In 1485, one year before Maximilian was elected King of the Romans, Mathias Corvinus not only held Hungary and Bohemia, which had belonged to the Hapsburgs from 1437 to 1457, but had driven Frederick III. from Vienna. The Tyrol and Alsace were in the hands of Maximilian’s cousin Sigismund. Styria and Carinthia were being ravaged by the Turk, and Maximilian himself, now that his wife Mary of Burgundy was dead (1482), was deprived of the government of the Netherlands, and even of the education of his son Philip. Far different was the state of things in 1519. Not only had all Austria proper been regained, but on the death of Sigismund, 1496, the Emperor reunited in his own hands all the Hapsburg possessions, and the ravages of the Turks had for the time ceased. If he had lost Switzerland, and if his attempt to restore his authority in Italy had ludicrously failed, these were losses to the Empire rather than to his house. | His Marriage Alliances. It is, however, in his marriage alliances that Maximilian met with most success. The marriage treaties with Ladislas and his son Lewis, mentioned just above (p. 125), were shortly (1526) to restore Hungary and Bohemia to the Hapsburgs. His wife Mary, daughter of Charles the Bold, had brought him most of the possessions of the powerful House of Burgundy, and Philip, the issue of this match, had wedded Joanna of Spain. Already in 1516, Charles, their son, ruled in the Netherlands and in Spain and in Naples.[41] | His Character. In spite of his long struggle with the electors, and the failure of his Italian wars, Maximilian was not unpopular with the Germans. Indeed, he must have been an attractive character, if rather an irritating person to deal with. Although not handsome--for his complexion was pale, and he had a snub nose rising above a grey beard--his countenance was manly, and his activity and strength extraordinary, as his feats in pursuit of the chamois prove. His intellectual activity was not less remarkable; well educated, speaking seven languages or dialects; with wide interests, quick sympathies, a chivalrous and highly imaginative mind, and inexhaustible energy, his many-sidedness won him admirers among all classes. No doubt, some of these qualities stood in the way of his success. Fond of indulging in magnificent schemes, many of them incapable of realisation, his very versatility and resource opened him to the reproach of being indecisive and changeable. ‘What he says at night he holds of no account on the morrow,’ said Louis XI. of him. His self-confidence taught him to be impatient of strong men; ‘to refuse the advice of any, and yet to be deceived of all,’ says Machiavelli. His overweening ambition led him into financial straits, and these to humiliating shifts, more especially in his dealings with foreign powers who called him ‘the man of few pence,’ and treated him as an importunate beggar, to be pensioned or bought off at will. But at least, Maximilian was not self-deceived.