Introduction: the importance of a definition

In the late Middle Ages most of the territory making up modern Piedmont was controlled by three princely dynasties: the counts of Savoy (dukes from 1416), the marquises of Monferrato and the marquises of Saluzzo. The Savoy dynasty, which also ruled over vast possessions on the other side of the Alps, was undoubtedly the strongest: between the thirteenth and fifteenth centuries, its domains underwent a period of steady expansion, while, in contrast, the marquisate of Saluzzo shrank considerably and that of Monferrato struggled to defend its possessions. However, the Savoy state was itself squeezed between two far more powerful rivals: the kingdom of France and the Visconti–Sforza state. These curbed its expansion and created the political circumstances in which both marquisates were able to survive.

There is a technical justification for defining these states as feudal principalities. Count Umberto, the founder of the house of Savoy, and marquis Aleramo, the antecedent of both the Monferrato and Saluzzo lineages, were public officials working in the kingdom of Burgundy and the Italic kingdom, respectively, during the tenth and eleventh centuries. Their successors continued to recognise feudal loyalty to the emperor: this was still true in 1530, when the duke of Savoy, Carlo II, took precedence as the most senior imperial prince at Charles V's coronation in Bologna. All three dynasties came from what were essentially rural roots; as counts and marquises, they were accustomed to governing the territory through feudal investitures to families of vassals. They used feudal investiture with greater juridical awareness, were stricter in controlling its forms, and showed less of a tendency to experiment than other Italian potentates.