ABSTRACT
At an interview with Richelieu, at Pinerolo, in April 1630, Mazarini had met Father Joseph, 1 the Capuchin friar who was already Richelieu’s trusted agent. He was still pursuing his ideal of a European crusade against the Turks while directing his immediate efforts against the Habsburgs. In personality and outlook the two men could hardly have been more different. Inevitably they were to be, to some extent, rivals. The ascetic friar was to remain something of an enigma to Mazarini. At this stage, however, he was to serve Mazarini and the cause of peace better than he did Richelieu and his Italian ambition. Mazarini had been trying to bring the military chiefs together. When political control was so feeble, it was usually best to go direct to the generals. But the authority of the Emperor still counted for something, and he was presiding at the Diet of Regensburg, summoned in June 1630 to secure from the reluctant princes the election of his son, as king of the Romans and so heir, in due course, to the Empire. 2
