Duchy of Milan

Duchy of Milan
Ducatus Mediolani (Latin)
Ducato di Milano (Italian)
Ducaa de Milan (Lombard)
1395–1447
1450–1796
Coat of arms (1395–1535) of Milan
Coat of arms
(1395–1535)
The Italian Peninsula in 1499
Duchy of Milan in 1499
The Duchy of Milan in its period of greatest expansion, between the end of the 14th century and the beginning of the 15th century.
The Duchy of Milan in its period of greatest expansion, between the end of the 14th century and the beginning of the 15th century.
CapitalMilan
Common languagesLombard
Italian
Religion
Roman Catholicism
Demonym(s)Milanese
GovernmentPrincely hereditary monarchy
Duke 
• 1395–1402
Gian Galeazzo Visconti (first)
• 1792–1796
Francis II (last)
Historical eraEarly modern
1 May 1395
1447–1450
• French occupation
1499–1512, 1515–1522 and 1524–1525
• Protectorate of the Swiss Confederacy
1512–1515
• Habsburg rule
1535–1796
• Spanish rule
1556–1707
• Austrian rule
1707–1796
• Annexation to the Transpadane Republic
15 November 1796
Population
• Estimate
750,000 in the 17th century
CurrencyMilanese scudo, lira and soldo
Preceded by
Succeeded by
1395:
Lordship of Milan
1447:
Golden Ambrosian Republic
1447:
Golden Ambrosian Republic
1500:
Old Swiss Confederacy
1796:
Transpadane Republic
Today part ofItaly
Switzerland

The Duchy of Milan (Italian: Ducato di Milano; Lombard: Ducaa de Milan) was a state in Northern Italy, created in 1395 by Gian Galeazzo Visconti, then the lord of Milan, and a member of the important Visconti family, which had been ruling the city since 1277.[1][2]

At that time, it included twenty-six towns and the wide rural area of the middle Padan Plain east of the hills of Montferrat. During much of its existence, it was wedged between Savoy to the west, Republic of Venice to the east, the Swiss Confederacy to the north, and separated from the Mediterranean by Republic of Genoa to the south. The duchy was at its largest at the beginning of the 15th century, at which time it included almost all of what is now Lombardy and parts of what are now Piedmont, Veneto, Tuscany, and Emilia-Romagna.[2]

Under the House of Sforza, Milan experienced a period of great prosperity with the introduction of the silk industry, becoming one of the wealthiest states during the Renaissance.[3]

From the late 15th century, the Duchy of Milan was contested between the forces of the Habsburg Monarchy and the Kingdom of France. It was ruled by Habsburg Spain from 1556 and it passed to Habsburg Austria in 1707 during the War of the Spanish Succession as a vacant Imperial fief.[4] The duchy remained an Austrian possession until 1796 when a French army under Napoleon Bonaparte conquered it, and it ceased to exist a year later as a result of the Treaty of Campo Formio, when Austria ceded it to the new Cisalpine Republic.[5]

After the defeat of Napoleon, the Congress of Vienna of 1815 restored many other states which he had destroyed, but not the Duchy of Milan. Instead, its former territory became part of the Kingdom of Lombardy–Venetia, with the Emperor of Austria as its king. In 1859, Lombardy was ceded to the Kingdom of Piedmont-Sardinia, which became the Kingdom of Italy in 1861.

  1. ^ Black (2009), pp. 68–72
  2. ^ a b "::: Storia di Milano ::: dal 1201 al 1225". www.storiadimilano.it. Retrieved 1 July 2020.
  3. ^ "Milan – History". Encyclopedia Britannica. Retrieved 17 December 2020.
  4. ^ "Storia di Milano ::: dal 1701 al 1725". www.storiadimilano.it. Retrieved 1 July 2020.
  5. ^ "Storia di Milano ::: dal 1776 al 1800". www.storiadimilano.it. Retrieved 1 July 2020.