THE EMPERORS FREDERIC II. AND MAXIMILIAN I.
From 1477 to 1500.
Wanderings of the Emperor Frederic.--Proposed Alliance with the Duke of
Burgundy.--Mutual Distrust.--Marriage of Mary.--The Age of
Chivalry.--The Motive inducing the Lord of Praunstein to declare
War.--Death of Frederic II.--The Emperor's Secret.--Designs of the
Turks.--Death of Mahomet II.--First Establishment of standing
Armies.--Use of Gunpowder.--Energy of Maximilian.--French
Aggressions.--The League to expel the French.--Disappointments of
Maximilian.--Bribing the Pope.--Invasion of Italy.--Capture and
Recapture.--The Chevalier De Bayard.
Adversity only developed more fully the weak and ignoble character of
Frederic. He wandered about, recognized Emperor of Germany, but a
fugitive from his own Austrian estates, occasionally encountering pity,
but never sympathy or respect. Matthias professed his readiness to
surrender Austria back to Frederic so soon as he would fulfill the
treaty by paying the stipulated money. Frederic was accompanied in his
wanderings by his son Maximilian, a remarkably elegant lad, fourteen
years of age. They came to the court of the powerful Duke of Burgundy.
The dukedom extended over wide realms, populous and opulent, and the
duke had the power of a sovereign but not the regal title. He was
ambitious of elevating his dukedom into a kingdom and of being crowned
king; and he agreed to give his only daughter and heiress, Mary, a
beautiful and accomplished girl, to the emperor's son Maximilian, if
Frederic would confer upon his estates the regal dignity and crown him
king. The bargain was made, and Maximilian and Mary both were delighted,
for they regarded each other with all the warmth of young lovers. Mary,
heiress to the dukedom of Burgundy, was a prize which any monarch might
covet; and half the princes of Europe were striving for her hand.
But now came a new difficulty. Neither the emperor nor duke had the
slightest confidence in each other. The King of France, who had hoped to
obtain the hand of Mary for his son the dauphin, caused the suspicion to
be whispered into the ear of Frederic that the Duke of Burgundy sought
the kingly crown only as the first step to the imperial crown; and that
so soon as the dukedom was elevated into a kingdom, Charles, the Duke of
Burgundy, would avail himself of his increased power, to dethrone
Frederic and grasp the crown of Germany. This was probably all true.
Charles, fully understanding the perfidious nature of Frederic, did not
dare to solemnize the marriage until he first should be crowned.
Frederic, on the other hand, did not dare to crown the duke until the
marriage was solemnized, for he had no confidence that the duke, after
having attained the regal dignity, would fulfill his pledge.
Charles was for hurrying the coronation, Frederic for pushing the
marriage. A magnificent throne was erected in the cathedral at Treves,
and preparations were making on the grandest scale for the coronation
solemnities, when Frederic, who did not like to tell the duke plumply to
his face that he was fearful of being cheated, extricated himself from
his embarrassment by feigning important business which called him
suddenly to Cologne. A scene of petty and disgraceful intrigues ensued
between the exasperated duke and emperor, and there were the marching
and the countermarching of hostile bands and the usual miseries of war,
until the death of Duke Charles at the battle of Nancy on the 5th of
January, 1477.
The King of France now made a desperate endeavor to obtain the hand of
Mary for his son. One of the novel acts of this imperial courtship, was
to send an army into Burgundy, which wrested a large portion of Mary's
dominions from her, which the king, Louis XI., refused to surrender
unless Mary would marry his son. Many of her nobles urged the claims of
France. But love in the heart of Mary was stronger than political
expediency, and more persuasive than the entreaties of her nobles. To
relieve herself from importunity, she was hurriedly married, three
months after the death of her father, by proxy to Maximilian.
