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69-542: The word halberd is cognate with the German word Hellebarde , deriving from Middle High German halm (handle) and barte (battleaxe) joined to form helmbarte . Troops that used the weapon were called halberdiers . The word has also been used to describe a weapon of the early Bronze Age in Western Europe. This consisted of a blade mounted on a pole at a right angle. The halberd is first mentioned (as hallenbarte ) in

138-532: A common parent language . Because language change can have radical effects on both the sound and the meaning of a word, cognates may not be obvious, and it often takes rigorous study of historical sources and the application of the comparative method to establish whether lexemes are cognate. Cognates are distinguished from loanwords , where a word has been borrowed from another language. The English term cognate derives from Latin cognatus , meaning "blood relative". An example of cognates from

207-652: A Génova depicting the Relief of Genoa has all the soldiers armed with halberds. The most consistent users of the halberd in the Thirty Years' War were German sergeants who would carry one as a sign of rank. While they could use them in melee combat, more often they were used for dressing the ranks by grasping the shaft in both hands and pushing it against several men simultaneously. They could also be used to push pikes or muskets up or down, especially to stop overexcited musketeers from firing prematurely. The halberd has been used as

276-700: A Mass. In a public ceremony on 6 May 2006, 33 new guards were sworn in on the steps of St. Peter's Basilica instead of the traditional venue in the San Damaso Courtyard. The date chosen marked the anniversary of the Sack of Rome when the Swiss Guard had been nearly destroyed. Present at this event were representatives of the Company of Pikemen and Musketeers of the Honourable Artillery Company of London and

345-544: A collection of historical plate armor ( cuirasses or half-armor ). The oldest specimens date to c. 1580, while the majority originates in the 18th century. Historical armor was worn on the occasion of canonizations until 1970, since when their use has been limited to the oath ceremony on 6 May. A full set of replicas of the historical cuirasses was commissioned in 2012, from Waffen und Harnischschmiede Schmidberger in Molln , Upper Austria in 2012. The cuirasses are handmade, and

414-617: A common origin, but which in fact do not. For example, Latin habēre and German haben both mean 'to have' and are phonetically similar. However, the words evolved from different Proto-Indo-European (PIE) roots: haben , like English have , comes from PIE *kh₂pyé- 'to grasp', and has the Latin cognate capere 'to seize, grasp, capture'. Habēre , on the other hand, is from PIE *gʰabʰ 'to give, to receive', and hence cognate with English give and German geben . Likewise, English much and Spanish mucho look similar and have

483-814: A court bodyguard weapon for centuries, and is still the ceremonial weapon of the Swiss Guard in the Vatican and the Alabarderos (Halberdiers) Company of the Spanish Royal Guard . The halberd was one of the polearms sometimes carried by lower-ranking officers in European infantry units in the 16th through 18th centuries. In the British army, sergeants continued to carry halberds until 1793, when they were replaced by spontoons . The 18th-century halberd had, however, become simply

552-935: A gesture that symbolizes the Holy Trinity and the Rütlischwur , and swears the oath in his native tongue. This may be any of the four official languages of Switzerland , of which German is the most common (over 60% of the population), while speakers of the various dialects of the Romansh language are rare (under 1% of the population). In 2021, 34 news guards were sworn in, 23 in German language oath, 2 in Italian, 8 in French and 1 in Romansh. (English translation) I, Halberdier (name), swear to diligently and faithfully abide by all that has just been read out to me, so help me God and his Saints. (German version) Ich, Hellebardier ..., schwöre, alles das,

621-475: A halberd or a bill sliced through the back of King Richard III 's skull at the Battle of Bosworth Field on 22 August 1485, leaving his brain visible before killing him during the battle, and were later able to confirm that it was a halberd. While rarer than it had been from the late 15th to mid-16th centuries, the halberd was still used infrequently as an infantry weapon well into the mid-17th century. The armies of

