30.3 Europe: a.d. 1501 to 1600  (Page 3/29)

Greece and upper balkans

All of the Balkan area, including Greece, was under nominal control of the Ottoman Turks, but in some areas there was considerable local autonomy. At the end of the century (1593) when the Turks were again at war with Austria, Sigismund Bathory, Prince of Transylvania (central Romania) sided with the Austrians. The emperor, however, took Transylvania from Bathory and then Moldavia from Michael, to dominate this area for the remainder of the century. In the more southern areas a feudal aristocracy maintained estates and fiefs through many generations. (Ref. 119 , 292 ) Although some Greek families and merchants living in Constantinople and coastal cities, such as Smyrna, were very prosperous, Greece itself sank into obscurity and poverty. (Ref. 38 )

The eastern Balkans were a great source of cattle for Central Europe and Italy, sending some 200,000 head each year. (Ref. 260 ) Even so, as in Eastern Europe, large areas moved back into a "second" serfdom - producing raw materials only - not finished goods. Idria, in the Julian Alps of Yugoslavia, became an important source of mercury, which was shipped clear to America for use in the silver mining process. The Austrian state took over these mines as a monopoly, in 1580. (Ref. 292 )

Italy

France and Spain had begun to fight over possession of Italy at the end of the last century, when French armies under Charles VIII invaded, using new batteries of light, mobile, bronze, field artillery, firing iron cannon balls. "Modern warfare" might be said to have begun in great battles at Ravenna in 1512 and Marignano in 1515. (Ref. 213 ) "The peninsula then became a theater of war where foreign powers competed for control of the Italians' superior wealth and skill."

The primacy of Italian cities further declined as the Mediterranean became the scene of struggles between the two power-houses of the time - the Spanish Habsburgs and the Ottoman Turks. Milan became ruled by a Spanish governor; Naples, Sicily and Sardinia by Spanish viceroys. Genoa retained its western colony of Corsica, but only after a long revolt late in the century (1551-1569), with the insurgents receiving help from the Turks. Otherwise Genoa, too, was tied economically to Spain. This link with wealthy Spain and the richness of the town of Genoa, itself, did not alleviate the wretchedness of the lower class. The homeless poor of Genoa sold themselves as galley slaves every winter. (Ref. 260 ) One redeeming feature was an attempt at rejuvenation of the old "Champagne" fairs, which had first moved to Geneva, then to Lyons and finally now to Piacenza, near Genoa. It cannot be denied that it was mainly Genoese who financed the credit operations allowing Spain and others to develop the great trade operations with the New World, at least up until 1568. After that the Piacenza fairs centralized the Genoese business transactions and international payments. (Ref. 292 )