<P> However, the council was delayed until 1545 and, as it happened, convened right before Luther's death . Unable, however, to resist the urging of Charles V, the pope, after proposing Mantua as the place of meeting, convened the council at Trento (at that time a free city of the Holy Roman Empire under a prince - bishop), on 13 December 1545; the Pope's decision to transfer it to Bologna in March 1547 on the pretext of avoiding a plague failed to take effect and the Council was indefinitely prorogued on 17 September 1549 . None of the three popes reigning over the duration of the council ever attended, which had been a condition of Charles V. Papal legates were appointed to represent the Papacy . </P> <P> Reopened at Trento on 1 May 1551 by convocation of Pope Julius III (1550--1555), it was broken up by the sudden victory of Maurice, Elector of Saxony over the Emperor Charles V and his march into surrounding state of Tirol on 28 April 1552 . There was no hope of reassembling the council while the very anti-Protestant Paul IV was Pope . The council was reconvened by Pope Pius IV (1559--1565) for the last time, meeting from 18 January 1562 at Santa Maria Maggiore, Trento, and continued until its final adjournment on 4 December 1563 . It closed with a series of ritual acclamations honouring the reigning Pope, the Popes who had convoked the Council, the emperor and the kings who had supported it, the papal legates, the cardinals, the ambassadors present, and the bishops, followed by acclamations of acceptance of the faith of the Council and its decrees, and of anathema for all heretics . </P> <P> The history of the council is thus divided into three distinct periods: 1545--1549, 1551--1552 and 1562--1563 . During the second period, the Protestants present asked for renewed discussion on points already defined and for bishops to be released from their oaths of allegiance to the Pope . When the last period began, all hope of conciliating the Protestants was gone and the Jesuits had become a strong force . </P> <P> The number of attending members in the three periods varied considerably . The council was small to begin with, opening with only about 30 bishops . It increased toward the close, but never reached the number of the First Council of Nicaea (which had 318 members) nor of the First Vatican Council (which numbered 744). The decrees were signed in 1563 by 255 members, the highest attendance of the whole council, including four papal legates, two cardinals, three patriarchs, twenty - five archbishops, and 168 bishops, two - thirds of whom were Italians . The Italian and Spanish prelates were vastly preponderant in power and numbers . At the passage of the most important decrees, not more than sixty prelates were present . </P>

What reforms were enacted by the council of trent why were these changes made