690-561: A high or ruff collar , and either a black beret or comb morion , usually black but silver-coloured for high occasions. Sergeants wear a black top with crimson leggings, while other officers wear an all-crimson uniform. The colors blue and yellow were in use from the 16th century, said to be chosen to represent the Della Rovere coat of arms of Julius II, with red added to represent the Medici coat of arms of Leo X. The ordinary guardsmen and

759-440: A longer sword, which is used when commanding a group or a squadron of guards. In gala dress all ranks wear a bigger purple plume on their helmets, except for the commander, who has a white one. Usually the commander and the chief of staff (usually the vice-commander) use armor when present at gala ceremonies. On such occasions "armor complete" – including sleeve armor, is worn. Except for ceremonial occasions and exercises, officers of

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828-467: A minimum of 26 months. Regular guardsmen (halberdiers) were paid a tax-free salary of €1,300 per month plus overtime in 2006; accommodation and board are provided. Members of the guard are eligible for pontifical decorations; the Benemerenti medal is usually awarded after three years of faithful service. If accepted, new guards are sworn in every year on 6 May, the anniversary of the Sack of Rome , in

897-418: A red plume on his helmet, except for the sergeant major, who displays distinctive white feathers. When the gala uniform is worn, sergeants have a different pattern of armor with a gold cord across the chest. The commissioned officers , captains, major, vice-commander and commander, are distinguished by a completely red uniform with a different style of breeches, and golden embroidery on the sleeves. They have

966-412: A similar meaning, but are not cognates: much is from Proto-Germanic *mikilaz < PIE *meǵ- and mucho is from Latin multum < PIE *mel- . A true cognate of much is the archaic Spanish maño 'big'. Cognates are distinguished from other kinds of relationships. An etymon , or ancestor word, is the ultimate source word from which one or more cognates derive. In other words, it

1035-465: A symbol of rank with no sharpened edge and insufficient strength to use as a weapon. It served as an instrument for ensuring that infantrymen in ranks stood correctly aligned with each other and that their muskets were aimed at the correct level. The word helmbarte or variations thereof show up in German texts from the 13th century onwards. At that point, the halberd is not too distinct from other types of broad axes or bardiches used all over Europe. In

1104-450: A total of ten of the commanders (the exception being Johann Kaspar Mayr von Baldegg, also of Lucerne, served 1696–1704). In 1798, commander Franz Alois Pfyffer von Altishofen went into exile with the deposed Pius VI . After the death of the Pope on 29 August 1799, the Swiss Guard was disbanded and then reinstated by Pius VII in 1800. In 1809, Rome was again captured by the French and the guard

1173-465: A work by 13th-century German poet Konrad von Würzburg . John of Winterthur described it as a new weapon used by the Swiss at the Battle of Morgarten of 1315. The halberd was inexpensive to produce and very versatile in battle. As the halberd was eventually refined, its point was more fully developed to allow it to better deal with spears and pikes (and make it able to push back approaching horsemen), as

1242-489: Is considered an elite military unit and highly selective in its recruitment: candidates must be unmarried Swiss Catholic males between 19 and 30 years of age, and at least 5 feet 8.5 inches (1.74 meters), who have completed basic training with the Swiss Armed Forces and hold a professional diploma or high school degree. As of 2024 there were 135 members of the guards. The Swiss Guard's security mission extends to

1311-493: Is escorted by two flamberge great swords carried by corporals or vice-corporals. A dress sword is carried by all ranks, swords with a simple S-shaped crossguard by the lower ranks, and elaborate basket-hilt rapiers in the early baroque style by officers. Arms and armor used by the Swiss Guard are kept in the Armeria (armory). The Armeria also contains a collection of historical weapons no longer in use. The armory holds

1380-406: Is more functional, consisting of a simpler solid blue version of the more colorful tricolor grand gala uniform, worn with a simple brown belt, a flat white collar and a black beret. For new recruits and rifle practice, a simple light blue overall with a brown belt may be worn. During cold or inclement weather, a dark blue cape is worn over the regular uniform. In 2019, after more than 500 years,

