King Theodore's Corsica
- Thread starter Carp
- Start date
There is currently no specific army or battle flag. Careful observers will note that only the Guard Regiment and the Leibgarde actually have a "standardbearer" in their ranks (nominally, at least), both of whom fly the royal Moor's Head flag.
The Corsicans haven't quite caught up with the continent on things like "regimental colors." Generally, the Corsican style of warfare doesn't lend itself to battle flags, although with the expansion of the regular army that may change.
Extra: Notes on the Moor's Head Flag
Come to think of it, now might be a good time to give you a little detail on the whole flag business.
The common story you will read online about the Corsican flag goes something like this: The Moor's Head was a medieval symbol of Corsica which was adopted by Pasquale Paoli to be the flag of the nation. Traditionally, the Moor was blindfolded, but Paoli decided to "lift the blindfold" and make it a headband instead, symbolizing the liberation of the Corsicans and the opening of their eyes to the light of freedom.
This is a very nice story, but it's mostly wrong. Theodore was flying a flag with the Moor's Head when Paoli was still a pre-teen, so while it's possible that Paoli popularized the image he definitely didn't bring it out of medieval obscurity on his own. It was an established symbol of the rebellion, or at least of Theodore's kingdom, since at least 1736.
Now, about that blindfold. It's true that the Moor's Head is a medieval symbol of Corsica; it first appears in the 14th century Gelre Armorial, which coincidentally also has the first known image of the Dannebrog, the flag of Denmark. The flag of Corsica in the Gelre Armorial looks like this:
Note that the Moor's eyes are showing! Even in the earliest known image of the Moor's Head, it's not blindfolded. In fact every historical image of Corsica's arms between the Gelre Armorial and the Revolutionary era which I've managed to find does not have a blindfold, but a headband, or in some cases a "tortil" (a headband of twisted cloth).
In 1731, the Imperial Geographer Matthäus Seutter published a map of Corsica. In the bottom left corner, he placed the arms of Genoa and Corsica, which look like this:
That seems fairly obviously to be a headband to me, not a blindfold, and this was published after the start of the rebellion.
Theodore certainly used the Moor's Head, and seems to have figured it out prior to his arrival, which would not have been difficult seeing as it was already an established symbol in European atlases (perhaps he even got it from Seutter's recent work). While I don't have real proof that Theodore was the first to use the Moor's Head in the Corsican rebellion, I have yet to come across a reference to it being associated with the rebels before 1736. If he did get it from a source in Europe, then it's hard to see how it would have been blindfolded, since the most recent European atlases definitely showed a headband, not a blindfold. At least one source I've read disagrees, claiming that Theodore's Moor was blindfolded, but I haven't seen good evidence for that, and there's plenty against it. See, for instance, this Neuhoff coat of arms on a republication of Vogt's 1735 map shortly after Theodore's reign, which is the image I based the CoA in the first post of this thread on:
So where does all this blindfold business come from, anyway? Well, there's one possibility I've considered, and that's Sardinia. The Sardinian flag, of course, also has the Moor's Head (in fact it has four of them). The flag also appears in the Gelre Armorial, but without blindfolds or headbands. By the 17th century, however, the usage seems to have been inconsistent, and there are examples of both blindfolded and non-blindfolded Moors. The issue was only formally settled around 1720 when the Savoyard kings acquired Sardinia. By royal decree, they made the Moors blindfolded.
Corsica had no single, functioning government during this time to tell the people what their flag was and was not. Perhaps the Corsicans, aware of Theodore's symbol but unclear on the details (Theodore's flag was not often flown), copied the blindfolded Moors on the Sardinian arms. In that case perhaps Paoli really was "opening the eyes" of the Moor if usage had changed to a blindfold by that time, although I have no evidence of that. Alternately, perhaps Paoli was simply mistaken - or the people who "reported" the story were mistaken, and simply invented a nice story that buttressed the notion of Paoli as the liberator of the nation.
Another interesting bit of flag business is the sex of the Moor. If you look at a "modern" Corsican flag, it looks rather like a man. In the 17th and 18th centuries, however, the Moor's Head is often depicted with jewelry - specifically, an earring, a necklace of pearls, or both. Seutter's image has an earring, the republished Vogt map with Theodore's arms has a necklace and what appears to be an earring, and you can very clearly see both on the only extant flag of Paoli's Republic:
What do you think - man or woman?
How the Moor came to be female, or indeed whether it actually is female (as opposed to a man with jewelry) is unclear; I've heard some theorizing that it is related to Genoa's brisk trade in Moorish slaves in the Renaissance/Early Modern period, which certainly included women, but I haven't found any hard evidence either way. In the modern era, the Moor was "masculinized," and today is usually shown without any jewelry (although I have occasionally seen a modern Corsican flag which gives the Moor an earring).
The other 18th century change is the white background. From the Gelre Armorial through the 17th century, the Moor is more often displayed on a gold/yellow background than a white one, but from the 18th century on it's pretty much always on white. I'm not sure how exactly that change occurred.
The canon of TTL is that Theodore's flag is white, and bears a Moor with a headband/tortil, not a blindfold, whose sex is perhaps a bit ambiguous but definitely has the earring and pearl necklace. When I made the CoA on the first post of this thread, I was a little lazy and used the "modern" Moor's head and added a necklace; in fact I ought to add the earring too, something I forgot to do at the time, and if I find a decent alternative image I might make the head into something a little less masculine.
The common story you will read online about the Corsican flag goes something like this: The Moor's Head was a medieval symbol of Corsica which was adopted by Pasquale Paoli to be the flag of the nation. Traditionally, the Moor was blindfolded, but Paoli decided to "lift the blindfold" and make it a headband instead, symbolizing the liberation of the Corsicans and the opening of their eyes to the light of freedom.
This is a very nice story, but it's mostly wrong. Theodore was flying a flag with the Moor's Head when Paoli was still a pre-teen, so while it's possible that Paoli popularized the image he definitely didn't bring it out of medieval obscurity on his own. It was an established symbol of the rebellion, or at least of Theodore's kingdom, since at least 1736.
