Emperor Charles V, Impresario of War
Emperor Charles V, Impresario of War
$63.00
USDEmperor Charles V (1500–1558) asserted his princely authority by deciding at times to lead his own armies to war, despite the misgivings of advisers. Since Europe's wars were fought with money borrowed against future revenues, even an emperor had to share power with his bankers, and his parliaments. This 2002 book examines all three dimensions of European warfare. Charles's role as commander-in-chief is evaluated by measuring the strategic aims of his personal campaigns. The process by which bankers took control of the finances of the Habsburg lands becomes clear from an examination of where the money came from to pay for Charles's campaigns. Finally, a comparison of the realms that provided most of Charles's revenues - Castile, Naples, and three Low Countries provinces - shows how some parliamentary bodies, if not all, successfully pursued long-term local interests by exploiting the dynasty's need for money.
- An application of the ongoing 'grand strategy' discussion to Charles's wars
- Complementary estimates for each campaign of: 1) troop strength and total costs, and 2) remittances commanded by Charles for purposes of campaign
- Comparative parliamentary history of Castile, Naples, and three key Low Countries provinces (Flanders, Brabant, and Holland)
Reviews & endorsements
Review of the hardback: 'This is a meticulous piece of scholarship … This is an important book. It draws together a mass of information gleaned from a wide range of European archives and, more significantly, offers a new perspective on Charles V and the modus operandi of the Habsburg dynastic empire.' Alastair Duke, Ashgate
Review of the hardback: 'Tracey must be congratulated on a book which not only deals with a key aspect of Charles's career - one which is not as fully treated in some other recent studies of Charles V - but which also makes available important work by European scholars, particularly on Naples, which is otherwise not easily accessible, and one which, finally, fruitfully adopts a comparative approach in order to draw some important conclusions about war, politics, and finance in sixteenth-century Europe.' Journal of Early Modern History
Review of the hardback: 'One must admire the comprehensive scholarship and depth of understanding that has shaped this work …'. Australian History Yearbook
Product details
August 2010Paperback
9780521147668
362 pages
229 × 152 × 21 mm
0.53kg
Available
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Table of Contents
- List of illustrations
- List of tables
- Acknowledgements
- List of abbreviations
- Introduction
- Part I. Strategy and Finance:
- 1. The grand strategy of Charles V
- 2. The Habsburg-Valois struggle: Italy 1515–28
- 3. The search for revenue, I: the hard roads of fiscal reform
- 4. The search for revenue, II: parliamentary subsidies
- 5. The search for credit: Charles and his bankers
- Part II. Impresario of War: Charles's Campaigns, 1529–52
- 6. Finding uses for an army: Charles in Italy, 1529–30
- 7. Crusades in Austria and the Mediterranean, 1532–5
- 8. Failures in Provence and at Prevesa and Algiers, 1536–41
- 9. Charles's Grand Plan, 1543–4
- 10. The first Schmalkaldic War, 1546–7
- 11. The second Schmalkaldic War and the assault on Metz, 1552
- Part III. War Taxation: Parliaments of the Core Provinces of the Low Countries, Naples, and Castile
- 12. Fiscal devolution and war taxation in the Low Countries
- 13. Baronial politics and war finances in the Kingdom of Naples
- 14. Town autonomy, Noble magistrates, and war taxation in Castile
- Conclusions
- Bibliography
- Index.
