On This Day In History: Sack Of Rome Took Place on May 6, 1527

MessageToEagle.com – On May 6, 1527, Rome suffered the worst assault that it had ever known, far worse than anything at the time of the barbarian migrations.

Spanish successes led to the sack of Rome in 1527. It was the last of the many sackings of this city since its foundation.

City of Rome had not been sacked for several centuries.

The imperial army under the command of the Duke of Bourbon marched on Rome and at 7:30 a.m., on this day, in 1527, about 20,000 troops, some Spanish and some Germans, mostly mercenaries, broke into the city, through Rome’s defenses and entered the Vatican district.

Meanwhile, the Duke of Bourbon had been killed in the fighting outside the city’s walls.

The death of the last respected command authority among the Imperial army caused any restraint in the soldiers to disappear, and they easily captured the walls of Rome the same day. One of the Swiss Guard’s most notable hours occurred at this time. Almost the entire guard was massacred by Imperial troops on the steps of St Peter’s Basilica.

Of 189 guards on duty only the 42 brave men who accompanied the pope survived. Approximately 1,000 defenders of the Papal capital and shrines were executed.

Pope Clement VII escaped through a secret corridor between the Vatican City and the fortress Castel Sant’ Angelo. He found refuge within the walls of this fortress, constructed from the remains of the tomb of the Emperor Hadrian.

The city of Rome suffered badly due to a horrific massacre of its residents and unlimited devastation inside the city’s walls. Cardinals and prelates, including one future Pope, Julius III, were humiliated and tortured, altars were ransacked, riches confiscated, patients in hospitals and children in orphanages butchered.

After the brutal execution of some 1,000 defenders of the Papal capital and shrines, the pillage began. Churches and monasteries, as well as the palaces of prelates and cardinals, were looted and destroyed.

The ancient records say that normal life came to a halt for almost a year. Priceless pieces of art were also destroyed. Nothing was spared, sacred or profane.

This military event is strongly connected with the French-Spanish struggle for hegemony in Italy in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries.

However, the event’s immediate cause was the clash between the political program of the harried Medici Pope, Clement VII (1523-1534), and the ambitions of Charles V (1516-1558), King of Spain, King of Germany, and Holy Roman Emperor.

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