In August the young prince, but eighteen years of age, with a splendid
retinue, made his public entry into Ghent. His commanding person and the
elegance of his manners, attracted universal admiration. His subjects
rallied with enthusiasm around him, and, guided by his prowess, in a
continued warfare of five years, drove the invading French from their
territories. But death, the goal to which every one tends, was suddenly
and unexpectedly reached by Mary. She died the 7th of August, 1479,
leaving two infant children, Philip and Margaret.
The Emperor Frederic also succeeded, by diplomatic cunning, in convening
the diet of electors and choosing Maximilian as his successor to the
imperial throne. Frederic and Maximilian now united in the endeavor to
recover Austria from the King of Hungary. The German princes, however,
notwithstanding the summons of the emperor, refused to take any part in
the private quarrels of Austria, and thus the battle would have to be
fought between the troops of Maximilian and of Matthias. Maximilian
prudently decided that it would be better to purchase the redemption of
the territory with money than with blood. The affair was in negotiation
when Matthias was taken sick and died the 15th of July, 1490. He left no
heir, and the Hungarian nobles chose Ladislaus, King of Bohemia, to
succeed him. Maximilian had been confident of obtaining the crown of
Hungary. Exasperated by the disappointment, he relinquished all idea of
purchasing his patrimonial estates, but making a sudden rush with his
troops upon the Hungarians, he drove them out of Austria, and pursued
them far over the frontiers of Hungary. Ladislaus, the new King of
Hungary, now listened to terms of peace. A singular treaty was made. The
Bohemian king was to retain the crown of Hungary, officiating as
reigning monarch, while Maximilian was to have the _title_ of King of
Hungary. Ladislaus relinquished all claim to the Austrian territories,
and paid a large sum of money as indemnity for the war.
Thus Austria again comes into independent existence, to watch amidst the
tumult and strife of Europe for opportunities to enlarge her territories
and increase her power. Maximilian was a prince, energetic and brave,
who would not allow any opportunity to escape him. In those dark days of
violence and of blood, every petty quarrel was settled by the sword. All
over Germany the clash of steel against steel was ever resounding. Not
only kings and dukes engaged in wars, but the most insignificant baron
would gather his few retainers around him and declare formal war against
the occupant of the adjacent castle. The spirit of chivalry, so called,
was so rampant that private individuals would send a challenge to the
emperor. Contemporary writers record many curious specimens of these
declarations of war. The Lord of Praunstein declared war against the
city of Frankfort, because a young lady of that city refused to dance
with his uncle at a ball.
Frederic was now suffering from the infirmities of age. Surrendering the
administration of affairs, both in Austria and over the estates of the
empire, to Maximilian, he retired, with his wife and three young
daughters, to Lintz, where he devoted himself, at the close of his long
and turbulent reign, to the peaceful pursuits of rural life. A cancerous
affection of the leg rendered it necessary for him to submit to the
amputation of the limb. He submitted to the painful operation with the
greatest fortitude, and taking up his severed limb, with his accustomed
phlegm remarked to those standing by,
"What difference is there between an emperor and a peasant? Or rather,
is not a sound peasant better than a sick emperor? Yet I hope to enjoy
the greatest good which can happen to man--a happy exit from this
transitory life."
The shock of a second amputation, which from the vitiated state of his
blood seemed necessary, was too great for his enfeebled frame to bear.
He died August 19th, 1493, seventy-eight years of age, and after a reign
of fifty-three years. He was what would be called, in these days, an
ultra temperance man, never drinking even wine, and expressing ever the
strongest abhorrence of alcoholic drinks, calling them the parent of all
vices. He seems to have anticipated the future greatness of Austria; for
he had imprinted upon all his books, engraved upon his plate and carved
into the walls of his palace a mysterious species of anagram composed of
the five vowels, A, E, I, O, U.
The significance of this great secret no one could obtain from him. It
of course excited great curiosity, as it everywhere met the eye of the
public. After his death the riddle was solved by finding among his
papers the following interpretation--
_Austri Est Imperare Orbi Universo._
Austria Is To govern The world Universal.