1449-534: Is of blue, red, orange and yellow with a distinctly Renaissance appearance. It was introduced by commandant Jules Repond (1910–1921) in 1914, inspired by 16th-century depictions of the Swiss Guard. A clear expression of the modern Pontifical Swiss Guard uniform can be seen in a 1577 fresco by Jacopo Coppi of the Empress Eudoxia conversing with Pope Sixtus III . It shows the precursor of today's recognisable three-colored uniform with boot covers, white gloves,

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1518-584: Is popularly recognised by its Renaissance -era dress uniform , consisting of a tunic striped in red, dark blue, and yellow, high plumed helmet, and traditional weapons such as the halberd . However, guardsmen perform their protective duties in functional attire and with modern firearms; since the assassination attempt on Pope John Paul II in 1981, the Guard has placed greater emphasis on its nonceremonial roles and has seen enhanced training in unarmed combat , small arms , and counterterrorism tactics. The Swiss Guard

1587-492: Is regular. Paradigms of conjugations or declensions, the correspondence of which cannot be generally due to chance, have often been used in cognacy assessment. However, beyond paradigms, morphosyntax is often excluded in the assessment of cognacy between words, mainly because structures are usually seen as more subject to borrowing. Still, very complex, non-trivial morphosyntactic structures can rarely take precedence over phonetic shapes to indicate cognates. For instance, Tangut ,

1656-477: Is the source of related words in different languages. For example, the etymon of both Welsh ceffyl and Irish capall is the Proto-Celtic * kaballos (all meaning horse ). Descendants are words inherited across a language barrier, coming from a particular etymon in an ancestor language. For example, Russian мо́ре and Polish morze are both descendants of Proto-Slavic * moře (meaning sea ). A root

1725-444: Is the source of related words within a single language (no language barrier is crossed). Similar to the distinction between etymon and root , a nuanced distinction can sometimes be made between a descendant and a derivative . A derivative is one of the words which have their source in a root word, and were at some time created from the root word using morphological constructs such as suffixes, prefixes, and slight changes to

1794-482: Is worn for ceremonial duties, the former for guard duty or drill ; the latter for high ceremonial occasions such as the annual swearing-in ceremony or reception of foreign heads of state. Historically, brightly colored pheasant or heron feathers were used. Senior non-commissioned and warrant officers have a different type of uniform. All sergeants have essentially the same pattern of dress as ordinary guardsmen, but with black tunics and red breeches . Each sergeant has

1863-697: The Ancient and Honorable Artillery Company of Massachusetts . In December 2014, Pope Francis directed that Daniel Anrig 's term as commander should end on 31 January 2015, and that he be succeeded by his deputy Christoph Graf . This followed reports about Anrig's "authoritarian style". With the rise of Islamic terrorism in Europe and open threats against the Vatican issued by the Islamic State (ISIS) , Vatican officials in 2015 collaborated with Italian authorities to improve

1932-620: The Catholic League in 1625, for example, had halberdiers comprising 7% of infantry units, with musketeers comprising 58% and armored pikemen 35%. By 1627 this had changed to 65% muskets, 20% pikes, and 15% halberds. A near-contemporary depiction of the 1665 Battle of Montes Claros at Palace of the Marquises of Fronteira depicts a minority of the Portuguese and Spanish soldiers as armed with halberds. Antonio de Pereda 's 1635 painting El Socorro

2001-679: The Papal Swiss Guard or simply Swiss Guard, is an armed force and honour guard unit maintained by the Holy See that protects the Pope and the Apostolic Palace within the territory of the Vatican City State . Established in 1506 under Pope Julius II , it is among the oldest military units in continuous operation , and is sometimes called "the world's smallest army". The Swiss Guard

2070-789: The Paraguayan Guarani panambi , the Eastern Bolivian Guarani panapana , the Cocama and Omagua panama , and the Sirionó ana ana are cognates, derived from the Old Tupi panapana , 'butterfly', maintaining their original meaning in these Tupi languages . Cognates need not have the same meaning, as they may have undergone semantic change as the languages developed independently. For example English starve and Dutch sterven 'to die' or German sterben 'to die' all descend from

