Louis XI.’s relation to Pope Sixtus IV. had always been uncertain. The king had, from the beginning of his reign, held out the Pragmatic Sanction and the Council as a bait and a terror. He had not even always observed outward respect; anger and sorrow at the slighting treatment shown to him during his French legation, had shortened Cardinal Bessarion’s life. He was on the verge of open hostility when the Pope appointed Giuliano della Rovere legate of Avignon, which dignity was filled by Charles de Bourbon. The king accused the new legate of being implicated in Réné of Anjou’s plans, who, at variance with Louis XI., hoped to obtain the county of Provence for the Duke of Burgundy. After appointing his only remaining nephew, Charles, Count of Maine, as his heir, the old king entered into an agreement of the kind with Charles the Bold in 1474, who by this means, and the reviving of the superannuated royal title of Arelat, hoped to attain the dignity, for the grant of which he had vainly negotiated with the Emperor Frederick III. Louis XI. had formerly garrisoned the province of Anjou, and taken the precautions necessary to hold both Charles and Réné in check. Towards the end of the winter of 1476 the terrible defeat of Charles at Granson left the hands of Louis free, and he immediately commenced a trial against Réné in Parliament for high treason, and forced him and the other branches of the house of Anjou at Lyons to cede all rights and claims to him. Réné, who was then sixty-eight years old, still retained the government of his States, but the king took precautions against future vagaries by fortifying and by gaining over to his side the principal councillors of his wavering and incapable cousin, precautions which future events proved useless. The influence on the destinies of Italy of this transferring of the claims on Naples from a weak collateral line to the royal house of France, need not be indicated here. In order to punish the Holy See for the share ascribed to her legates, the king had an idea of garrisoning Franche Comtois, Venaissin and Anjou, and he refrained only because Charles the Bold, who had speedily collected his army, threatened to advance into Provence in case the Pope were annoyed in his French possessions.