Europe in 1618 was riven between Protestants and Catholics, Bourbon and Hapsburg--as well as empires, kingdoms, and countless principalities. After angry Protestants tossed three representatives of the Holy Roman Empire out the window of the royal castle in Prague, world war spread from Bohemia with relentless abandon, drawing powers from Spain to Sweden into a nightmarish world of famine, disease, and seemingly unstoppable destruction.
An edited and annotated collection of translated documents on the Thirty Years War, providing students with accessible source material on this destructive conflict. Covering all aspects of the war from a variety of contemporary perspectives, it brings together an exciting range of material from treaties to literature to eyewitness accounts.
Most of the material appears in English for the first time, including a variety of previously unpublished archival sources, all reproduced in their full original length.
This abridgment of Tryntje Helfferich's acclaimed 2009 anthology The Thirty Years War features an expanded General Introduction and annotation designed to support student readings in swift-moving surveys of European and World history.
What you are about to read is an attempt at a new and different account of the Thirty Years War, seen as an example of two civilizations and ideological conflict. The clash of one conception, deriving from the legacy of Humanism, tinged with Protestantism and taking as its model the United Netherlands, with another, Catholic-Humanist one which followed the example of Spain, becomes thus the point of departure for the development of political fronts and coalitions of power. It belongs to the central theme of this book to examine how during the War new and modern prototypes were evolved by France and England, models for experiment both in parliamentary government and absolutism, economic advance and manufactory production, colonial expansion and unbridled repression of minorities at home, scientific progress, religious toleration and witch-hunting. The traditional themes like the 'war for European hegemony', the fate of 'Europe divided', the relationship between Baroque and Classicism, will not be the center of attention here, but this author considers that the present interpretation of the Thirty Years War can throw light on those problems too. - page 9.
Reveals the origins, significance, and consequences of the Thirty Years War (1618-1648), the first great, and catastrophic, pan-European conflict. This book also provides a brief history of the War and a discussion of its causes. It includes maps and a chronology, an index, a select bibliography, and several examples of 17th-century artwork.
One of the most momentous and destructive wars in European history, the Thirty Years War has long been studied for its diplomatic, political, and military consequences. Yet the actual participants in this religiously motivated, seemingly endless conflict have largely been ignored. Hans Medick and Benjamin Marschke reveal the Thirty Years War from the perspective of those who lived it. Their introduction provides important insights into the roiling religious and political landscape from which the war emerged, as well as a thoughtful examination of the war's stages and enduring significance. An unprecedented collection of personal accounts, many of them translated for the first time into English, combine with visual sources to convey directly to students the experience of early modern warfare. Incisive document headnotes, maps and illustrations, a chronology, questions to consider, and a bibliography enrich students' understanding of this fateful war.
This is a reproduction of the original artefact. Generally these books are created from careful scans of the original. This allows us to preserve the book accurately and present it in the way the author intended. Since the original versions are generally quite old, there may occasionally be certain imperfections within these reproductions. We're happy to make these classics available again for future generations to enjoy!
