CRISTO RAUL.ORG

READING HALL

THE DOORS OF WISDOM

CHAPTER X. The Anti-Papal Policy of the Emperor. —Advance of the Imperial Army on Rome.

In order to form a just estimate of Charles V in his opposition to Clement VII, we must represent to ourselves the part played by the Emperor in connection with the raid of the Colonna. Before Charles had been more fully informed of the Pope’s hostile intentions he had already, on the 11th of June 1526, instructed his Ambassador in Rome that if Clement did not show himself compliant he should be driven out by means of the Colonna and a revolutionary movement set up in the States of the Church. While the Emperor, in this way, signified his approval of the treacherous and piratical manoeuvre so unworthy of him, which Moncada carried out by means of the Colonna on the 20th of September, he was giving the Papal Nuncio Castiglione assurances of his filial submission to the Holy See. As soon as the raid had successfully taken place, Moncada advised the Emperor to express to the Nuncio and Clement his great grief at the acts of violence done by the Colonna and to make known to the princes of Christendom how repugnant such occurrences had been to his views and wishes. Before the Emperor, then staying in Granada, could give effect to this advice, he had already taken a fresh step against the Pope. On the 13th of August he announced publicly, for communication to the Christian world, that the aggression of the French, the Pope, and other Italians forced him to take up arms. Moncada was fully empowered to confirm the Duke of Ferrara in the possession of all his fiefs held from the Empire.

In pursuing his contest with the Pope, Charles had recourse also to the advice of learned canonists. The latter were to expound to him in particular how far and under what circumstances an Emperor owed obedience to the Pope, and whether the former would be justified in refusing payment of half the annates and in declaring war against the supreme Pontiff, if he were called upon to do so. Castiglione, who reported upon these consultations, said the views differed, yet all had aimed at pleasing Charles. In a report in cipher he also observed that most secret consultations had been held as to the way in which the Emperor could proceed against the Pope, and whether he was bound to subject himself to excommunication and censures and a thousand other evils.

Such was the state of opinion when the severely worded Brief of the 23rd of June was handed to Charles. The presentation of this all-important document was made on the 20th of August by Castiglione, who had not yet received the second and milder communication with the order to withhold the first. The Brief caused Charles deep resentment, especially as there were about him those who knew how to fan his justifiable agitation into extreme anger; Gattinara, who was sore at not receiving the Cardinalate, was active in this direction. Charles concealed his inward displeasure; he spoke, it is true, of a council before which he would vindicate himself from the Pope’s charges, but, on the whole, he remained outwardly calm, and used, as he had done previously to Castiglione, the most fervent expressions of devotion to the Holy See. Meanwhile a bulky state-paper was drawn up which exceeded in its language even that of the Brief, and opposed to the one-sided statement of the Pope another not less one-sided on the part of the Emperor.

In the opening of this document, dated “Granada, September 17, 1526,” prominence was given to the fact that the Brief of the 23rd of June, handed in by the Nuncio on the 20th of August, was couched in language neither becoming in the Chief Shepherd of Christendom nor consonant with the “filial devotion” which Charles had always shown towards the Apostolic See and the Pope. It was necessary to reply in some detail, as the Emperor was not conscious of blame and could not allow his unsullied reputation to be assailed. He had always shown himself to be a great lover of peace, and had aimed only at the peace and freedom of Italy. Let the Pope consider whether his present behaviour was in keeping with his pastoral office; whether he ought to have drawn the sword that Christ had ordered Peter to replace in its sheath; whether he had a right to weaken the forces of Christendom and to strengthen its enemies, the heretics. When his Holiness, at the beginning of his Brief, lays stress on the necessity of pardon, the position is not an intelligible one, since no one has injured the Pope’s honour and dignity. In order to make his statements more credible, the Brief describes a “long tragedy,” recounts what is in keeping with the Papal conception, but passes over in silence everything that explains the real course of affairs. To show clearly the real sequence of facts, the state-paper refers back to the position assumed by the Papacy in the question of the Imperial election the many marks of favour shown by the Emperor to Clement when he was Cardinal are stated with clear precision the events of the most recent years are set forth very thoroughly The object of the whole representation is to brand Clement VII with disloyalty, and to justify Charles in his treatment of disputed Italian questions (Milan, Reggio, Modena). This is done in exceedingly “energetic, compact” language, not without an admixture of sophistry. Many passages are marked by a refinement of sarcasm as when it is said that it is incredible that the Vicar of Christ on earth should acquire for himself worldly possessions at the cost of a single drop of human blood, since this would be in direct contradiction to the teaching of the Gospel. In another place it is specially pointed out that the Pope would not have lost the praise due to a good shepherd and father if he had kept himself aloof from plots and alliances against the Emperor. In other respects also severe charges are brought against Clement. His conduct has not tended to protect the safety of Italy and Christendom, nor even that of the Holy See, which—seeing that no one was coming forward to attack it—stood in no need of weapons and troops. In consequence of this the Pope has destroyed the means of protecting the Holy See, has squandered the treasure of the Church, and acted in opposition to Christ Himself and to the hurt of Christendom. The Pope cannot justify his deeds before God or men. It is evident—if such language may be used—that he has only occasioned scandal and destruction to the Christian commonwealth. Clement VII might remember that the Curia draws greater revenues from the Emperor's dominions than from any other countries. If the Pope is as anxious for peace as is the Emperor, let him lay down his arms, and it would then be easy to combat the errors of the Lutherans and other heretics. If, on the contrary, his Holiness disregards the Emperor’s defence, insists on maintaining war and opposing himself to the general peace—in which case he is acting not as a father but as a party leader, not as a shepherd but as a hireling—the Emperor will then be forced, seeing that no other higher judge can be appealed to, to turn to a Holy General Council of collective Christendom, in whose hands it shall be left to decide on all questions in dispute. At the end of his indictment Charles solemnly appeals to the judgment of this Council, which the Pope shall summon in some safe and fitting place within limits of time to be definitely settled.

