This period, a period of change, but of comparatively slight geographical change, was followed by a time when, in Italy as in Germany, boundaries were changed, new names were invented or forgotten names revived, when old land-marks were rooted up, and thrones were set up and cast down, with a speed which baffles the chronicler. The first strictly geographical change which was wrought in Italy by the revolutionary wars was a characteristic one. ♦Cispadane Republic, 1796.♦ A Cispadane Republic, the first of a number of momentary commonwealths bearing names dug up from the recesses of bygone times, took in the duchy of Modena and the Papal Legations of Romagna. Without exactly following the same boundaries, it answered roughly to the old Exarchate. ♦Transpadane Republic, 1797.♦ Then the French victories over Austria caused the Austrian duchies of Milan and Mantua to become a Transpadane Republic. ♦Treaty of Campo Formio, 1797. Cisalpine Republic.♦ Then Venice was wiped out at Campo Formio, and her Lombard possessions were joined together with the two newly made commonwealths, to form a Cisalpine Republic. But the same treaty wrought another change which was more distinctly geographical. ♦Venice surrendered to Austria.♦ Venice and the eastern part of her possessions on the mainland, the old Venetia, the Lombard Austria, was now handed over to the modern state which bore the latter name. This change may be looked on as distinctly cutting short the boundaries of Italy. The duchy of Milan in Austrian hands had been an outlying part of the Austrian dominions; but Venetia marches on the older territory of the Austrian house, and was thus more completely severed from Italy. The whole north of the Hadriatic coast thus became Austrian in the modern sense. One Italian commonwealth—for Venice had long counted as Italian—was thus wiped out, and handed over to a foreign king. But elsewhere, at this stage of revolutionary progress, the fashion ran in favour of the creation of local commonwealths. ♦Ligurian Republic, 1797.
Parthenopæan Republic.
Tiberine Republic, 1798-1801.♦ The dominions of Genoa became a Ligurian Republic; Naples became a Parthenopæan Republic; Rome herself exchanged for a moment the memories of kings, consuls, emperors, and pontiffs to become the head of a Tiberine Republic. ♦Piedmont joined to France, 1798-1800.♦ Piedmont was overwhelmed; the greater part was incorporated with France. Some small parts were added to the neighbouring republics, and the king of Sardinia withdrew to his island kingdom. Amid this crowd of new-fangled states and new-fangled names, ancient San Marino still lived on.

Thus far revolutionary Italy followed the example of revolutionary France, and the new states were all at least nominal commonwealths. In the next stage, when France came under the rule of a single man, above all when that single ruler took on him the Imperial title, the tide turned in favour of monarchy. In Rome and Naples it had already turned so in another way. ♦Restoration of the Pope and the King of the Two Sicilies, 1801.♦ By help of the Czar and the Sultan, the new republics vanished, and the old rulers, Pope and King, came back again. And now France herself began to create kingdoms instead of commonwealths. ♦Kingdom of Etruria, 1801-1808.♦ Parma was annexed to France, and its Duke was sent to rule in Tuscany by the title of King of Etruria. Presently Italy herself gave her name to a kingdom. ♦Kingdom of Italy, 1805-1814.♦ The Cisalpine republic, further enlarged by Venice and the other territory ceded to Austria at Campo Formio, enlarged also by the Valtellina and the former bishopric of Trent at one end and by the march of Ancona at the other, became the Kingdom of Italy. ♦Buonaparte king of Italy.♦ Its King, the first since Charles the Fifth who had worn the Italian crown, was no other than the new ruler of France, the self-styled ‘Emperor.’ But, in Buonaparte’s later distributions of Italian territory, it was not his Italian kingdom, but his French ‘empire’ whose frontiers were extended. ♦Annexation of Liguria, 1805;
of Etruria, 1808.
Grand duchy of Lucca.♦ The Ligurian Republic was annexed; so before long was the new kingdom of Etruria; Lucca meanwhile was made into a grand duchy for the conqueror’s sister. ♦Incorporation of Rome and France, 1809.♦ Lastly, Rome itself, with what was left of the papal dominions, was also incorporated with the French dominion. The work alike of Cæsar and of Charles was wiped out from the Eternal City. The Empire of the Gauls, which Civilis had dreamed of more than seventeen centuries before, had come at last.

