Invasion of Corsica (1553) 1 February 1553, a new Franco-Ottoman treaty of alliance, involving naval collaboration against the Habsburgs, had been signed between France and the Ottoman Empire. The Ottoman admirals Turgut and Koja Sinan, together with a French squadron under Baron Paulin de la Garde, raided the coasts of Naples, Sicily, Elba and then Corsica. The island of Corsica was occupied by the Genoese at the time. The Ottoman fleet supported the French by ferrying the French troops of Parma under Marshal Paul de Thermes from Siennese Maremma to Corsica. The French were also supported by Corsican exiles under Sampiero Corso and Giordano
Roman Catholic Diocese of Mariana in Corsica Corsica", bishop in Corsica, not bishop of Corsica. Leo had been sent by the Pope as an Apostolic Visitor, since, as the Pope notes, the dioceses of Corsica had long been vacant. The fourteenth century was a period of extreme crisis in Corsica. Roger Caratini notes that the population of ordinary people on the island had decreased by 8% between 1300 and 1350, mostly by migration to the territory of Pisa; then came the Black Death; between 1350 and 1400 the population decreased another 19%. The ability to maintain traditional institutions in the face of the new Genoese overlords was