Spanish period (1557–1708) Control of the
Presidi allowed the Spanish to monitor maritime traffic between
Genoa, an important ally of Spain, and Naples, since in the 16th century ships kept close to the coast. During the
Eighty Years' War (1568–1648) and the
Franco-Spanish War (1635–59), the
Presidi served as a stopover on the so-called
Cammino di Fiandra ("path of Flanders"). Soldiers were massed in Naples and then moved in stages to the
Spanish Netherlands, to fight Netherlandish rebels or the French. If they took ship in Naples, they usually stopped to revictual in the
Presidi before moving on to Genoa; otherwise they marched overland from Naples to the
Presidi and took ship there. In 1587 Cosimo's successor,
Francesco, offered Philip II a million gold pieces for just one of the
Presidi, but the king of Spain refused on the grounds that he had no other ports between Catalonia and Naples. In the 16th century, the
Presidi also provided pasture for Tuscan shepherds, who brought their flocks of sheep to the warm coastal grazing lands during the winter. The Tuscan authorities even taxed the head of sheep as their shepherds brought them to the coast, an act which provoked some complaints to the Spanish authorities. In 1603 King
Philip III decided to make use of the clause of the treaty of 1557 that allowed Spain to fortify any part of the Island of Elba and on 22 October of the following year he ordered his viceroy,
Juan Alonso Pimentel de Herrera, to build a fortress on the island. Construction of Fort San Giacomo at Porto Longone began in March 1605. It had barracks for 2,000 men. The Prince of Piombino, who shared
territorial sovereignty over Elba with the Duke of Tuscany, ceded his authority over the thirteen square kilometres of Porto Longone to the Spanish. This was the only case of territorial expansion in the history of the
Presidi. From May to July 1646, Orbetello successfully resisted a siege by troops sent by the French royal minister
Mazarin in an attempt to dislodge the Spaniards from Italy. However, French efforts to bring Grand Duke
Ferdinand II of Tuscany out of his alliance with Spain failed. He refortified his own coast and raised a militia of 10,000 to observe the Franco-Spanish conflict across the border. In June, the Spanish gained
a naval victory over the French off Porto Ercole. In September of the same year, after conquering Piombino, the French managed to capture Porto Longone. The Spanish garrison, which consisted of merely 80 men, held out for two weeks. The Spaniards recaptured both Piombino and Porto Longone during the summer of 1650, at a time when France was in the throes of the
Fronde, a domestic uprising. Piombino fell quickly to a Neapolitan force, while Porto Longone, garrisoned by 1,500 Frenchmen, held out ten weeks. Because of subsequent pirate attacks and to defend against any future attacks by the French, the Spanish Crown decided to build another fortress on the bay of Longone: Fort Focardo. Naples managed to meet this obligation, keeping the Tuscan fortresses fully garrisoned, even during the
Messina War (1672–78) and the
Nine Years' War (1688–97). At the start of the Messina revolt in 1672, the viceroy dispatched 4,600 infantry and 1,200 cavalry to the
Presidi and in May 1677 his successor sent 300 men to strengthen the garrison at Porto Longone. In 1693, the year of heaviest fighting during the Nine Years' War, Neapolitan troops intended for the Catalonian front were instead sent to the
Presidi in response to a French fleet. In 1678, Grand Duke
Cosimo III of Tuscany sought to take advantage of the Messina War to negotiate the purchase of the
Presidi, or at least the exchange of Orbetello for Portoferraio. The latter, although belonging to Tuscany, was frequently used by French privateers. In 1695, during the Nine Years' War, the
Republic of Genoa offered to buy the
Presidi outright. The Spanish king
Charles II refused both offers.
Austrian period (1708–1733) During the
War of the Spanish Succession, the
Presidi were claimed by the Emperor
Charles VI, who also claimed the Spanish throne. Between 1708 and 1712, he conquered all of them save Porto Longone. In Article 30 of the
Treaty of Rastatt of 7 March 1714, France recognised Charles' claim, but no peace with Spain was forthcoming. The chief opponent of that peace was
Elisabeth Farnese, queen of
Philip V of Spain, who hoped to create an Italian principality for her son. In 1718, the Emperor, France,
Great Britain and the
Netherlands signed the
Quadruple Alliance against Spain. Article 5 of the alliance proposed to grant to Elisabeth Farnese's eldest son, Don
Carlos, the future Charles III of Spain, the Grand Duchy of Tuscany with Porto Longone when the ruling
House of Medici died out, as it was soon expected to. This presumed that Philip V would formally renounced Porto Longone, which he held, and recognised it as an imperial fief like the other
Presidi. A final treaty of peace between Charles VI, who held the coastal
Presidi, and Philip V, who retained Porto Longone, was not signed until the
Treaty of Vienna of 30 April 1725. In this treaty, Charles agreed to enfeoff Don Carlos with the
Duchy of Parma and Piacenza when he came of age. The emperor would retain the coastal
Presidi and Spain its rights in Piombino and Elba, including Porto Longone. In a draft treaty submitted by Spain on 5 April 1724, Philip would have received the return of the coastal
Presidi (Article 4), but this demand was roundly mocked.
Bourbon period (1733–1801) This situation was revised in 1733 by the
Treaty of Turin (26 September), in which
France and
Sardinia allied themselves against the Holy Roman Empire and agreed that Don Carlos should receive the
Presidi together with the kingdoms of Naples and
Sicily. Spain agreed to the same stipulations and joined the alliance against the emperor in the
Treaty of El Escorial on 7 November. During the subsequent
War of the Polish Succession in May 1735, a Spanish and allied army under the
Duke of Montemar, the
Duke of Noailles and the
Duke of Savoy conquered the
Presidi and the south Italian realms. A preliminary peace signed in Vienna in October 1735 confirmed these conquests to Don Carlos. On 11 December 1736, the emperor issued a diploma ceding the
Presidi to him. This was finalised in the
definitive Peace of Vienna of 18 November 1738, ratified by Spain at Versailles in 1739. In 1736, Carlos commissioned a work to demonstrate that the kings of Naples had sovereignty over the princes of Piombino. The result, the 120-page
Dritto della Corona di Napoli sopra Piombino, was published around 1760. On 21 March 1801, by the
Convention of Aranjuez, France and Spain agreed to establish the
Kingdom of Etruria out of the old Grand Duchy of Tuscany and to award it the Principality of Piombino, while allowing France to annex the Tuscan part of Elba (Portoferraio). This fulfillment of these terms depended on the agreement of Naples. On 28 March, following the defeat of his armies by the French during the
War of the Second Coalition, King
Ferdinand IV of Naples agreed, as part of
the general settlement of the war, to cede the State of the
Presidi, his rights on Elba (Porto Longone) and his claimed sovereignty over the Principality of Piombino to France on the understanding that they would be annexed to Tuscany to form the new Kingdom of Etruria. On 2 May, the French
attempted to seize the Tuscan half of Elba, but the Tuscan garrison, with British assistance, resisted until the
Treaty of Amiens of 25 March 1802 forced the British to evacuate. The formal cession of the
Presidi to Etruria took place on 19 September 1801. Thereafter, its fate follows that of the rest of Tuscany. Piombino and Elba, however, remained under the French. ==Government and military==