The fate of the remainder of the peninsula had been already sealed before Rome became French. The kingdom of the Two Sicilies fell asunder. The Bourbon king kept his island, as the Savoyard king kept his. ♦Kingdoms of Naples and Sicily, 1806. 1809. Stati degli Presidi.♦ The continental kingdom passed, as a Kingdom of Naples, first to Joseph Buonaparte, and then to Joachim Murat. ♦Benevento.♦ But the outlying Tuscan possessions of the Sicilian crown had already passed to France, and Benevento, the outlying papal possession in the heart of the kingdom, became a separate principality.

Thus all Italy—unless we count the island kingdoms of Sardinia and Sicily as parts of Italy—was brought under French dominion in one form or another. But of that dominion there were three varieties. ♦Part incorporated with France.♦ The whole western part of the land, from Aosta to Tarracina—unless it is worth while to except the new Lucchese duchy—was formally incorporated with France. ♦Extent of the kingdom of Italy.♦ The north-eastern side, from Bözen to Ascoli, formed a Kingdom of Italy, distinct from France, but held by the same sovereign. And this Kingdom of Italy was further increased to the north by part of those Italian lands which had become Swiss and German. ♦Kingdom of Naples.♦ Southern Italy, the Kingdom of Naples, remained in form an independent kingdom; but it was held by princes who could not be looked on as anything but the humble vassals of their mighty kinsman. Never had Italy been brought more completely under foreign dominion. ♦Revival of the Italian name.♦ Still, in a part at least of the land, the name of Italy, and the shadow of a Kingdom of Italy, had been revived. ♦Its effects.♦ And, as names and shadows are not without influence in human affairs, the mere existence of an Italian state, called by the Italian name, did something. The creation of a sham Italy was no unimportant step towards the creation of a real one.

The settlement of Italy after the fall of Buonaparte was far more strictly a return to the old state of things than the contemporary settlement of Germany. Italy remained a geographical expression. Its states were, as before, independent of one another. ♦No tie between the Italian states.♦ They were practically dependent on a foreign power: but they were in no way bound together, even by the laxest federal tie. ♦The princes restored, but not the commonwealths.♦ The main principle of settlement was that the princes who had lost their dominions should be restored, but that the commonwealths which had been overthrown should not be restored. Only harmless San Marino was allowed to live on. Venice, Lucca, and Genoa remained possessions of princes. ♦Kingdom of Lombardy and Venice.♦ The sovereign of Hungary and Austria, now calling himself ‘Emperor’ of his archduchy, carved out for himself an Italian kingdom which bore the name of the Kingdom of Lombardy and Venice. On the strength of this, the Austrian, like his French predecessor, took upon him to wear the Italian crown. ♦Its extent.♦ The new kingdom consisted of the former Italian possessions of Austria, the duchies of Milan and Mantua, enlarged by the former possessions of Venice, which had become Austrian at Campoformio. The old boundary between Germany and Italy was restored. Trent, Aquileia, Trieste, were again severed from Italy. They remained possessions of the same prince as Milan and Venice, but they formed no part of his Lombardo-Venetian kingdom. On another frontier, where restoration would have had to be made to a commonwealth, the arrangements were less conservative, and the Valtellina remained part of the new kingdom. The Ticino formed, as before, the boundary towards Piedmont. ♦Genoa annexed to Piedmont.♦ The King of Sardinia came again into possession of this last country, enlarged by the former dominions of Genoa. ♦Monaco.♦ This gave him the whole Ligurian seaboard, except where the little principality of Monaco still went on. ♦Tuscany, Parma, Modena, Lucca.♦ Parma, Modena, and Tuscany again became separate duchies. Lucca remained a duchy alongside of them. ♦Lucca annexed to Tuscany.♦ The family arrangements by which these states were handed about to this and that widow do not concern geography; all that need be marked is that, by virtue of one of these compacts, Lucca was in the end added to Tuscany. That grand-duchy was further increased by the addition of the former outlying possessions of the Sicilian crown, including Elba, the island which for a moment was an Empire. ♦The Papal states.♦ The Pope came back to all his old Italian possessions, outlying Benevento included. ♦The Two Sicilies.♦ The Kingdom of the Two Sicilies was formed again by the restoration of the Kingdom of Naples to the Bourbon king. Thus was formed the Italy of 1815, an Italy which, save in the sweeping away of its commonwealths, and the consequent extension of Sardinian and Austrian territory, differed geographically but little from the Italy of 1748. But in 1815 there were hopes which had had no being in 1748. Italy was divided on the map; but she had made up her mind to be one.

