page_title: War of the Eight Saints
section_title: Causes
hierarchical_section_title: War of the Eight Saints / Causes
context_page_description: The War of the Eight Saints was a war between Pope Gregory XI and a coalition of Italian city-states led by Florence that contributed to the end of the Avignon Papacy.
context_section_description: The causes of the war were rooted in interrelated issues, Florentine opposition to the expansion of the Papal States in central Italy (which the Avignon Popes had set as a condition for their return), and antipathy toward the Parte Guelfa in Florence. Specifically, Florence feared in the autumn of 1372 that Gregory XI intended to reoccupy a strip of territory near Lunigiana, which Florence had conquered from Bernabò Visconti, and that the Ubaldini might switch from Florentine to Papal allegiance.
  Gregory XI also harbored various grievances against Florence for their refusal to aid him directly in his war against the Visconti of Milan. When Gregory XI's war against Milan ended in 1375, many Florentines feared that the pope would turn his military attention toward Tuscany; thus, Florence arranged a nonaggression pact with the English condottiere John Hawkwood, who was Gregory XI's main military commander,  at a cost of 130,000 florins, extracted from local clergy, bishops, abbots, monasteries, and ecclesiastical institutions, by an eight-member committee appointed by the Signoria of Florence, the Otto dei Preti. Hawkwood also received a 600 florin annual salary for the next five years and a lifetime annual pension of 1,200 florins.
  The transalpine mercenaries employed by Gregory XI against Milan, now unemployed, were often a source of friction and conflict in papal towns.
caption: John Hawkwood, papal condottiere in Gregory XI's wars against Milan
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