The treaty that ended the War of the Spanish Succession. After negotiations between the English and French, a Congress met at Utrecht without Austria and signed the treaties. The Austrian emperor Charles VI found he could not carry on without allies and accepted the terms at Rastadt and Baden in 1714. Philip V remained King of Spain but renounced his claim to the French throne and lost Spain’s European empire. The southern Netherlands, Milan, Naples, and Sardinia went to Austria. Britain kept Gibraltar and Minorca and obtained the right to supply the Spanish American colonies with Negro slaves (see asiento de negros). From France it gained Newfoundland, Hudson Bay, St Kitts, and recognition of the Hanoverian succession. France returned recent conquests, but kept everything acquired up to the Peace of Nijmegen in 1679 and also the city of Strasbourg. The Duke of Savoy gained Sicily and improved frontiers in northern Italy. The Dutch secured Austrian recognition for their right to garrison “barrier” fortresses in the southern Netherlands. French domination had been checked. Britain made significant naval, commercial, and colonial gains and thereafter assumed a much greater role in world affairs.