Since the days of Frederick the Second and Louis of Bavaria no ruler of Germany had addressed such language to Rome. There were many passages in which Charles used language “of which no follower of Luther need have been ashamed”. It was at one with the notions of the draftsman of the paper, Alfonso de Valdes, who was steeped in the spirit of Erasmus the humanist.

On the 18th of September 1526 the document was officially handed over to Castiglione, the Papal Nuncio, who entered a protest against such an uncivil reply, and then went on to point out that it was only in consequence of belated instructions that the Brief of the 23rd of June had been presented, and that he was most painfully surprised. Hitherto Charles, in his conversations with him, had always evinced a most conciliatory temper; even as regards the Brief of the 23rd of June he had shown diplomatic self­restraint; the second and more temperate Brief of the 25th had, Castiglione felt certain, restored the Emperor to perfect composure. Charles, indeed, had solemnly assured him that his answer, even if he appealed to a council, would be so gentle that the Pope would have no cause to complain of it. And now there came this official paper! In great anger Castiglione complained to Gattinara and to Charles that he had been deceived, and felt it an affront that he should have been expected to transmit such a violent and insulting reply. It was of really little use that the Imperial Chancery, on this very 18th of September, drew up an answer, in corresponding terms, to the more moderately expressed Brief. The conciliatory and friendly words which the Emperor continued to address freely to Castiglione and others had quite as little meaning. He adhered inflexibly to the standpoint of his paper of the 17th of September. Indeed, in the letter addressed to the Cardinals on the 6th of October, he went still further and endeavoured to stir up an anti-Papal schism. If his Holiness, he wrote, will not summon a council, then the Cardinals, “in conformity with legal right”, must do so.

In thorough keeping with the Emperor’s embittered feeling was the insulting manner in which Perez, the Secretary of the Embassy, communicated to the Pope his master’s message. Perez had received the document on the 9th of December. He kept its existence a close secret until the 12th, when a Consistory was held. On that day he appeared unexpectedly with a Spanish notary and Spanish witnesses before the Cardinals surrounding the Pope and handed to Clement the state-paper, and to the Cardinals the letter of the 6th of October. Immediately after leaving the hall he had an act to notify their delivery drawn up by his notary. Consequently the news of the Emperor's demand for a council was at once spread through Rome.

Two days later Perez had an audience of Clement VII in order to communicate to him a letter which the Emperor had written to Cesare Fieramosca. “Why”, asked the Pope irritably, “have you not brought a notary with you on this occasion as well, so that the delivery of this letter might also be certified?”. Perez, according to his own account, had the audacity to deny altogether the notarial act of the 12th of December. “But”, so he himself relates, “when I perceived that the Pope had observed the whole proceeding and had seen the notary, whom he knew quite well by sight, and the witnesses, I was obliged to admit that I was acting by the express command of your Majesty”. “In that case”, answered the Pope, “if you had given me notice before­hand, I should not have prevented the letter being read in Consistory”. Further excuses from Perez he cut short by bringing the audience to a close; but to the Portuguese Ambassador he remarked that he would, in case of necessity, make use of the Emperor's letter in self-defence.

That the Imperialists were determined on going to extremities is shown by the fact that Lannoy, step by step, increased his demands and ordered his troops to advance on Frosinone. The acceptance of his conditions, which, in their final form, called upon the Pope to give up, as guarantees of peace, Parma, Piacenza, Ostia, and Civita Vecchia, and demanded the surrender by the Florentines of Pisa and Leghorn, would have meant the practical abolition of the temporal possessions of the Holy See. In great agitation the Pope declared that, since they were determined to rob him of everything, it should be done only by force and not under the guise of fair play.