Maximilian, in the prime of manhood, energetic, ambitious, and invested
with the imperial dignity, now assumed the government of the Austrian
States. The prospect of greatness was brilliant before Maximilian. The
crowns of Bohemia and Hungary were united in the person of Ladislaus,
who was without children. As Maximilian already enjoyed the title of
King of Hungary, no one enjoyed so good a chance as he of securing both
of those crowns so soon as they should fall from the brow of Ladislaus.
Europe was still trembling before the threatening cimeter of the Turk.
Mahomet II., having annihilated the Greek empire, and consolidated his
vast power, and checked in his career by the warlike barons of Hungary,
now cast a lustful eye across the Adriatic to the shores of Italy. He
crossed the sea, landed a powerful army and established twenty thousand
men, strongly garrisoned, at Otranto, and supplied with provisions for a
year. All Italy was in consternation, for a passage was now open
directly from Turkey to Naples and Rome. Mahomet boasted that he would
soon feed his horse on the altar of St. Peter's. The pope, Sextus IV.,
in dismay, was about abandoning Rome, and as there was no hope of
uniting the discordant States of Italy in any effectual resistance, it
seemed inevitable that Italy, like Greece, would soon become a Turkish
province. And where then could it be hoped that the ravages of the Turks
would be arrested?
In this crisis, so alarming, Providence interposed, and the sudden death
of Mahomet, in the vigor of his pride and ambition, averted the danger.
Bajazet II. succeeded to the Moslem throne, an indolent and imbecile
sultan. Insurrection in his own dominions exhausted all his feeble
energies. The Neapolitans, encouraged, raised an army, recovered
Otranto, and drove the Turks out of Italy. Troubles in the Turkish
dominions now gave Christendom a short respite, as all the strength of
the sultan was required to subjugate insurgent Circassia and Egypt.
Though the Emperor of Germany was esteemed the first sovereign in
Europe, and, on state occasions, was served by kings and electors, he
had in reality but little power. The kings who formed his retinue on
occasions of ceremonial pomp, were often vastly his superiors in wealth
and power. Frequently he possessed no territory of his own, not even a
castle, but depended upon the uncertain aids reluctantly granted by the
diet.
Gunpowder was now coming into use as one of the most efficient engines
of destruction, and was working great changes in the science of war. It
became necessary to have troops drilled to the use of cannon and
muskets. The baron could no longer summon his vassals, at the moment, to
abandon the plow, and seize pike and saber for battle, where the strong
arm only was needed. Disciplined troops were needed, who could sweep the
field with well-aimed bullets, and crumble walls with shot and shells.
This led to the establishment of standing armies, and gave the great
powers an immense advantage over their weaker neighbors. The invention
of printing, also, which began to be operative about the middle of the
fifteenth century, rapidly changed, by the diffusion of intelligence,
the state of society, hitherto so barbarous. The learned men of Greece,
driven from their country by the Turkish invasion, were scattered over
Europe, and contributed not a little to the extension of the love of
letters. The discovery of the mariner's compass and improvements in
nautical astronomy, also opened new sources of knowledge and of wealth,
and the human mind all over Europe commenced a new start in the career
of civilization. Men of letters began to share in those honors which
heretofore had belonged exclusively to men of war; and the arts of peace
began to claim consideration with those who had been accustomed to
respect only the science of destruction.
Maximilian was at Innspruck when he received intelligence of the death
of his father. He commenced his reign with an act of rigor which was
characteristic of his whole career. A horde of Turks had penetrated
Styria and Carniola, laying every thing waste before them as far as
Carniola. Maximilian, sounding the alarm, inspired his countrymen with
the same energy which animated his own breast. Fifteen thousand men
rallied at the blast of his bugles. Instead of intrusting the command of
them to his generals, he placed himself at their head, and made so
fierce an onset upon the invaders, that they precipitately fled.
Maximilian returned at the head of his troops triumphant to Vienna,
where he was received with acclamations such as had seldom resounded in
the metropolis. He was hailed as the deliverer of his country, and at
once rose to the highest position in the esteem and affection of the
Austrians.
