Maximilian, for purely utilitarian ends, had sought a rapprochement with the
cantons as soon as the Swiss War was over. As Bettina Braun has argued, the old
regional hostility within southern Germany towards the Swiss was peripheral to his
imperial vision which was focused on the conflict with France over hegemony in
Italy. In her verdict, the Swiss War was a local conflict which had spun out of con-
trol, rather than the ineluctable consequence of a ‘hereditary animosity’ between
the Confederation and the house of Austria.261 Nevertheless, it was not altogether
easy to bring a new accord to fruition. After 1501 the Confederation had expanded
to XII cantons, with Appenzell to join as the last full member in 1513. Should the
Perpetual Accord of 1474 now be extended to the new cantons and indeed to the
associated members? A draft treaty in January 1511 proposed that they should,262
but several cantons—Luzern, Uri, Schwyz, Nidwalden, Zug, and Basel—had
misgivings.263 Though the final wording of the treaty in February did name all the
Swiss members—a deliberate back-dating to preserve the fiction of unanimity—by
the summer of 1511 Maximilian’s envoys were putting pressure on the six cantons
to sign.264 Yet it was not until January 1512 that Uri and Schwyz ratified the
Agreement, shortly to be followed by Luzern.265
This reluctance can be explained by the high-handed treatment meted out to
Konstanz in 1510 by Maximilian, which appeared to jeopardize the city’s neutral-
ity, enshrined in the Peace of Basel. Voices had been raised, above all in Zürich,
whether Konstanz should not, after all, seek security by joining the Confederation.266
In September that year the king had appeared with an armed detachment in the
city to punish it for its close relations with the Swiss, with whom it had long been
in clandestine talks.267 His tactic was to clip the wings of the pro-Helvetic faction
on the council (most of whom had fled at news of his impending arrival) by
increasing the representation of the guilds (supposedly pro-Austrian) on the Great
and Small Councils at the expense of patrician seats.268 In the treaty of protection
which the city was obliged to sign the following year Konstanz was promised an
261 Braun, ‘Habsburger und Eidgenossen’, 144. 262 EA III, 2, 544–7 (no. 386) (1511).
263 EA III, 2, 553–5 (no. 391: h) (1511). 264 EA III, 2, 571–3 (no. 409: e).
265 Braun, Eidgenossen, 231; EA III, 2, 593 (no. 426) (1512).
266 EA III, 2, 499–503 (no. 369: b) (1510).
267 Dobras, ‘Konstanz zur Zeit der Reformation’, 21.
268 Maurer, Konstanz im Mittelalter, 267; Carl, ‘Eidgenossen und Schwäbischer Bund’, 257. The
fishers’ guild was regarded as especially pro-Austrian. See the discussions of Maximilian’s attempt to
favour the guilds in Chapter 5 and of Konstanz’s Great and Small Councils in Chapter 10.
9
The Hereditary Agreement of 1511