The union of Italy was at last to come from one of those corners which in earlier history we have looked on as being hardly Italian at all. It was not Milan or Florence or Rome which was to grow into the new Italy. That function was reserved for a princely house whose beginnings had been Burgundian rather than Italian, whose chief territories had long lain on the Burgundian side of the Alps, but which had gradually put on an Italian character, and which had now become the one national Italian dynasty. The Italian possessions of the Savoyard house, Piedmont, Genoa, and the island of Sardinia, now formed one of the chief Italian states, and the only one whose rule, if still despotic, was not foreign. Savoy, by ceasing to be Savoy, was to become Italy. ♦Movements of 1848.♦ The movements of 1848 in Italy, like those in Germany, led to no lasting changes on the map: but they do so far affect geography that new states were actually founded, if only for a moment. ♦Momentary commonwealths.♦ Rome, Venice, Milan, were actually for a while republics, and the Two Sicilies were for a while separated. In the next year all came back as before. The next lasting change on the map was that which at last restored a real Kingdom of Italy. ♦Campaign of 1859.♦ The joint campaign of France and Sardinia won Lombardy for the Sardinian kingdom. Lombardy was now defined as that part of the Lombardo-Venetian kingdom which lay west of the Mincio, except that Mantua was left out. She was left to Austria. A French scheme for an Italian confederation came to nothing. ♦Union of the smaller states, 1860.♦ Tuscany, Modena, Parma, and Romagna voted their own annexation to Piedmont. The Two Sicilies were won by Garibaldi, and the kingly title of Sardinia was merged in that of the restored Kingdom of Italy. ♦Addition of the Sicilies.♦ This new Italian kingdom was, by the addition of the Sicilies, extended over lands which had never been part of the elder Italian kingdom. But Venetia was still cut off; the Pope kept the lands on each side of Rome, the so-called Patrimony and the Campagna. ♦Cession of Savoy and Nizza to France.♦ But France annexed the lands, strictly Burgundian rather than Italian, of Savoy and Nizza. The Italian kingdom was thus again called into being; but it had not yet come to perfection. Italy had ceased to be a geographical expression; but the Italian frontier still presented some geographical anomalies.

The war between Prussia and Austria gave Venetia to Italy; the war between Germany and France allowed Italy to recover Rome. ♦Part of the old kingdom not yet recovered.♦ The two great gaps in her frontier were thus made good; but, to say nothing of the annexations made by France, a large Italian-speaking population, lying within the bounds of the old Italian kingdom, still remains outside its modern revival. Trent, Aquileia, Trieste, Istria, are still parts, not of an Italian kingdom, not of a German kingdom, confederation, or empire, but of an Austro-Hungarian monarchy. Otherwise the Italian kingdom has formed itself, and it has taken its place among the great powers of Europe. Yet the whole peninsula does not form part of the Italian kingdom. ♦San Marino remains free.♦ Surrounded on every side by that kingdom, the commonwealth of San Marino, like Rhodes or Byzantium under the early Cæsars, still keeps its ancient freedom.

§ 5. The Kingdom of Burgundy.

