Siege of Mirandola (1511)  The Siege of Mirandola occurred in January 1511 as a part of Pope Julius II's campaign to keep France from dominating northern Italy during the War of the League of Cambrai. At that time Mirandola was the capital of the Duchy of Mirandola in the Italian region of Emilia. The siege was conducted by Julius after he had broken away from the League of Cambrai and entered into a treaty with Venice. In the early years of the 16th Century, the leading powers of Europe including the Holy Roman Empire, Spain, and France all had an interest in the territories which today constitute Italy. Among the local Italian powers, the Republic of Venice and the Papal States ranked among the strongest independent political entities. For Pope Julius II, the leader of the Roman Catholic Church and the ruler of the Papal States, the presence of foreign powers in Italy represented a significant problem as he planned to make the Papacy the arbiter of the Italian Wars. Another issue, and more immediate after the occupation in Romagna of Rimini, Faenza, and Cervia, was the dominance of Venice: Julius felt that the Papal States could prosper as a buffer between two foreign powers if it could grow and maintain its possessions in central ltaly. A strong local competitor such as Venice, however, would hamper the Papal States ability to dominate central Italy. As a result, on 25 March 1509, Julius joined the leading European powers in the League of Cambrai which had as its expressed purpose the partition of the possessions of the Republic of Venice. When the War of the League of Cambrai broke out in May 1509, Venice immediately suffered defeat at the hands of the French at the Battle of Vailà. The Venetian military and their mercenaries fell into disarray and the members of the League of Cambrai seized numerous cities and towns in northern Italy, central Italy, and along the Neopolitan Coast. Immediately thereafter, Venice approached Julius attempting to make peace and break apart the Cambrai alliance. Negotiations were undertaken and on 11 February 1510 Venice agreed to the peace terms of Julius. Concurrent with the peace agreement with Venice, Julius withdrew from the League of Cambrai. He now turned his attention to stopping the French from dominating northern Italy. First, Julius attempted to ally unsuccessfully with the Holy Roman Empire and Spain in a new league against France. When that did not work, Julius let the Venetian military revitalize and supplemented that force by entering into a five-year alliance with the Swiss guard mercenaries.