What happened at the Battle of Staffarda?
On 18 August 1690, near the Cistercian abbey of Staffarda in southern Piedmont, the French army of Nicolas Catinat defeated the Austro-Piedmontese army of Duke Victor Amadeus II of Savoy, who had just broken with Louis XIV and joined the alliance against him. Catinat's flanking move and a bold placing of his artillery broke the duke's army, which lost about 4,000 men. Cavalry under the young Prince Eugene of Savoy covered its retreat on Turin.1
For decades the dukes of Savoy had lived in the shadow of France. French troops held the fortress of Pinerolo in Piedmont, and Nicolas Catinat, a magistrate's son who rose in the French army by merit rather than birth, had served as its governor and in 1686 led the campaign against the Protestant Waldensians in the Alpine valleys.2
The young Duke Victor Amadeus II wanted out. When the League of Augsburg formed against Louis XIV in 1686, he saw the chance to throw off French hegemony, Carlo Morandi writes in the Enciclopedia Italiana. In 1687 he traveled to Venice under a false name to meet his cousin Max Emanuel of Bavaria and an imperial agent, and in 1688 and 1689 he negotiated with William III of Orange. In 1690 Savoy joined the Grand Alliance. When Catinat demanded that a French garrison be placed even in Turin, the duke refused and took the field at the head of his army. According to the Enciclopedia Italiana entry on the battle, he had the French ambassador in Turin arrested.3
The duke does not wait
Help was on its way. Prince Eugene of Savoy, the duke's cousin and an imperial general, was sent to Piedmont that year with five cavalry regiments, Piero Pieri writes. But Victor Amadeus attacked without waiting for them.4
Eugene had left Paris for the emperor's service in 1683. Pieri records the story that Louis XIV asked his courtiers, with irony, whether France had not suffered a great loss. Eugene made his name against the Ottomans, was badly wounded at Belgrade in 1688, and in 1689 helped negotiate the very alliance between Savoy and the emperor that now brought him to Piedmont as a general of cavalry.5
Catinat was marching from southern Piedmont toward Turin. With an army of about 15,000 men, slightly stronger than Catinat's 12,000 or so, the duke moved against him. The two armies met near the abbey of Staffarda, between the Po and the Giandone stream, about 12 kilometers north of Saluzzo.6
Flank and guns
Both sides fought bravely, the Enciclopedia Italiana says, but the duke's troops had the worse of it. They were overwhelmed by Catinat's outflanking maneuver and by a daring placement of the French artillery. The allied army broke and fell back toward Turin.7
The retreat was covered by a few cavalry regiments that maneuvered boldly under the young Prince Eugene. Pieri adds that Eugene could only protect the withdrawal with the duke's gendarmerie. The engraving above, published under the title of the battle, praises him for conducting the retreat with as much order as prudence and glory.8
Losses and reprisals
The Austro-Piedmontese lost about 4,000 men, while French losses were very light, according to the Enciclopedia Italiana. Following his instructions from Paris, Catinat then had Saluzzo and the nearby villages sacked, and dealt cruelly with groups of peasants who showed any will to resist.9
Six more years of war
Staffarda was only the first of the duke's setbacks. An attempt to invade the Dauphiné failed in 1692, and on 4 October 1693 Catinat beat him again at Marsaglia, Morandi writes. Catinat, later a marshal of France, occupied Savoy and part of Piedmont. Eugene had his own success in 1691, relieving the besieged fortress of Cuneo.10
Victor Amadeus treated war as politics, Morandi notes: always ready to fight, but also to negotiate. When Spain refused him the government of Milan, he made a separate peace with Louis XIV, signed in secret at Pinerolo on 29 June 1696 and made public at Turin on 29 August. France gave back the occupied lands and Pinerolo itself, and the duke's daughter Marie Adélaïde was married into the French royal family. Catinat's march on Turin in 1696 had helped force him to it. Eugene would meet Catinat again in the next war and beat him at Carpi in 1701.11
Notes
A number in the text points to a note; each note names the works that paragraph draws on, listed in full under Sources.
- Alberto Baldini, “Staffarda (La battaglia di Staffarda)”; Piero Pieri, “Eugenio di Savoia”. ↩
- Enciclopedia on line, “Catinat, Nicolas de”; The Columbia Encyclopedia, “Catinat, Nicolas”. ↩
- Carlo Morandi, “Vittorio Amedeo II duca di Savoia, re di Sicilia, re di Sardegna”; Alberto Baldini, “Staffarda (La battaglia di Staffarda)”. ↩
- Piero Pieri, “Eugenio di Savoia”. ↩
- Piero Pieri, “Eugenio di Savoia”. ↩
- Alberto Baldini, “Staffarda (La battaglia di Staffarda)”. ↩
- Alberto Baldini, “Staffarda (La battaglia di Staffarda)”. ↩
- Alberto Baldini, “Staffarda (La battaglia di Staffarda)”; Piero Pieri, “Eugenio di Savoia”. ↩
- Alberto Baldini, “Staffarda (La battaglia di Staffarda)”. ↩
- Carlo Morandi, “Vittorio Amedeo II duca di Savoia, re di Sicilia, re di Sardegna”; Enciclopedia on line, “Catinat, Nicolas de”; The Columbia Encyclopedia, “Catinat, Nicolas”; Piero Pieri, “Eugenio di Savoia”. ↩
- Carlo Morandi, “Vittorio Amedeo II duca di Savoia, re di Sicilia, re di Sardegna”; Enciclopedia on line, “Catinat, Nicolas de”; Piero Pieri, “Eugenio di Savoia”. ↩
Sources
- Alberto Baldini, Enciclopedia Italiana (1936), Treccani, “Staffarda (La battaglia di Staffarda)”
- Piero Pieri, Enciclopedia Italiana (1936), Treccani, “Eugenio di Savoia”
- Enciclopedia on line, Treccani, “Catinat, Nicolas de”
- The Columbia Encyclopedia, 6th ed., via Encyclopedia.com, “Catinat, Nicolas”
- Carlo Morandi, Enciclopedia Italiana (1937), Treccani, “Vittorio Amedeo II duca di Savoia, re di Sicilia, re di Sardegna”
