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La guerra dei trent'anni — Transcript

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0:00In our last video, we started looking
0:02at the religious wars in 16th and late
0:0517 th-century Europe. We talked about
0:08France, about the struggle between
0:10Huguenots and Catholics, but the
0:12problem of religious conflict didn't
0:14just affect France, it affected all of
0:16Europe. And today, in fact, we'll look
0:20at a massive and very important war
0:21that devastated much of the continent
0:23during the first half of the 1600s: the
0:25Thirty Years 'War. Let's get started.
0:52So, let's resume looking at these
0:54religious wars and specifically focus
0:56on the German area, because this area
0:59was heavily involved in clashes and the
1:01Thirty Years' War I mentioned. First of
1:05all, we need to take stock of the
1:07situation. If you remember, we left
1:11this area around 1555, when Emperor
1:14Charles V had signed the Peace of
1:17Augsburg with the Schmalkaldic League.
1:21The one about "cuius regio, eius
1:23religio," remember? That peace was
1:26important because it allowed German
1:30princes to convert to Lutheranism and
1:34required their subjects to follow suit
1:39if their prince did. But that peace,
1:43which had temporarily settled things in
1:45Germany, had its limitations. The main
1:49one was that Calvinists were not
1:51considered at all. That peace—we
1:55mentioned it, but you should have
1:57studied it by now. It stipulated that
2:00German princes could choose between
2:03Catholicism and Lutheranism, but could
2:05not adhere to Calvinism, which was not
2:07yet recognized within the empire. This
2:10was one of the problems. Furthermore,
2:14in the following years, the conflict
2:16between Catholics and Protestants had
2:19calmed down, at least in part, and
2:21tensions had eased, but problems
2:23persisted. For example, some Catholic
2:28princes would occasionally try to win
2:31lands back to Catholicism; in
2:33particular, Bavaria was very active, a
2:36Catholic region—still predominantly
2:39Catholic today—that hoped to return
2:42things to the old days by conquering
2:45territories or convincing them to
2:47return to the Catholic faith. Added to
2:52this landscape is a second problem
2:55concerning two peripheral territories
2:58of the empire: Bohemia and Hungary.
3:03Until the early 16th century, these
3:05territories had been held by an
3:07independent ruler, the King of Bohemia
3:09and Hungary. However, the last of these
3:14sovereigns, Louis II, was defeated and
3:16killed in battle by the Turks in 1526
3:19and left no heir. So its lands had been
3:24divided, partly taken by the Turks and
3:27partly assigned to the Habsburg family,
3:29which already dominated various
3:31territories in Austria and the
3:33southeast of the German area, but which
3:36then saw its domains increase
3:38enormously. The Habsburg family is the
3:41very same one as Charles V, by the way,
3:43and of his heirs. This family was
3:46staunchly Catholic, while in the
3:48Bohemian territories—that is, part of
3:50the current Czech Republic—and
3:52Hungarian lands, Catholicism had gone
3:54quite into crisis in previous years and
3:57had been supplanted by other religious
3:59faiths. After all, if you remember,
4:02Bohemia had been the land of Jan Hus.
4:05Do you remember that late medieval
4:07heretic we studied who was persecuted
4:09and burned alive by the Catholic Church
4:11? His preaching had taken great hold in
4:15the territories of Bohemia and still
4:17survived in the 1500s. So Bohemia had
4:20largely exited, while Hungary,
4:22precisely in an anti-Habsburg key,
4:25began in those years to become a land
4:28of conquest for Lutherans and
4:30Calvinists. Why do I say in an
4:32anti-Habsburg key? Because the
4:34Hungarians, and we will see this often
4:37as time goes on, did not tolerate
4:39Habsburg rule, and since the Habsburgs
4:41were Catholic, they did not want to be
4:43Catholic like the Habsburg invaders,
4:45and so, let's put it this way, the
4:47preaching of Lutheran and Calvinist
4:50pastors found fertile ground in these
4:52lands. So yes, the Habsburgs are
4:55enlarging their direct domains, but
4:57there are strong religious tensions
5:00even within these domains. Thus,
5:03throughout the German area, which
5:05includes Germany, Austria, Bohemia,
5:07part of Hungary, bits of present-day
5:09Poland, and so on, throughout this
5:11large German area, between the end of
5:13the 1500s and the beginning of the
5:151600s, two alliances were created, two,
5:18I would even say military alliances,
5:20between Catholics on one side and
5:22Protestants on the other. The
5:25Protestant Union is called the
5:27Evangelical Union. It is led by the
5:31Palatinate, which had been one of the
5:33German regions that first adhered to
5:36Lutheranism and the Reformation, and it
5:39is also supported by France, which has
5:41every interest in opposing the
5:44Habsburgs 'desires in that region. On
5:48the other side, opposing this
5:50Evangelical Union, is the Catholic
5:52League, which is instead led in
5:54particular by Bavaria, that Catholic
5:56region in the south of Germany, and is
5:58supported indirectly by Spain, a great
6:01Catholic power that hopes Catholicism
6:03will return to impose itself in Germany
6:05. So you see, it is no longer just a
6:09German issue, not only German princes
6:11against other German princes, because
6:13behind them lie the interests of France
6:16and Spain—that is, two super-powers,
6:19we could say, that intend to dominate
6:21Europe and that support one side or the
6:24other out of self-interest. Well,
6:26because it is true that in France, as
6:28we saw with the Edict of Nantes,
6:30tolerance was granted to Protestants,
6:32to the Huguenots and therefore to the
6:34Calvinists, but ultimately France
6:35supported the Evangelical Union for
6:37purely political reasons, not religious
6:39faith, because it wanted to oppose the
6:41Habsburgs and Spain. These tensions
6:44were, all in all, quite strong and
6:47indeed foreshadowed a future war.