Maximilian had encountered innumerable difficulties in Burgundy, and was
not unwilling to escape from the vexations and cares of that distant
dukedom, by surrendering its government to his son Philip, who was now
sixteen years of age, and whom the Burgundians claimed to be their ruler
as the heir of Mary. The Swiss estates were also sundered from Austrian
dominion, and, uniting with the Swiss confederacy, were no longer
subject to the house of Hapsburg. Thus Maximilian had the Austrian
estates upon the Danube only, as the nucleus of the empire he was
ambitious of establishing.
Conscious of his power, and rejoicing in the imperial title, he had no
idea of playing an obscure part on the conspicuous stage of European
affairs. With an eagle eye he watched the condition of the empire, and
no less eagerly did he fix his eye upon the movements of those great
southern powers, now becoming consolidated into kingdoms and empires,
and marshaling armies which threatened again to bring all Europe under a
dominion as wide and despotic as that of Rome.
Charles VIII., King of France, crossed the Alps with an army of
twenty-two thousand men, in the highest state of discipline, and armed
with all the modern enginery of war. With ease he subjugated Tuscany,
and in a triumphant march through Pisa and Siena, entered Rome as a
conqueror. It was the 31st of December, 1394, when Charles, by
torchlight, at the head of his exultant troops, entered the eternal
city. The pope threw himself into the castle of St. Angelo, but was soon
compelled to capitulate and to resign all his fortresses to the
conqueror. Charles then continued his march to Naples, which he reached
on the 22d of February. He overran and subjugated the whole kingdom,
and, having consolidated his conquest, entered Naples on a white steed,
beneath imperial banners, and arrogantly assumed the title of King of
Naples, Sicily and Jerusalem. Alphonso, King of Naples, in despair,
abdicated in favor of his son, Ferdinand; and Ferdinand, unable to
oppose any effectual resistance, abandoned his kingdom to the conqueror,
and fled to the island of Ischia.
These alarming aggressions on the part of France, already very powerful,
excited general consternation throughout Europe. Maximilian, as emperor,
was highly incensed, and roused all his energies to check the progress
of so dangerous a rival. The Austrian States alone could by no means
cope with the kingdom of France. Maximilian sent agents to the pope, to
the Dukes of Milan and Florence, and to the King of Arragon, and formed
a secret league to expel the French from Italy, and restore Ferdinand to
Naples. It was understood that the strength of France was such, that
this enterprise could only be achieved through a long war, and that the
allies must continue united to prevent France, when once expelled from
Italy, from renewing her aggressions. The league was to continue
twenty-two years. The pope was to furnish six thousand men, and the
other Italian States twelve thousand. Maximilian promised to furnish
nine thousand. Venice granted the troops of the emperor a free passage
through her dominions.
These important first steps being thus taken secretly and securely, the
emperor summoned a diet of Germany to enlist the States of the empire in
the enterprise. This was the most difficult task, and yet nothing could
be accomplished without the coöperation of Germany. But the Germanic
States, loosely held together, jealous of each other, each grasping
solely at its own aggrandizement, reluctantly delegating any power to
the emperor, were slow to promise coöperation in any general enterprise,
and having promised, were still slower to perform. The emperor had no
power to enforce the fulfillment of agreements, and could only
supplicate. During the long reign of Frederic the imperial dignity had
lapsed more and more into an empty title; and Maximilian had an arduous
task before him in securing even respectful attention to his demands. He
was fully aware of the difficulties, and made arrangements accordingly.
