Foreign domination is commonly used to describe the condition of foreign rule over Italian states at the beginning of the Risorgimento, when the only state left under local Italian rule was Piedmont-Sardinia (predecessor state of Italy) whereas much of the north was under the Habsburgs. All of Italy was organised in independent states from the 11th-12th century as a result of the Walk to Canossa and the Treaty of Venice, but this condition was gradually lost between the end of the Italian Wars and the balance of power established by the Congress of Vienna.