House of Habsburg
The House of Habsburg called the House of Austria, was one of the most influential and distinguished royal houses of Europe. The throne of the Holy Roman Empire was continuously occupied by the Habsburgs from 1438 until their extinction in the male line in 1740; the house produced emperors and kings of the Kingdom of Bohemia, Kingdom of England, Kingdom of Germany, Kingdom of Hungary, Kingdom of Croatia, Kingdom of Illyria, Second Mexican Empire, Kingdom of Ireland, Kingdom of Portugal, Kingdom of Spain, as well as rulers of several Dutch and Italian principalities. From the 16th century, following the reign of Charles V, the dynasty was split between its Austrian and Spanish branches. Although they ruled distinct territories, they maintained close relations and intermarried; the House takes its name from Habsburg Castle, a fortress built in the 1020s in present-day Switzerland, in the canton of Aargau, by Count Radbot of Klettgau, who chose to name his fortress Habsburg. His grandson Otto II was the first to take the fortress name as his own, adding "Count of Habsburg" to his title.
The House of Habsburg gathered dynastic momentum through the 11th, 12th, 13th centuries. By 1276, Count Radbot's seventh generation descendant Rudolph of Habsburg moved the family's power base from Habsburg Castle to the Duchy of Austria. Rudolph became King of Germany in 1273, the dynasty of the House of Habsburg was entrenched in 1276 when Rudolph became ruler of Austria, which the Habsburgs and their descendants ruled until 1918. A series of dynastic marriages enabled the family to vastly expand its domains to include Burgundy and its colonial empire, Bohemia and other territories. In the 16th century, the family separated into the senior Habsburg Spain and the junior Habsburg Monarchy branches, who settled their mutual claims in the Oñate treaty; the House of Habsburg became extinct in the 18th century. The senior Spanish branch ended upon the death of Charles II of Spain in 1700 and was replaced by the House of Bourbon; the remaining Austrian branch became extinct in the male line in 1740 with the death of Holy Roman Emperor Charles VI, in 1780 with the death of his eldest daughter Maria Theresa of Austria.
It was succeeded by the Vaudémont branch of the House of Lorraine, descendants of Maria Theresa's marriage to Francis III, Duke of Lorraine. The new successor house styled itself formally as the House of Habsburg-Lorraine, because it was confusingly still referred to as the House of Habsburg, historians use the unofficial appellation of the Habsburg Monarchy for the countries and provinces that were ruled by the junior Austrian branch of the House of Habsburg between 1521 and 1780 and by the successor branch of Habsburg-Lorraine until 1918; the Lorraine branch continues to exist to this day and its members use the Habsburg name. The Habsburg Empire had the advantage of size, but multiple disadvantages. There were rivals on four sides, its finances were unstable, the population was fragmented into multiple ethnicities, its industrial base was thin, its naval resources were so minimal. It typified by Metternich. Along with the Capetian dynasty, it was one of the two most powerful continental European royal families, dominating European politics for nearly five centuries.
Their principal roles were as follows: Holy Roman Emperors, kings of Germany, kings of the Romans) Rulers of Austria Kings of Bohemia Kings of Hungary and Croatia Kings of Spain Kings of Portugal Kings of Galicia and Lodomeria Grand princes of Transylvania Numerous other titles were attached to the crowns listed above. The progenitor of the House of Habsburg may have been Guntram the Rich, a count in the Breisgau who lived in the 10th century, forewith farther back as the early medieval Adalrich, Duke of Alsace, father of the Etichonids from which Habsburg derives, his grandson Radbot, Count of Habsburg founded the Habsburg Castle, after which the Habsburgs are named. The origins of the castle's name, located in what is now the Swiss canton of Aargau, are uncertain. There is disagreement on whether the name is derived from the High German Habichtsburg, or from the Middle High German word hab/hap meaning ford, as there is a river with a ford nearby; the first documented use of the name by the dynasty itself has been traced to the year 1108.
