Central+European+Monarchs+Clash

Central European Monarchs Clash

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 * 1) Thirty Years’ War- A conflict over religion and territory and for power among European ruling families. The war can be divided into two main phases: the phase of Hapsburg triumphs and the phase of Hapsburg defeats. The Thirty Years’ War lasted from 1618 to 1648. During the first 12 years, Hapsburg armies from Austria and Spain crushed the troops hired by the Protestant princes. They succeeded in putting down the Czech uprising. They also defeated the German Protestants who had supported the Czechs. Ferdinand II paid his army of 125,000 men by allowing them to plunder, or rob, German villages. This huge army destroyed everything in its path.
 * 2) Maria Theresa- Charles’s eldest daughter as the heir to all his Hapsburg territories. In theory, this agreement guaranteed Maria Theresa a peaceful reign. Instead, she faced years of war. Her main enemy was Prussia, a state to the north of Austria.
 * 3) Frederick the Great- Also known as Frederick II, followed his father’s military policies when he came to power. However, he also softened some of his father’s laws. With regard to domestic affairs, he encouraged religious toleration and legal reform.
 * 4) Seven Years’ War - In 1756, Frederick attacked Saxony, an Austrian ally. Soon every great European power was involved in the war. Fought in Europe, India, and North America, the war lasted until 1763.
 * 5) HAPSBURGS- THE RULING FAMILY OF AUSTRIA.

Key People:


 * 1) Maria Theresa- 1717–1780 An able ruler, Maria Theresa also devoted herself to her children, whom she continued to advise even after they were grown. Perhaps her most famous child was Marie Antoinette, wife of Louis XVI of France. As the Austrian empress, Maria Theresa decreased the power of the nobility. She also limited the amount of labor that nobles could force peasants to do. She argued: “The peasantry must be able to sustain itself.
 * 2) Frederick the Great 1712–1786 Although they reigned during the same time, Frederick the Great and Maria Theresa were very different. Where Maria was religious, Frederick was practical and atheistic. Maria Theresa had a happy home life and a huge family, while Frederick died without a son to succeed him. An aggressor in foreign affairs, Frederick once wrote that “the fundamental role of governments is the principle of extending their territories.” Frederick earned the title “the Great” by achieving his goals for Prussia.
 * 3) Gustavus Adolphus of Sweden- A Protestant, his disciplined army of 23,000 shifted the tide of war in 1630. They drove the Hapsburg armies out of Northern Germany. He was killed in 1632.
 * 4) The Junkers- Prussia’s landowning nobility, they resisted the king’s growing power. However, in the early 1700s, King Frederick William I bought their cooperation. He gave the Junkers the exclusive right to be officers in his army.

Ideas/Events:

THE THIRTY YEARS’ WAR


 * Both the Lutheran and the Catholic princes tried to gain followers. In addition, both sides felt threatened by Calvinism, which was spreading in Germany and gaining many followers. As tension mounted, the Lutherans joined together in the Protestant Union in 1608.
 * he future Holy Roman emperor, Ferdinand II, was head of the Hapsburg family. As such, he ruled the Czech kingdom of Bohemia.
 * Cardinal Richelieu and Cardinal Mazarin of France dominated the remaining years of the war. Although Catholic, these two cardinals feared the Hapsburgs more than the Protestants. They did not want other European rulers to have as much power as the French king.
 * In 1635, Richelieu sent French troops to join the German and Swedish Protestants in their struggle against the Hapsburg armies.
 * The war did great damage to Germany. Its population dropped from 20 million to about 16 million. Both trade and agriculture were disrupted, and Germany’s economy was ruined.
 * T**he Peace of Westphalia (1648) ended the war. The treaty had these important consequences:**


 * *weakened the Hapsburg states of Spain and Austria; **
 * *strengthened France by awarding it German territory; **
 * *made German princes independent of the Holy Roman emperor; **
 * *ended religious wars in Europe; • introduced a new method of peace negotiation whereby all participants meet. To settle the problems of a war and decide the terms of peace. **

STATES FORM IN CENTRAL EUROPE:


 * The major powers of this region were the kingdom of Poland, the Holy Roman Empire, and the Ottoman Empire. None of them was very strong in the mid-1600s.
 * central Europe developed differently from that of western Europe. During the late Middle Ages, serfs in western Europe slowly won freedom and moved to towns. There, they joined middle-class townspeople, who gained economic power because of the commercial revolution and the development of capitalism.
 * The two empires of central Europe were also weak. Although Suleyman the Magnificent had conquered Hungary and threatened Vienna in 1529, the Ottoman Empire could not take its European conquest any farther.
 * One of these families was the Hapsburgs of Austria. The Austrian Hapsburgs took several steps to become absolute monarchs. First, during the Thirty Years’ War, they reconquered Bohemia. The Hapsburgs wiped out Protestantism there and created a new Czech nobility that pledged loyalty to them.
 * Within its borders lived a diverse assortment of people: Czechs, Hungarians, Italians, Croatians, and Germans.
 * Charles VI spent his entire reign working out an answer to this problem. With endless arm-twisting, he persuaded other leaders of Europe to sign an agreement that declared they would recognize Charles’s eldest daughter as the heir to all his Hapsburg territories.

PRUSSIA CHALLENGES AUSTRIA:


 * Like Austria, Prussia rose to power in the late 1600s. Like the Hapsburgs of Austria, Prussia’s ruling family, the Hohenzollerns, also had ambitions.
 * The Hohenzollerns built up their state from a number of small holdings, beginning with the German states of Brandenburg and Prussia. In 1640, a 20-year-old Hohenzollern named Frederick William inherited the title of elector of Brandenburg.
 * To pay for the army, they introduced permanent taxation. Beginning with the Great Elector’s son, they called themselves kings. They also weakened the representative assemblies of their territories.
 * In 1740, Maria Theresa succeeded her father, just five months after Frederick II became king of Prussia. Frederick wanted the Austrian land of Silesia, which bordered Prussia.
 * Maria Theresa decided that the French kings were no longer Austria’s chief enemies. She made an alliance with them. The result was a diplomatic revolution. When Frederick heard of her actions, he signed a treaty with Britain Austria’s former ally.