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 greatly compromised. In 1453 Pope Nicholas V entered into a verbal agreement with the Republic of Genoa, which specified that, although the Pope maintained the exclusive right to appoint bishops on the Island of Corsica, he would appoint only Genoese subjects who were acceptable to the Government. The Genoese government turned the island over to the administration of the Genoese Banco di S. Giorgio, under new statutes for Corsica were issued, the "Capitula Corsorum", which specified that bishops on the island had to be natives of the island. In 1464, however, the Republic of Genoa came under the domination of