The Habsburg Castle was the family seat in the 12th and 13th centuries. The Habsburgs expanded their influence through arranged marriages and by gaining political privileges countship rights in Zürichgau and Thurgau. In the 13th century, the house aimed its marriage policy at families in Upper Swabia, they were able to gain high positions in the church hierarchy for their members. Territorially, they profited from the extinction of other noble families such as the House of Kyburg. By the second half of the 13th century, count Rudolph IV had become one of the most influential territorial lords in the area between the Vosg
Amadeus VII, Count of Savoy
Amadeus VII, known as the Red Count, was Count of Savoy from 1383 to 1391. Amadeus was Count of Savoy and Bonne of Bourbon. Amadeus VII was known for his hospitality, for he would entertain people of all stations and never turned a person from his table without a meal, he married Bonne of Berry, daughter of John, Duke of Berry, the younger brother of Charles V of France. They had three children: Amadeus VIII known as Antipope Felix V, married Mary of Burgundy, daughter of Philip the Bold Bonne married to Louis of Piedmont, the final of the Savoy-Archaea Branch. Upon his death at age 29 from tetanus, controversy arose because of his will. Amadeus VII left the important role of guardian of his son and heir, Amadeus VIII, to his own mother, a sister of the powerful Duke de Bourbon, instead of following the tradition of appointing the child's mother, a daughter of the powerful Duke de Berry, it took three months of negotiations to restore peace in the family. Cox, Eugene L.. The Green Count of Savoy.
Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton University Press. LCCN 67-11030. Tuchman, Barbara Wertheim. A Distant Mirror: The Calamitous 14th Century. New York: Knopf. Vaughan, Richard. Philip the Bold: The Formation of the Burgundian State. Boydell Press
Janus of Cyprus
Janus of Cyprus was a King of Cyprus and titular King of Armenian Cilicia and Jerusalem from 1398 to 1432. Janus was born in Genoa, where James I of Cyprus, was a captive, his mother, Helvis of Brunswick-Grubenhagen, named him in honor of the god Janus, the founder of Genoa according to mythological tradition. When his father was elected king, he negotiated an agreement with the Genoese to release him to go to Cyprus, which he signed on 2 February 1383. Under that agreement, the Genoese were given new commercial privileges. However, the Genoese demanded. James sent a noble to John Babin, to act as stepfather to his son; as the Cypriot historian Leontios Makhairas writes, James ordered a special tax which required the Cypriots—both nobles and commoners—to purchase an amount of salt in order to collect the money needed to release his son from Genoese captivity. After his father's death on 9 September 1398, Janus took over the throne of Cyprus, he was crowned in Nicosia's Saint Sophia Cathedral on 11 November 1398.
As king he tried in 1402 to take back Famagusta, under Genoese rule. According to writings of Amati, the administrator of Famagusta, the Genoese Antonio de Karko, was Janus' godfather. Janus conspired with a priest, the spiritual father of de Karko, in order to return the city to the Cypriot kingdom, upon which the priest was to become Bishop of Famagusta. Involved in that conspiracy was Peter Makhairas, brother of Leontios, they made secret keys to the city gates and there were many preparations to take over Famagusta and to murder de Karko with the help of Brother Gregory and to open the gates for Janus' soldiers. However, at the last moment the plan was betrayed, the conspirators were arrested at Famagusta; the king continued his effort to take back Famagusta. In 1403, the governor of Genoa, Jean Le Maingre, had talks with Janus' representative Giorgio Billi which ended in an agreement by which the cities remained under Genoese hands, he forced the Cypriot people to pay special taxes to assemble an army and siege machines, he besieged Famagusta for three years but in vain, since there was access from the sea to the city.
In 1406 the siege ended and the Genoese tried to occupy Limassol, but were defeated. Two years the island was affected by epidemics. There were many raids of locusts on the island, which caused destruction to agriculture. A new epidemic arrived in 1419–20, which caused the death of Janus' second wife, Charlotte on 15 January 1422; because the king was distraught about her death, the body of the dead queen was moved out of the palace where her funeral was, in order to not be seen by Janus. Meanwhile, because Cyprus was still a permanent base of campaign for pirates and adventurers, after raids around the Cypriot coasts, Janus had repeated discussions with the Sultan of Egypt via the sultan's representatives. Janus was unable to stop the raids. Cypriot nobles and officials of the kingdom participated in the raids. Barsbay, the Sultan of Egypt, sent military forces to Cyprus several times. A small force, around 1424, attacked Limassol, in 1425 the Egyptian army attacked Famagusta and pillaged Larnaca together with the nearby area, including Kiti, Kellia and Agrinou.
