Venetian-Milanese Wars
The Venetian-Milanese Wars were a series of conflicts in the 15th century, primarily involving Venice and the Duchy of Milan, amidst a backdrop of shifting power dynamics among various Italian city-states. During this period, significant figures like Gian Galeazzo Visconti of Milan sought to consolidate power, prompting responses from neighboring states such as Venice and Florence. The wars began in earnest with the First Venetian-Milanese War (1425-1428), where Venice aimed to expand its influence in Lombardy and secured territories like Brescia through military campaigns led by notable commanders.
Subsequent conflicts saw changing leadership and strategies, with prominent military leaders like Francesco Sforza emerging. The wars were characterized by alternating successes and failures, leading to the execution of traitorous leaders and the eventual establishment of peace agreements, such as the Treaty of Ferrara and the Peace of Lodi. The latter, signed in 1454, marked a significant reconciliation in Italy and established a protective alliance known as the Italic League, encompassing several major powers and promoting stability in the region. Overall, these wars were instrumental in shaping the political landscape of northern Italy during the Renaissance era.
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Venetian-Milanese Wars
At issue: Venetian expansion on the Italian mainland and containment of the duchy of Milan
Date: 1423–1454
Location: Northern Italy
Combatants: Venetians vs. Milanese
Principal commanders:Venetian, Captains general Francesco Bussone, conte di Carmagnola (c. 1385–1432), Erasmo da Narni Gattamelata (d. 1443), Bartolomeo Colleoni (1400–1475); Milanese, Carlo Malatesta (1364?-1429), Niccolò Piccinino (1386–1444); Both sides, Francesco Sforza (1401–1466)
Principal battles: Maclodio, Cremona, Anghiari
Result: Strong Venetian mainland with protected routes to European markets; long-term peace between Venice and Milan, extended to Florence
Background
In the fourteenth century, northern and central Italy became a mosaic of independent city-states, some of which replaced their elective governments with dictatorships that placed power in the hand of a member of a leading family. Between 1378 and 1400, Gian Galeazzo Visconti of Milan consolidated the family holdings in Lombardy and pushed into central Italy with the goal of creating a large territorial state. Florence felt threatened in Tuscany, and Venice feared that the trade routes to its European markets would be blocked. When Visconti died in 1402, Florence secured its preeminence in Tuscany by acquiring Pisa in 1406.
Venice had an early entry on the mainland when it acquired Treviso in 1339. However, it gave Treviso to Leopold II of Austria in return for his neutrality in its War of Chioggia against Genoa (1378–1380). In 1383, Leopold sold Treviso to the ambitious lord of Padua, Francesco Carrara. In 1400, it became the first conquest of Venice from the Carrara family. Venice followed between 1403 and 1406 with the occupation of Padua as well as Verona and Vicenza. Venice completed the northern phase of its expansion with the Friuli between 1411 and 1420. This was just in time as Filippo Maria Visconti became duke of Milan in 1412 and in 1421 also lord of Genoa. The new Venetian doge, Francesco Foscari (1423–1457), took up the challenge.
Action
In the fall of 1425, Venice hired the former captain general of Filippo Maria Visconti, Francesco Bussone, conte di Carmagnola, and negotiated a ten-year alliance against Visconti with Florence. Carmagnola took Brescia in 1426 and defeated the Milanese at Maclodio (October 11, 1427), between Brescia and Lodi. In an ambush, he captured Visconti’s captain general, Carlo Malatesta; his two lieutenants, Francesco Sforza and Niccolò Piccinino; and 10,000 troops. The Treaty of Ferrara, concluding the First Venetian-Milanese War in May, 1428, confirmed Brescia and gave Bergamo to the Venetians.
Hostilities resumed early in 1431 with Francesco Sforza now captain general for Visconti. Carmagnola aimed at extending Venetian control from Bergamo and the line of the Oglio River westward to the Adda. However, he failed to take the castle of Soncino, near the west bank of the Oglio, and Lodi on the Adda against Sforza. From June to October, 1432, he unsuccessfully besieged Cremona, near the entry of the Adda to the Po River. On June 22, a Venetian fleet, commanded by Niccolò Trevisani under Carmagnola but not sufficiently supported by him, was beaten at Cremona by a Visconti fleet manned by Genoese and Sforza troops. The failure of Carmagnola was a critical juncture for the Venetians. The Venetian Senate recalled Carmagnola, found him guilty of treason, and had him executed on May 5, 1432.
In 1431, a Venetian, Eugene IV (Gabriele Condulmer), who had been elected pope came into conflict with the Council of Basel over Church reform. Filippo Maria Visconti sided with the Council. Moreover, with Emperor Sigismund preparing to come to Rome for his imperial coronation (May 31, 1433), neither side could afford to be tied down by a regional conflict across northern Italy, and peace was concluded in April, 1433.
In the interval between the Second and Third Venetian-Milanese Wars, Sforza made himself an independent agent. Visconti had sent him to harass the pope in the March of Ancona, part of the State of the Church on the Adriatic coast. However, Pope Eugene withdrew to Florence and countered Visconti by making Sforza his vicar in the March. The Venetians began the Third War in 1435 with two captains of unwavering loyalty, Erasmo da Narni Gattamelata and Bartolomeo Colleoni, while Niccolò Piccinino, a lifelong competitor of Sforza, led the Milanese. Piccinino tried to reverse the situation in Lombardy by turning on Bergamo and Brescia. However, the two Venetian captains saved both cities and threatened Piccinino with a Venetian fleet hauled overland and floated on Lake Garda. In the autumn of 1339, the failing health of Gattamelata—he died in 1443—made Venice replace him with Sforza as captain general. Sforza cornered Piccinino at Riva at the north end of Lake Garda. Piccinino escaped and took Verona by surprise, only to be dislodged three days later by Sforza bringing up his troops in a forced march. Piccinino drew Sforza to Tuscany as a diversion, and again his competitor had the better of him, defeating him at Anghiari above the upper Tiber Valley on June 29, 1440. The war had deteriorated into a contest between captains general, the condottieri. In the south of Italy, King Alfonso V of Aragon was preparing to take over the kingdom of Naples against French Anjou claimants (1442). In the north, peace came at Cavriana, a fortified village between Brescia and Verona, combined with the long-promised marriage between Bianca Maria Visconti and Francesco Sforza at Cremona in October, 1441.
In the Fourth Venetian-Milanese War, the Venetians swept across the Adda in 1446. The war, however, was cut short by the death of Filippo Maria Visconti in August, 1447. The Milanese proclaimed the Ambrosian Republic. However, Sforza was the stronger player with the March of Ancona and Cremona as his wife’s dowry. The Milanese made him their captain general and in 1450 their duke. He recognized the Venetians in their mainland possessions, and after the fall of Constantinople to the Turks in 1453 prompted reconciliation in Italy at the Peace of Lodi on April 9, 1454.
Aftermath
The Peace of Lodi was extended to Florence and in March, 1455, expanded to the Italic League as a protective and peacekeeping association including also the Papal State, the kingdom of Naples, and the condottieri on stipends. The Italic League was renewable every twenty-five years.
Bibliography
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Epstein, Steven A. Genoa and the Genoese, 958-1528. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1996.
Kohl, Benjamin G. Padua Under the Carrara, 1318–1405. Baltimore, Md.: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1998.
Lane, Frederic C. Venice, a Maritime Republic. Baltimore, Md.: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1973.
Trease, Geoffrey. The Condottieri. New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1971.