urged Charles to renounce Tuscany. In the autumn of 1275 the Ghibellines offered to make peace with Charles, but he did not accept their terms. Early the next year the Ghibellines defeated his troops at Col de Tende, forcing them to withdraw to Provence. Papal elections Pope Gregory X died on 10January 1276. After the hostility he experienced during Gregory's pontificate, Charles was determined to secure the election of a pope willing to support his plans. Gregory's successor, Pope Innocent V, had always been Charles's partisan and he rapidly confirmed Charles as senator of Rome and imperial vicar of Tuscany. He also mediated a peace treaty between Charles and Genoa, which was signed in Rome on 22June 1276. Charles restored the privileges of the Genoese merchants and renounced his conquests, and the Genoese acknowledged his rule in Ventimiglia. Pope Innocent died on 30June 1276. After the cardinals assembled in the Lateran Palace, Charles's troops surrounded it, enabling only his allies to communicate with other cardinals and with outsiders. On 11July the cardinals elected Charles's old friend, Ottobuono de' Fieschi, pope, but he died on 18August. The cardinals met again, this time at Viterbo. Although Charles was staying in the nearby Vetralla, he could not directly influence the election, because his vehement opponent, Cardinal Giovanni Gaetano Orsini, dominated the papal conclave. Pope John XXI, who was elected on 20September, excommunicated Charles's opponents in Piedmont and prohibited Rudolf from coming to Lombardy, but did not forbid the Lombardian Guelph leaders swearing fealty to Rudolf. The Pope also confirmed the treaty concluded by Charles and Maria of Antioch on 18March which transferred her claims to Jerusalem to Charles for 1,000 bezants and a pension of 4,000 . Charles appointed Roger of San Severino to administer the Kingdom of Jerusalem as his bailiff. San Severino landed at Acre on 7June 1277. Hugh III's bailiff, Balian of Arsuf, surrendered the town without resistance. Although initially only the Knights Hospitaller and the Venetians acknowledged Charles as the lawful ruler, the barons of the realm also paid homage to San Severino in January 1278, after he had threatened to confiscate their estates. The Mamluks of Egypt had already confined the kingdom to a coastal strip covering and Charles had ordered San Severino to avoid conflicts with Egypt. Pope John died on 20May 1277. Charles was ill and could not prevent the election of Giovanni Gaetano Orsini as