After Larnaca, they went to Limassol, sacked, including the city's castle. In the summer of 1426, the Mamluks launched a large-scale attack against the island. Led by Tangriver Mohamed and Inal el Kakimi, their army contained over 3,000 men and included Mamluks and Arabs and arrived at the island with 180 ships near Avdimou. Limassol was again occupied. Janus moved from Nicosia to Limassol, he asked in vain for help from the forces in Europe: the Genoese were his enemies, the Venetians and others did not want to destroy commercial relations with the sultan. Following the Battle of Chirokitia against the Mamluks, King Janus was captured by the Egyptian forces, he was ransomed after ten months of captivity in Cairo. During his captivity his brother Hugh of Lusignan, Archbishop of Nicosia, took charge of Cyprus. After their victory the Mamluks pillaged Larnaca again and the capital of Cyprus, Nicosia; the royal family were rescued. The invaders took a great deal of loot and captives; that disaster, together with the previous raids, the war operations of Janus against Genoese, the epidemics and the invasion of locusts caused the Cypriot serfs, who lived in conditions of utter poverty, to revolt.
The leader of the Cypriot revolutionaries was a person called Alexis, declared king in Lefkoniko. The revolution was big, was supported by the population, who elected their own leaders in many places of Cyprus. Meanwhile, Janus was humiliated in Cairo: they took him, tied up with chains and riding a donkey, in front of the sultan, after which he was forced to kneel and worship nine times the soil on which he stepped; the release of Janus was effected after the mediations of Europeans, who collected money for the required ransoms. Cyprus had to offer the sultan an annual tax based on income from 5,000 duchies; this tax continued to be paid after the end of Frankish rule in Cyprus. Together with Janus, some of the captives managed to buy their freedom after their families collected money to ransom them. Others were sold as slaves. While Janus was captive in Cyprus, the nobles and the royal family members were trying to deal
Henry II of France
Henry II was King of France from 31 March 1547 until his death in 1559. The second son of Francis I, he became Dauphin of France upon the death of his elder brother Francis III, Duke of Brittany, in 1536. Henry was the tenth king from the House of Valois, the third from the Valois-Orléans branch, the second from the Valois-Orléans-Angoulême branch; as a child and his elder brother spent over four years in captivity in Spain as hostages in exchange for their father. Henry pursued his father's policies in matter of arts and religion, he persevered in the Italian Wars against the House of Habsburg and tried to suppress the Protestant Reformation as the Huguenot numbers were increasing drastically in France during his reign. The Treaty of Cateau-Cambrésis, which put an end to the Italian Wars, had mixed results: France renounced its claims to territories in Italy, but gained certain other territories, including the Pale of Calais and the Three Bishoprics. France failed to change the balance of power in Europe, as Spain remained the sole dominant power, but it did benefit from the division of the holdings of its ruler, Charles V, from the weakening of the Holy Roman Empire, which Charles ruled.
Henry suffered an untimely death in a jousting tournament held to celebrate the Peace of Cateau-Cambrésis at the conclusion of the Eighth Italian War. The king's surgeon, Ambroise Paré, was unable to cure the infected wound inflicted by Gabriel de Montgomery, the captain of his Scottish Guard, he was succeeded in turn by three of his sons, whose ineffective reigns helped to spark the French Wars of Religion between Protestants and Catholics. Henry was born in the royal Château de Saint-Germain-en-Laye, near Paris, the son of King Francis I and Claude, Duchess of Brittany, his father was captured at the Battle of Pavia in 1525 by the forces of the Holy Roman Emperor Charles V, held prisoner in Spain. To obtain his release, it was agreed that his older brother be sent to Spain in his place, they remained in captivity for over four years. Henry married Catherine de' Medici, a member of the ruling family of Florence, on 28 October 1533, when they were both fourteen years old. At this time, his elder brother was alive and there was little prospect of Henry coming to the throne.
The following year, he became romantically involved with a thirty-five-year-old widow, Diane de Poitiers. Henry and Diane had always been close: the young lady had fondly embraced Henry on the day he, as a 7-year-old child, set off to captivity in Spain, the bond had been renewed after his return to France. In a tournament to honor his father's new bride, Eleanor and his older brother were dressed as chevaliers, in which Henry wore Diane's colors. Confident and intelligent, Diane left Catherine powerless to intervene, she did, insist that Henry sleep with Catherine in order to produce heirs to the throne. When his elder brother Francis, the Dauphin and Duke of Brittany, died in 1536 after a game of tennis, Henry became heir apparent to the throne, he succeeded his father on his 28th birthday and was crowned King of France on 25 July 1547 at Reims Cathedral. Henry's reign was marked by wars with Austria and the persecution of Protestants Calvinists known as Huguenots. Henry II punished them the ministers, for example by burning at the stake or cutting off their tongues for uttering heresies.