6:50However, there was a Habsburg emperor
6:52during this very period who somehow
6:54managed to ease the tension. This
6:57emperor was named Rudolf II, a Habsburg
7:00, who decided to grant the Bohemians—
7:02that is, the Praguerites, let's say, to
7:05be clear—a certain freedom of worship
7:07. The law with which he guaranteed all
7:12this was called the Letter of Majesty,
7:14which indeed granted them the right to
7:16practice their religion at least in
7:18part. This effectively healed the
7:22conflicts for some time, smoothed over
7:25the differences, and allowed for a
7:27certain peace in the empire. But it
7:30only lasted as long as Rudolf II was in
7:33power, because after his death,
7:35preparations were made to elect
7:37Ferdinand of Styria as the new emperor,
7:40who would eventually become emperor
7:42under the name Ferdinand II. This
7:47Ferdinand of Styria had a profoundly
7:49different character from Rudolf; he was
7:51indeed Catholic like him, but with a,
7:54one might say, ferocious Catholicism—
7:56educated by the Jesuits, by the way—
7:58and very little inclined to accept
8:00Protestants under his crown. In fact,
8:05as soon as he ascended to the Austrian
8:07throne, even before becoming German
8:09emperor, he immediately abolished the
8:11Letter of Majesty, creating quite a
8:13stir. This move obviously created great
8:18discontent in Bohemia, also because
8:21Ferdinand sent a series of German
8:24officials to Prague, the capital of
8:26Bohemia, who went there to try to
8:29impose Catholicism and the authority of
8:32the Habsburgs using very abrupt and
8:35harsh methods. This fueled discontent:
8:40partly because Prague, by now, had
8:42moved on and hardly identified with the
8:44Catholic faith; and also because it was
8:47no longer just a religious motive,
8:49there was also an ethnic one, one might
8:52say, because the Bohemian language
8:54itself was humiliated by the arrival of
8:56these officials, these important and
8:59powerful German politicians, almost as
9:01if Prague had been colonized by the
9:03Germans. All this, or rather, the
9:07discontent grew further when Ferdinand
9:10was elected Holy Roman Emperor under
9:13the name of Ferdinand II, and it
9:15finally erupted in May 1618. A date to
9:21remember, a year to remember, because
9:23on that occasion, during an uprising in
9:25Prague, the city's population ended up
9:28defenestrating two German imperial
9:30officials—that is, they literally
9:32grabbed them and threw them out of the
9:35window. Something which, as we will see
9:38as we go on with our program, is not
9:40entirely new in Prague's history. It
9:43will return to Prague; often, unpopular
9:45people end up being defenestrated one
9:47way or another. Furthermore, the people
9:52of Prague were not content with just
9:54this bold gesture, but declared
9:56Ferdinand II's authority forfeit and
9:58decided to offer the crown of the
10:00Kingdom of Bohemia to Frederick V of
10:02the Palatinate, who was a Calvinist—a
10:05great offense to Catholicism—and the
10:07leader of the Protestant Union, the
10:09alliance I mentioned that grouped all
10:12the Protestant princes. Clearly, this
10:15was a clamorous act of defiance against
10:18Ferdinand II and Catholicism. Thus, two
10:22factions quickly formed, ready to go to
10:24war, even if war had not yet formally
10:26broken out in these first days. On one
10:31side is Frederick V of the Palatinate,
10:33who in the following days finds the
10:35support of England, because in England
10:37they have James I, who is his (
10:39Frederick V's) relative. And the
10:43support of Denmark with King Christian,
10:46where the Protestant religion had
10:48widely spread, as well as the support
10:50of Venice and the United Provinces,
10:53that is, all those who wanted to
10:55prevent the Habsburgs from becoming too
10:58strong. On the other side, siding with
11:03the empire, that is, with Ferdinand II,
11:06were Spain obviously and Bavaria, which
11:09was indeed the leading kingdom, the
11:11leading principality of the Catholic
11:14League. For the moment, France remains
11:18on the sidelines, not siding with
11:19either one or the other, even though we
11:21previously said it had supported the
11:23Protestant Union up to that point. For
11:26the time being, however, it prefers not
11:27to take sides. It is clear, therefore,
11:29that the problem is no longer just
11:30about Bohemia. Certainly, Bohemia is,
11:33let's say, the straw that broke the
