ABSTRACT
The Italians’ worry about Louis XI was an idle one, because they did not know how greatly he was overburdening himself with things to do at home.
Although only two battles, those at Montlhéry and Guinegate, were fought under his command, his courage was more than hussar’s courage and analogous to the courage of Cardinal Richelieu. (After all, he could have become a Carthusian.) The psychic tensions which he endured in his reign do add up to a sort of greatness.