The memorable diet was summoned at Worms, on the 26th of May, 1496. The
emperor had succeeded, by great exertion, in assembling a more numerous
concourse of the princes and nobles of the empire than had ever met on a
similar occasion. He presided in person, and in a long and earnest
address endeavored to rouse the empire to a sense of its own dignity and
its own high mission as the regulator of the affairs of Europe. He spoke
earnestly of their duty to combine and chastise the insolence of the
Turks; but waiving that for the present moment, he unfolded to them the
danger to which Europe was immediately and imminently exposed by the
encroachments of France. To add to the force of his words, he introduced
ambassadors from the King of Naples, who informed the assembly of the
conquests of the French, of their haughty bearing, and implored the aid
of the diet to repel the invaders. The Duke of Milan was then presented,
and, as a member of the empire, he implored as a favor and claimed as a
right, the armies of the empire for the salvation of his duchy. And then
the legate of the pope, in the robes of the Church, and speaking in the
name of the Holy Father to his children, pathetically described the
indignities to which the pope had been exposed, driven from his palace,
bombarded in the fortress to which he had retreated, compelled to
capitulate and leave his kingdom in the hands of the enemy; he
expatiated upon the impiety of the French troops, the sacrilegious
horrors of which they had been guilty, and in tones of eloquence hardly
surpassed by Peter the Hermit, strove to rouse them to a crusade for the
rescue of the pope and his sacred possessions.
Maximilian had now exhausted all his powers of persuasion. He had done
apparently enough to rouse every heart to intensest action. But the diet
listened coldly to all these appeals, and then in substance replied,
"We admit the necessity of checking the incursions of the Turks; we
admit that it is important to check the progress of the French. But our
first duty is to secure peace in Germany. The States of the empire are
embroiled in incessant wars with each other. All attempts to prevent
these private wars between the States of the empire have hitherto
failed. Before we can vote money and men for any foreign enterprise
whatever, we must secure internal tranquillity. This can only be done by
establishing a supreme tribunal, supported by a power which can enforce
its decisions."
These views were so manifestly judicious, that Maximilian assented to
them, and, anxious to lose no time in raising troops to expel the French
from Italy, he set immediately about the organization of an imperial
tribunal to regulate the internal affairs of the empire. A court was
created called the Imperial Chamber. It was composed of a president and
sixteen judges, half of whom were taken from the army, and half from the
class of scholars. To secure impartiality, the judges held their office
for life. A majority of suffrages decided a question and in case of a
tie, the president gave a casting vote. The emperor reserved the right
of deciding certain questions himself. This court gradually became one
of the most important and salutary institutions of the German empire.
By the 7th of August these important measures were arranged. Maximilian
had made great concessions of his imperial dignity in transferring so
much of his nominal power to the Imperial Chamber, and he was now
sanguine that the States would vote him the supplies which were needed
to expel the French from Italy, or, in more honest words, to win for the
empire in Italy that ascendency which France had attained. But bitter
indeed was his disappointment. After long deliberation and vexatious
delays, the diet voted a ridiculous sum, less than one hundred and fifty
thousand dollars, to raise an army "sufficient to check the progress of
the French." One third of this sum Maximilian was to raise from his
Austrian States; the remaining two thirds he was permitted to obtain by
a loan. Four years were to be allowed for raising the money, and the
emperor, as a condition for the reception of even this miserable boon,
was required to pledge his word of honor that at the expiration of the
four years he would raise no more. And even these hundred and fifty
thousand dollars were to be intrusted to seven treasurers, to be
administered according to their discretion. One only of these treasurers
was to be chosen by the emperor, and the other six by the diet.
Deeply chagrined by this result, Maximilian was able to raise only three
thousand men, instead of the nine thousand which he had promised the
league. Charles VIII., informed of the formidable coalition combining
against him, and not aware of the feeble resources of the emperor,
apprehensive that the armies of Germany, marching down and uniting with
the roused States of Italy, might cut off his retreat and overwhelm him,
decided that the "better part of courage is discretion;" and he
accordingly abandoned his conquests, recrossed the Apennines, fought his
backward path through Italy, and returned to France. He, however, left
behind him six thousand men strongly intrenched, to await his return
with a new and more powerful armament.
Maximilian now resolved chivalrously to throw himself into Italy, and
endeavor to rouse the Italians themselves to resist the threatened
invasion, trusting that the diet of Germany, when they should see him
struggling against the hosts of France, would send troops to his aid.