11:35camel's back, but the stake is not who
11:37will rule in Bohemia. The stake is
11:40whether there will return to be only
11:43one religion in the German empire,
11:45namely Catholicism, or not. Because
11:49this is what Ferdinand II wants; in
11:51fact, he wants little by little,
11:53starting from Bohemia and then perhaps
11:55moving on to others, to restore a
11:56single religion in the empire, and in
11:58this he is strongly supported by
12:00Bavaria and Spain, with whom he is also
12:02related, obviously. On the other side
12:06are those princes or those powers that
12:08do not want there to be a single
12:10religion in Germany and, furthermore,
12:12do not want there to be a single strong
12:15state in Germany either. Because, as we
12:19will see, this will soon become the
12:20problem as well. We have in Spain a
12:24united State, a national state, a
12:26modern state, because there is a
12:28sovereign, there are officials, and the
12:30whole State obeys the sovereign. In
12:33France, it's the same; we have a
12:36sovereign, we saw Henry IV who managed
12:38to, let's say, curb the internal strife
12:41and now all of France obeys the
12:43sovereign. In England, we also saw how
12:46the sovereigns even changed the face of
12:48the local church and made themselves
12:50its leaders. In other words, we have
12:53some countries with a national monarchy
12:55, a modern nation-state: Spain, France,
12:57England. In Germany, nothing of the
13:00sort exists, because while it is true
13:02that there is an empire, as we saw with
13:05Charles V, imperial power is not as
13:07solid as that of the sovereigns of the
13:09various Western countries. Imperial
13:12power is a somewhat mild power, isn't
13:14it? The ruler is elected by a few great
13:17electors. Certainly, he has some
13:21authority, but the German princes often
13:23do as they please; they can even wage
13:25war against the emperor and can stand
13:27up to him on many occasions. Now,
13:30Germany is therefore very disunited;
13:33there is no true unitary state, but
13:35almost an alliance of different
13:37autonomous states, one could say, which
13:40nevertheless maintain very strong
13:42autonomies. Ferdinand II's project
13:45seems to be not only to restore
13:48Catholicism but even to transform the
13:50German empire into a modern, unitary,
13:53strong state, in which the emperor has
13:55a very strong, highly centralized power
13:58, capable of suppressing any dissent.
14:03Now it is clear that the German princes
14:05cannot accept this, because it would
14:07mean giving up their autonomy. And not
14:11only can they not give it up, but
14:12neither can the United Provinces, nor
14:15Venice, nor other neighboring countries
14:17, because if a strong unitary state
14:19were created in Germany, it would
14:21become a danger to all neighboring
14:23countries. Do you understand? The
14:25United Provinces have fought, for
14:27example, until now to make themselves
14:29autonomous from Spain. It would be
14:32trouble to have nearby—because
14:33Germany borders Holland—to have a
14:35very strong Catholic power alongside
14:37them, and they do not want that. Venice
14:41, likewise; Venice is to the south,
14:43south of Austria, but as long as the
14:45Habsburgs have only a few domains, it's
14:47fine, but if this domain were to become
14:49very strong and a united Germany were
14:51created that also takes in Austria,
14:52Bohemia, and other territories, it
14:54would be a real problem for Venice
14:56because Venice would become a land at
14:58risk of conquest. So you understand
15:01that Germany wants to unify, Spain
15:03looks favorably upon this, but
15:05neighboring countries and very
15:06important parts of the German area
15:08itself are not of the same opinion. So,
15:11in this very year 1618, a war begins
15:13that will last for 30 years, and it is
15:15not by chance that it is renamed the
15:17Thirty Years' War. It begins in 1618
15:20and will only end in 1648, although as
15:22we will see, not entirely definitively,
15:24but essentially the most important part
15:27of this conflict concludes in '48. It
15:31will be a war that starts in Bohemia;
15:33it is precisely in Bohemia that it will
15:34be fought at the beginning, but then it
15:36will expand to the entire German area
15:37and, in some ways, even outside of it,
15:39because fighting will end up occurring
15:41in the United Provinces, the
15:42Netherlands, and partially in France.
