All Unquiet on the Western Front 99
The reasons why Bern and its allies gave way in 1514 are not straightforward.
There was certainly unrest within the city of Neuchâtel itself, with some inhabit-
ants threatening to rally to France and seize the castle of Joux.247 Bern and
Solothurn could not be assured of Luzern and Fribourg’s wholehearted backing;
indeed, at one point Fribourg was taking an openly Confederal line.248 After the
French defeat at Novara the previous year relations between the Swiss and France
were coming under increasing strain, so that the cantons as a whole were more
inclined to engage in western politics.249 Moreover, they continued to be suspi-
cious of what Bern would do if left to its own devices.250 By 1518 a majority of
cantons was in favour of retaining Neuchâtel as a common lordship, unless
Margravine Johanna was prepared to conclude Burgrechte with all XII cantons.251
Only Schwyz, Zug, and Basel refused to contemplate ceding control of Neuchâtel
in any circumstances.252 As a result, the status quo ante remained in place—and
Neuchâtel remained, perhaps surprisingly, at peace for the next decade.253
By then circumstances had fundamentally changed. Margravine Johanna, faced
by growing religious dissent, renewed her plea for independence in 1528,254 and
Bern was now prepared to offer support if she encouraged (or tolerated) evangelical
doctrines. For their part, the looming religious conflict in the Confederation as a
whole diminished the interest of the Catholic cantons in retaining control of
a distant western outpost. By 1529 only Uri (for reasons unknown) was opposed
to a restitution.255 Once the transfer had been completed (which entailed sizeable
reparations to the Swiss),256 Johanna renewed her Burgrechte with the four allied
cities.257 The fifteen-year common lordship of Neuchâtel, while nowhere near as
fraught as the administration of the Thurgau, demonstrated beyond peradventure
that the principle and practice of common lordship could not usefully serve as a
template for the consolidation of the Confederal polity or as an instrument with
which to forge a common identity.
Beyond the Romandie the balance of power had shifted decisively in these
decades. After Novara, which obliged France to abandon its claims to Milan and
pay the Swiss 400,000 écus in compensation, the tables were turned in 1515 with
the crushing defeat of a Swiss army at Marignano. With that, Swiss involvement
in Lombardy was effectively terminated—heralding the era of so-called Swiss
‘neutrality’—and the resulting rapprochement between the Confederation and the
247 Reutter, Comté de Neuchâtel, 311; SABE, Teutsche Missiven-Buch 16 N, p. 153v (June
1513); Allgemeine Eidgenössische Abschiede 13 N, pp. 474–6; EA III, 2, 732–3 (no. 515: m) (Aug. 1513).
248 Reutter, Comté de Neuchâtel, 319–20, 365–6.
249 Reutter, Comté de Neuchâtel, 340. 250 Reutter, Comté de Neuchâtel, 358, 370.
251 Reutter, Comté de Neuchâtel, 355–7.
252 EA III, 2, 1131 (no. 761: a; b) (Sept. 1518); Reutter, Comté de Neuchâtel, 357.
253 Reutter, Comté de Neuchâtel, 373–4, 383. The reasons for Johanna’s compliance are unclear.
254 Reutter, Comté de Neuchâtel, 385–6.
255 Reutter, Comté de Neuchâtel, 392–6; EA IV, 1b, 40–1 (no. 18: g) (Feb. 1529); 169 (no. 88: b)
(May 1529).
256 Jean-Pierre Felber, De l’Helvétie Romaine à la Suisse Romande (Geneva, 2006), 170.
257 EA IV, 1b, 351 (no. 178) (Sept. 1529) and Appendix 9; Reutter, Comté de Neuchâtel, 397. Bern
had already renewed its Burgrecht with Neuchâtel in 1526. EA IV, 1a, 992 (no. 394) (Aug. 1526).
SASO, Ratsmanuale 18, p. 381.