Now, about that blindfold. It's true that the Moor's Head is a medieval symbol of Corsica; it first appears in the 14th century Gelre Armorial, which coincidentally also has the first known image of the Dannebrog, the flag of Denmark. The flag of Corsica in the Gelre Armorial looks like this:
Note that the Moor's eyes are showing! Even in the earliest known image of the Moor's Head, it's not blindfolded. In fact every historical image of Corsica's arms between the Gelre Armorial and the Revolutionary era which I've managed to find does not have a blindfold, but a headband, or in some cases a "tortil" (a headband of twisted cloth).
In 1731, the Imperial Geographer Matthäus Seutter published a map of Corsica. In the bottom left corner, he placed the arms of Genoa and Corsica, which look like this:
That seems fairly obviously to be a headband to me, not a blindfold, and this was published after the start of the rebellion.
Theodore certainly used the Moor's Head, and seems to have figured it out prior to his arrival, which would not have been difficult seeing as it was already an established symbol in European atlases (perhaps he even got it from Seutter's recent work). While I don't have real proof that Theodore was the first to use the Moor's Head in the Corsican rebellion, I have yet to come across a reference to it being associated with the rebels before 1736. If he did get it from a source in Europe, then it's hard to see how it would have been blindfolded, since the most recent European atlases definitely showed a headband, not a blindfold. At least one source I've read disagrees, claiming that Theodore's Moor was blindfolded, but I haven't seen good evidence for that, and there's plenty against it. See, for instance, this Neuhoff coat of arms on a republication of Vogt's 1735 map shortly after Theodore's reign, which is the image I based the CoA in the first post of this thread on:
So where does all this blindfold business come from, anyway? Well, there's one possibility I've considered, and that's Sardinia. The Sardinian flag, of course, also has the Moor's Head (in fact it has four of them). The flag also appears in the Gelre Armorial, but without blindfolds or headbands. By the 17th century, however, the usage seems to have been inconsistent, and there are examples of both blindfolded and non-blindfolded Moors. The issue was only formally settled around 1720 when the Savoyard kings acquired Sardinia. By royal decree, they made the Moors blindfolded.
Corsica had no single, functioning government during this time to tell the people what their flag was and was not. Perhaps the Corsicans, aware of Theodore's symbol but unclear on the details (Theodore's flag was not often flown), copied the blindfolded Moors on the Sardinian arms. In that case perhaps Paoli really was "opening the eyes" of the Moor if usage had changed to a blindfold by that time, although I have no evidence of that. Alternately, perhaps Paoli was simply mistaken - or the people who "reported" the story were mistaken, and simply invented a nice story that buttressed the notion of Paoli as the liberator of the nation.
Another interesting bit of flag business is the sex of the Moor. If you look at a "modern" Corsican flag, it looks rather like a man. In the 17th and 18th centuries, however, the Moor's Head is often depicted with jewelry - specifically, an earring, a necklace of pearls, or both. Seutter's image has an earring, the republished Vogt map with Theodore's arms has a necklace and what appears to be an earring, and you can very clearly see both on the only extant flag of Paoli's Republic:
What do you think - man or woman?
How the Moor came to be female, or indeed whether it actually is female (as opposed to a man with jewelry) is unclear; I've heard some theorizing that it is related to Genoa's brisk trade in Moorish slaves in the Renaissance/Early Modern period, which certainly included women, but I haven't found any hard evidence either way. In the modern era, the Moor was "masculinized," and today is usually shown without any jewelry (although I have occasionally seen a modern Corsican flag which gives the Moor an earring).
The other 18th century change is the white background. From the Gelre Armorial through the 17th century, the Moor is more often displayed on a gold/yellow background than a white one, but from the 18th century on it's pretty much always on white. I'm not sure how exactly that change occurred.
The canon of TTL is that Theodore's flag is white, and bears a Moor with a headband/tortil, not a blindfold, whose sex is perhaps a bit ambiguous but definitely has the earring and pearl necklace. When I made the CoA on the first post of this thread, I was a little lazy and used the "modern" Moor's head and added a necklace; in fact I ought to add the earring too, something I forgot to do at the time, and if I find a decent alternative image I might make the head into something a little less masculine.
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How long have you been researching this?
You seem to know just so much about this period that I feel inadequate in terms of whatever I could research.
You seem to know just so much about this period that I feel inadequate in terms of whatever I could research.
I must say, I do prefer the winged satyrs supporting Paoli's republic to the German-style Herculi. Are those some manner of established creatures of folklore?
Edit: A cursory image search has revealed some greco-roman bronze statues of such. Do they bear any specific extra importance in Corsica?
Edit: A cursory image search has revealed some greco-roman bronze statues of such. Do they bear any specific extra importance in Corsica?
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How long have you been researching this?
You seem to know just so much about this period that I feel inadequate in terms of whatever I could research.
I was kicking around ideas for this TL for months before the thread started, reading a little now and then. That said, the CoA stuff didn't take long to put together. As I've said, I don't have any special resources at my fingertips.
Apparently the supporters of Paoli's flag/coat of arms were originally giganti marini ("sea giants"), which seem to have been a lot like Theodore's Wilde Männer, except with merman-tails instead of legs. In 1762 or sometime thereafter they became "fauns," which I presume to be what's on the Ponte Novu flag, but I can't explain why he decided to give them wings. I know of no connection between any of those figures/creatures and Corsica; both seem to have been the products of Paoli's imagination.
The illustration in Boswell's famous 1768 book on Corsica seems to show both creatures, although in this one the merman also has bat wings for some reason:
@Carp, sorry to bother you if you have mentioned this earlier or it has otherwise been brought up, but how well does Theodore speak Corsican?
Theodore speaks Italian just fine. Language is one of his intellectual strengths, and he's spent years in Italy. He might still have an accent, but he's completely fluent.
