Francesco I Sforza was an Italian condottiero who founded the Sforza dynasty in the duchy of Milan, ruling as its (fourth) duke from 1450 until his death.
Francesco II Gonzaga was the ruler of the Italian city of Mantua from 1484 until his death.
The League of Cambrai was a military coalition against the Republic of Venice formed on 8 December 1508, by the main European powers, to maintain their hegemony over the Italian Peninsula.
Condottieri were Italian military leaders during the Middle Ages and the early modern period. The definition originally applied only to commanders of mercenary companies, condottiero in medieval Italian meaning 'contractor' and condotta being the contract by which the condottieri put themselves in the service of a city or lord. The term, however, came to refer to all the famed Italian military leaders of the Renaissance, Reformation and Counter-Reformation eras. Notable condottieri include Prospero Colonna, Giovanni dalle Bande Nere, Cesare Borgia, the Marquis of Pescara, Andrea Doria, and the Duke of Parma. They served Popes and other European monarchs and states during the Italian Wars and the European wars of religion.
Erasmo Stefano of Narni, better known by his nickname of Gattamelata, was an Italian condottiero of the Renaissance. He was born in Narni, and served a number of Italian city-states: he began with Braccio da Montone, served the Papal States and Florence, as well as the Republic of Venice in 1434 in the battles with the Visconti of Milan.
The War of the League of Cambrai, sometimes known as the War of the Holy League and several other names, was fought from February 1508 to December 1516 as part of the Italian Wars of 1494–1559. The main participants of the war, who fought for its entire duration, were France, the Papal States, and the Republic of Venice; they were joined at various times by nearly every significant power in Western Europe, including Spain, the Holy Roman Empire, England, the Duchy of Milan, the Republic of Florence, the Duchy of Ferrara, and the Swiss.
Filippo Maria Visconti was the duke of Milan from 1412 to 1447. Reports stated that he was "paranoid", but "shrewd as a ruler." He went to war in the 1420s with Romagna, Florence, and Venice in the Wars in Lombardy but was eventually forced to surrender under Pope Martin V. He would return to war again, where another peace agreement was required to stop the war. He married twice. Her second wife was Marie, from which he married in 1448. She was the daughter of his ally Amadeus VIII. When he died, Fillippo was the last of the Visconti male line and was succeeded by Francesco Sforza, husband to his daughter.
Niccolò Piccinino was an Italian condottiero.
The First Italian War, or Charles VIII's Italian War, was the opening phase of the Italian Wars. The war pitted Charles VIII of France, who had initial Milanese aid, against the Holy Roman Empire, Spain and an alliance of Italian powers led by Pope Alexander VI, known as the League of Venice.
Bartolomeo Colleoni was an Italian condottiero, who became captain-general of the Republic of Venice. Colleoni "gained reputation as the foremost tactician and disciplinarian of the 15th century". He is also credited with having refurbished the Roman baths at Trescore Balneario.
Francesco Barbaro (1390–1454) was an Italian politician, diplomat, and humanist from Venice and a member of the patrician Barbaro family. He is interred in the Church of the Frari, Venice.
The Wars in Lombardy were a series of conflicts between the Republic of Venice and the Duchy of Milan and their respective allies, fought in four campaigns in a struggle for hegemony in Northern Italy that ravaged the economy of Lombardy. They lasted from 1423 until the signing of the Treaty of Lodi in 1454. During their course, the political structure of Italy was transformed: out of a competitive congeries of communes and city-states emerged the five major Italian territorial powers that would make up the map of Italy for the remainder of the 15th century and the beginning of the Italian Wars at the turn of the 16th century. They were Venice, Milan, Florence, the Papal States and Naples. Important cultural centers of Tuscany and Northern Italy—Siena, Pisa, Urbino, Mantua, Ferrara—became politically marginalized.
Niccolò III d'Este was Marquess of Ferrara from 1393 until his death. He was also a condottiero.
Micheletto Attendolo, also called Micheletto da Cotignola, was an Italian condottiero. He was seigneur of Acquapendente, Potenza, Alianello, Castelfranco Veneto and Pozzolo Formigaro.
Carlo Gonzaga, Lord of Sabbioneta, was an Italian nobleman of the Mantuan House of Gonzaga who rose to the position of Captain of the People in the Ambrosian Republic of Milan, and eventually ruled practically as an autocrat. He was the younger son of Gianfrancesco Gonzaga and Paola Malatesta, as well as a friend of the humanist writer Francesco Filelfo. His brother was Ludovico III Gonzaga, Marquis of Mantua, and became a rival of his for Mantua and in the field of battle.
Louis of Teck was a duke German prelate, who was Patriarch of Aquileia from 1412 until his death.
The War of Padua was a conflict in 1404–1405 between the Republic of Venice and the Carrarese lordship of Padua. In the power vacuum produced by the death of the Duke of Milan, Gian Galeazzo Visconti, in 1402, Francesco II da Carrara endeavored to expand into the Veneto and capture cities held by Visconti troops. These designs alarmed Venice, which allied with Milan to counter the common threat posed by the Carrarese state, and for the first time adopted a policy of direct intervention in the affairs of its hinterland.
Guido Torelli was a condottiero. Through his military campaigns and diplomatic skills, he achieved the title of the first Count of Guastalla and Montechiarugolo.
The siege of Brescia in 1438–1440 was an attempt by the Duchy of Milan to capture the city of Brescia, annexed in 1428 by the Republic of Venice, during the Wars in Lombardy. The long siege of Brescia was lifted after the Venetians successfully transported galleys overland into Lake Garda, overcoming the Milanese ships there. The successful defence of Brescia helped Venice preserve its recently acquired mainland dominions in the face of Milanese expansion.