Henry II was made a Knight of the Garter, April 1515. The Edict of Châteaubriant called upon the civil and ecclesiastical courts to detect and punish all heretics and placed severe restrictions on Huguenots, including the loss of one-third of their property to informers, confiscations; the Edict strictly regulated publications by prohibiting the sale, importation or printing of any unapproved book. It was during the reign of Henry II that Huguenot attempts at establishing a colony in Brazil were made, with the short-lived formation of France Antarctique; the Eighth Italian War of 1551–1559, sometimes known as the Habsburg–Valois War, began when Henry declared war against Holy Roman Emperor Charles V with the intent of recapturing Italy and ensuring French, rather than Habsburg, domination of European affairs. Persecution of Protestants at home did not prevent Henry II from becoming allied with German Protestant princes at the Treaty of Chambord in 1552; the continuation of his father's Franco-Ottoman alliance allowed Henry II to push for French conquests towards the Rhine while a Franco-Ottoman fleet defended southern France.
An early offensive into Lorraine was successful. Henry captured the three episcopal cities of Metz and Verdun, secured them by defeating the Habsburg army at the Battle of Renty in 1554; however the attempted French invasion of Tuscany in 1553 was defeated at the Battle of Marciano. After the abdication of Charles V in 1556, the Habsburg empire was split between Philip II of Spain and Holy Roman Emperor Ferdinand I; the focus of Henry's conflict with the Habsburgs shifted to Flanders, where Phillip, in conjunction with Emmanuel Philibert of Savoy, defeated the French at the Battle of St. Quentin. England's entry into the war that year led to the French capture of Calais, French armies plundered Spanish possessions in the Low Countries. Henry was nonetheless forced to accept the Peace of Cateau-Cambrésis, in which he renounced any further claims to territories in Italy; the Peace of Cateau-Cambrésis was signed between Henry and Elizabeth I of England on 2 April and between Henry and Philip II of Spain on 3 April 1559 at Le Cateau-Cambrésis.
Under its terms, France restored Piedmont and Savoy to
John I, Count of La Marche
John of Bourbon, was the second son of James I, Count of La Marche and Jeanne of Châtillon. He ransomed. After the death of his father and elder brother following the Battle of Brignais, John succeeded them as Count of La Marche, he took an active part in the Hundred Years' War, became Governor of Limousin after helping reconquer it from the English. He joined Bertrand du Guesclin in his campaign of 1366 in Castile. In 1374, his brother-in-law Bouchard VII, Count of Vendôme died, John became Count of Vendôme and Castres in right of his wife, he fought in 1392 in Brittany. He rebuilt the castles of Lavardin. On 28 September 1364, he married Catherine of Vendôme, countess of Vendôme and daughter of John VI, Count of Vendôme, he had seven children by Catherine: Count of La Marche and Castres. Isabelle, a nun at Poissy. Louis, Count of Vendôme. Anne, married in 1401 John of Berry, Count of Montpensier, married in Paris in 1402 Louis VII, Duke of Bavaria. Marie, Lady of Brehencourt, married Jean de Lord of Croix.
Charlotte, married in 1411 at Nicosia King Janus of Cyprus. Famiglietti, R. C.. Tales of the Marriage Bed from Medieval France. Picardy Press. Potter, David. Keen, Maurice, ed. A History of France, 1460–1560: The Emergence of a Nation State. Macmillan
Duchy of Brittany
The Duchy of Brittany was a medieval feudal state that existed between 939 and 1547. Its territory covered the northwestern peninsula of Europe, bordered by the Atlantic Ocean on the west, the English Channel to the north, it was less definitively bordered by the Loire River to the south, Normandy and other French provinces to the east. The Duchy was established after the expulsion of Viking armies from the region around 939; the Duchy, in the 10th and 11th centuries, was politically unstable, with the dukes holding only limited power outside their own personal lands. The Duchy had mixed relationships with the neighbouring Duchy of Normandy, sometimes allying itself with Normandy, at other times, such as the Breton-Norman War, entering into open conflict. Henry II of England invaded Brittany in the mid-12th century and became Count of Nantes in 1158 under a treaty with Duke Conan IV. Henry's son, became Duke through his marriage to Constance, the hereditary Duchess; the Angevins remained in control until the collapse of their empire in northern France in 1204.