As for whether he speaks Corsican, @DarkKayder dropped some knowledge on us about this back on Page 2 of this thread which I recommend reading. To summarize, "Corsican" is really just a dialect of Florentine/Tuscan Italian, which is what we know as "Standard Italian." The pronunciation is somewhat different, but written Corsican looks a great deal like written Standard Italian save for a few tweaks (-u endings instead of -o, ghj- instead of gi-, "a" and "u" instead of the usual Italian articles, etc.). In fact the difference between Corsican and Standard Italian is much smaller than, say, the difference between Standard Italian and Ligurian, the language of Genoa which is in a different branch of the Romance family.
My understanding is that "Corsican," in Theodore's time, would be thought of as a "rustic" accent of Tuscan Italian spoken by uneducated islanders. A Florentine nobleman might have a hard time understanding a Niolesi shepherd, but in the same way that nobody understands Boomhauer, not because they're actually speaking different languages. Educated Corsicans like Costa probably make a point of speaking "properly," that is to say like a Pisan or Florentine would. Theodore doesn't "speak Corsican" in the sense of speaking in the dialect of a Corsican native; that would be inconsistent with royal dignity, as kings don't talk in the provincial accent of peasants (and peasants wouldn't expect them to). He does, however, have a good ear for language, so I suspect he has little trouble understanding them.
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LOOOOOL
I didn`t know Boomhauer. Now I have tears in my eyes from laughing. What this thread doesn`t teach us...
I didn`t know Boomhauer. Now I have tears in my eyes from laughing. What this thread doesn`t teach us...
The Thaw
The Thaw
Another view of Corti in the winter
Another view of Corti in the winter
As the Corsicans waited for spring, the tension in Europe was steadily building. The continent seemed to be moving inexorably towards a general conflict sparked by Britain's declaration of war on Spain in October of 1739. When King Theodore assured his ministers that war between Britain and France was imminent, he was expressing an opinion that was shared by many people across the continent including Emperor Karl VI himself. The emperor was increasingly alarmed by the power of France and the abominable state into which Austrian military and diplomatic power appeared to have slid. His hopes for the preservation of the Habsburg patrimony and the enforcement of the Pragmatic Sanction after his own death rested upon a grand anti-Bourbon alliance in which British participation was absolutely essential. Indeed, it was quite apparent that Britain's failure to join Austria's side in the last Bourbon-Habsburg war, the War of Polish Succession, had been a major factor in Austria's defeat.
The emperor's eagerness to draw the British into a firm alliance led him to consider the warnings of their ministers regarding Corsica all the more seriously. The British certainly did not seek war with France - quite the opposite, they hoped that King Louis XV would remain uninvolved to allow them to concentrate solely on Spain - but they had long suspected that the French (or some other Bourbon power) had designs upon Corsica. This concerned the British mainly because of Corsica's proximity to Livorno, the key port of the Grand Duchy of Tuscany. English merchants did quite a bit of business in Livorno, where there was a substantial expatriate community. If a general war were to begin with the Bourbon powers, the city was also likely to be Britain's only friendly naval base in the Western Mediterranean east of Minorca. French control of Corsica would allow them to strangle British trade through Livorno completely, and would make the operation of a battle fleet out of Livorno more hazardous. Only a few months past, when Britain was at peace and Austria was still reeling from her defeat by the Turks, Corsica had seemed like an insignificant mote with no relevance to British or imperial policy. Now, however, the British were growing anxious, and the emperor began to perceive that little mote as a place worth taking notice of, if only to continue wooing the British and limiting the power of France in Europe.
The emperor somewhat misjudged the intentions of French chief minister Cardinal André-Hercule de Fleury. The venerable cardinal, in fact, had long been an advocate of peace between France and Britain, a goal which he shared with his counterpart Sir Robert Walpole, whose period of dominance in Britain roughly paralleled that of Fleury in France. Both men, however, were nearing the end of their reigns. Walpole's influence was clearly declining; he had opposed the Spanish war but had been outmatched by popular will and his opponents in the parliament. Fleury, whose power was more secure as it depended on his close personal relationship with King Louis XV rather than the whims of the electorate (Fleury had been the king's tutor since the age of five), remained supreme, but the cardinal was now nearing 87 years of age and spent much of 1739 and 1740 suffering through long spells of illness. Despite his infirmity, he still held the reigns of power through trusted subordinates, but the vultures were circling in the form of court factions eager to supplant him. Fleury was never eager for war; he found France better served by neutrality in the Anglo-Spanish conflict, supported France's acceptance of the Pragmatic Sanction, and generally opposed another war with the Habsburgs. How long his influence (and indeed his life) would last, however, was another question.
The defeat of Lieutenant-General Louis de Frétat, Marquis de Boissieux at Ponte Novu came as a great shock to the French, who could scarcely imagine such a catastrophe befalling a numerically superior French army at the hands of half-wild bandits led by a renegade charlatan. Boissieux's career seemed unlikely to survive it. Recovering from a flesh wound and taken ill again, Boissieux had sent a letter to the king in December requesting to be relieved of his command for reasons of health. His wound, in fact, was quite minor, but his health had indeed been poor of late - he had spent a good part of the previous summer struggling with dysentery. Whether he would have been sacked otherwise will never truly be known, as his resignation was accepted. The debacle also reflected badly on Nicolas Prosper Bauyn d'Angervilliers, the secretary of state for war who pushed Boissieux into seeking a decisive confrontation, but it scarcely mattered as the secretary died in February. His replacement, François Victor Le Tonnelier de Breteuil, was wholly subservient to Fleury's will.
Fleury was souring on the Corsican adventure. He had worked hard to keep France at peace with its neighbors (whenever possible) and to put the state's finances on a stable footing. During his tenure thus far, France's debt had been substantially paid down, the currency had stabilized, and trade had grown considerably. Throwing money and lives away in Corsica for no tangible gain—for contrary to the fears of France's rivals, Fleury had no intention of annexation—seemed ill-advised, particularly when there was talk of impending war across the continent. Fleury remained concerned about the prospect of a closer Habsburg-Hanoverian relationship, and his representatives in Vienna complained constantly of the frequent conversations which Grand Duke Franz Stefan, the emperor's son-in-law, was said to have with British diplomats. Nevertheless, Boissieux's failure meant that France had little chance of preempting Austrian involvement if the emperor was inclined to it. Fleury, who was still hopeful that peace could be preserved, thus decided it was better to cooperate in this intervention than be left in the cold, and sent instructions to French diplomats in Vienna to discuss possible terms for the joint occupation.
