The small Duchy of Piedmont-Savoy was, although tiny, nevertheless an important factor in European politics between 1500 and 1800. Strategically placed in the area occupied today be South-Eastern France and North-Western Italy, it was severely damaged by the Italian Wars during the first half of the sixteenth century. The duchy was shorn of its Swiss possessions (including Geneva), and King Francis I of France occupied the rest of the duchy in 1536, forcing Duke Charles III into exile.
The French occupation did not last, however. The 1559 Treaty of Cateau-Cambrésis, which brought an end to half a century of pan-European conflict (especially between the French and the Habsburgs of Austria and Spain), restored Piedmont to Duke Emmanuel Philibert (1553 - 1580, the son of Duke Charles III and known to contemporaries as "Ironhead"). Emmanuel was, however, made to recognise the permanent loss of the duchy's former Swiss possessions, but received the consolation of being able to marry the sister of King Henry II of France.