Editing Battle of Mohács (section)

===European events, and the Franco-Ottoman alliance===
In Europe, especially in Germany, negative trends had started to unfold. The Fuggers, who had taken control of the finances, "by around 1503 had a veritable monopoly of 'favoritism' in Germany, Hungary, Poland and Scandinavia, to the extent that any priest who wanted to get access to even the most modest parish had to turn to the merchants of Augsburg."

The [[Fugger family]] controlled the distribution of the Roman Catholic Church's [[indulgence]]s, which, among other reasons, soon led to an international scandal and then to strong social unrest. After 1517, European public opinion became increasingly preoccupied and divided by the Reformation launched by Martin Luther. The religious upheaval was compounded by the German Peasants' War of 1524–1526, which mobilised considerable forces and, in addition to the material damage, caused more than 100,000 deaths.

Between 1521 and 1526, the Western European powers were preoccupied with the current episode of the Italian wars (which lasted from 1494 to 1559, with minor interruptions). France first sought allies in Eastern Europe against Holy Roman Emperor Charles V. French envoy Antonio Rincon visited Poland and Hungary several times between 1522 and 1525. After the Battle of Bicocca (1522), King Francis I of France tried – unsuccessfully – to ally himself with King [[Sigismund I the Old|Sigismund I of Poland]]. The Hungarian royal court also rejected the French offer. However, John Zápolya, the [[Voivode of Transylvania]], showed a willingness to cooperate with the French, although the formal treaty was not signed until 1528.

King [[Francis I of France]] was defeated at the [[Battle of Pavia]] on 24 February 1525 by the troops of the [[Habsburg]] Holy Roman Emperor, [[Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor|Charles V]]. After several months in prison, Francis I was forced to sign the [[Treaty of Madrid (1526)|Treaty of Madrid]].

In a watershed moment in European diplomacy, Francis formed a formal [[Franco-Ottoman alliance]] with Sultan [[Suleiman the Magnificent]] as an ally against Charles V. The French-Ottoman strategic, and sometimes tactical, alliance lasted for about three centuries.<ref name="Merriman, p.132">Merriman, p. 132</ref>

To relieve the Habsburg pressure on France, in 1525 Francis asked Suleiman to make war on the Holy Roman Empire, and the road from Turkey to the Holy Roman Empire led across Hungary. The request of the French king coincided well with the ambitions of Suleiman in Europe and gave him an incentive to attack Hungary in 1526, leading to the Battle of Mohács.<ref name="Merriman, p.132"/>

At the news of the war, the young King Louis II of Hungary appealed to the European princes for help, but only King [[Henry VIII]] of England offered aid (which arrived only in 1527 to Queen Mary of Hungary in Pozsony) and the Pope offered 50,000 gold pieces, while neither Charles V nor Ferdinand Habsburg (Archduke of Austria, the Hungarian king's brother-in-law) did anything. The fact was that the Habsburgs' armies were still on the battlefields of Italy.{{citation needed|date=February 2025}}