Lautrec's medal from the city of Geneva
In the meantime a replacement was needed for Boissieux. In January, Lieutenant-General Daniel François de Gélas, Vicomte de Lautrec was summoned to Paris to receive his orders: Corsica was now his problem. The arc of Lautrec's career thus far was not very different from the man he was replacing. Both had served in Italy during the War of Polish Succession with the rank of maréchal de camp, and both had commanded divisions at the Battle of Guastalla in 1734. Lautrec had been appointed inspector-general of the infantry in 1736 and promoted to lieutenant-general in 1738, the same year as Boissieux. While Boissieux was sent to Corsica, however, Lautrec went to Switzerland. In that year, civil strife had broken out between the city's magistracy and the burghers, and Lautrec had been selected as a French plenipotentiary to mediate the conflict. During his time there (1737-8), he managed to forge a compromise between the two sides which proved so effective that the city demonstrated its gratitude by striking a medal in his honor. Lautrec was no mere diplomat—he had been a French officer since 1705 and had extensive experience in the field. Still, it is at least plausible that his success as a mediator in Geneva elevated him above France's many other available lieutenant-generals for consideration for this particular service. Aside from any possible negotiations with the rebels, he would have to deal with the disgruntled Genoese authorities and quite possibly manage a joint occupation with France's great continental rival, a task which might benefit from some tact and delicacy.[A]
February was a quiet month on Corsica. Although low-level skirmishing in the occupied provinces never truly stopped, neither the rebels nor the French or Genoese attempted serious moves against one another. The most notable event was not a battle, but a wedding. In late February, King Theodore's "nephew" Matthias von Drost married Maria Rosa Colonna-Bozzi, the sister of Count Antonio Colonna-Bozzi and the niece of Chancellor Sebastiano Costa. It was an auspicious match for all parties involved. The prestige of being linked to the king's relations, even a rather distant relation like Drost, was clearly appealing to Drost's new brother-in-law. For Drost, it was even smarter; as a landless minor nobleman his prospects in Westphalia could not have been terribly bright, and he had made up his mind to link his fate to Corsica and his "uncle's" kingdom, for better or for worse. A marriage into the Colonna-Bozzi family ensured his acceptance into Corsican elite society and gave him access to the influence and power of a well-established clan. And there was more to the marriage than simply calculations of status and power; Drost and Count Colonna had become good friends, and while Drost did not marry for love we are told that his relationship with his wife was affectionate.[B]
At the beginning of March, Theodore summoned his ministers and generals to a war council at Corti. Marquis Simone Fabiani, as the vice-president of the council, was present, along with minister of war Count Marc-Antonio Giappiconi, Adjutant-General Edward Sarsfield, Viscount Kilmallock, Lieutenant-General Andrea Ceccaldi, Lieutenant-General von Drost, Lieutenant-General Johann Friedrich von Neuhoff zu Rauschenburg, and Count Gianpietro Gaffori, whose key position as the army's quartermaster had been recently recognized by Theodore with his promotion from colonel to major-general. The royalists had learned that Boissieux had departed from Corsica near the end of February, but as far as they knew his replacement had not yet arrived. Maréchal de Camp Jean-Charles, Seigneur de Rousset held interim command, but he was clearly disinclined to do anything with it lest he suffer a career-ending disaster like Boissieux had. The Corsicans were equally unsure of what France had in store for them, or indeed what their strategy should be when the campaign season resumed. The occupation of the coasts had cut the king's correspondence to a trickle, which made Theodore anxious, as he had little information on developments in France or Fleury's further intentions.
What the royalists did have was an army, or at least something like it. Fabiani had reorganized the militia which had wintered at Ponte Leccia into "proper" battalions and along with Kilmallock had done as much as he could to give them some modicum of training in that time. The government had paid the men to remain over the winter, but now winter was nearing its end. Fabiani forcefully argued that the men should be kept on the payroll, lest the training and organization they had acquired be lost, and the interior be left vulnerable to a new French offensive.
The problem, as Gaffori pointed out, was money. The rebels still had a substantial reserve of weapons and ammunition, recently replenished by the Battle of Ponte Novu in which hundreds of French muskets, swords, and bayonets had been captured.[1] The state had no virtually no income, however, and while the syndicate-provided coffers had not yet run out, they would be depleted all the more quickly by expanding the regular forces. Gaffori explained that there was no way that Fabiani's new regiments could be paid for their entire year of enlistment with the money the government currently had. At some point—probably that summer, he surmised—they would have to hope that the soldiers would start accepting IOUs. Nevertheless, Fabiani carried the day. The marquis was among the royalist leaders with the closest personal relationship to Theodore, and the king rarely opposed him on military matters.
The question then became what the rebels should do with their army. Several of the generals wanted to strike at Pietralba; it was uncomfortably close to the interior, and according to Rauschenburg's scouts the French had drawn down their forces there to a single reinforced battalion. The Corsicans would have the advantage of numbers and surprise. Others, particularly Ceccaldi, argued that the French should first be driven from the Castagniccia, for surely there they would be joined by large numbers of sympathetic militia. Theodore, however, was reluctant to attack the French either in the north or the east. They had not yet stirred from their winter slumber; was it such a good idea to rouse them prematurely? Although the king projected confidence in his soldiers, his private belief seems to have been that the best way to approach the French was through diplomatic means. That had served him well early on in Boissieux's term when the general had been as ready to talk as Theodore, but the 1739 campaign had demonstrated the limits of a strategy of continual obfuscation and delay.
