List of battles of the Italian Wars
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Italian War of 1494–98
Seminara
Fornovo
Italian War of 1499–1504
Ruvo
Cerignola
Garigliano
War of the League of Cambrai
Agnadello
Padua
Polesella
Mirandola (1510)
Brescia
The Sack of Brescia took place on February 18, 1512 during the War of the League of Cambrai. The city of Brescia had revolted against French control, garrisoning itself with Venetian troops. Gaston de Foix, recently arrived to command the French armies in Italy, ordered the city to surrender; when it refused, he attacked it with around 12,000 men. The French attack took place in a pouring rain, through a field of mud; Foix ordered his men to remove their shoes for better traction.[1] The defenders inflicted heavy casualties on the French, but were eventually overrun, suffering 8,000 – 15,000 casualties.[2]. The Gascon infantry and landsknechts then proceeded to thoroughly sack the city, massacring thousands of civilians over the next five days. Following this, the city of Bergamo paid some 60,000 ducats to the French to avoid a similar fate.
Ravenna
St. Mathieu
Novara
Guinegate
The Battle of Guinegate or Battle of the Spurs took place on August 16, 1513. As part of the Holy League under the on-going Italian Wars, English and Imperial troops under Henry VIII and Maximilian I surprised and routed a body of French cavalry under Jacques de La Palice.
The English army was provided by Cardinal Thomas Wolsey and combined several different types of martial forces, and included cavalry, artillery, infantry and longbows using hardened steel arrows designed to penetrate armour more effectively. The French forces were mostly companies of gendarmes and pikemen, with some other mixed forces as well.
Called the "Battle of the Spurs" because of the haste of the French horse to leave the battlefield, it took place at Guinegate (now Enguinegatte, France), hence its name:
A French cavalry force, which had come to succour the besieged town of Therouanne, suddenly found itself opposite the Anglo-Imperial army, the size and position of which it had misjudged. Repelled by the latter’s artillery, the French turned and fled, with English and Burgundian cavalry in hot pursuit.[1]
At the end of the battle the cities of Therouanne and Tournai were in the hands of Henry VIII of England.
Flodden Field
The kingdoms of France and Scotland had traditionally enjoyed a close diplomatic relationship, reflected in a defensive treaty signed between the two kingoms in 1512. When Henry crossed the English Channel to campaign in France, the King of France activated the treaty, sending arms, money and military advisers to James IV of Scotland to encourage him to fulfil his obligations, in the hope that this would draw English resources away from the invasion of France. James crossed the border with a force of some 35,000 men, including 5,000 French advisers[3]. He was opposed by an English force under the Earl of Surrey. The two sides met on 9th September, 1513, near the village of Flodden. The Scottish army was heavily defeated, losing some 9,000 men and many nobles, including King James, the King's illegitimate son, and twelve earls.[4]
La Motta
The Battle of La Motta, also known as the Battle of Schio, Battle of Vicenza or Battle of Creazzo, which took place on October 7, 1513 between the Republic of Venice and Spain, was a significant battle of the War of the League of Cambrai. A Venetian army under Bartolomeo d'Alviano attempted to prevent the Spanish under Ramon de Cardona from withdrawing from the Veneto, but was defeated and scattered.
Marignano
Italian War of 1521–26
Pampeluna
The Battle of Pampeluna (also spelled Pamplona) occurred on May 20, 1521, between French and Spanish troops, during the Italian War of 1521–1526. As its result the French army conquered the town and the castle of Pamplona.
It was at this battle that Inigo Lopez de Loyola, better known as St. Ignatius Loyola, suffered severe injuries, a French cannonball shattering his leg. His meditations during his long recovery set him on the road of a conversion of life from soldier to priest. He would eventually found the Society of Jesus (the Jesuits), and create the Spiritual Exercises, which is the basis for the idea of "retreats" as an experience of prayer as practiced in the Roman Catholic Church.
Esquiroz
The Battle of Esquiroz was fought near Pamplona on June 30, 1521, during the Italian War of 1521. A makeshift Spanish army defeated the French forces under Henry d'Albret and Lesparre, driving them out of Navarre.
Mézières
The Siege of Mézières (1521) took place during the Italian War of 1521. An Imperial army besieged the city (now part of Charleville-Mézières), which was defended by French troops under the command of the Chevalier de Bayard and Anne de Montmorency; the siege was unsuccessful, and the determined French resistance gave Francis I time to concentrate his forces against Charles V.
Tournai
The Siege of Tournai (1521) took place during the Italian War of 1521. An Imperial army besieged the city of Tournai, capturing it from the French in late November; it would remain a Habsburg possession until the independence of Belgium.
