War of the League of Cambrai

The War of the League of Cambrai, also known by its second stage as the War of the Holy League, was fought from December 1508 to December 1516, as part of the wider Italian Wars of 1494–1559. The main participants of the war, who fought for its entire duration, were France, the Holy Roman Empire, the Papal States, and the Republic of Venice; they were joined at various times by nearly every significant power in Western Europe, including Spain, England, the Duchy of Milan, the Republic of Florence, the Duchy of Ferrara, and the Swiss.

The war was preceded by the Italienzug of Maximilian I, King of the Romans, who crossed into Venetian territory in February 1508 with the imperial army on the way to be crowned Holy Roman Emperor by the pope in Rome. Meanwhile, Pope Julius II, intending to curb Venetian influence in northern Italy, brought together the League of Cambrai, an anti-Venetian alliance consisting of him, Maximilian I, Louis XII of France, and Ferdinand II of Aragon, which was formally concluded in December 1508. Although the League was initially successful, later frictions between Julius and Louis culminated in the pope abandoning the League in 1510 and allying himself with Venice against France.

The Veneto–Papal alliance eventually expanded into the Holy League in 1511, that was also joined by Spain. The League drove the French from Italy in 1512. Later disagreements about the division of the spoils, however, led Venice to abandon the coalition in favor of an alliance with France in 1513. Under the leadership of Francis I, who had succeeded Louis on the throne of France, the French and Venetians would regain the territory they had lost in a campaign culminating in the Battle of Marignano in 1515; the treaties of Noyon (August 1516) and Brussels (December 1516), which were implemented by January 1517, would essentially return the map of Italy to the status quo of 1508.