto Sanseverino could disembark unmolested.
Meanwhile everybody was reinforcing their armies. We raised 10,000 men in Veneto, and the same number were recruited in Rome by the Pope. Ferrante armed 5,000 men, too little too late.
Since the death of Malatesta, Rome had been unable to secure the services of a condottiero of note. Francesco Gonzaga had rejected Sixtus offer, and the Pope has placed his nephew, Girolamo Riario, on command of the 31,000 Papal forces that invaded Naples. Hastu Neon in Marche had orders of waiting for the reinforcements of Carlec, despite Rome being almost unguarded. The peasants that Ferrante had quickly assembled did not withstand the Papal armies, and Alfonso, the Duke of Calabria, was captured. The sieges of Naples and Taranto were established at about the same time, and the fleets of Barbarigo and Gandolfi took turns to bring supplies from Corfu to maintain a constant blockade.
Hastu Neon was impatient. He had now 23,000 cavalry ready to rescue Naples or to conquer Rome, yet the provedittores were receiving orders from the Signoria prohibiting the army to march into Rome or to help Naples.
Hastu did not know it, but the Signoria had decided already the fate of Ferrante. He was an unreliable ally, despised by his own subjects. The peaceful annexation of Naples was expensive and likely to further upset the rest of the nations, while the recovery of Naples from the hands of the Pope would be seeing as a defensive movement, since Sixtus IV had started the war. Besides, there was always the risk that the King of Aragon would want to make good his claim on Naples, since the kings of Naples are a bastard branch of the Trastamara of Aragon. The disappearance of the Kingdom of Naples at the hands of the Pope was seeing as desirable by Venice. Rome was to be left alone to avoid a failure of the siege of Naples if Girolamo decided to run into the help of his uncle. This is the cold nature of the Serenissima Repubblica, always keeping her own interest as the main priority.
But the Republic of Venice had her own problems. Taking advantage of the war, several colonies were demanding old rights. In the middle of a war is not a good time to lose stability, but centralization was considered the only priority domestic policy by the senate, so Doge Giovanni Mocenigo even refused to receive the delegates, knowing too well that showing signs of weakness was very dangerous. The delegates were understandably angry, but it was a clear message to the other cities.
The dead of Sixtus IV could have meant the end of the war. In fact a Venetian cardinal, Marco Bembo, was 5 votes short of being elected, but Giovanni della Rovere, nephew of Sixtus IV, found an agreement with his rival Rodrigo Borgia and they chose a puppet Pope, the Genoese Giovanni Battista Cybo. The new Pope, Innocentius VIII, was therefore easy to convince to continue the war.
It was on April 1485, that finally Taranto surrendered to Roberto Sanseverin. We only had to wait for one month before Naples fell. Innocentius VIII decreed the annexation of Naples and the 64 years old Ferrante and his son Alfonso were exiled to Sicily. But Girolamo Riario made a tactical blunder. He sent half of his forces to defend Rome, while he went to attempt the recovery of Taranto with the other half.
Hastu Neon, reinforced with the 6,000 stradioti of Carlec, and 5,000 cavalry from Veneto, had under his command 23,000 cavalry. He received orders to march over Rome, where he arrived ahead of the Papal forces and quickly dispersed the 1,300 papal guards that he found there. When the 12,000 men Papal army arrived to Rome, Neon had taken on a small hill waiting for them. He sent Carlec with the Stradioti to attack and confuse the Papal forces with their usual charges and retreats followed by counter-charges tactics. When Neon saw that the enemy forces had lost cohesion, he charged downhill with the rest of the cavalry and the Papal army, badly commanded by Luigi Colonna, quickly dissolved.
Roberto Sanseverin also repelled the attack from Girolamo and his superior forces, 19,000 to Sanseverin 15,000, and then followed Girolamo to Naples, defeating him again. Girolamo took refuge in Apulia, with insufficient forces to retake Taranto, and when he tried to force the siege of Naples, the last Papal army was destroyed. On a curious note, we received an invitation by the Grand Master of Rhodes to join their alliance with Hungary and Genoa. Clearly he must be senile to ignore the hatred that Hungary profess us, or our own hatred of Genoa.
Without Papal forces the war was basically over, with only the sieges of Naples and Rome to complete, but then politics were going to alter the picture drastically. First Innocentius VIII was able to convince Joao II of Portugal to join him in alliance and declare war to us. Joao is already at war with the Catholic Kings of Spain, and is therefore unlikely to send forces to help the Pope, but the implications of being at war with Portugal, and the opportunity to hit a trade rival do not escape the Signoria.
