The Italian princes, whether they liked it or not, were compelled to follow in the main a Spanish policy.

At length, in 1559, by the Peace of Cateau Cambresis signed between Henri II.

and Philip II., the French claims were finally abandoned, and the Spanish hegemony was formally acknowledged.

The later treaty of Vervins, in 1598, ceded Saluzzo to the Duchy of Savoy, and shut the gates of Italy to French interference.
Though the people endured far less misery from foreign armies in the period between 1630 and 1600 than they had done in the period from 1494 to 1527, yet the state of the country grew ever more and more deplorable.

This was due in the first instance to the insane methods of taxation adopted by the Spanish viceroys, who held monopolies of corn and other necessary commodities in their hands and who invented imposts for the meanest articles of consumption.