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OTTOMAN CORSAIRS IN THE WESTERN ... - Bilkent University

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was dragged was not more than the conquest of the Duchy of Milan and some places in<br />

Flanders. What he wanted to do was to conserve his patrimony and fulfil his obligations<br />

that the imperial office set forth for him. Thus his idea was to preserve the peace in and<br />

the coherence of universitas cristiana and thus his eminent enemies were Turks, heretics<br />

(i.e. protestants), and the neighbour princes (i.e. France). He defended Ordinatio totius<br />

mundi against France; Concordia hominum against Protestants and acted as Defensor<br />

Fidei against the Turks. 9 His wars were the natural outcomes of his desire to establish<br />

peace within the Christian community and therefore to wage a holy war against the<br />

infidels.<br />

Charles had to confront Ottoman expansion as the Defensor Fidei of the Catholic<br />

World. It is interesting to note that the idea of a crusade has played an important role in<br />

the imperial propaganda of the time. According to Montes, messianic beliefs in Spain<br />

around the personality of Charles and consequently the belief for his invincibility that<br />

were strengthened by the expansion of the Hispanic world resulted in a concrete idea of<br />

a Crusade. 10 Castro asserted: “The emotion of holy war disappeared in France with the<br />

Crusades, while it was still vivid in Spain in the sixteenth century”. 11 Montes mentioned<br />

a three staged holy war in which North Africa appeared as the second. 12 This illusion of<br />

crusade was based on four pillars: The imperial dignity or the theoretic leadership of<br />

9<br />

Juan Sánchez Montes, Franceses, Protestantes, Turcos. Los Españoles ante la Política Internaciónal de<br />

Carlos V (Granada, 1995), p. 129.<br />

10<br />

Montes, p. 50.<br />

11<br />

Américo Castro, España en su Historia. Cristianos, Moros y Judios (Buenos Aires, 1948), pp. 191, 202,<br />

223, cited by Montes, p. 84.<br />

12<br />

Montes, p. 98. The first was the Reconquista and the third would be the conquest of Jerusalem.<br />

10

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