15:45It is a war in which not only German
15:47princes will participate; others will
15:49join at alternating stages, which we
15:51will see now, including northern
15:53territories like Denmark, Sweden, and
15:55also important armies like the Spanish
15:59one and eventually even France at a
16:01certain point. Therefore, it is a
16:04European war, in some respects almost a
16:06precursor to those world wars that
16:09would come in later centuries. In fact,
16:13I'll open a very brief parenthesis:
16:16when in the 1900s we witnessed two
16:18world wars very close together, the
16:20first between '14 and '18, the second
16:23between '39 and '45, some historians,
16:25in a provocative way, but only up to a
16:28point, spoke almost of a second Thirty
16:30Years 'War, because in some ways,
16:33despite a thousand other differences,
16:35of course, there are some similarities
16:39between this Thirty Years' War and
16:41those of the 1900s. The first great
16:44battle of this conflict arrived in 1620
16:46and was fought precisely in Bohemia; it
16:49is famous as the Battle of White
16:51Mountain. It saw two rival armies clash
16:54. On one side, the army of Frederick V,
16:57specifically the Duke of the Palatinate
17:00, and on the other, the army of
17:01Ferdinand II. It must be said that
17:05Frederick V, despite initially having
17:07the support of many European sovereigns
17:10, as we mentioned, many European states
17:12, in this battle was left practically
17:14alone with the Bohemians by his side,
17:16of course, but without other
17:18international allies, while Ferdinand
17:20II's army could count on the military
17:22support of Bavaria and Spain. And
17:26indeed, the battle was won quite
17:28clearly by the Empire, by Ferdinand II,
17:31so much so that Frederick V even had to
17:33flee, and for a moment it seemed that
17:36the Empire had gained the upper hand
17:38definitively. In fact, in the Bohemian
17:42area, after that battle, months of
17:44harsh persecution began, and the Prague
17:47officials, those most compromised, had
17:49to escape. Many families that had left
17:54also had to emigrate. They tried to
17:59forcibly restore Catholicism, and in
18:01general, the Bohemian lands, often
18:04seized from those who had sided with
18:07Frederick V, were reassigned to
18:09soldiers who had fought alongside
18:11Ferdinand II. So, in practice,
18:15Spaniards, Bavarians, and Italians who
18:17had sided with the Catholics arrived in
18:19these Bohemian lands to fight against
18:21the people of Prague. Therefore, the
18:25Bohemians saw themselves not only
18:26defeated but also humiliated by the
18:28fact that their lands were being taken
18:30away and their religion was being
18:31stripped from them. In short, some
18:34rather harsh months began. However, the
18:36war did not end. The Battle of White
18:39Mountain, which seemed so decisive, was
18:42actually just the first piece of a much
18:44larger conflict, and it didn't end
18:46because the Spaniards tried to take
18:48advantage of the situation at this
18:50point. You must remember that Spain
18:54clearly dominated the Iberian Peninsula
18:56, but it also had vast possessions in
18:58Italy, because under the Spanish crown
19:00at this stage, at the beginning of the
19:021600s, there was all of Southern Italy,
19:04the Kingdom of Naples, plus the Duchy
19:06of Milan, which you remember, for which
19:08Charles V had fought great wars to
19:10obtain. The Duchy of Milan was
19:14particularly important because it was
19:16close to Austria; in Spain there were
19:17the Habsburgs, the Spanish Habsburgs,
19:19and in Austria there were the Austrian
19:21Habsburgs, who were cousins. This
19:24alliance between the Spanish and the
19:26Austrians also had to be cemented by
19:28geographical proximity; Milan was near
19:30Austria, but the direct connection
19:32between Milan and Austria was missing.
19:36The direct connection could be secured
19:39by conquering the Valtellina, that
19:41small Swiss region—at the time, Swiss
19:44—which allowed passage from Milan to
19:47Austria. If Spain had obtained the
19:51Valtellina, it could have easily moved
19:53its army from Northern Italy to Austria
19:55, then from Austria to the German area,
19:58and from there head toward the United
20:00Provinces. Because if you remember with
20:04Philip II, we said that the United
20:06Provinces, that is, present-day Holland
20:08, had rebelled against the Spanish
20:10crown and had effectively obtained a
20:13certain autonomy, but Spain had not
20:15entirely given up on these lands. It
20:19could certainly attack them from the
20:21Spanish Netherlands, that is, from
20:23Belgium, but arriving also from the
20:24German side, arriving from Germany,
20:26would have allowed a much stronger
20:28attack on these United Provinces, and
20:29would likely have allowed the Spaniards
20:31to reconquer them. Therefore, the
20:34Valtellina became strategic. For this
20:37reason, also in 1620, the Spaniards
20:39actually took the Valtellina. They did
20:42it in a way that was also quite clever,
20:45because instead of going directly to
20:47the attack, they decided to somehow
20:49incite the local population, the
20:50Valtellinese Catholics, so that they
20:52would lash out against the Protestants,
20:54because in Valtellina there were groups
20:57of both Catholics and Protestants.