The recruiting of troops for the Papal army was pushed on in haste. In Rome, where the inhabitants, with a view to taking their share in the defence, were employing the best means for the security of the city, the famous engineer Sangallo, in whom the Pope placed special confidence, was active. On the 10th of December the warlike Legate Trivulzio joined the troops intended to oppose Lannoy. Soon afterwards a monition was issued against all invaders of the Papal territories. In closest alliance with Lannoy were the Colonna, still breathing vengeance, who always found strong support among the Imperialists in Naples. Perez had already, on the 4th and 5th of December, informed the Emperor that, sooner or later, the Colonna, with the help of the Viceroy and Moncada, would once more make war on the Pope and try to drive him out of Rome.

Still greater than the danger threatening in the south was the peril slowly drawing nearer from the north.

It was of the utmost importance for the development of events in upper Italy that the Pope, in spite of all negotiations, was unsuccessful in coming to an agreement with the Duke of Ferrara. It was only with Alfonso’s support that Frundsberg was able, at the end of November 1526, to make the difficult passage of the Po and to carry the ravages of war into the states of Parma and Piacenza. Guicciardini, who was stationed here with Papal troops, implored the Duke of Urbino, but in vain, to come to his aid. The Duke remained on the other side of the Po to cover the territory of Venice. “The Emperor's luck”, said Guicciardini, “is boundless ; but the limit has been reached, inasmuch as his enemies have neither the wits nor the will to make use of the forces at their disposal”.

Frundsberg did not seize any of the fortified towns on his route, but encamped in the territory of Piacenza, to await the arrival of the Constable de Bourbon and his army. The latter had the greatest difficulties to surmount with his mutinous and savage troops, who were clamouring with threats for their arrears of pay. On the 1st of February 1527 he had been able at last to satisfy at least the army in Milan after, so he wrote to the Emperor, he had drained the city of its blood. De Leyva remained behind in Milan with twelve thousand men; the remainder went south with Bourbon. In the days between the 7th and 12th of February the conjunction of Bourbon’s army with that of Frundsberg took place not far from Piacenza. The host of nearly twenty-two thousand men took, on the 22nd of February, the ancient Emilian Way; the advance was slow owing to bad weather and the painful scarcity of provisions. If the Duke of Ferrara had not sent frequent supplies of money and victuals, the highly dissatisfied and to some extent mutinous horde would undoubtedly have broken up. Never was there such a good opportunity of attacking the Imperial forces; nevertheless, the Duke of Urbino lay idle. Thus the former were able, although amid the greatest hardships, to march through Parma and Modena and to cross the Panaro, the old river boundary of the States of the Church. On the 8th of March they encamped at San Giovanni, hardly a day’s journey from Bologna.

In the meantime there had been constant alternations in Rome of fear and hope, military preparations and negotiations for peace. During the first days of the year of misfortune 1527 Clement had addressed to Lannoy and the Colonna a solemn admonition to lay down their arms under pain of excommunication and, at the same time, had released Orazio Baglioni from his three years’ imprisonment in St. Angelo and taken him into his pay. On the 4th of January Lannoy’s ultimatum was presented to the Pope. Four days later the long-expected envoy of Francis I, Renzo da Ceri, arrived, but without soldiers and without money. “It would not have been so bad,” thought even a friend of the French, Canossa, “if he had not come at all.” Instead of the necessary help Renzo brought fresh demands from his self-seeking sovereign : the cession of Naples to France. The dissatisfaction and alarm of Clement were still more increased at this time by the growing scarcity of money and the incessant appeals of the Florentines to come quickly to terms with the Imperialists. His fellow-countrymen depicted in the blackest colours the infernal horrors which might be let loose on Florence at any moment by Spaniards and landsknechts. Schonberg made similar representations; moreover, Clement was daily besought, with tears, by Clarice de' Medici, to deliver her husband, held fast in Naples as a hostage; so that, as the Mantuan envoy remarked, the poor Pope, assailed thus on every side, was to be compared to a ship tossed hither and thither on the high seas by conflicting winds.

Cardinal Farnese advised flight from Rome. “Things cannot go on thus”, said the Venetian Ambassador; “the Pope has not a soldo left”. Clement openly confessed his despair. He even declared that he would like to withdraw entirely from politics and confine himself exclusively to his ecclesiastical functions.