Theodore had another use for the army in mind. To the surprise of many, he suggested that an attack should be made neither against Pietralba nor the Castagniccia, but Aleria. Villemur had captured the fortress in his march northwards, but it had since been turned over to the Genoese army, which - according to Theodore's own spies - had only a few companies in the area. Capturing Aleria would mean the liberation of the Tavignano estuary and the nearby lagoons, which had been significant smuggling areas before the coast had been lost to the French and Genoese. Some concern was raised at the prospect of taking the fort unless artillery was also brought to bear, which would considerably delay the campaign, but Theodore reminded them that the rebels had, before his arrival, stormed and slaughtered the garrison there without any artillery, and recalled to them the success of the attack on Porto Vecchio, the first successful battle of his reign, in which the Corsicans had likewise surprised and taken a fortified position by storm. Questions remained—would the Alerian coastline be of any actual use with the French and Genoese still in command of the sea? Having taken Aleria, how would it be held? In retrospect, one wonders whether part of Theodore's motivation was to restore some contact with the outside world, as being a hermit-king in the mountains did not suit his temperament. Despite some misgivings, however, the council approved of the plan. Theodore had the strong support of Gaffori, and many others felt obligated to defer to his "genius," as Theodore's military reputation was still riding high after Ponte Novu.
Three battalions were furnished for the purpose—the Giuseppe regiment and the Guards under Brigadier Gio-Giacomo Ambrosi di Castinetta—at the insistence of the war council that at least some of the regular forces needed to remain behind to defend the capital.[2] In total, this amounted to about 800 regulars placed under Castineta's command, a force that was expected to comfortably outnumber the Genoese garrison even before the addition of the local militia.
Situation at the end of February 1740
Green: Royalist control
Red: Genoese control
Blue: French or Franco-Genoese control
White: Unknown or unaligned
Footnotes
[1] These muskets were mainly Model 1728 French infantry muskets [see image], several hundred of which were already in rebel hands by the time of Ponte Novu thanks to French troops killed or captured at San Pellegrino and elsewhere. The barrel of the Model 1728 was attached to the stock by iron bands, unlike the typical Liege muskets provided by the syndicate whose barrels were pinned into position. A banded barrel made for a sturdier and more durable musket that held up better to the rigors of back-country travel and hand-to-hand combat. In addition, there is some speculation that the Corsicans, who prized accuracy and often preferred taking aimed shots from cover, found a banded barrel better for sighting the musket (as military muskets of the period lacked actual sights). The rebels took an instant liking to the weapon and preferred the "French musket" to all other muskets during the Revolutionary era. Although few examples survive today, Corsican gunsmiths also converted a substantial amount of pinned-barrel Dutch/Liege muskets into banded-barrel muskets during the Revolutionary period and through the rest of the 18th century.
[2] Typical European practice at this time was to name brigades after their colonel. Some armies numbered their regiments, but for most this was merely an administrative identifier and a means to establish ceremonial precedence rather than the common name of the unit. The Corsicans did not actually refer to Fabiani's new regiments as "first" and "second" at the time, although they did refer to the battalions within those regiments as first and second battalions, with the former under the colonel's command (or the major, in the colonel's absence) and the latter under the lieutenant-colonel.
Timeline Notes
[A] I don't really know why Boissieux and Maillebois were, in OTL, chosen for Corsican command, but it was notable to me that they were both veterans of the Italian theater of the War of Polish Succession. Thus, to find Boissieux's replacement ITTL, I started with other divisional commanders in Italy at that time. Frustratingly, most don't really have a lot of biographical info available on them, but Lautrec - who went on to become a Marshal of France IOTL - stood out to me for his diplomatic success and seemed like a decent choice.
[B] Drost's marriage to Maria Rosa is OTL, although perhaps not at this exact time (some sources say 1736 or 1738; another 1748, which does not seem credible to me). The information on his family is conflicting and often rather suspect. It is alleged by some that his son, named Frederick or Francesco, married Maddalena Buonaparte, Napoleon's great-aunt.
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Thank you. I had actually read those posts, I was wondering about his ability to understand/speak the basilect. I understand why he would have no need to speak it.
Discord
Discord
The Fort of Aleria, 19th century illustration
The Fort of Aleria, 19th century illustration
The Aleria expedition was entrusted to Brigadier Count Gio-Giacomo Ambrosi di Castinetta, who had been given the colonelcy of the reorganized (and significantly reduced) guard regiment after the death of Lieutenant-Colonel Giovan Luca Poggi at Ponte Novu. The career of Poggi, a former Neapolitan officer, had been as glorious as it was brief, and he was destined for a prominent spot in the pantheon of revolutionary heroes. Poggi had boldly defended the Col de Teghime from the Genoese in 1736 with only 150 men, a splendid action which had made possible the decisive defeat of the Genoese at Rutali; he had led the capture of Vecchiaja, helping to seal the fate of Genoese San Fiorenzo, and then led an audacious raid with a captured Genoese galley to destroy vital supply ships under the very nose of the Genoese; his forces had relieved San Antonino at a pivotal moment and repulsed French attacks, which had helped preserve the Corsican army from likely destruction in the Balagna; he had led the Guard at San Pellegrino, where the French met their first defeat in open battle; and he had fought his final action at Ponte Novu, leading from the thickest part of the fighting and exhorting the guard to stand its ground until a French musket-ball claimed him. In some modern, less hagiographic assessments, Poggi does receive some mild criticism: his bravery and audacity are better documented than any true tactical skill, and as he tended to be the only Corsican commander on the field leading regular forces it was perhaps inevitable that he would outshine his comrades and their militia battalions. His earliest victories in the Nebbio, however, were accomplished with militia; and even without military genius, bravery and audacity count for quite a lot in warfare.