21:01Incited by the Spaniards, these
21:03Catholic groups literally went on to
21:05massacre their Protestant compatriots.
21:08They even speak of a "sacred slaughter"
21:10; that is what it was called at the
21:11time, a sacred slaughter. It was a
21:13massacre, but this allowed the
21:15Spaniards to easily annex the
21:16Valtellina and then, precisely,
21:18overlook the German area. Clearly, this
21:22fundamental move by the Spanish worried
21:24the other Protestant countries of
21:26north-central Europe a great deal,
21:28because the United Provinces ended up
21:31being threatened, but even Denmark
21:33ended up being threatened, because
21:35Denmark too had become Lutheran for
21:37some time, and this indeed led to the
21:39entry of other powers into the war. In
21:42fact, in 1625, the Danish king, named
21:48Christian IV (whom we had already seen
21:50had supported the claims of Frederick V
21:53), collected funding from various
21:55European powers, from the United
21:58Provinces, England, and France, and
22:00decided to wage war against Ferdinand
22:03II and the Spanish, hoping to curb, to
22:05block these hegemonic pretensions of
22:08the Habsburgs. The war with Denmark
22:12continued for a few years. This small
22:15internal phase of the Thirty Years 'War
22:18ended in 1629, in reality with the
22:20defeat of Christian, who actually
22:22suffered various military disasters and
22:24was eventually forced to surrender with
22:27a peace treaty signed in Lübeck; it is
22:29called the Peace of Lübeck, which
22:32sanctioned Denmark's return to its
22:34domains and a momentary victory for the
22:36Catholics. At this point, we are in
22:401629, about ten years have passed since
22:42the beginning of the war. Ferdinand II
22:44is convinced he has won. After all, he
22:47beat the Bohemians almost immediately,
22:49and he also beat the Danes who got
22:51involved shortly after. He seems to
22:54have no more problems, no more rivals,
22:57and indeed, emboldened by this
22:59certainty, perhaps even too sure of
23:01himself, in 1629 he issued a very
23:03important edict called the Edict of
23:06Restitution. It is a law that mandates
23:10that all princes in the territory of
23:13the German Empire are obligated to
23:15return to the Catholic Church the lands
23:18that were confiscated after 1552. Now,
23:24this date should set off an alarm bell
23:26for you because we have already spoken
23:29about 1552. I remind you that we spoke
23:34about it when we dealt with the Peace
23:36of Augsburg, the one signed by Charles
23:38V and the Schmalkaldic League, that is,
23:40signed 70 years before where we are now
23:42. But let's take a step back. In that
23:46Peace of Augsburg, that of*cuius regio,
23:48eius religio*, it was also established
23:51in fact that Protestant princes could
23:53indeed become Protestant, but they
23:55necessarily had to return to the
23:57Catholic Church the lands that had been
23:59confiscated after 1552. Why this rule?
24:07Because becoming Lutheran at a certain
24:09point had become very convenient,
24:11because one could easily proclaim
24:13oneself Lutheran and in this way seize
24:15the lands, the possessions of the
24:17monasteries, because Lutheranism
24:19abolishes all monastic orders, do you
24:21remember? So when a prince became
24:25Lutheran, he could do it also for pure
24:27economic convenience, because becoming
24:29Lutheran meant closing monasteries,
24:31closing convents, and taking a lot, a
24:33lot of land. And then being able to
24:36resell them, making money from them; in
24:38short, for the state treasury, it could
24:40be a significant advantage. So, Charles
24:43V, when he finally reached peace with
24:44the Protestants, had said: "Okay, I
24:46grant you permission to remain
24:48Protestant, but you must not do it for
24:50self-interest; you must do it out of
24:51true faith, out of conscience, this
24:53becoming Lutheran or not?" So let's
24:57agree, let's sanction it, let's
24:58establish a date. Before that, the
25:01lands you have requisitioned remain
25:03yours. After that, you can no longer
25:05requisition land; you can become
25:07Lutheran, but the lands must remain
25:08Catholic, otherwise you are only doing
25:10it for interest. Do you understand?