The Pope’s cares were made still heavier by the representations of a member of the Sacred College, who urged him to raise the necessary funds by a nomination of Cardinals and to anticipate the Emperor by summoning a council. The sale of Cardinals’ hats had, at an earlier date, been decisively rejected by Clement; and even now he would hear nothing of it “from an honourable conscientiousness”. The thought of bringing these important affairs into his own hands by means of a council was one which in itself pleased him; yet he held back through the fear that his hands would be completely tied in respect of the nomination of Cardinals. So nothing definite was settled, and the plan came to nothing. But the situation was one which imperatively demanded that he should make himself safe in Rome. On the 14th of January 1527 Renzo visited the Papal forces encamped to the south of Rome and afterwards returned to the city, where the citizens were armed and organized on a war footing with all possible haste. Lannoy’s answer consisted in the reopening of hostilities by the siege of Frosinone, although the limits of the armistice had not expired. Thereupon Clement, on the 23rd of January, called upon all the Neapolitan fief-holders to take up arms for the States of the Church. At the same time he entered into closer communication with the Voivode of Siebenbürgen, Joannes Zapolya, who was contesting the crown of Hungary against the Emperor’s brother. While these warlike measures were in progress the negotiations of that strange time went steadily on. On the evening of the 25th of January, Cesare Fieramosca, accompanied by Schonberg and Quiñones, arrived in Rome with proposals for an armistice from Charles. They at once went to see Clement in the Belvedere.

Fieramosca brought from the Emperor, who also continued to employ very friendly language with regard to Castiglione, the best assurances of his good-will towards the Holy See, but very hard conditions for the conclusion of a three years’ peace: the restoration of the Colonna; the payment of 200,000 ducats by the Pope and Florence, and, as security, the surrender of Parma, Piacenza, and Civita Vecchia into the hands of a third party. In spite of the opposition of the Cardinals, Clement VII, in his necessity, entered into the agreement on the 28th of January, but the ratification of the treaty was postponed in order to allow of Venice being asked to give her adhesion; an eight days’ armistice was to be observed provisionally.

Before the latter had run its course the state of affairs had undergone a fresh change. The ink of the treaty was hardly dry before the news arrived that Rene, Count de Vaudemont, the champion of the claims of the house of Anjou on Naples, had come from France with 30,000 ducats, and that the envoy of Henry VIII, Sir John Russell, with a like amount, was on his way to Rome. This was enough to rekindle Clement’s warlike spirit—who very rightly placed no trust in Lannoy—to such an extent that Giberti, on the 29th of January, disregarding the armistice, gave orders to Cardinal Trivulzio to make an offensive movement. On the 1st of February came Vaudemont, and on the 2nd the Rector of the University of Rome mustered the students, fifteen hundred fine well-armed youths eager for service. On the evening of the 4th, beacons on the hills of Tivoli announced the defeat of Lannoy, “the greatest enemy of the Holy See,” at Frosinone. After so many misfortunes, Giberti and the Pope rejoiced at this gleam of sunshine. On the 7th of February Andrea Doria arrived, and it was resolved to turn the victory to account by attacking Naples; and yet a conspiracy had first been discovered at Rome which ought to have been a warning to use extreme caution

In order to create disturbances on the rear of the Papal army, Lannoy and the Colonna had joined themselves with the chief of the Orsini, Napoleone, Abbot of Farfa. This turbulent man was offered pay in the Imperial service and the daughter of Vespasiano Colonna with a dowry of 30,000 ducats. In return Napoleone bound himself to give free passage through his domains to the troops of Charles V, commanded by Ascanio Colonna, and to procure, by means of an adherent in Rome, the opening of one of the city gates. At the same time Orsini was to assemble all his troops and to appear with them in the Leonine city under pretext of protecting the Pope ; in reality, in order to murder him together with eight Cardinals. The attempt had all the more prospect of success as Orsini, the traitor, enjoyed the full confidence of the Pope. Luckily, however, Clement was told of the danger threatening him by the Count of Anguillara, whom Orsini had asked to participate in the plot. The Abbot was therefore arrested at Bracciano on the 1st of February, and brought to the castle of St. Angelo, where, after a struggle, he made a full confession.

The miscarriage of this plot, the defeat at Frosinone, and, lastly, the Papal advance on Naples, made such an impression on Lannoy that he renounced all his previous demands for money payments, the surrender of strongholds, and the restoration of the Colonna. Although the envoys of France and Venice were even now still averse to an armistice, the arrangements for one might very likely have been carried out had not the English representative insisted that the opinion of Venice must first be heard. For this they had to wait, and in the meantime first one and then another messenger of disaster reached Clement.

The King of France had not fulfilled one of all his glittering promises. His auxiliaries arrived late and in insufficient numbers; for the monthly payments of the war subsidy the Roman treasury waited in vain; although a tenth of the ecclesiastical revenues of the whole of France had been granted him, Francis only sent the ridiculous sum of 9000 ducats. Also, the support intended for the expedition against Naples was so insignificant in men and money that the whole enterprise, started with such hopes, came to nothing. This frivolous Prince was so absorbed in hunting and other pleasures that no time was left to him for things of serious importance. To the Italians Francis was as prodigal as ever of fair words, but he did nothing, and his indifference threw the Papal Ambassador, Acciaiuoli, into sheer desperation. This indifference did not grow less as affairs in Italy turned more and more in favour of the Imperialists; even so true a partisan of France as Canossa had to admit that Francis let the Pope’s business go to rack and ruin. The behaviour of the Venetians was not much better; they certainly did all they could to prevent an agreement between the Pope and the Emperor, but showed no sign of procuring for the former means to prosecute the war. “Venice”, as Canossa had written to Giberti on the 28th of November 1526, “cares for nothing but her own interests: help from that quarter is to be expected as little as from France”.

