The descent of Humbert the Whitehanded, the founder of the family, is uncertain, but he was probably a son of Amadeus, the great-grandson of Boson of Provence. In reward for services rendered to Rudolf III of Arles, Humbert obtained from him in 1027 the counties of Savoy and Maurienne, and from the emperor Conrad the Salic, Chablais, and the lower Valais. On his death in 1048 he was succeeded perhaps by his eldest son, Amadeus I, but eventually by his fourth son, Otho, who, by his marriage with Adelaide of Susa, obtained the counties of Turin and the Val d’Aosta, and so acquired a footing in the valley of the Po. Otho was succeeded in 1060 by his son Amadeus II, who maintained a judicious neutrality between his brother-in-law, the emperor Henry IV, and the pope. In reward for his mediation he obtained from the former, after Canossa, the province of Bugey. The accession of his son Humbert II in 1080 brought fresh increase of territory in the valley of the Tarantaise, and in 1091 this prince succeeded to the dignities of his grandmother, Adelaide. Amadeus III came to the throne in 1103, and in 1111 his states were created counties of the empire by Henry V. On his way home from the crusades in 1149 Amadeus died at Nicosia, and was succeeded by his son Humbert III. The prince took the part of the pope against Barbarossa, who ravaged his territories until Humbert’s death in 1188. The guardians of his son Thomas reconciled their ward and the emperor. He received from Henry VI accessions of territory in Vaud, Bugey, and Valais, with the title of imperial vicar in Piedmont and Lombardy. He was followed in 1233 by Amadeus IV. A campaign against the inhabitants of Valais ended in the annexation of their district, and his support of Frederick II against the pope caused the erection of Chablais and Aosta into a duchy.
[1253-1482 A.D.]
In 1253 his son Boniface succeeded to his states at the age of nine, but after giving proofs of his valour by defeating the troops of Charles of Anjou before Turin, he was taken prisoner and died of grief (1263).
The Salic law now came into operation for the first time, and Peter, the uncle of Boniface, was called to the throne. This prince, on the marriage of his nieces, Eleanor and Sancha of Provence, with Henry III of England and Richard, earl of Cornwall, had visited England, where he had been created earl of Richmond, and built a palace in London, afterwards called Savoy House. In return he recognised the claims of Richard to the imperial throne, and received from him Kyburg, in the diocese of Lausanne. At his death in 1268 he was succeeded by his brother Philip I, who died in 1285, when their nephew Amadeus V came to the throne. This prince, surnamed the Great, united Baugé and Bresse to his states in right of his wife Sibylla, and later on lower Faucigny and part of Geneva. For his second wife he married Mary of Brabant, sister of the emperor Henry VII, from whom he received the seigniory of Aosta. His life was passed in continual and victorious warfare, and one of his last exploits was to force the Turks to raise the siege of Rhodes. He died in 1323. His son Edward succeeded him, and dying in 1329, was followed by his brother Aymon. This prince died in 1343, when his son Amadeus VI ascended the throne. His reign was, like his grandfather’s, a series of petty wars, from which he came out victorious and with extended territory, until he died of the plague (1383). The promising reign of his son Amadeus VII was cut short by a fall from his horse in 1391. Before his death, however, he had received the allegiance of Barcelonnette, Ventimiglia, Villafranca, and Nice, so gaining access to the Mediterranean.