Castinetta's record was rather less lustrous, although in his defense Poggi was an exceptionally tough act to follow. The count had fought bravely at Furiani and led the victorious siege of Bastia in Theodore's absence, although the thirsty and demoralized garrison had not put up much of a fight. As governor of occupied Bastia he had played little role in the Nebbio campaign and held back most of his soldiers, but he was responsible for dispatching Poggi and his company to the Col de Teghime in the aforementioned action and thus deserves at least some of the credit. As governor, his tenure had been effective if heavy-handed. He had supported the delaying action which kept Montmorency crawling down Capo Corso for months, although he had not let it personally. After Bastia, Castinetta had seen no major combat actions until Ponte Novu, where he had been given command of the rebel forces on the other side of the river. He had done his duty competently and intervened at a choice moment, and criticisms that he failed to trap the French or pursue them as doggedly as he could have can be dismissed given the paucity of his resources. Even Poggi would have been hard pressed to cut off and destroy a professional army more than three times as numerous with a force composed entirely of militia.
The march to the coastal plain along the Tavignano was executed swiftly. The army encamped on the edge of the plain near Casaperta two days after leaving Corte. In the meantime, Castinetta had dispatched some men to nearby villages to rally local militia forces. They did not meet with much success—the mountainous lands around the Tavignano, scattered with little hilltop villages, did not make for a swift mustering of local manpower. The local population was also not particularly enthusiastic about taking up arms and attacking the Genoese. The region had been largely quiet since Brigadier Jean-Baptiste François, Marquis de Villemur's advance, and the people had generally followed the example of Marquis Saviero Matra (whose hometown was only a few miles to the north) by submitting to Genoese rule once more. Although his lieutenant in the guard Lieutenant-Colonel Antonio Buttafuoco urged an immediate attack, Castinetta wanted to remain at Casaperta for a few days to gain what strength they could. After another three days, however, fewer than two hundred militiamen had gathered, and the army's supply of food was running low. The soldiers had been issued eight days worth of bread at Corte, and Castinetta had restricted foraging as he feared his foraging parties would tip off the Genoese or leave his force vulnerable to an attack. In fact the Genoese had already learned of his presence during his encampment at Casaperta, presumably informed by a spy or just an unsympathetic local.
The Genoese only had around 300 regulars at Aleria and were in no position to attack a force of around a thousand Corsicans. They could, however, send word to the French forces encamped near Cervione 16 miles to the north. Had the French swiftly descended on the royalists, the result might have been disastrous, but the French commander, Colonel Charles Cléron, Comte d'Haussonville, appears to have given the Genoese reports little weight and waited until the next day before even bothering to pass the word on to Brigadier Villemur. Faced with rebels in the Alesani valley much closer to home, he may have thought it a distraction, or simply the overactive imaginations of the Genoese. In the meantime, on March 14th, Castinetta finally decided to make his attack.
To his surprise, Castinetta found the Genoese force ready and arrayed for battle. While outnumbered more than three to one, the Genoese had a strong position at Fort Aleria, a three-story blockhouse with soldiers posted in every window and gun-loop. The fort sat on a low rise above the plain, which was marshy and criss-crossed by tributaries of the Tavignano. After an initial attack across this terrain failed, Castinetta decided to withdraw, correctly assuming that if the Genoese were aware of him then they must have notified the French. It made no sense, in his estimation, to throw men away on such a strong position only to have to immediately vacate it once the French arrived, or even worse to be caught by the French and defeated.
Despite light casualties, the morale of the army quickly plunged. The second most senior officer in the brigade, Colonel Paolo Francesco Giannoni, was a friend of Castinetta and a fellow native of Rostino and had supported his deicision. Buttafuoco, however, openly derided Castinetta for his incompetence and timidity, and found many sympathetic ears among the company officers, many of whom already disliked Castinetta. Theodore was in the habit of promoting "worthy" men to officer positions regardless of their background, but Count Castinetta was a dyed-in-the-wool elitist who could hardly conceal his scorn for commoners made into captains. Divisions soon spread among the rank-and-file, too, and a rumor circulated in the brigade that Castinetta was in the pay of the Genoese. In camp, the soldiers nearly started a battle with each other when a sergeant in Giannoni's company replied to an insult from a guardsman by pulling his knife and stabbing him. Castinetta, fearing a mutiny or assassination attempt, had his tent guarded by a picked group of Rostino soldiers. The army that returned to Corte was not very bloodied, but it had ceased to be an effective fighting force.
In the field, the two colonels from Rostino had clearly been dominant, but this changed once they arrived at Corti. Buttafuoco was well connected; he was the son-in-law of Count Andrea Ceccaldi (as well as a fellow native of Vescovato) and a friend of Count Gianpietro Gaffori, two of the most powerful men in the war council. When the army arrived at Corti, Buttafuoco and his men immediately informed Gaffori of their interpretation of events. According to Castinetta's supporters, the brigadier had taken only prudent decisions: he had waited to gather local militia to bolster his strength, and upon seeing that surprise had been lost he decided not to press an attack which would have been very costly if it succeeded at all. Buttafuoco and the malcontents, however, gave a very different account. They claimed that Castinetta had dithered at Casaperta either out of cowardice or because he purposefully intended the attack to fail, and in the actual attack on the fort had only devoted a part of his strength and retreated without making a genuine attempt.
Gaffori immediately took Buttafuoco's side, all the more effectively as Marquis Simone Fabiani, who had played the largest role in selecting the new officers, was at Ponte Leccia at the moment. The count informed King Theodore that there were rumors of cowardice or even treason surrounding Castinetta, and while he personally had no reason to believe them to be true he was convinced that the brigadier could not lead the guard under such a cloud. Although upset by Castinetta's failure, the king was reluctant to remove him—Castinetta was a powerful man in Rostino, a key royalist pieve whose militia had been essential to the victory at Ponte Novu. To dismiss him would be dangerous, and even more so under the suspicion of treason, however baseless, as removing him would appear to give credence to the rumor. Theodore decided to give him a "lateral promotion" instead. Summoning Castinetta to a royal audience, the king informed that he thought nothing of the expedition, and that such setbacks were merely the nature of war. Theodore thanked him for his loyalty, praised his wisdom in keeping order both as governor of Bastia and in command of the army, and informed him that he was being made militia commander of Rostino in order to bring some order and discipline to the militiamen there, whose service was vital to the national cause. Castinetta was not a fool; it was obvious that Buttafuoco and Gaffori had gotten their hooks into Theodore and had engineered his removal. Put on the spot by the king, however, he could only swallow his pride and accept the "honor." Nevertheless, it was a personal humiliation that the count would not soon forget.
