ABSTRACT
The great powers of western Europe - France and the Holy Roman Empire - were usually at war during the first half of the sixteenth century and their main area of conflict was Italy. French foreign policy in the early sixteenth century was concerned with the assertion of dynastic rights, not with the achievement of 'natural frontiers'. The peace entailed no fundamental change in French foreign policy. It merely provided Francis I with a breathing-space in which to replenish his treasury, rebuild his forces and consolidate his alliances. Between 1530 and 1534 he stirred up trouble for the emperor Charles in Germany and in the Mediterranean without openly contravening the recent peace treaty. French foreign policy turned a somersauit in 1538: after years of bitter hostility towards the emperor. The accession of Henry II to the French throne in March 1547 and the return to power of the constable of Montmorency produced no startling change in French foreign policy.
