Charles v religion

On his 30th birthday Charles was crowned Holy Roman Emperor by Pope Clement VII in Bologna. Less than three years earlier his troops had brutally sacked Rome and Clement had been forced to pay a ransom for his freedom. This is one of the many apparent contradictions in the life of Emperor Charles V (see the pages in 'Charles V'), who ruled much of Europe - the Low Countries, Spain, the Holy Roman Empire, and much of Italy - for almost 40 years in the 16th century.

Born in 1500 he was a key figure in the time of the Renaissance and the Reformation (see the pages in 'Charles' World'), in the dynastic struggles between the Habsburgs and the Valois, in efforts to hold back Ottoman expansion from the east, and in the conquest of the Americas. This was a period of increasingly rapid political, social, economic, religious and scientific change – to the great excitement of some and to the horror of others. Charles met with those whose names resound through history - Luther, Erasmus, Henry VIII, Titian, Medici popes and the conquistadores Cortes and Pizarro.

Yet Charles rarely receiv

•