Schmalkaldic League - Activities

Activities

The members of the League agreed to provide 10,000 infantry and 2,000 cavalry for their mutual protection. They rarely provoked Charles directly, but confiscated Church land, expelled bishops and Catholic princes, and helped spread Lutheranism throughout northern Germany. Martin Luther planned to present to the League the Schmalkald Articles, a stricter Protestant confession, during a meeting in 1537. Luther attended the critical meeting in 1537, but spent most of his time suffering from kidney stones. The rulers and princes even met in the home where Luther was staying. Though Luther was asked to prepare the articles of faith that came to be known as the Schmalcald Articles, they were not formally adopted at the time of the meeting, though later they were incorporated into the Lutheran Confessions, in the Book of Concord, of 1580, in German, and in Latin translation, in the official Latin edition of the Book of Concord, the Leipzig edition of 1584.

For fifteen years the League was able to exist without opposition, because Charles was busy fighting wars with France and the Ottoman Empire. The Ottoman–Habsburg wars lasted from 1526 until 1571. In 1535 Charles led a successful campaign against Tunis. Francis I of France, in an effort to limit the power of the Habsburgs, allied with Suleiman the Magnificent of the Ottoman Empire, forming a Franco-Ottoman alliance. The Italian War of 1535–1538, between France and the Holy Roman Empire, ended in 1538 with the Truce of Nice. The final war during this period Charles fought against France, the Italian War of 1542–1546, ended with inconclusive results and the Treaty of Crépy.