2139-703: The Sacred College of Cardinals whenever the Apostolic See is vacant . Furthermore, I promise the Captain Commandant and my other superiors respect, fidelity and obedience. I swear to observe all that the honour of my position demands of me. When his name is called, each new guard approaches the Pontifical Swiss Guard's flag , grasping the banner in his left hand. He raises his right hand with his thumb, index, and middle finger extended along three axes,

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2208-494: The Swiss Armed Forces , and of irreproachable reputation and health. Recruits must be between 19 and 30 years of age, at least 174 cm (5 ft 8.5 in) tall, and prepared to sign up for at least 26 months. In 2009, Pontifical Swiss Guard commandant Daniel Anrig suggested that the Guard might be open to recruiting women far in the future. Guards are permitted to marry after five years of service. Qualified candidates must apply to serve. Those who are accepted serve for

2277-400: The assassination attempt on John Paul II of 13 May 1981, a much stronger emphasis has been placed on the guard's non-ceremonial roles. The Swiss Guard has developed into a modern guard corps equipped with modern small arms, and members of the Swiss Guard in plain clothes now accompany the Pope on his travels abroad for his protection. On 4 May 1998 commander Alois Estermann was murdered on

2346-617: The 15th century. Pope Sixtus IV (1471–1484) had already allied with the Swiss Confederacy and built barracks in Via Pellegrino after foreseeing the possibility of recruiting Swiss mercenaries . The pact was renewed by Pope Innocent VIII (1484–1492) in order to use Swiss troops against the Duke of Milan. Alexander VI (1492–1503) later actually used the Swiss mercenaries during his alliance with

2415-670: The King of France. During the time of the Borgias , however, the Italian Wars began in which the Swiss mercenaries were a fixture in the front lines among the warring factions, sometimes for France and sometimes for the Holy See or the Holy Roman Empire . The mercenaries enlisted when they heard King Charles VIII of France was going to war with Naples. Among the participants in the war against Naples

2484-525: The Pontifical Swiss Guard of Pius V served as part of the Swiss Guard of admiral Marcantonio Colonna at the Battle of Lepanto in 1571. The office of commander of the Papal Guard came to be a special honour in the Catholic region of the Swiss Confederacy . It became strongly associated with the leading family of Lucerne , Pfyffer von Altishofen , a family which between 1652 and 1847 provided nine out of

2553-495: The Pope's apostolic travels, the pontifical palace of Castel Gandolfo , and the College of Cardinals when the papal throne is vacant. Though the Guard traditionally served as watchmen of Vatican City, the overall security and law enforcement of the city-state is conducted by the Corps of Gendarmerie of Vatican City , which is a separate body. The Pontifical Swiss Guard has its origins in

2622-445: The Pope, defending Vatican City, and providing police and security services within its territory, while the Swiss Guard continued to serve ceremonial functions only. Paul VI in a decree of 28 June 1976 defined the nominal size of the corps at 90 men. This was increased to 100 men by John Paul II on 5 April 1979. As of 2010 the guard numbered 107 halberdiers divided into three squads, with commissioned and non-commissioned officers. Since

2691-706: The Proto-Indo-European *nókʷts 'night'. The Indo-European languages have hundreds of such cognate sets, though few of them are as neat as this. The Arabic سلام salām , the Hebrew שלום ‎ shalom , the Assyrian Neo-Aramaic shlama and the Amharic selam 'peace' are cognates, derived from the Proto-Semitic *šalām- 'peace'. The Brazilian Portuguese panapanã , (flock of butterflies in flight),

2760-577: The San Damaso Courtyard ( Italian : Cortile di San Damaso ) in the Vatican. The chaplain of the guard reads aloud the full oath of allegiance in the command languages of the Guard (German, Italian, and French): (English translation) I swear that I will faithfully, loyally and honourably serve the Supreme Pontiff ( name of Pope ) and his legitimate successors, and dedicate myself to them with all my strength, sacrificing, if necessary, my life to defend them. I assume this same commitment with regard to

