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The title was held by the Torelli family in his whole history, until in 1612 it was annexed by Ranuccio I Farnese, Duke of Parma.
The Duke of Parma also usually held the title of Duke of Guastalla from 1735 (when Charles VI, Holy Roman Emperor took it from Mantua) to 1847 (when the territory was ceded to Modena), again, except for the Napoleonic dukes, when Napoleon's sister Pauline was Duchess of Guastalla and of Varella.
Married to Dorothea Sophia of the Palatinate, his brother Odoardo's widow, to avoid the return of her dowry, Francesco curtailed court expenditure, enormous under his father and predecessor, Ranuccio II, while preventing the occupation of his Duchy of Parma, nominally a Papal fief, during the War of the Spanish Succession.
During the War of the Spanish Succession Alberoni laid the foundation of his political success by the services he rendered to Louis-Joseph, duc de Vendôme, commander of the French forces in Italy, to whom the duke of Parma had sent him.
He received patronage from Ranuccio II Farnese, Duke of Parma, to which Zucchi dedicated his book Nova de machinis philosophia in 1642.
In 1672 he bought the principate of Bardi and Compiano from Gianandrea Doria Landi, giving the Duchy its final shape.