ABSTRACT
Piedm ont was the only Italian state to evolve along a north European pattern in the early m odern period, where the dukes o f Savoy enforced their absolutist pretensions with a significant arm y, in which nobility' served. In this unusual evolution, geography certainly played a part. T h e sixteenth-century duchy was a ra ther loose and heterogeneous Alpine feudal state w ithout a central focus. Part o f it looked tow ard Lyon on the R hone, p art towards G erm an-speaking Switzerland, and p art towards the upper Po valley w hich was a backw ard cul-de-sac com pared to Lom bardy or Venetia. D uke Charles III (1504-53) employed no mercenaries, nor did he have perm anent and assured taxes by which to pay any. France occupied Savoy and Piedm ont in the 1530s w ithout m uch resistance, in order to ensure free access to M ilan, the prize it sought. T h e Swiss Protestant league detached parts o f Savoy, and Calvinist G eneva broke away, while Spanish troops occupied Vercelli to keep the French arm y from M ilan. T he heir to the throne, Em anuel Philibert, used his birthright - being a nephew of Charles V - to cut a figure in the H ispano-Im perial army. H e proved to be one o f the em peror’s ablest generals, w inning the decisive battle against France at St Q uentin in the Low Countries in 1557. W ith the peace of C ateau-Cam bresis in 1559, the duke recovered most o f his states, save for Geneva, which was perm anently lost. Spanish garrisons held eastern P iedm ont until, after m any Piedmontese dem onstrations o f good faith and m ore or less spontaneous contributions to the H absburg cause, they relinquished them in 1575. Em anuel Philibert would have preferred to expand his duchy by intervening in the ongoing religious struggle in France, but for the m om ent concentrated on putting his state back in order.