Meanwhile the danger from the north was drawing ever nearer; Florence and the Romagna were seriously threatened, while Venice and the Duke of Urbino only thought of themselves. In the south the advantages gained against Naples could not be followed up owing to the ever-increasing poverty of the Pope, now left in straits by his allies. In consequence the Papal troops were not only left without pay, but without that bare necessity of life—bread. The half-famished soldiers deserted by the score; the remainder had at last to make their way back to Piperno. At Terracina a plot was discovered to deliver the town to Pompeo Colonna.

In these difficulties Clement, on the 6th of March, forwarded a safe-conduct to Cesare Fieramosca, and five days later this agent of the Emperor entered Rome. Du Bellay also arrived on the same day; he brought many fine promises but not the longed-for 20,000 ducats. According to his wont Clement hesitated for some days but at last, driven to extremity, nothing remained for him to do but to accept the conditions offered by Fieramosca and Serenon as Lannoy’s plenipotentiaries. In the night between the 15th and 16th of March an eight months’ armistice began, the terms of which were that each party should give up their conquests, although the territory wrested from the Colonna remained in the Pope’s possession during the truce. On the other hand, Clement promised to absolve the whole house from the censures passed upon them, to reinstate Cardinal Pompeo, and to pay, as ransom for the hostages Strozzi and Salviati, 60,000 ducats to the Imperialist army, who were, in return, to evacuate the Papal States. Lannoy was to come to Rome in person to ratify the treaty; the Pope saw in that a guarantee that Bourbon also would respect the agreement.

Lannoy came to Rome on the 25th of March. The Pope received him with great honour and assigned him rooms in the Vatican. Charles V’s opponents tried at the last hour  to change Clement’s mind; they represented to him how dangerous it was to sacrifice himself for the good-will of the Imperialists. The whole convention, thought John Russell, was only a trick to separate Clement from his allies. But Clement, after Lannoy’s arrival, held that the execution of the treaty would be quite safe; he repeatedly said in tones of decision to the Ambassadors when they warned him, “Quod scripsi scripsi”. On the 27th of March, in a secret consistory, he addressed the Cardinals on the state of affairs; on the 28th he excused himself to the Doge, referring to the failure of all his means of help; on the 29th followed the ratification of the treaty.

Trusting to the loyalty of Lannoy, Clement VII carried out his treaty obligations at once in the most conscientious manner. There can be no doubt that his pacific intentions were serious. In order to put an end finally to all questions in dispute, the mission of Giberti to England and France was taken into consideration. Although Clement had the  advantage in the Neapolitan war, he withdrew his troops both by land and sea. He even went so far, in order to save money, as to reduce the total of his forces to a hundred light horsemen and two hundred foot soldiers of the so- called “Black Band”. All these measures show how certainly he counted on Bourbon also accepting the treaty. In order to settle this Fieramosca had already, on the 15th of March, arrived at the Imperialist camp fully empowered to take all the necessary steps. It is certain that both the Pope and Giberti had not the least presentiment that the danger threatening them from the Imperial army was not yet fully removed. When the news first reached Rome that Bourbon's army refused to accept the treaty con­cluded with Lannoy, Giberti saw only a daring attempt to extort more money.

Of all the illusions under which Clement VII and his adviser laboured, none was more momentous than their attributing to the Imperial generals an influence over the army which, for a long time past, had got entirely out of control.

On the very first rumour of Lannoy’s negotiations with the Pope, the German and Spanish soldiers, who had bivouacked at San Giovanni, near Bologna, since the 8th of March, were thrown into great excitement. The troops were in a wretched condition they had endured up till then four months of poverty, hunger, and cold, and no end to their hardships was in sight. Heavy downfalls of snow and rain had turned the ground almost into a swamp, where in damp, miserable clothing the soldiers were encamped, many without shoes to their feet, all without pay and a sufficiency of food. The prospect of booty, the riches of Florence, the greater riches of Rome, had alone kept them together and given them courage amid their misery. It can easily be imagined what an impression was made on them by the news that they were to be “thrust out of Italy like beggars” and the prizes of victory snatched from them. As the increasing hurricane lashes the sea into greater and greater agitation until the conflicting tumult of the waves resembles chaos, so the rumour of a disastrous peace, passing from mouth to mouth through the Imperialist host, produced a scene of unparalleled excitement and passion. The Spaniards, to whom the Emperor owed eight months’ pay, were the first to mutiny. They flung themselves in fury on Bourbon’s tent, demanding payment in full with wild uproar. Bourbon had to hide himself in a horse-stall; one of his gentlemen was murdered; his tent was plundered. The Germans, stirred up by the tumult, quickly assembled; they also shouted “Pay, pay”, refusing to march a step further unless they had their money. “All the men were in a kindling temper which burned like fire. They were ready to kill the captains and leaders”.