The Burgundian Kingdom, which was united with those of Germany and Italy after the death of its last separate king Rudolf the Third, has had a fate unlike that of any other part of Europe. ♦Dying out of the kingdom.♦ Its memory, as a separate state, has gradually died out. ♦Chiefly annexed by France;♦ The greater part of its territory has been swallowed up bit by bit by a neighbouring power, and the small part which has escaped that fate has long lost all trace of its original name or its original political relations. By a long series of annexations, spreading over more than five hundred years, the greater part of the kingdom has gradually been incorporated with France. ♦part Italian;
part Swiss.♦ Of what remains, a small corner forms part of the modern kingdom of Italy, while the rest still keeps its independence in the form of the commonwealths which make up the western cantons of Switzerland. ♦Burgundy represented by Switzerland.♦ These cantons, in fact, are the truest modern representatives of the Burgundian kingdom. ♦Neutrality of Switzerland and Belgium.♦ And it is on the Confederation of which they form a part, interposed as it is between France, Italy, the new German Empire, and the modern Austrian monarchy, as a central state with a guaranteed neutrality, that some trace of the old function of Burgundy, as the middle kingdom, is thrown. This function it shares with the Lotharingian lands at the other end of the Empire, which now form part of the equally neutral kingdom of Belgium, lands which, oddly enough, themselves became Burgundian in another sense.

The Burgundian Kingdom, lying between the Alps, the Saône and the Rhone, and the Mediterranean, might be thought to have a fair natural boundary. ♦Boundaries of the kingdom.♦ And, while it kept any shadow of separate being, its boundaries did not greatly change. ♦Fluctuation of its frontier.♦ They were however somewhat fluctuating on the side of the Western kingdom, being sometimes bounded by the Rhone and sometimes reaching to the line of hills to the west of it. They were also, as we have seen, somewhat fluctuating on the side of Germany. ♦Chiefly Romance speaking.♦ At this end the kingdom took in some German-speaking districts; otherwise the language was Romance, including several dialects of the tongue of Oc.

The northern part of the kingdom, answering to the former Transjurane kingdom—the Regnum Jurense—formed two chief states, the County Palatine of Burgundy—the modern Franche Comté—and the Lesser Burgundy, roughly taking in western Switzerland and northern Savoy. ♦Provence.♦ On the Mediterranean lay the great county of Provence, with a number of smaller counties lying between it and the two northern principalities. ♦The Free Cities.♦ But the great characteristic of the land was that, next to Italy, no part of Europe contained so many considerable cities lying near together. Many of these at different times strove more or less successfully after a republican independence, and a few have kept it to our own day.

But, though the Burgundian kingdom might be thought to have, on three sides at least, a good natural frontier, it had but little real unity. The northern part naturally clave to its connexion with the Empire much longer than the southern. ♦The Burgundian Palatinate.♦ The County Palatine of Burgundy often passed from one dynasty to another, and it is remarkable for the number of times that it was held as a separate state by several of the great princes of Europe. ♦Held by the Emperor Frederick, 1156-1189;
by Philip of France, 1315-1330.♦ It was held by the Emperor Frederick Barbarossa in right of his wife; the marriage of one of his female descendants carried it to Philip the Fifth of France. ♦United with the French Duchy.♦ Then it became united with the French duchy of Burgundy under the dukes of the House of Valois. ♦1477.
Held by the House of Austria, Charles the Fifth Count of Burgundy.♦ Saving a momentary French occupation after the death of Charles the Bold, it remained with them and their Austrian and Spanish representatives. Among these it had a second Imperial Count in the person of Charles the Fifth. ♦Annexed to France, 1674.♦ But, through all these changes of dynasty, it remained an acknowledged fief of the Empire, till its annexation to France under Lewis the Fourteenth. ♦Dole the capital of the county.♦ The capital of this county, it must be remembered, was Dole. ♦Besançon a Free Imperial city. 1189-1651.♦ The ecclesiastical metropolis of Besançon, though surrounded by the county, remained a free city of the Empire from the days of Frederick Barbarossa to those of Ferdinand the Third. ♦United to France.♦ It was then merged in the county, and along with the county it passed to France. ♦Montbeilliard.♦ And it should be noticed that a small Burgundian land in this quarter, the county of Montbeilliard or Mümpelgard, first as a separate state, then in union with the duchy of Württemberg, kept its allegiance to the Empire till the wars of the French Revolution, when it was annexed to France and was never restored.