His son Amadeus VIII now came to the throne, under the guardianship of his grandmother Bona (Bonne) de Bourbon. On attaining his majority he first directed his efforts to strengthening his power in the outlying provinces. The states of Savoy now extended from the Lake of Geneva to the Mediterranean, and from the Saône to the Sesia. Amadeus threw all the weight of his power on the side of the emperor, and Sigismund in 1416 erected the counties of Savoy and Piedmont into duchies. At this time, too, the duke recovered the fief of Piedmont, which had been granted to Philip, prince of Achaia, by Amadeus V. The county of Vercelli afterwards rewarded him for joining the league against the duke of Milan, but in 1434 a plot against his life made him put into execution a plan he had long formed, of retiring to a monastery. He accordingly made his son Louis lieutenant-general of the dukedom, and assumed the habit of the knights of St. Maurice. But he was not destined to find the repose he sought. The prelates assembled at the council of Bâle voted the deposition of Pope Eugenius IV, and elected Amadeus in his place, as Felix V. He abdicated his dukedom definitely, but without much gain in temporal honours, for the schism continued until the death of Eugenius in 1447, shortly after which it was healed by the honourable submission of Felix to Nicholas V. The early years of Louis’ reign were under the guidance of his father, and peace and prosperity blessed his people; but he afterwards made an alliance with the dauphin which brought him into conflict with Charles VII of France, though a lasting reconciliation was soon effected. His son Amadeus IX succeeded in 1465, but, though his virtues led to his beatification, his bodily sufferings made him assign the regency to his wife Yolande, a daughter of Charles VII. He died in 1472, when his son Philibert I succeeded to the throne and to his share in the contests of Yolande with her brother and brothers-in-law. His reign lasted only ten years, when he was succeeded by his brother Charles I. This prince raised for a time by his valour the drooping fortunes of his house, but he died in 1489 at the age of thirty-one, having inherited from his aunt, Charlotte of Lusignan, her pretensions to the titular kingdoms of Cyprus, Jerusalem, and Armenia. He was succeeded by his son Charles II, an infant, who, dying in 1496, was followed by Philip II, brother of Amadeus XI. He died in 1497, leaving Philibert II, who succeeded him, and Charles III, who ascended the throne on his brother’s death in 1504. In spite of himself Charles was drawn into the wars of the period, but the decisive victory of Francis at Marignano gave the duke the opportunity of negotiating the conference at Bologna which led to the conclusion of peace in 1516. Charles was less fortunate in the part he took in the wars between Francis I and Charles V, the brother-in-law of his wife. He tried to maintain a strict neutrality, but his attendance at the emperor’s coronation at Bologna in 1530 was imperative in his double character of kinsman and vassal. The visit was fatal to him, for he was rewarded with the county of Asti, and this so displeased the French king that on the revolt of Geneva to Protestantism in 1532, Francis sent help to the citizens. Berne and Fribourg did likewise, and so expelled the duke from Lausanne and Vaud. Charles now sided definitely with the emperor, and Francis at once raised some imaginary claims to his states. On their rejection the French army marched into Savoy, descended on Piedmont, and seized Turin (1536). Charles V came to the aid of his ally, and invested the city, but was obliged to make peace. France kept Savoy, and the emperor occupied Piedmont, so that only Nice remained to the duke. On the resumption of hostilities in 1541 Piedmont again suffered. In 1544 the Treaty of Crespy restored his states to Charles, but the terms were not carried out, and he died of grief in 1553. His only surviving son, Emmanuel Philibert, succeeded to the rights, but not the domains of his ancestors. On the abdication of Charles V the duke was appointed governor of the Low Countries, and in 1557 the victory of St. Quentin marked him as one of the first generals of his time. Such services could not go unrewarded, and the Peace of Cateau-Cambrésis restored him his states, with certain exceptions still to be held by France and Spain. One of the conditions of the treaty also provided for the marriage of the duke with Margaret of France, sister of Henry II. The evacuation of the places held by them was faithfully carried out by the contracting powers, and Emmanuel Philibert occupied himself in strengthening his military and naval forces, until his death in 1580 prevented the execution of his ambitious designs. His son Charles Emmanuel I, called the Great, threw in his lot with Spain, and in 1590 invaded Provence and was received by the citizens of Aix. His intention was doubtless to revive the ancient kingdom of Arles, but his plans were frustrated by the accession of Henry IV to the throne of France.[e]
[1482-1601 A.D.]
By his treaty with Henry, in the year 1601, Charles Emmanuel exchanged his Savoyard county of Bresse for the Italian marquisate of Saluzzo. By this arrangement, the duke of Savoy sacrificed a fertile province to acquire a barren and rocky territory; but he excluded the French from an easy access into Piedmont, and strengthened his Italian frontier. By consolidating his states, he gained a considerable advance towards the future independence of his family; and the superiority of his policy over that of Henry IV in this transaction occasioned the remark of a contemporary, that the French king had bargained like a peddler, and the Savoyard duke like a king.
From this epoch, the house of Savoy became almost exclusively an Italian power, and its princes, to use the language of one of their historians, thenceforth viewed the remains of their transmontane possessions only as a nobleman, moving in the splendour of a court, regards the ancient and neglected fief from which he derives his title. Charles Emmanuel found that the improvement effected in the geographical posture of his states immediately increased his importance; and his alliance was courted both by France and Spain. But during the remainder of his long reign, his own restless and overweening ambition, and the natural difficulties of his situation, placed as he was with inferior strength between two mighty rivals, entailed many calamities on his dominions. He made an unsuccessful attempt in 1602 to surprise Geneva by an escalade in the night, and after a disgraceful repulse concluded a peace, which recognised the independence of that republic. Ten years later, he endeavoured, as we have seen, to wrest Montferrat from the house of Gonzaga; but being violently opposed by Spain, and weakly supported by France, he was compelled, after several years of hostilities, to submit his claim to the decision of the emperor—or, in other words, to abandon it altogether. Such checks to his ambition were, however, of little importance, in comparison with the reverses consequent upon the share which he took in the war of the Mantuan succession (1628).
[1601-1634 A.D.]