With five hundred horse, and about a thousand foot soldiers, he crossed
the Alps. Here he learned that for some unknown reason Charles had
postponed his expedition. Recoiling from the ridicule attending a
quixotic and useless adventure, he hunted around for some time to find
some heroic achievement which would redeem his name from reproach, when,
thwarted in every thing, he returned to Austria, chagrined and
humiliated.
Thus frustrated in all his attempts to gain ascendency in Italy,
Maximilian turned his eyes to the Swiss estates of the house of
Hapsburg, now sundered from the Austrian territories. He made a vigorous
effort, first by diplomacy, then by force of arms, to regain them. Here
again he was frustrated, and was compelled to enter into a capitulation
by which he acknowledged the independence of the Helvetic States, and
their permanent severance from Austrian jurisdiction.
In April, 1498, Charles VIII. died, and Louis XII. succeeded him on the
throne of France. Louis immediately made preparations for a new invasion
of Italy. In those miserable days of violence and blood, almost any
prince was ready to embark in war under anybody's banner, where there
was the least prospect of personal aggrandizement. The question of right
or wrong, seemed seldom to enter any one's mind. Louis fixed his eyes
upon the duchy of Milan as the richest and most available prize within
his grasp. Conscious that he would meet with much opposition, he looked
around for allies.
"If you will aid me," he said to Pope Alexander VI., "I will assist you
in your war against the Duke of Romagna. I will give your son, Caesar
Borgia,[1] a pension of two thousand dollars a year, will confer upon
him an important command in my army, and will procure for him a marriage
with a princess of the royal house of Navarre."
[Footnote 1: Cæsar Borgia, who has filled the world with the renown of
his infamy, was the illegitimate son of Alexander VI., and of a Roman
lady named Yanozza.]
The holy father could not resist this bribe, and eagerly joined the
robber king in his foray. To Venice Louis said--
"If you will unite with me, I will assist you in annexing to your
domains the city of Cremona, and the Ghiaradadda." Lured by such hopes
of plunder, Venice was as eager as the pope to take a share in the
piratic expedition. Louis then sent to the court of Turin, and offered
them large sums of money and increased territory, if they would allow
him a free passage across the Alps. Turin bowed obsequiously, and
grasped at the easy bargain. To Florence he said, "If you raise a hand
to assist the Duke of Milan, I will crush you. If you remain quiet, I
will leave you unharmed." Florence, overawed, remained as meek as a
lamb. The diplomacy being thus successfully closed, an army of
twenty-two thousand men was put in vigorous motion in July, 1499. They
crossed the Alps, fought a few battles, in which, with overpowering
numbers, they easily conquered their opposers, and in twenty days were
in possession of Milan. The Duke Ludovico with difficulty escaped. With
a few followers he threaded the defiles of the Tyrolese mountains, and
hastened to Innspruck, the capital of Tyrol, where Maximilian then was,
to whom he conveyed the first tidings of his disaster. Louis XII.
followed after his triumphant army, and on the 6th of October made a
triumphal entry into the captured city, and was inaugurated Duke of
Milan.
Maximilian promised assistance, but could raise neither money nor men.
Ludovico, however, succeeded in hiring fifteen hundred Burgundian
horsemen, and eight thousand Swiss mercenaries--for in those ages of
ignorance and crime all men were ready, for pay, to fight in any
cause--and emerging from the mountains upon the plains of Milan, found
all his former subjects disgusted with the French, and eager to rally
under his banners. His army increased at every step. He fell fiercely
upon the invaders, routed them everywhere, drove them from the duchy,
and recovered his country and his capital as rapidly as he had lost
them. One fortress only the French maintained. The intrepid Chevalier De
Bayard, _the knight without fear and without reproach_, threw himself
into the citadel of Novarra, and held out against all the efforts of
Ludovico, awaiting the succor which he was sure would come from his
powerful sovereign the King of France.