Ponte Leccia, near the site of Fabiani's camp
It was a bad time for the rebels to be quarreling, as the French had finally received their new leader. Lieutenant-General Daniel François de Gélas, Vicomte de Lautrec, the new commander of the French forces in Corsica, had arrived at Bastia two days before the "battle" of Aleria. What he found did not please him. The idleness of winter quarters and the leadership vacuum had caused discipline to become intolerably lax. The soldiers' camps were rife with drunkenness, for while Corsica was poor in many things wine was not one of them. Meanwhile, the officers at Bastia spent their time gambling and holding balls. Lautrec immediately summoned his brigadiers to Bastia, where he commanded them to crack down on debauchery and idleness and prepare their battalions for deployment. Lautrec was not under the whip as Boissieux had been in the previous autumn, but he was nevertheless expected to make an advance against the rebels.
Cardinal André-Hercule de Fleury, whose representatives had begun negotiations with the Austrians regarding the possible joint intervention, had informed Lautrec that the current proposal being discussed was based on a division of the island between north and south, with the French occupying the Diqua and the Austrians in the Dila. The specifics, however, were still up in the air, and there was no consensus on where exactly the proposed line of control would fall. The French wished to retain control of Ajaccio, despite its position in the south, as it was a key strategic port (and the island's second-largest city) and already occupied by French forces. The Austrians, however, were demanding parity, and wanted parts of the interior and eastern Diqua—in particular, Corti, Aleria, Fiumorbo, and the Tavignano—particularly if the French were going to retain Ajaccio. If Lautrec could take this territory in the interior, the French negotiating position would be stronger, and with luck the Austrians could be restricted to Porto Vecchio and the rather worthless mountain valleys of the interior Dila.
Despite making preparations for their destruction, Lautrec was not averse to treating with the rebels' delegates. Only a week after his arrival, the general was presented with a delegation from King Theodore led by Father Erasmo Orticoni, the king's foreign minister. He bore a letter from the king himself in Theodore's usual grandiloquent prose, which welcomed Lautrec to "our fair kingdom" and expressed a desire for peace and friendly relations between Corsica and France. Lautrec was not particularly impressed, describing it as a fulsome and pompous letter. He would, however, entertain Orticoni, and refused the immediate demands of the Genoese that this "rebel spy" be handed over for execution. Lautrec was polite but unyielding; his government's position on the rebels and their so-called king had not changed. The terms of Fontainebleau stood: The rebels, if they wished to escape destruction, needed at once to disarm and throw themselves upon the mercy of the King of France, who would fairly consider the “just grievances” of the people. Orticoni responded that no Corsican doubted the justice and mercy of the Most Christian King, and explained that “the representatives of the nation” would consider these terms favorably if Lautrec could guarantee that French troops would be present, in perpetuity, to ensure Genoese observance of the King’s verdict. Lautrec was obviously unable to provide this guarantee, and the parties were once more at an impasse.
Despite this failure, there was a breakthrough on the matter of prisoners held by each side. Although most of the rank-and-file French soldiers captured by the Corsicans over the course of the intervention had been released in the previous year because of a lack of food, Theodore had retained custody of their officers, including Colonel Armand de Bourbon-Malauze, Marquis de Malauze, as well as around 60 soldiers and officers captured at Ponte Novu in November. The presence of a marquis in the custody of “bandits” was a continuing embarrassment to the French. What the Corsicans wanted, in turn, were the “worthy hostages” who had been traded to Boissieux in the summer of 1738. When serious hostilities between the French and Corsicans began in October of that year, they had been moved to the Chateau d’If, a notorious island prison. General Boissieux, who had taken the “Corsican Vespers” as a personal betrayal, had always refused to release the hostages, but Lautrec considered them strategically worthless—they had been taken to guarantee the good behavior of the Corsicans, something they had obviously failed to do. Lautrec would not return the hostages to Corsica, as that would simply be supplying leaders to the rebellion, but he offered to free the hostages under condition of perpetual exile. They would be given their liberty, but would have to swear not to return to Corsica and would be turned over to the Genoese for execution if they did. Several other “royalists” currently in French custody captured since then, who had not yet been rendered to the Genoese, would be given the same offer.[1]
Orticoni returned with this offer to Theodore, who enthusiastically gave his assent. Numerically, it was far from an even trade—the Corsicans were returning more than 80 Frenchmen in exchange for fewer than twenty of their own, who would not even be permitted to return to Corsica. Realistically, however, there was not much else that Theodore could buy with his French prisoners, and he was grateful to be rid of men who required scarce resources to feed and guard. In addition, he felt an obligation to the families which had agreed to send men into captivity, including his High Chancellor and good friend Sebastiano Costa whose son Filippo Maria was one of the prisoners. Lautrec kept his end of the bargain, and two weeks later the hostages were set free in Marseilles. Fearing Genoese assassins, however, they did not stay long, and boarded a Spanish ship bound for Naples. Even there they were not out of danger, but the exiles were offered protection by Joseph Valembergh, the Dutch consul. The nature of Valembergh's interest is not precisely clear, but there is circumstantial evidence that links him to the syndicate, including alleged correspondence between Valembergh and Lucas Boon, one of the syndicate's founding partners. Frustrated, the Genoese turned to the Neapolitan government. Their efforts to seek extradition, however, were stonewalled by the king's secretary of state, José Joaquín di Montealegre, Duca di Salas. The Genoese do not seem to have been aware that Montealegre was married to the sister of Theodore's late wife.[A]
Footnotes
[1] One of the hostages of the Chateau d’If, Alerio Francesco Matra, the son of Marquis Saviero Matra, had already been granted this liberty months before on account of his father’s collaboration with the French.
