The marriage on 14 February 1451 between Louis and the eight year-old Charlotte of Savoy was the true beginning of French involvement in the affairs of Italy. The Italian peninsula was a compact and politically competitive space dominated by five powers: Venice, Milan, Florence, the Papacy, and the Kingdom of Naples. Beside these five great regional powers, there were about a dozen smaller states in Italy that were constantly changing policies and shifting alliances between and towards the various regional powers. The city/state of Genoa and the rising state of Savoy, which centered on the city of Turin, were examples of these lesser powers in northern Italy. Even the Italic League – the combination of the five major powers of Italy that had been born out of the Treaty of Lodi of 1454 – was constantly undergoing internal realignments.