While the Burgundian Palatinate thus kept its history as an unit in European geography, the Lesser Burgundy to the south-west of it had a different history. The geography here gets somewhat confused through the fact that this Lesser Burgundy, which in the twelfth century passed under the power of the Dukes of Zähringen in Swabia as Rectors, took in some districts which were not parts of the Burgundian kingdom. ♦The eastern part German.♦ The eastern part of the kingdom itself was of German speech, and its frontier towards the German duchy of Alemannia or Swabia was somewhat fluctuating. The Aar may be taken as the boundary of the kingdom, while the Lesser Burgundy, as an administrative division, stretched somewhat further to the East. ♦Cities of the Lesser Burgundy.♦ Thus Basel, as well the foundations of the House of Zähringen at Bern and Freiburg, stood on strictly Burgundian ground, while the city of Luzern and the land of Unterwalden come under the head of the Lesser Burgundy, without forming part of the Burgundian kingdom. These lands long kept up their connexion with the Empire, though the Lesser Burgundy did not long remain as a separate unit. ♦Dukes of Zähringen.
End of their house, 1218.♦ When the House of Zähringen came to an end, the country began to split up into small principalities and free cities which gradually grew into independent commonwealths. ♦Break-up of the duchy.
Savoyard territory.♦ The counts of Savoy, of whom more presently, acquired a large territory on both sides of the Lake of Geneva. ♦Bishops, Counts, and Free Cities.♦ Other considerable princes were the bishops of Basel, Lausanne, Geneva, and Sitten, the counts of Geneva, Kyburg, Gruyères, and Neufchâtel. ♦The Free Lands.♦ Basel, Solothurn, and Bern were Imperial cities. The complicated relations between the Bishops and the city of Geneva hindered that city from having a strict right to that title. In Unterwalden and in Wallis, notwithstanding the possessions and claims of various spiritual and temporal lords, the most marked feature was the retention of the old rural independence. ♦The Old League of High Germany.♦ Of the cities in this region, Luzern, Bern, Freiburg, Solothurn, and Basel, all gradually became members of the Old League of High Germany, the ground-work of the modern Swiss Confederation. ♦Conquests of Bern and Freiburg from Savoy, 1536.♦ The Savoyard lands north of the lake were conquered by Bern and Freiburg in the sixteenth century, a conquest which also secured the independence of Geneva. ♦The Burgundian cantons of Switzerland.♦ All these lands, after going through the intermediate stage of allies or subjects of some or other of the confederate cantons, have in modern times become independent cantons themselves. This process of annexation and liberation will be traced more fully when we come to the history of the Swiss Confederation.

To the south of this group of states, and partly intermingled with them, lay another group, lying partly within the Cisjurane and partly within the Transjurane kingdom, which gradually grew into a great power. ♦Growth of Savoy.♦ These were the states which were united step by step under the Counts of Maurienne, afterwards Counts of Savoy. ♦Burgundian possession of its county.♦ When their dominions were at their greatest extent, they held south of the Lake of Geneva, besides Maurienne and Savoy strictly so called, the districts of Aosta, Tarantaise, the Genevois, Chablais, and Faucigny, together with Vaud and Gex north of the lake. Thus grew up the power of Savoy, which has already been noticed in its purely Italian aspect, but which must receive fuller separate treatment in a section of its own.