25:13This was the agreement that had been
25:15established in the Peace of Augsburg,
25:17precisely in 1552. And in 1555. It
25:23concerned '52, but the peace was signed
25:25in '55. Now more than 70 years have
25:28passed, and what has happened in the
25:30meantime? That no one respects those
25:32agreements anymore. Meaning, in the 70
25:35years that followed, the German princes
25:37in many cases continued to convert to
25:39Lutheranism or Calvinism and to
25:41requisition the lands of the Catholic
25:42Church without respecting the
25:44agreements anymore. Now Ferdinand II,
25:49who has just won, uh, the military
25:51confrontations, says: "Now I want to
25:53reapply this old law from 70 years ago
25:56that no one has applied until now." So
26:00I say to you, Protestant princes, who
26:02have been, in quotes, "clever" until
26:05now by requisitioning land from the
26:07Catholic Church, I say to you: now you
26:09must return everything. I am forcing
26:12you to return everything. Clearly, this
26:15is a very risky and provocative move
26:17because what Protestant prince could
26:19ever accept such a thing? These princes
26:23requisitioned the lands perhaps 20, 30,
26:2540 years ago. They sold them, made
26:28deals with them, balanced the state
26:30coffers, and certainly now they are not
26:32willing to pay the Church back for what
26:34was stolen. So, formally, Ferdinand II
26:37seems to want to do nothing more than
26:39apply the law as it was established.
26:42But it is clear that beyond the form,
26:44the substance is very different. The
26:46substance is to reaffirm his power over
26:48the princes, or rather, not only
26:50reaffirm it, but strengthen it
26:52enormously. It is like saying "Now I
26:55decide what is done with your lands."
26:57Moreover, as I told you from the
26:59beginning, Ferdinand's project does not
27:01only concern the religious aspect; it
27:03is much broader. Certainly, he is a
27:06fervent Catholic and the religious
27:08aspect carries great weight in his
27:10motivations, but he also wants to
27:12create, to make Germany a unified state
27:15, a true, modern, centralized state. In
27:18fact, precisely in these years he
27:21begins to toy with a project to reform
27:23the title, uh, the imperial title,
27:26because, as I told you, this title had
27:29for a long time been assigned through
27:31election: that is, there were the
27:34prince-electors who would vote and
27:36appoint, in this way, by majority, a
27:39new emperor when the previous one died.
27:44Now, this made imperial power somewhat
27:46fragile, because every aspiring emperor
27:49had to strike deals with the electors,
27:51convince them, bribe them in certain
27:53cases, as we saw with Charles V. Now,
27:56Ferdinand II seems to hypothesize a
27:58reform—he doesn't put it in writing
28:00yet, but he seems to be heading in that
28:03direction; a reform that would lead the
28:05imperial title to become hereditary,
28:08that is, no longer elective, but
28:10transmitted dynastically, clearly to
28:13the Habsburgs, because he is a Habsburg
28:16. Meaning he says: why do we have to be
28:18voted in by the great electors? I will
28:21pass the title to my son, and my son to
28:23his son and so on, so as to divest the
28:25electors of authority, to take away
28:27their power to influence the emperor's
28:30choices. So Ferdinand II feels very
28:33self-confident at this moment and sure
28:36he can realize his projects, but in
28:38reality, behind these strong victories
28:41or apparent victories, Ferdinand also
28:43has some problems. The main problem is
28:47the fact that he obtained these
28:48victories thanks to the army; he has a
28:50very strong army, but he does not have
28:52full control over this army. Because
28:56this army is led by a Bohemian nobleman
28:58who has, uh, strengthened himself
29:01enormously, assumed great power, and
29:03seems almost capable of even rivaling
29:06Ferdinand. This, uh, Bohemian nobleman
29:09is named Wallenstein, and by conquering
29:11lands in Bohemia, he has already
29:13enriched himself and profited greatly
29:16from the lands. Moreover, this army of
29:19Wallenstein's is fighting all over
29:21Europe, throughout the German area, but
29:24also moving around a lot, and it is
29:26strong, numerous, etc., and needs to be
29:28paid. Ferdinand II, however, as often
29:32happens to German emperors, does not
29:34have great liquidity, that is, he does
29:35not have the money to pay them, so he
29:37sometimes has the money lent to him by
29:39Wallenstein himself; that is,
29:41Wallenstein lends money to the emperor,
29:43so the emperor can pay the army, namely
29:45Wallenstein's soldiers. But by doing so
29:48, the emperor becomes a debtor to his
29:50own general. You see that it is a
29:53somewhat strange, vicious cycle of
29:54power, and Wallenstein himself demands
29:56quite high interest rates. When the
29:59emperor cannot pay, he acquires lands,
30:01he acquires power. Certainly, he is in
30:05a position strong enough to blackmail
30:07even the emperor at times, which in
30:09some ways worries Ferdinand himself,
30:11because he too realizes that his power
30:14is strong but also fragile at the same
30:16time. So, while Wallenstein is
