Battle of Castione

The Battle of Castione was a military conflict between the Ambrosian Republic ( Duchy of Milan from 1447 to 1450 ) and the federal Uri place during the Ennetbirgischen campaigns. It took place in at Castione in today's Canton Ticino ( Switzerland ) on July 6, 1449.

Prehistory

Cause of the hostilities was the city of Bellinzona, which was under the urn step towards the South in their focus, since control of this place for the control of the adjacent valleys ( valley of the Ticino, Misox ) and the Gotthard pass was of immense importance. Uri tried several times to take possession of the place. They managed to Bellinzona in 1419 to acquire from the Barons of Sax - Misox, but they had to purchase (→ Ennetbirgische campaigns ) a reconquest of Milan after for them unhappy verlaufenen Battle of Arbedo 1422. The deprivation of federal dealer gave Uri a new pretext for intervention.

The Uri fell again in 1439 in the southern valleys of a threatened Bellinzona and forced the at the time weakened Milan in 1441, left them the Leventina, which they had purchased for the first time in 1403, to the place Pollegio as a pledge to. They formed an alliance with Henry II of Sax, the Earl of Misox and Franchino Rusca, Lord of Locarno. The uncertain situation in Milan after the death of Filippo Maria Visconti in 1447 ( establishment of the short-lived Ambrosian Republic) favored their situation and they occupied in the first months of the year 1449 again the Leventina and the Riviera and penetrated to Bellinzona before.

Events and consequences

The army of Condottiere Giovanni della Noce received from Milan commissioned to subdue the Sottoceneri again for the Duchy. It defeated the urn generic army at Castione and in the course of the battle that went on for a good part of the day, the patch was burned down. The Urner were forced to withdraw into the Misox. After relief of Bellinzona ensued the reconquest of the Riviera by the Milanese.

1450 was followed by a formal peace with Visconti's successor Francesco Sforza, the Leventina was awarded in 1466 Uri permanently. The defeat brought the urn generic policy of expansion for several decades again to a halt. The gesamteidgenössische campaign to Bellinzona in 1478 and the victory at the Battle of Giornico 1487 finally brought the recognition of the dominion of Uri in the Leventina by the Milan cathedral chapter. Bellinzona was initially in the possession of Milan. After various owners, the French King Louis XII entered. Bellinzona in 1503 in the Treaty of Arona thing of Uri, Schwyz and Nidwalden from.

Others

There was a long period of time is ambiguity surrounding the event because of the Lucerne historian Theodor von Liebenau and the subsequent historiography had confused the battle with that of Castiglione Olona in the area of Varese ( Lombardy ). The Battle of Castiglione Olona was of greater importance, since it was part of the defeat and dissolution of the Ambrosian Republic by Francesco Sforza. Its rule and good neighborly relations with the Confederates brought two decades security and stability.