The remainder of the Burgundian Kingdom consisted of a number of small states stretching from the southern boundary of the Burgundian county to the Mediterranean. ♦Bresse and Bugey become Savoyard. Bugey, 1137-1344; Bresse, 1272-1402.♦ North of the Rhone lay the districts of Bresse and Bugey, which passed at various times to the House of Savoy. ♦Lyons, Vienne, Orange, &c.
Provence.♦ Southwards on the Rhone lay a number of small states, among which the most important in history are the archbishopric, the county, and the free city of Lyons, the county or Dauphiny of Vienne and the city of Vienne, the county or principality of Orange, the city of Avignon, the county of Venaissin, the free city of Arles, the capital of the kingdom, the free city of Massalia or Marseilles, the county of Nizza or Nice, and the great county or marquisate of Provence. In this last power lay the first element of danger, especially to the republican independence of the free cities. ♦Changes of dynasty.
The Angevins, 1246.♦ After being held by separate princes of its own, as well as by the Aragonese kings, it passed by marriage into the hands of a French prince, Charles of Anjou, the conqueror of Sicily, and also the destroyer of the second freedom of Massalia. ♦Growing French connexion.♦ The possession of the greatest member of the kingdom by a French ruler, though it made no immediate change in the formal state of things, gave fresh strength to every tendency which tended to withdraw the Burgundian lands from their allegiance to the Empire and to bring them, first into connexion with France, and then into actual incorporation with the French kingdom.

Step by step, though by a process which was spread over many centuries, all the principalities and commonwealths of the Burgundian kingdom, save the lands which have been Swiss and the single valley which is now Italian, have come into the hands of France. The tendency shows itself early. ♦Avignon first seized, 1226.
Annexation of Lyons, 1310.♦ Avignon was seized for a moment during the Albigensian wars; but the permanent process of French annexation began when Philip the Fair took advantage of the disputes between the archbishops and the citizens of Lyons, to join that Imperial city to his dominions. The head of all the Gauls, the seat of the Primate of all the Gauls, thus passed into the hands of the new monarchy of Paris, the first-fruits of French aggrandizement at the cost of the Middle Kingdom. ♦Purchase of the Dauphiny of Vienne, 1343.♦ Later in the same century, the Dauphiny of Vienne was acquired by a bargain with its last independent prince. This land also passed, through the intermediate stage of an Imperial fief held by the heir-apparent of the French crown, into a mere province of France. ♦The city of Vienne annexed, 1448.♦ But the acquisition of the Dauphiny did not carry with it that of the city of Vienne, which escaped for more than a century. ♦Valence, 1446.♦ Between the acquisition of the Dauphiny and the acquisition of the city, the county of Valence was annexed to the Dauphiny. ♦Provence, 1481.♦ Later in the same century followed the great annexation of Provence itself. The rule of French princes in that county for two centuries had doubtless paved the way for this annexation. And the acquisition of Provence carried with it the acquisition of the cities of Arles and Marseilles, which the counts of Provence had deprived of their freedom. By this time the whole of the land between the Rhone and the sea had been swallowed up, save one state at the extreme south-east corner of the kingdom, and a group of small states which were now quite hemmed in by French territory. ♦Nizza passes to Savoy, 1388.♦ The first was the county of Nizza or Nice, which had passed away from Provence to Savoy before the French annexation of Provence. But by this time Savoy had become an Italian power, and Nizza was from henceforth looked on as Italian rather than Burgundian. Between Provence and the Dauphiny lay the city of Avignon, the county of Venaissin, and the principality of Orange. ♦Avignon and Venaissin become Papal, 1348.
Annexed to France, 1791.♦ Avignon and Venaissin became papal possessions by purchase from the sovereign of Provence; and, though they were at last quite surrounded by French territory, they remained papal possessions till they were annexed in the course of the great Revolution. These outlying possessions of the Popes perhaps did somewhat towards preserving the independence of a more interesting fragment of the ancient kingdom. ♦Orange.♦ This was the Principality of Orange, which the neighbourhood of the Pope hindered from being altogether surrounded by French territory. This little state, whose name has become so much more famous than itself, passed through several dynasties, and for a long time it was regularly seized by France in the course of every war. ♦Its annexation to France, 1714-1771.♦ But it was as regularly restored to independence at every peace, and its final annexation did not happen till the eighteenth century. The acquisition of Orange, Avignon, and Venaissin, completed the process of French aggrandizement in the lands between the Rhone and the Var. The stages of the same process as applied to the Savoyard lands will be best told in another section.