An attempt to get sufficient money from the Duke of Ferrara failed. Thereupon “Father Frundsberg”, on the 16th of March, gathered the Germans together and gave them an address “so earnest”  in its tone that he “must have moved a stone”. But all the representations of the man who, for a generation, by the power of his presence, of his will, of his word, and of his successes, had held the landsknechts together, were unavailing. “Pay, pay”, shouted the frenzied soldiers. They even turned their pikes against their captains. Then Frundsberg’s giant constitution suddenly gave way; overcome by grief and anger, he fell speechless on a drum. He had been struck down by apoplexy .

The party of Clement VII saw in the unexpected fate of Frundsberg the judgment of God on one who had presumptuously declared his willingness to lay hands on the Pope’s person. But if they hoped that the landsknechts, deprived of their leader, would disband, they soon found themselves bitterly undeceived. The Germans only wished to escape as quickly as possible from the scene of misfortune. The whole army was of one mind that, under any circumstances, an advance must be made on districts that still lay open to plunder and offered a prospect of provision and booty. Bourbon had given each soldier a ducat and promised him unlimited pillage—"the law of Mohammed”.

Such was the situation when, on the 20th of March, Fieramosca produced the treaty of the 15th and 30,000 ducats, but this sum could not satisfy the soldiers; it was only like a drop of water on a hot stone. The reception given to the messenger of peace was in keeping with the soldiers’ mood ; “they were like raging lions”, Fieramosca reported to the Emperor, and he only saved his life by taking flight to Ferrara. Bourbon had lost all power over his army. He stood helpless before the chaos, in which the only element of unity was the desire to be let loose. Forward at any cost, forward to Florence, forward to Rome! On the 29th of March Bourbon sent a message to Lannoy that he was forced of necessity to advance; at the same time he informed the Pope of this decision, by which the armistice was broken. Soon afterwards he raised his demands to 150,000 ducats. “Three things,” wrote Guicciardini on the 29th of March to Giberti, “remain open to you; to accede to everything by a new treaty, to take flight, or to defend yourselves to the death.”

After provisions and munitions had come from Ferrara the Imperialist army set forward on the 30th of March. Many thought that the fierce horde would throw itself immediately on Florence. But the Apennines were still covered with snow, and well protected by troops. They therefore went by way of Bologna, plundering and burning slowly on the ancient Emilian Way as they drew nearer to the Romagna. Guicciardini had, in the meantime, succeeded in getting the Duke of Urbino—who, hitherto solely occupied in guarding Venetian territory, had remained near the Po—to follow up the enemy, although at a considerable distance. This induced Bourbon to turn to the Apennines. He chose the road leading over Meldola into the upper valley of the Arno. The rain fell in torrents; but on went the army, up into the mountains, having to leave behind all their baggage waggons. The hope of the “glorious plunder of Florence” gave wings to the steps of the soldiers, who on the 16th of April reached Santa Sofia, that belonged to Florentine territory.

On the entreaty of Clement VII, Lannoy, with 60,000 ducats from the Pope and 20,000 raised from his own resources, had left Rome for the Romagna on the 3rd of April to try and persuade the Imperialist forces to return. Letters from Bourbon caused him to alter his course and to go direct to Florence. Here he succeeded in arranging with Bourbon’s agents that the Florentines should pay the Imperialist army 150,000 ducats; on receipt of the first half the army was to begin its return march. Clement VII, meanwhile, had continued to dismiss his soldiers. He had hardly had news of the Florentine arrangement when, from misdirected economy and disgust at their insubordination, he parted with the last of his forces, the men of the Black Band. Vaudemont, with his contingent at Civita Vecchia, sailed for Marseilles just as if peace had been securely concluded; all warnings had been in vain. “The imprudence and carelessness”, wrote Francesco Gonzaga on the 11th of April, “is too great; before the armistice has taken effect the Pope has entirely disarmed himself. All this has been done only to save a little money. Everyone is astonished at such proceedings. But without doubt God's will has so ordered this, that the Church and its leaders may be destroyed”.