30:20emboldened by his power, he seems to
30:22even aspire to political offices, as at
30:25one point he receives the title of
30:27imperial prince; his army demands money
30:30, and this demand for money by an army
30:32counting as many as 100,000 men becomes
30:35quite a problem for the German region
30:37itself, for various reasons. So,
30:41Ferdinand II has to pay them; he gets
30:43some money borrowed from Wallenstein,
30:44and raises some more by increasing
30:46taxes. Thus, taxes in German territory
30:50increase significantly, and this
30:52clearly doesn't make any of the Germans
30:55happy, but furthermore, when the army
30:57isn't paid, it often tends to take
31:00money in, let's say, violent ways. Do
31:03you remember when we talked about the
31:05mercenaries of Charles V, the
31:07Landsknechte who descend on Rome and
31:09sack it? Well, this practice of armies
31:12sacking the lands where they were
31:14stationed when they weren't paid was
31:16traditional at the time. So,
31:19Wallenstein’s army, too, when it
31:21doesn't receive its due pay, feels
31:23authorized to sack the areas where it
31:25is located or to demand ransoms or
31:28simply to requisition, say, harvests.
31:31All of this creates major problems in
31:33Germany because the same areas, the
31:35same German regions, even Catholic ones
31:38at times, suffer the fury of this army
31:40that takes what it can, grabbing
31:42everything it can just to maintain
31:44itself, and so, very significant
31:46economic crises and difficulties are
31:48generated. Furthermore, Ferdinand II
31:51has internal problems with, indeed, his
31:53own army, but he hasn't entirely solved
31:55the problems on the outside. Because
31:59yes, Denmark is defeated, the United
32:01Provinces seem quite harmless at the
32:03moment, but there is another power that
32:05appears on the scene shortly after,
32:07which is Sweden. What does Sweden have
32:10to do with the German area? The reasons
32:12why Sweden feels compelled, in a
32:14certain sense, to intervene are various
32:16. The first is the religious issue.
32:19Sweden has become Lutheran, practically
32:21entirely Lutheran, and it does not want
32:23a large and very strong Catholic power
32:25created to the south of its territories
32:27that could threaten Sweden itself from
32:29a religious perspective. So, this is
32:32the first reason. However, there is
32:34also another reason that is more
32:35strictly economic. Sweden, in fact, at
32:38that stage had dominance over trade in
32:40the Baltic Sea, that is, the sea that
32:42is above Germany, indeed, close to
32:44Sweden. where essentially the Swedes,
32:48with their ships, traded both German
32:51goods and goods from the north. The
32:54Germans sold the manufactured goods
32:57they produced on the continent and
32:59usually bought raw materials like iron,
33:02copper, hemp, and tar. And these trades
33:06were managed almost entirely by the
33:08Swedes. They acted as intermediaries in
33:10the purchase and sale of these goods.
33:15The problem was that this was one of
33:17the Swedes' main sources of income, and
33:20Sweden saw it as a risk that Ferdinand
33:23II, the emperor, might acquire
33:25territory, strengthen Germany, and
33:28reach the northern Baltic Sea, meaning
33:31Germany might try to take this trade
33:34away from Sweden. So, they had to do
33:38everything possible to slow down
33:40Ferdinand II's rise and block his
33:42hegemonic project. Thus, in 1631, the
33:46Swedish king, Gustavus Adolphus,
33:48decided to intervene after gaining
33:50financial support from France and
33:52several Protestant German princes, who
33:55were deeply shaken by the fact that the
33:57Catholics were massacring many
33:59Protestants. He went into Germany and
34:03began fighting against the empire,
34:05against the imperial army, achieving,
34:07among other things, many victories.
34:11Sweden seemed truly unstoppable; it won
34:13a first great battle at Breitenfeld
34:15near Leipzig, but then advanced
34:17throughout Germany, arriving
34:18practically as far as Bavaria and
34:20Alsace. Bavaria is that Catholic region
34:24in the south, not far from Austria, and
34:27Alsace is the border region with France
34:29; essentially, Sweden suddenly,
34:31unexpectedly seemed very close to
34:33winning the war. Why was Sweden so
34:36strong, a country like Sweden that we
34:38have never talked about until now,
34:39which is often on the fringes of
34:41European history and that, in short, no
34:42one really worried about? Well, Sweden
34:46was so strong partly thanks to its king
34:49, Gustavus Adolphus, a skilled military
34:51man who introduced some important
34:53innovations to the Swedish army. The
34:57first of these important innovations
34:58was the use of artillery. Sweden was
35:01well-equipped with cannons, like all
35:03the great European powers, but the
35:05cannons were made of a rather light
35:07alloy; lighter, much lighter than those
35:10used by the Austrians, the imperials,
35:12the Spanish, and so on. And this
35:15lightness was decisive because it made
35:17it easy to move the cannons and
35:19reorient them during battle, allowing
35:22for rapid and very incisive actions.