We have thus traced the geographical history of the three Imperial kingdoms themselves. It now follows to trace in the like sort the origin and growth of certain of the modern powers of Europe which have grown out of one or more of those kingdoms. Certain parts of the German, Italian, and Burgundian kingdoms have split off from these kingdoms, so as to form new political units, distinct from any of them. Five states of no small importance in later European history have thus been formed. ♦Their character as middle states.♦ Most of them partake more or less of the character of middle states, interposed between France and one or more of the Imperial kingdoms. ♦Switzerland.♦ First, there is the Confederation of Switzerland, which arose by certain German districts and cities forming so close an union among themselves that their common allegiance to the Empire gradually died out. The Confederation grew into its present form by the addition to these German districts of certain Italian and Burgundian districts. ♦Savoy.♦ Secondly, there are, or rather were, the dominions of the Dukes of Savoy, formed by the union of various Italian and Burgundian districts. This however, as a middle power, has ceased to exist; nearly all its Burgundian possessions have been joined to France, while its Italian possessions have grown into a new Italy. ♦The Dukes of Burgundy.♦ Thirdly, there were the dominions of the Dukes of Burgundy, forming a middle power between France and Germany, and made up by the union of French and Imperial fiefs. ♦Represented by the kingdoms of the Low Countries.♦ These are represented on the modern maps by the kingdoms of the Netherlands and Belgium, the greater part of both of which belonged to the Burgundian dukes. Of these kingdoms much the greater part had split off from the old kingdom of Germany. Certain parts were once French fiefs, but had ceased to be so. ♦Recognized neutrality of Belgium, Switzerland, and once of part of Savoy.♦ The position of three out of these four states as middle powers, and their importance in that character, has been acknowledged even by modern diplomacy in the neutrality which is still guaranteed to Belgium and Switzerland, and which was formerly extended to certain districts of Savoy.

Of these four states, Switzerland, Savoy, and the duchy of Burgundy as represented by the two kingdoms of the Low Countries, some have been merged in other powers, and those which still remain count only among the secondary states of Europe. But a fifth power has also broken off from Germany which still ranks among the greatest in Europe. ♦The Austrian dominions.♦ This is the power which, starting from a small German mark on the Danube, has, by the gradual union of various lands, German and non-German, grown into something distinct from Germany, first under the name of the Austrian ‘Empire’ and more latterly under that of the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy. This power differs from the other states of which we have been just speaking, not only in its vastly greater extent, but also in its position. ♦Position of the Austrian dominion as a marchland.♦ It is a marchland, a middle kingdom, but in a different sense from Burgundy, Switzerland, Savoy, or Belgium. ♦Comparison with the western marchlands.♦ All these were marchlands between Christian states, between states all of which had formed part of the Carolingian Empire. All lie on the western side of the German and Italian kingdoms. Austria, on the other hand, as its name implies, arose on the eastern side of the German kingdom, as a mark against Turanian and heathen invaders. ♦Austria as the march against the Magyar.♦ The first mission of Austria was to guard Germany against the Magyar. When the Magyar was admitted into the fellowship of Europe and Christendom—when, after a while, his realm was united under a single sovereign with Austria—the same duty was continued in another form. ♦Austria and Hungary the mark of Christendom against the Turk.♦ The power formed by the union of Hungary and Austria was one of the chief among those which had to guard Christendom against the Turk. Its history therefore forms one of the connecting links between Eastern and Western Europe. In this chapter it will be dealt with chiefly on its Western side, with regard to its relations towards Germany and Italy. The Eastern aspect of the Austro-Hungarian power has more to do with the states which arose out of the break up of the Eastern Empire.

These states then, Switzerland, Savoy, the Duchy of Burgundy, the Netherlands, and Austria, form a proper addition to the sections given to the three Imperial kingdoms. I will now go on to deal with them in order.

§ 6. The Swiss Confederation.