A feeling of uneasiness, such as almost always precedes great catastrophes, prevailed in Rome. Old predictions of overwhelming judgments on the seat and centre of the Church’s government revived again with increased force. Extraordinary accidents, regarded as portents, a flash of lightning which occurred as Lannoy arrived at the Vatican, caused disturbance in anxious minds; such things were looked upon as a premonition that the wrath of Heaven was about to strike the sinful city.

A still more powerful, if momentary, impression was made on the Romans by one of those fanatical preachers of repentance who even then were constantly trying to add to the excitement of the Italian people, terrified already by prophecies, and sorely visited by war, plague, and Other calamities. On Holy Thursday (18th April 1527), when Clement VII, after the reading of the Bull In Coena Domini, was giving the pontifical blessing to a devout multitude of ten thousand persons, a man with the demeanour of a maniac, almost entirely naked, save only for a leathern apron, clambered on to the statue of St. Paul in front of St. Peter's and shouted to the Pope : “Thou bastard of Sodom, for thy sins Rome shall be destroyed. Repent, and turn thee! If thou wilt not believe me, in fourteen days thou shalt see it”.

A prophet of this sort was nothing new to the Romans; as far back as the summer of 1525 a hermit had declared to them his strange visions. The prophecies of this new herald of misfortune, who was known by the name of Brandano, surpassed, however, in many respects anything of the kind known before. The appearance of this enthusiast was a highly characteristic episode of this agitated time. Bartolomeo Carosi, called Brandano, was a native of Petrojo near Siena. After leading for a long time an evil life in the world, he was suddenly converted and gave himself up, as a hermit, to severe acts of penance. Later on he quitted his solitude and passed through the towns of his native district holding up before the inhabitants their sinful manner of life. The wrath of God would burst upon them, war, plague, and other visitations would follow on the general iniquity. This was on the whole the substance of his penitential preaching. Sometimes in his fiery zeal he gave utterance to more concise discourse. Perhaps his outward appearance produced more effect than his preachings and prophesyings. Clothed only so far as decency demanded, barefooted and with long red hair hanging dishevelled to his shoulders, the prophet went his rounds. His frame was muscular, but emaciated by fasting; his face wan and deeply furrowed, the greenish-yellow eyes hollowed by tears and nightly vigils; his movements were abrupt and uncouth. When preaching he held a crucifix in his right hand, in his left a skull.  Some thought him a crazy fool, others a prophet and saint. The common folk had many a tale to tell of his severe exercises of penance, his frequent pilgrimages to Santiago in Spain, even of miracles he had worked. In Siena he had preached in the cathedral ; now, with cries of woe, he was announcing in the streets of the Eternal City  the certain downfall of its priests and inhabitants and the renewal of the Church.

On Easter Eve 1527 Brandano went from the Campo di Fiore to St. Angelo, and, like a second Jonas, cried with a loud voice, “Rome, do penance! They shall deal with thee as God dealt with Sodom and Gomorrha”. Then he said quietly, as if to himself: “He has robbed the Mother of God to adorn his harlot, or rather his friend”. On hearing of this scandalous speech the Pope put an end to his doings by ordering Brandano to be placed in confinement. He was soon afterwards set at liberty and started afresh on a career which brought upon him renewed imprisonment.

The destruction foretold by this prophet of evil was drawing nearer and nearer with the certainty of fate. Notwithstanding the arrangement with the Florentines, Bourbon’s army continued to march on Rome. After extraordinary exertions the crest of the Apennines was surmounted; the eight field-pieces, attached to ropes, had to be dragged along by hand. On the 18th of April the half-starved troops reached S. Maria in Bagno, on the south side of the mountains, and on the 20th Bourbon encamped at Pieve di S. Stefano in the upper valley of the Tiber. Here Lannoy met him. The latter had left Florence on the 15th of April, and on the 19th had been attacked by the inhabitants of Santa Sofia and forced to take refuge in the abbey of the Camaldoli, S. Maria in Cosmedin. Two days later he suddenly appeared in the Imperialist camp. It was soon discovered that he and Bourbon were trying to deceive the Florentines, who thereupon made energetic preparations for the defence of their city.

When Bourbon now raised his demand for money to 240,000 ducats, this, it was evident, was because he knew his enemy was unprepared. His army was in such a condition that necessity forced him to go forward. Only the hope of plundering Florence held his men together. Bourbon advanced all the more joyfully as he knew that he was thus meeting the Emperor’s wishes, whose first object was to get hold of money to pay his troops and to wring from the Pope the most favourable treaty possible.

Clement VII was highly indignant at the non-observance of the armistice. “To produce 240,000 ducats”, Giberti exclaimed, “was as impossible as to join heaven and earth together”. Bourbon replied by raising his demand to 300,000 ducats. In the meanwhile the Papal and Venetian troops, under the Duke of Urbino, the Marquis of Saluzzo, and Guicciardini, had come to the relief of Florence, already strongly fortified, so that Bourbon, having regard for the condition of his necessitous and wearied soldiers, felt compelled to renounce his purpose of attack. With rapid decision he recalled his troops, who were already making inroads in the valley of the Arno, disencumbered himself of his last pieces of artillery, and on the 26th of April struck the road to Rome.