2829-446: The Swiss Guard replaced its traditional metal helmet with a new version made of PVC , with hidden air vents, which requires just one day to make, compared to several days for the metal model. The eponymous main weapon of the halbardiers is the halberd ; corporals and vice-corporals are equipped with a partisan polearm. Ranks above corporal do not have polearms, but on certain ceremonial occasions carry command batons . The banner

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2898-646: The Vatican lay with the Papal Gendarmerie Corps , while the Swiss Guard, the Palatine Guard and the Noble Guard served mostly ceremonial functions. The Palatine and Noble Guards were disbanded by Paul VI in 1970, leaving the Swiss Guard as the only ceremonial guard unit of the Vatican. At the same time, the Gendarmerie Corps was transformed into a central security office, with the duties of protecting

2967-494: The corps, culminating in a week of open mutiny in July 1913, and the subsequent dismissal of thirteen ringleaders from the guard. In his project to restore the Swiss Guard to its former prestige, Repond also dedicated himself to the study of historical costume, with the aim of designing a new uniform that would be both reflective of the historical Swiss costume of the 16th century and suited for military exercise. The result of his studies

3036-467: The day of his promotion. Estermann and his wife, Gladys Meza Romero, were killed by the young guardsman Cédric Tornay, who later committed suicide. The case received considerable public attention and became the subject of a number of conspiracy theories alleging Cold War politics or involvement by the Opus Dei prelature. British journalist John Follain, who published a book on the case in 2006, concluded that

3105-452: The early 15th century the construction changes to incorporate sockets into the blade, instead of hoops as the previous designs had. With this development back spikes are directly integrated into the blade construction and become a universal part of the halberd design. Cognate In historical linguistics , cognates or lexical cognates are sets of words that have been inherited in direct descent from an etymological ancestor in

3174-484: The guard wear civilian dress when on duty. The tailors of the Swiss Guard work inside the Vatican barracks. There the uniform for each guardsman is tailor-made individually. The total set of Renaissance style clothing weighs 8 pounds (3.6 kg), and may be the heaviest and most complicated uniform in use by any standing army today. A single uniform requires 154 pieces and takes nearly 32 hours and 3 fittings to complete. The modern regular duty service dress uniform

3243-579: The halberd, hand-and-a-half sword , or the dagger known as the Schweizerdolch used for closer combat. The German Landsknechte , who imitated Swiss warfare methods, also used the pike, supplemented by the halberd—but their side arm of choice was a short sword called the Katzbalger . As long as pikemen fought other pikemen, the halberd remained a useful supplemental weapon for push of pike , but when their position became more defensive, to protect

3312-510: The killer acted purely out of personal motives. On the occasion of the 500th anniversary of the Swiss Guard, in April–May 2006, 80 former guardsmen marched from Bellinzona in southern Switzerland to Rome, recalling the march of the original 200 Swiss guards to take up Papal service, in 1505. The march had been preceded by other celebrations in Lucerne , including a rally of veterans of the Guard and

3381-521: The language of the Xixia Empire, and one Horpa language spoken today in Sichuan , Geshiza, both display a verbal alternation indicating tense, obeying the same morphosyntactic collocational restrictions. Even without regular phonetic correspondences between the stems of the two languages, the cognatic structures indicate secondary cognacy for the stems. False cognates are pairs of words that appear to have

3450-414: The late 13th century the weapon starts to develop into a distinct weapon, with the top of the blade developing into a more acute thrusting point. This form of the halberd is erroneously sometimes called a voulge or a swiss voulge , but there is no evidence for the usage of these terms for this weapon historically. There were variations of these weapons with spikes on the back, though also plenty without. In

3519-532: The later 19th century into a purely ceremonial body with low standards. Guards on duty at the Vatican were "Swiss" only in name, mostly born in Rome to parents of Swiss descent and speaking the Roman dialect . The guards were trained solely for ceremonial parade, kept only a few obsolete rifles in store and wore civilian dress when drilling or in barracks. Administration, accommodation, discipline and organization were neglected and

