Alfonso I d'Este, Duke of Ferrara

Alfonso I d'Este became Duke of Ferrara, Modena, and Reggio in 1505, inheriting a court and a conflict. The Italian Wars pulled him onto various sides over three decades, and he met them with a general's eye and a technician's hand. He built the finest weapons factory in Italy and pioneered innovations in artillery deployment that other commanders studied and copied. By the time he died in 1534, he'd spent twenty-nine years holding territory through cannon-fire and calculation, a duke who understood that wars were increasingly won by the man who could cast iron better.