I have just spoken of the Swiss Confederation as being in its origin purely German. This statement is practically correct, as all the original cantons were German in speech and feeling, and the formal style of their union was the Old League of High Germany. But in strict geographical accuracy there was, as we have seen in the last section, a small Burgundian element in the Confederation, if not from the beginning, at least from its aggrandizement in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries. ♦though part of it geographically Burgundian.♦ That is to say, part of the territory of the states which formed the old Confederation lay geographically within the kingdom of Burgundy, and a further part lay within the Lesser Burgundy of the Dukes of Zähringen. But, by the time when the history of the Confederation begins, the kingdom of Burgundy was pretty well forgotten, and the small German-speaking territory which it took in at its extreme north-east corner may be looked on as practically German ground. ♦All the old Cantons German in speech.♦ A more practical division than the old boundaries of the kingdoms is the boundary of the Teutonic and Romance speech; in this sense all the cantons of the old Confederation, except part of Freiburg, are German. ♦The later Romance Cantons.♦ The Romance cantons are those which were formed in modern times out of the allied and subject states. ♦Many popular errors.♦ It is specially needful to bear in mind, first, that, till the last years of the thirteenth century, not even the germ of modern Switzerland had appeared on the map of Europe; secondly, that the Confederation did not formally become an independent power till the seventeenth century; lastly, that, though the Swiss name had been in common use for ages, it did not become the formal style of the Confederation till the nineteenth century. Nothing in the whole study of historical geography is more necessary than to root out the notion that there has always been a country of Switzerland, as there has always been a country of Germany, Gaul, or Italy. ♦The Swiss do not represent the Helvetii.♦ And it is no less needful to root out the notion that the Swiss of the original cantons in any way represent the Helvetii of Cæsar. ♦Summary of Swiss history.
A German League having become more united and independent than others, annexes Romance allies and subjects.♦ The points to be borne in mind are that the Swiss Confederation is simply one of many German Leagues, which was more lasting and became more closely united than other German Leagues—that it gradually split off from the German Kingdom—that in the course of this process, the League and its members obtained a large body of Italian and Burgundian allies and subjects—lastly, that these allies and subjects have in modern times been joined into one Federal body with the original German Confederates.

The three Swabian lands which formed the kernel of the Old League lay at the point of union of the three Imperial kingdoms, parts of all of which were to become members of the Confederation in its later form. ♦First known document of union, 1291.♦ The first known document of confederation between the three lands dates from the last years of the thirteenth century. But that document is likely to have been rather the confirmation than the actual beginning of their union. They had for their neighbours several ecclesiastical and temporal lords, some other Imperial lands and towns, and far greater than all, the Counts of the house of Kyburg and Habsburg, who had lately grown into the more dangerous character of Dukes of Austria. ♦Growth of the League.♦ The Confederation grew for a while by the admission of neighbouring lands and cities as members of a free German Confederation, owning no superior but the Emperor. ♦Luzern, 1332.♦ First of all, the city of Luzern joined the League. ♦Zürich, 1351.♦ Then came the Imperial city of Zürich, which had already begun to form a little dominion in the adjoining lands. ♦Glarus and Zug, 1352.♦ Then came the land of Glarus and the town of Zug with its small territory. ♦Bern, 1353.♦ And lastly came the great city of Bern, which had already won a dominion over a considerable body of detached and outlying allies and subjects. ♦The Eight Ancient Cantons.♦ These confederate lands and towns formed the Eight Ancient Cantons. Their close alliance with each other helped the growth of each canton separately, as well as that of the League as a whole. ♦Their growth.♦ Those cantons whose geographical position allowed them to do so, were thus able to extend their power, in the form of various shades of dominion and alliance, over the smaller lands and towns in their neighbourhood. These lesser changes and annexations cannot all be recorded here; but it must be carefully borne in mind that the process was constantly going on. ♦Dominion of Zürich and Bern.♦ Zürich, and yet more Bern, each formed, after the manner of an ancient Greek city, what in ancient Greece would have passed for an empire. ♦Conquests from Austria, 1415-1460.♦ In the fifteenth century, large conquests were made at the expense of the House of Austria, of which the earlier ones were made by direct Imperial sanction. The Confederation, or some or other of its members, had now extended its territory to the Rhine and the Lake of Constanz. ♦Aargau, Thurgau, &c.♦ The lands thus won, Aargau, Thurgau, and some other districts, were held as subject territories in the hands of some or other of the Confederate states.