Then a new wave of pestilence killed Doge Giovanni Mocenigo. Marco Barbarigo, a kind and indecisive man, was chosen as his successor.
It is not surprising, given the nature of Marco Barbarigo, that he was to have problems with the nobility. Taddeo Michiel was a powerful noble with important possessions in Morea. A religious zealot, he was distressed by the war against the Pope, and he entered into a conspiration to depose Marco Barbarigo and take control of the Signoria to end the war. A denounce to the Council of Ten allowed to abort the conspiration. He was found guilty, but pleaded forgiveness. Marco Barbarigo was inclined to grant it, but the rest of the senators in the Consiglio were adamant. Centralization was still a priority, and only the fear of widespread revolts in the middle of the war prevented the confiscation of his states. Taddeo Michiel was beheaded between the two columns of the St. Mark square.
In January 1486, after two years of war, Rome surrendered to the generous terms of Hastu Neon, avoiding the customary three days of plunder. Genoa, afraid to be the next in our series of triumphs, cancelled the trade embargo.
Papal States was down to his knees, the Pope offering us Apulia and great sums to stop the war. Somehow, Constantine Kastrioti of Albania, despite having no army and being under siege from his own angry subjects at his fortress in Kruja, must have thought that it was a good idea to declare war to Innocentius VIII and Joao II of Portugal. Who knows what is inside the head of these absolute monarchs. But, since the only reason for keeping our vassal Albania out of our alliance was so they were not at war with Papal States and Portugal, the Doge asked Constantine in, and he gladly accepted. I sincerely have no idea of what his war plans could be.
A bold plan had been devised by the Navy Command. The availability of Hastu Neon's forces after the fall of Rome, allowed to put it in practice. Gabrielle Mocenigo, on command of all of our warships and transports was to transport Hastu's cavalry to Portuguese coasts. If he found the opportunity, he was to disembark them and return. Hastu Neon, who had volunteered for this dangerous mission, was ordered to proceed directly to Lisbon and conquer her. After that he was to follow his own initiative according to the situation. The war between Spain and Portugal was seeing as an opportunity to carry out this plan.
Berg, a little inland country near the Low Countries entered the war on the side of the Pope and Portugal, but that was seeing as of no consequence by the Signoria. On June, Naples finally surrendered. Innocentius offered Napoli and Apulia, but the Signoria wanted more. A separate proposal was made to the Pope, asking him not only to surrender Napoli and Apulia, but also to become our tributary. He rejected it, but a month later he had become more willing and accepted.
Marco Barbarigo had no time to enjoy his triumph, a few days later he died. He was substituted by Agostino Barbarigo. It was the first time that the rule of no two consecutive doges from the same family was broken, because he was Marco's brother. But it was more a consequence of infighting between noble families that he was elected.
Meanwhile the expedition of Gabrielle Mocenigo, that had departed Pisa in May, quickly turned into a complete disaster when they arrived to the Portuguese costs in September. The Signoria had tried to secure military access through Spain several times but the neutral relationships with the Catholic Kings, and the expense of gifts (Personal gift 88D), and lack of diplomats, forced Mocenigo to try to break through the naval defenses of Portugal. And it proved impossible. After six naval battles in the Straight of Gibraltar, the Gulf of Cadiz and the Lusitanian Sea, that Mocenigo refused to engage following orders, the mounting attrition and the loss of ships, forced the return of the fleet, that would arrive in March 1487, having lost all 7 warships, 2 transports and 10,000 men from dysentery and fevers. The loses amounted to 623 ducats, but the Signoria considered it only as a first assault, and while licking her wounds, was able to obtain a white peace with Joao, despite the defeat, because he was now at war also with Morocco, Granada, Tlemcen and Tunisia, and clearly did not need more enemies.
In contrast with the expedition to Lisbon, the rest of the war was won easily. Barely 5,000 men and no galleys were lost, while we eliminated all 32,000 Papal men and the entire Papal fleet. Our ally, Constantine Kastrioti remains at war with the Papal States and Portugal, but we do not consider them to be at danger, even if Albania has become perpetually occupied by an army of rebels of insufficient size to conquer Kruja.
Signed at Rome, July 1487.
Fodoroni, Capitano Generale of the Venetian army.
