Alexander Farnese, Duke of Parma

Biography

Philip II's nephew and by common consent the best general of his generation, Parma was everything Alba was not: patient, politically subtle, and willing to offer terms. He grasped that the revolt was held together by fear of Spanish tyranny, and he set about detaching the southern provinces by giving them what they wanted — their privileges restored, Walloon troops instead of Spanish, amnesty for those who returned. The Union of Arras in 1579 was his work as much as anyone's, and it split the seventeen provinces in two. Then he reconquered the south city by city with the most sophisticated siege craft in Europe. His masterpiece was Antwerp in 1585: an 800-metre fortified bridge of boats thrown across the Scheldt to cut the city from the sea, held against fire-ships that killed 800 of his men in the largest deliberate explosion yet engineered, and a thirteen-month blockade that starved out the richest city in northern Europe. He was on the verge of pushing into Holland when Philip ordered him to wait on the Armada, and then to invade France instead. Those two diversions saved the Republic. Parma died at Arras in 1592, worn out and out of favour, having done more than any Spaniard to win the war and having been stopped by his own king.

Key Battles