Timeline Notes
[A] Theodore's "network" was impressive. His career would not have been possible had he not benefited from having friends, relatives, friends-of-relatives, old war buddies, and so on in seemingly every country in western Europe. One could almost believe he was protected by some vast international conspiracy—and given his contacts in the world of Freemasonry, maybe he was. The OTL events surrounding Theodore in Naples were much stranger and more fantastical than anything in ITTL. IOTL, two Dutch captains paid by the syndicate were abducted off the streets and imprisoned by their own consul for not delivering the arms in their ships to Corsica. Later, Theodore was arrested in Naples, imprisoned at Gaeta, and then released in secret and placed on a ship to Teraccina, all of which appears to have been a ploy—possibly masterminded by Montealegre—to help him escape Genoese assassins. That it was not a "real" imprisonment could also be intuited by the fact that, while he was under custody at Gaeta, the King of Naples ordered an engraving to be made of Theodore. Not everybody gets a royally commissioned portrait while in prison.
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In the end having a bunch of Corsians slumming it in a Bourbon city, with your side granting them the honors of not!Alcatraz and never seeing their families again, and with places like Genoa and Sardinia being ridiculously oversensitive to the slightest rumor from anyone, doesn't look like a real solution.
You know, on reflection, it is somewhat implied that Theodore's inability to secure a major Great Power patron for the cause is indicative of his nature as a smooth talking charlatan, but I'm not so sure. He became King partly because of his claimed foreign connections, but it seems like these claims have considerable basis in reality with all of the folks he apparently knows (a point Carp hits on in TL Note A of the most recent entry). An alliance with a Great Power is a hard thing to swing, even for the most connected and respected diplomat. Theodore seems to have brought "the goods" (literally and figuratively) to Corsica, and I would assume him remaining on the Throne would indicate that the Corsican leaders are generally aware of how much of a boon to the cause he actually is, even without the constant physical reminder of the syndicate goods reminding them.
Perhaps not, although as cities go Naples is probably one of the safest they could have picked. While King Carlos is indeed a Bourbon, he and his government were historically rather lenient towards the Corsican rebels. A lot of Corsican smuggling seems to have gone through Naples, and there were a lot of rumors that the Neapolitans were indirectly supporting the rebels and/or Theodore, possibly with a mind towards acquiring the island for themselves. Many Corsican exiles (including Pasquale Paoli) sought refuge there IOTL; the king even raised a regiment of them. Carlos was a rather indifferent member of the "Bourbon monarchs' club" and practically needed to have his arm twisted by his dad, the King of Spain, before he would involve himself in the War of Austrian Succession. He's not beholden to the interests of France, and particularly with Montealegre in power Genoa is unlikely to get anywhere with diplomatic pressure.
The only real threat is posed by assassins, which Genoa really did send after Theodore and some of his associates, but the Neapolitan government is likely to take a dim view of the Republic murdering people in its own capital, particularly those under the protection of a foreign consul.
Theodore definitely exaggerated his credentials to the Corsicans, but he didn't make up his resume from whole cloth. He really was very well-traveled and had extensive international contacts, even if some of them were a bit on the shady side like Ripperda and Cardinal Alberoni.
I think the Genoese smear campaign was quite effective and harmed his ability to gain allies, but even without their libel the fight for recognition was very much an uphill battle. As "enlightened" as the age purported to be, this was an era of an immutable royal elite; the crowned heads of Europe did not easily admit newcomers to their exclusive club. Indeed, at this time the number of sovereign families was decreasing, particularly in Italy - in the first half of the 18th century, the Medici of Tuscany, the Gonzagas of Mantua, and the Farnesi of Parma all died out in the male line, every last one replaced by Bourbon or Habsburg cadets or viceroys. Even if Theodore had been a saint, the idea of a landless baron made into a new king was absolutely unprecedented. The only thing that made matters slightly easier was that Corsica was recognized as an existing kingdom, something which the Genoese themselves acknowledged as each newly elected Doge was also crowned ex officio as the King of Corsica.
Nor would things have been easier if the Corsicans had elected to eschew a monarch and keep their commonwealth. The only existing republics were the few remaining Italian communes (Venice, Genoa, and Lucca), the Swiss Confederacy, and the Dutch Republic. The Italian states were aristocratic by nature and had a medieval lineage, while the latter two republics had won their independence only after long and bloody struggles. A new republic formed by rebellious peasants was perhaps even more scandalous than a baron making himself a king. Certainly few European powers were likely to back such a country, as demonstrated by Paoli's failure to win any foreign support for his own state.
As for the Corsican leaders, I think their reasons for keeping Theodore around (aside from his material contributions to the cause, which are significant) have less to do with his diplomatic prowess and more to do with the lack of a viable alternative. If Theodore goes, what happens then? Men like Fabiani, Gaffori, and d'Ornano have local power bases and many jealous enemies; none of them could take Theodore's place at the head of government, at least not without triggering a civil war. All of them also derive benefits from Theodore that they would lose otherwise. Sans Theodore, Fabiani would be a general without an army, Gaffori would lose much of his ability to influence and control the rebel movement, and d'Ornano's supplies and armaments from the north would dry up. The only man who might plausibly be a leader of all Corsica is Giafferi, but Giafferi is an old man who is more respected than obeyed, someone with great legitimacy but little energy.
Not everyone on the Corsican side makes their decisions based on such cold logic. Honor, ambition, and pride are important, and there are plenty of people who will happily cut off their nose to spite their face, even knowing that the only plausible alternative to Theodore is Genoa. Hatred of Genoa, however, as well as fear of what might happen if Theodore' monarchy vanishes, puts enough pressure on enough of the rebellion's various leaders to keep the whole thing from spinning apart.
Really? That's interesting. I thought the King of Sardinia was the titular (although I suppose a claim does not make a de jure reality) King of Corsica?
The French general is not indolent and the assault on Aleria was a bust. The new professional army will collapse when the pay runs out, which will happen all too soon if Theodore does not stumble onto a convenient chest of shinies. It seems that it'd take a fairly serious French fuckup to give the rebellion a boost right about now.