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===Nature of war===
[[File:The Battle of Pavia, 1525 (by Rupert Heller) - Nationalmuseum, Stockholm.jpg|thumb|350px| right|[[Battle of Pavia]] in 1525. Fighting in this era became more dreadful as cannons were improved upon being able to destroy large fortified walls and could repel effectively against incoming enemy charges. The deadly concentration and slaughter of soldiers in this [[Visconti Park|park]] rendered it uninhabitable as is the bad omen of wars.]]
This period saw the size and scale of warfare greatly increase. The number of combatants involved escalated steadily from the mid 16th century and dramatically expanded after the 1660s. For example, [[Henry II of France]] could field around 20,000 men in total for [[Italian War of 1551–1559|his 1550 decade of war against Habsburg Spain]], but [[Louis XIV|Louis XIV, Sun King]] could mobilize up to 500,000 men into the field by 1700 in the [[War of the Spanish Succession]]. Moreover, wars became increasingly deadly and pyrrhic in this period. Cities that took months to conquer would fall in just mere days. European monarchs with bitter rivalries would put so much resources into intense warfare and would lead to mass death and destruction of innocent cultures like in the [[Sack of Rome (1527)|Habsburg Sack of Rome]]. The [[Italian Wars]] alone would [[Suleiman the Magnificent|threaten Europe's very existence]]. This may in part be attributed to improvements in weapons technology and in the techniques of using it (for example infantry [[volley fire]]).
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