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3588-619: The other 42 guards. The last stand battlefield is located on the left side of St Peter's Basilica , close to the Campo Santo Teutonico (German Graveyard). Clement VII was forced to replace the depleted Swiss Guard by a contingent of 200 German mercenaries ( Custodia Peditum Germanorum ). Ten years later, Pope Paul III ordered the Swiss Guard to be reinstated and sent Cardinal Ennio Filonardi to oversee recruitment. Anti-papal sentiment in Switzerland, however, hindered recruitment and it

3657-528: The production of a single piece takes about 120 hours. The replicas are not financed by the Vatican itself but by private donations via the Foundation for the Swiss Guard in the Vatican, a Fribourg -based organisation established in 2000. In the 19th century (prior to 1870), the Swiss Guard along with the Papal Army used firearms with special calibres such as the 12.7 mm Remington Papal. The Swiss Guard has

3726-471: The protection of Vatican City against attacks that cannot be reasonably defended against by the Swiss Guard and Vatican Gendarmerie, notably against drone attacks . In October 2019 the Swiss Guard was expanded to 135 men. Previously, according to article 7 of the regulations , the Swiss Guard was made up of 110 men. Recruits to the guards must be Catholic , single males with Swiss citizenship who have completed high school at least, basic training with

3795-528: The sad situation of the Church of God, Mother of Christianity, and realize how grave and dangerous it is that any tyrant, avid for wealth, can assault with impunity, the common Mother of Christianity," declared the Swiss Huldrych Zwingli , who later became a Protestant reformer . Pope Julius II later granted the Guard the title "Defenders of the Church's freedom". The force has varied greatly in size over

3864-983: The same Indo-European root are: night ( English ), Nacht ( German ), nacht ( Dutch , Frisian ), nag ( Afrikaans ), Naach ( Colognian ), natt ( Swedish , Norwegian ), nat ( Danish ), nátt ( Faroese ), nótt ( Icelandic ), noc ( Czech , Slovak , Polish ), ночь, noch ( Russian ), ноќ, noć ( Macedonian ), нощ, nosht ( Bulgarian ), ніч , nich ( Ukrainian ), ноч , noch / noč ( Belarusian ), noč ( Slovene ), noć ( Serbo-Croatian ), nakts ( Latvian ), naktis ( Lithuanian ), nos ( Welsh/Cymraeg ), νύξ, nyx ( Ancient Greek ), νύχτα / nychta ( Modern Greek ), nakt- ( Sanskrit ), natë ( Albanian ), nox , gen. sg. noctis ( Latin ), nuit ( French ), noche ( Spanish ), nochi ( Extremaduran ), nueche ( Asturian ), noite ( Portuguese and Galician ), notte ( Italian ), nit ( Catalan ), nuet/nit/nueit ( Aragonese ), nuèch / nuèit ( Occitan ) and noapte ( Romanian ). These all mean 'night' and derive from

3933-452: The same Proto-Germanic verb, *sterbaną 'to die'. Cognates also do not need to look or sound similar: English father , French père , and Armenian հայր ( hayr ) all descend directly from Proto-Indo-European *ph₂tḗr . An extreme case is Armenian երկու ( erku ) and English two , which descend from Proto-Indo-European *dwóh₁ ; the sound change *dw > erk in Armenian

4002-435: The slow-loading arquebusiers and matchlock musketeers from sudden attacks by cavalry , the percentage of halberdiers in the pike units steadily decreased. By 1588, official Dutch infantry composition was down to 39% arquebuses, 34% pikes, 13% muskets, 9% halberds, and 2% one-handed swords. By 1600, troops armed exclusively with swords were no longer used and the halberd was only used by sergeants. Researchers suspected that

4071-499: The unit numbered only about 90 men out of an authorized establishment of 133. The modern Swiss Guard is the product of the reforms pursued by Jules Repond , commander during the years 1910–1921. Repond proposed recruiting only native citizens of Switzerland and he introduced rigorous military exercises. He also attempted to introduce modern arms, but Pius X only permitted the presence of firearms if they were not functional. Repond's reforms and strict discipline were not well received by