Not only necessity and the conviction that at Rome he would meet with less opposition, but his ambition to become Viceroy of the whole of Italy urged Bourbon forward on the city. His soldiers, anticipating the plunder of Florence, at first showed signs of mutiny, but he succeeded in quieting them with visions of Rome, where he would “make all of them rich”. In hot haste they came to Montepulciano and Montefiascone. Neither the slow operations of the army of the League, nor the unwonted rain-storms, nor the gnawing want of provisions, could keep back the Imperialists, who were joined on the way by many adventurers eager to have a share in the spoils. On the 2nd of May they had reached Viterbo.

Clement, who up till now had almost intentionally shut his eyes and refused to see his danger, perceived at last that Bourbon had tricked him and that nothing could save him except a desperate struggle. On the 25th of April he rejoined the League. The Duke of Urbino was implored to render help; Giovanni Antonio Orsini was appointed Commander-in-Chief of the newly organized Papal cavalry, while to Renzo da Ceri was entrusted the defence of Rome. But for this the one thing necessary was lacking—money. In vain the Pope called upon the well-to-do citizens to give voluntary contributions. Greed and infatuation were so great, that Domenico Massimi himself, the richest man in Rome, only offered to lend the sum of 100 ducats!

The Pope was besought on every side to raise money for the defence of Rome by the sale of Cardinals’ hats. But Clement, even at this moment incapable of decision, refused his assent. But when, on the 3rd of May, he was informed that Bourbon had already advanced beyond Viterbo, he was driven to take the step so repugnant to him. But it was already too late to obtain the payments from his nominees; these were Benedetto Accolti, Niccolò Gaddi, Agostino Spinola, Ercole Gonzaga, Marino Grimani, and the French Chancellor Du Prat. The Pope could not make up his mind to fly to Civita Vecchia. Quite in contradiction to his usual character, he now displayed an extraordinary confidence. On the 3rd of May he rode through the city, encouraging the citizens, who were determined to defend Rome to the uttermost, and on the 4th he placed Bourbon under the ban of the greater excommunication.

If Clement entirely underrated his danger, the principal blame must be laid on his blind confidence in Renzo da Ceri. The latter, with the utmost assurance, set all fears at naught, and declared that the four thousand men he had raised were ample protection, for so great a city as Rome, against the undisciplined and famished hordes of Bourbon; he went so far as to boast that the city itself could hold out, even were the enemy so successful as to possess themselves of the right bank of the Tiber; he therefore even refused to destroy the bridges. That Renzo placed the greatest confidence in his hastily organized bands, recruited from stablemen, mechanics, and all sorts of persons inexperienced in the ways of war, is shown from the fact that on the 4th of May he sent a message through Giberti to Guido Rangoni, who had brought more than eight thousand men from the army of the League, that Rome was so perfectly secure that from six to eight hundred men, armed with guns, would be a sufficient reinforcement; he advised Rangoni to return to the League with the remainder of his forces, as he would there be of much greater use than at Rome!

A herald of Bourbon, coming to demand the 300,000 ducats from the Pope, received no answer. From the Vatican Clement VII could see the enemy advance across the Neronian fields; but even then he saw no serious danger, especially as they were not supported by artillery. Besides, there was the hourly expectation of the arrival of the army of the League.

Clement VII was confirmed in his mistaken conception of the state of things by the defeat of a troop of landsknechts at the Ponte Molle by Orazio Baglioni. The Mantuan envoy, who reported this on the 5th of May, added, “The Pope is in the best spirits”. Yet on the 4th of May such a panic had broken out in the city that it seemed as if the enemy were already within the walls. Thousands tried to find a safe hiding-place for their property. Many, in spite of prohibitions, fled from Rome.

Meanwhile the Imperialist army had surrounded Rome as far as the Janiculum. The main body encamped in the vineyards behind St. Peter’s. In the cloisters of S. Onofrio, the headquarters of Bourbon, a council of war had decided that the Leonine city should be stormed on the following morning without further preparation. The state of the army was desperate. Deprived of the necessities of life, in an empty and barren country with an enemy in their rear, they now saw before them their only means of deliverance: this was the capture of Rome by storm, the walls of which were defended, as they knew, by only a handful of brave soldiers. Victory or death was Bourbon’s watchword. With longing eyes his soldiers, craving for booty, counted up the prize of victory, now, at last, lying before them. The goal to which they had pressed through so many unheard-of hardships was now reached. The rays of that setting sun of the 5th of May lit up for the last, time all the magnificence of the Rome of the Renaissance, then the fairest and richest city in all the world.