The French Crown maintained its influence over the Duchy for the rest of the 13th century. Monastic orders supported by the Breton aristocracy spread across the Duchy in the 11th and 12th centuries, in the 13th, the first of the mendicant orders established themselves in Brittany's major towns. Civil war broke out in the 14th century, as rival claimants for the Duchy vied for power during the Breton War of Succession, with different factions supported by England and France; the independent sovereign nature of the Duchy began to come to an end upon the death of Francis II in 1488. The Duchy was inherited by his daughter, but King Charles VIII of France had her existing marriage annulled and married her himself; as a result, the King of France acquired the title of Duke of Brittany - jure uxoris. The Ducal crown became united with the French crown in 1532 through a vote of the Estates of Brittany, after the death of Queen Claude of France, the last sovereign duchess, her sons Francis III, Duke of Brittany and Henry II of France would in any case have created a personal union on the death of their father.
Following the French Revolution, as a result of the various republican forms of French government since 1792, the duchy was replaced by the French system of départements which continues under the Fifth Republic of France. In modern times the departments have joined into administrative regions although the administrative region of Brittany does not encompass the entirety of the medieval duchy; the Duchy of Brittany that emerged in the early 10th century was influenced by several earlier polities. Prior to the expansion of the Roman Empire into the region, Gallic tribes had occupied the Armorican peninsula, dividing it into five regions that formed the basis for the Roman administration of the area, which survived into the period of the Duchy; these Gallic tribes – termed the Armorici in Latin – had close relationships with the Britonnes tribes in Roman Britain. Between the late 4th and the early 7th centuries, many of these Britonnes migrated to the Armorican peninsula, blending with the local people to form the Britons, who became the Bretons.
The reasons for these migrations remain uncertain. These migrations from Britain contributed to Brittany's name. Brittany fragmented into small, warring regna, each competing for resources; the Frankish Carolingian Empire conquered the region during the 8th century, starting around 748 taking the whole of Brittany by 799. The Carolingians tried to create a unitary administration around the centres of Rennes and Vannes using the local rulers, but the kings of Brittany's hold on the region remained tenuous. Carolingian technology and culture began to influence Brittany, the church in Brittany began to emulate the Frankish model; the greatest influence on the Duchy, was the formation of a unitary Brittany kingdom in the 9th century. In 831 Louis the Pious appointed Nominoe, the Count of Vannes, ruler of the Bretons, imperial missus, at Ingelheim in 831. After the death of Louis in 840, Nominoe rose to challenge the new emperor, Charles the Bald, emboldened in part by new Viking raids on the empire.
Charles the Bald created the Marches of Neustria to defend Western Francia from the Bretons and the Vikings. Erispoe fought Charles the Bald, who felt that a quick attack would challenge the new Breton leader. Erispoe won a victory at the Battle of Jengland and, under their Treaty of Angers in 851, Brittany's independence was secured; the new kingdom collapsed under Viking attack. In 853 the Viking Godfried left the Seine with his fleet, sailed around the Breton peninsula and sacked Nantes. Erispoe entered into an alliance with the leader of another Viking fleet, who betrayed him, resulting in Erispoe's defeat at the hands of the Vikings. A weakened Erispoe ruled until 857 when he was assassinated and followed as Breton ruler by his cousin and rival, the Count of Rennes and Nantes. Viking raids continued. Alan I defeated one wave of Vikings around 900, expanding the kingdom to include not only the Breton territories of Léon, Domnonée, the Vannetais, but the Frankish counties of Rennes, Nantes and Avranches, as well as the western parts of Poitou and Anjou.
Alan I's military success resulted in a period of peace from Viking invasions and few raids from the Vikings were recorded from 900 through to 907. After Alan I's death in 907, Brittany was overrun once again by Vikings. Fulk the Red, Count of Anjou, is said to have occupied Nantes from 907 to 919 when he abandoned it to the invading Vikings. In 919, the
Counts and dukes of Savoy
The following is a list of rulers of Savoy. House of Savoy List of consorts of Savoy County of Savoy Duchy of Savoy Kingdom of Sardinia List of monarchs of Sardinia List of Sardinian consorts Kingdom of Italy King of Italy List of Italian queens Savoy Genealogy
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