Bicocca
Genoa
The Siege of Genoa (May 20, 1522–May 30, 1522) was conducted by an army of the Holy Roman Empire under the command of Spanish General Fernando d'Avalos and Italian condottiero Prospero Colonna against the French forces defending the Italian city. Since Genoa had refused to surrender, the Imperial troops were permitted to loot the city once it had fallen.
Sesia
The Battle of the Sesia (April 30, 1524) was a battle in the Italian War of 1521 fought near the Sesia River that saw the Habsburg forces under Charles de Lannoy inflict a decisive defeat on the French under Admiral Bonnivet and the comte de St. Pol, forcing the latter to withdraw from Lombardy.
Marseille
The Siege of Marseille (August–September 1524) was conducted by an Imperial army under Charles de Bourbon (who had recently betrayed Francis I) and Fernando de Avalos against the French defenders of Marseille. Although Avalos heavily looted the surrounding countryside, he was unsuccessful in seizing the city; and, faced with the arrival of French reinforcements, called off the siege in September.
Pavia
War of the League of Cognac
Rome
Naples
Landriano
Florence
Gavinana
Italian War of 1542–46
Nice
The Siege of Nice took place in August 1543, during the Italian War of 1542, when a combined Franco-Ottoman force attacked and captured the Imperial city of Nice.[5]
Düren
Ceresole
Serravalle
The Battle of Serravalle took place on June 2, 1544, during the Italian War of 1542. A Spanish-Imperial army under Alfonso d'Avalos d'Aquino, Marquis del Vasto, defeated a force of freshly-raised Italian mercenaries in French service, commanded by Pietro Strozzi and Giovan Francesco Orsini, Count of Pitigliano.
St. Dizier
The Siege of St. Dizier took place in the summer of 1544, during the Italian War of 1542, when the Imperial army of Charles V attacked the French city of St. Dizier at the beginning of its advance into Champagne. The siege was already underway when Charles V himself arrived with an army of 14,100 (including 1600 sappers) on 13 July. The next day an imperial commander, René of Châlon, Prince of Orange, was struck by a shot from the defenders, and died the next day with the Emperor by his bed (his title and lands going to his famous cousin, William the Silent). On 23 July French outposts near the besieged town were overrun, but a French army under the command of the Dauphin Henri maintained an observing position at Jalons. On August 17 the town surrendered. Charles elected not to attack the Dauphin's army and instead pressed on to Soissons.
Lagny-sur-Marne
Montreuil
1st Boulogne
2nd Boulogne
Solent
Bonchurch
Beachy Head
Italian War of 1551–59
Mirandola (1551)
Metz
Marciano
Renty
St. Quentin
Gravelines
Notes
- ^ Baumgartner, Louis XII, 220.
- ^ Baumgartner, Louis XII, 220; Norwich, History of Venice, 421. Baumgartner gives 8,000 as a minimal estimate, while Norwich gives 15,000.
- ^ Guest, Ken, and Denise Guest, British Battles, p. 80
- ^ Guest, Ken, and Denise Guest, British Battles, p. 85
- ^ Arnold, Renaissance at War, 180; Blockmans, Emperor Charles V, 72–73; Oman, Art of War, 213.
References
- Arnold, Thomas F. The Renaissance at War. Smithsonian History of Warfare, edited by John Keegan. New York: Smithsonian Books / Collins, 2006. ISBN 978-0-06-089195-4.
- Baumgartner, Frederic J. Louis XII. New York: St. Martin's Press, 1994. ISBN 0-312-12072-9.
- Blockmans, Wim. Emperor Charles V, 1500–1558. Translated by Isola van den Hoven-Vardon. New York: Oxford University Press, 2002. ISBN 0340731109.
- Hackett, Francis. Francis the First. Garden City, NY: Doubleday, Doran & Co., 1937.
- Guicciardini, Francesco. The History of Italy. Translated by Sydney Alexander. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1984. ISBN 0-691-00800-0.
- Norwich, John Julius. A History of Venice. New York: Vintage Books, 1989. ISBN 0-679-72197-5.
- Oman, Charles. A History of the Art of War in the Sixteenth Century. London: Methuen & Co., 1937.
- Phillips, Charles and Alan Axelrod. Encyclopedia of Wars. Volume 2. New York: Facts on File, 2005. ISBN 978-0-8160-2851-1.
- Taylor, Frederick Lewis. The Art of War in Italy, 1494–1529. Westport: Greenwood Press, 1973. ISBN 0-8371-5025-6.
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