Published as part of project Edition and Translation of the Orations of Enea Silvio Piccolomini / Pope Pius II After the Fall of Constantinople, in May 1453, the major preoccupation of Venice was to protect its merchant empire by establishing friendly relations and even a formal peace with the Turkish Sultan, Mehmed II. The Venetians were therefore not very keen to participate in a military expedition against the Turks in the form a crusade under the pope’s aegis. However, when all the other Italian powers had sent their representatives to the Congress of Mantua, which was to discuss such a crusade, the Venetians sent their ambassadors too. In their address to the pope, the ambassadors acknowledged the necessity of a military response to Turkish expansion into Europe and pledged Venetian support to a crusade – on the important condition that all the other European powers would participate. In his reply, the pope rebuked Venice for the late arrival of the ambassadors, but thanked them for their promise of support.