4140-421: The vice-corporals wear the "tricolor" (yellow, blue and red) uniform without any rank distinctions except for a different model of halberd in gala dress. The corporals have red braid insignia on their cuffs and use a different, more spear-like, halberd. Headwear is typically a large black beret for daily duties, while a black or silver morion helmet with red, white, yellow, black, and purple ostrich feathers

4209-427: The vowels or to the consonants of the root word. For example unhappy , happily , and unhappily are all derivatives of the root word happy . The terms root and derivative are used in the analysis of morphological derivation within a language in studies that are not concerned with historical linguistics and that do not cross the language barrier. Swiss Guard The Pontifical Swiss Guard , also known as

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4278-451: The years and on occasion has been disbanded and reconstituted. Its most significant hostile engagement was on 6 May 1527, when 147 of the 189 Guards, including their commander Caspar Röist , died fighting the troops of Holy Roman Emperor Charles V in the stand made by the Swiss Guard during the Sack of Rome in order to allow Clement VII to escape through the Passetto di Borgo , escorted by

4347-471: Was Cardinal Giuliano della Rovere , the future Pope Julius II (1503–1513), who was well acquainted with the Swiss, having been Bishop of Lausanne years earlier. The expedition failed, in part thanks to new alliances made by Alexander VI against the French. When Cardinal della Rovere became Pope Julius II in 1503, he asked the Swiss Diet to provide him with a constant corps of 200 Swiss mercenaries. This

4416-470: Was again disbanded. Pius VII was exiled to Fontainebleau. The guard was reinstated in 1814, when the Pope returned from exile, under the previous commander Karl Leodegar Pfyffer von Altishofen. The guard was disbanded yet again in 1848 , when Pius IX fled to Gaeta , but was reinstated when the Pope returned to Rome the following year. After the Piedmontese invasion of Rome, the Swiss Guard declined in

4485-418: Was made possible through financing by German merchants from Augsburg , Ulrich and Jacob Fugger , who had invested in the Pope and saw fit to protect their investment. In September 1505, the first contingent of 150 soldiers set off on march to Rome, under the command of Kaspar von Silenen , and entered the city on 22 January 1506, now regarded as the official date of the Guard's foundation. "The Swiss see

4554-543: Was mir soeben vorgelesen wurde, gewissenhaft und treu zu halten, so wahr mir Gott und seine Heiligen helfen. (French version) Moi, Hallebardier ..., jure d'observer, loyalement et de bonne foi, tout ce qui vient de m'être lu aussi vrai, que Dieu et Ses saints m'assistent. (Italian version) Io, Alabardiere ...., giuro d'osservare fedelmente, lealmente e onorevolmente tutto ciò che in questo momento mi è stato letto, che Iddio e i Suoi Santi mi assistano. (plus various Romansh language versions) The official full dress uniform

4623-499: Was not until 1548 that the papacy reached an agreement with mayor of Lucerne, Nikolaus von Meggen, to swear-in 150 new Swiss Guardsmen under commander Jost von Meggen, the mayor's nephew. After the end of the Italian Wars , the Swiss Guard ceased to be used as a military combat unit in the service of the Pope and its role became mostly that of the protection of the person of the Pope and of an honour guard . However, twelve members of

4692-571: Was published as Le costume de la Garde suisse pontificale et la Renaissance italienne (1917). Repond designed the distinctive Renaissance-style uniforms still worn by the modern Swiss Guard. The introduction of the new uniforms was completed in May 1914. The foundation of Vatican City as a modern sovereign state was effected by the Lateran Treaty of 1929, negotiated between the Holy See and Italy. The duties of protecting public order and security in

4761-457: Was the hook opposite the axe head, which could be used to pull horsemen to the ground. A Swiss peasant used a halberd to kill Charles the Bold , the Duke of Burgundy , at the Battle of Nancy , decisively ending the Burgundian Wars . The halberd was the primary weapon of the early Swiss armies in the 14th and early 15th centuries. Later, the Swiss added the pike to better repel knightly attacks and roll over enemy infantry formations, with

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