35:24Furthermore, the light artillery was
35:27also very innovative for the time.
35:30There was a corps of Swedish musketeers
35:33, very advanced, who had at their
35:35disposal a musket that was easy and
35:38quick to reload, and also very light—
35:41an important factor in an era when
35:43firearms were already being used by
35:46individual soldiers, but required slow
35:48reloading, meaning once you fired a
35:51shot, a significant amount of time had
35:55to pass before you could reload and
35:57fire again. Swedish light artillery, on
36:01the other hand, was much more efficient
36:02from this point of view, and this was a
36:03point in their favor. Another factor is
36:07the cavalry, because the Swedish
36:10cavalry had been trained very
36:12effectively to attack in close
36:14formation, that is, with ranks closed
36:17and sabers drawn, giving them a strong
36:20impact and great shock power when they
36:23charged the enemy. So these are the
36:27three fundamental elements: heavy
36:29artillery, light artillery, and cavalry
36:31. In all three cases, especially
36:35regarding the cavalry and light
36:37artillery, but also the others, the
36:39decisive element is the fact that the
36:42men, the Swedish soldiers, were
36:44well-trained. This is the truly
36:48decisive element: Sweden had prepared
36:50its soldiers for years and years to
36:52fight in this manner. Something that
36:56was quite rare at the time, because
36:58European armies were mostly formed of
37:01short-term recruits, men gathered as
37:03best as possible whenever there was a
37:05war or a battle to fight, and so they
37:08weren't very well trained; they
37:10underwent quick basic training and were
37:13then sent to fight. Sweden, however,
37:17had long since had a standing army,
37:19because the soldiers remained in the
37:21military and were maintained by the
37:23state for up to 20 years. In this way,
37:27they had the ability to train and fight
37:30in a very orderly manner, much more
37:32orderly than their European rivals. So,
37:36for the Swedes, they truly seemed
37:38unbeatable and destined to prevail.
37:40Even in 1632, in a very important
37:43battle, they won again. This battle was
37:46Lützen, but with a flaw, a "but,"
37:48because during this battle Gustavus
37:51Adolphus died—he was struck and died.
37:55This turned out to be an unexpected
37:57stroke of luck for Ferdinand II,
37:59because the death of the sovereign—a
38:02sovereign so capable and charismatic—
38:04brought great turmoil to the Swedish
38:06army and country, giving Ferdinand II
38:08time to reorganize and avoid a defeat
38:10that, at that point, seemed almost
38:13inevitable. So in 1634, Ferdinand II
38:18went on the counteroffensive. First, he
38:20had Wallenstein killed, this general
38:23who had become so dangerous to his
38:25authority and his power. After that, he
38:28asked the Spanish for help so that they
38:30would support him militarily in the war
38:32against Sweden. Indeed, the imperial
38:35army, reinforced with Spanish elements,
38:38managed the following year, in 1635, to
38:40secure a first victory against the
38:42Swedish army, which was precisely in
38:45this phase of, uh, discouragement, but
38:47also of disorganization and. This led,
38:51in a short time, to a peace that was
38:53signed in Prague, the Peace of Prague,
38:55which was signed between the Empire and
38:58the Protestant forces, which
38:59momentarily established an end to
39:01hostilities. An end that was almost a
39:06draw, in a sense, because Ferdinand II
39:08agreed to refrain from applying the
39:11Edict of Restitution for at least 40
39:13years; so the edict wasn't abolished,
39:15but it was suspended for quite a long
39:18time. But the war was far from over. It
39:22seems over, but as often happens in the
39:24Thirty Years 'War, it is not over
39:25entirely. Why is the war not over
39:27entirely? Because Sweden, uh, returns
39:30home in a sense; it has slowed down its
39:32project by now, but it has other things
39:35to think about. So the Swedish army
39:39will step aside, but the very lack of
39:41an enemy for Ferdinand II worries the
39:44other powers surrounding him greatly,
39:46because now Ferdinand II would have a
39:49free hand to realize that old project
39:52of unifying Germany under Catholicism
39:54and making it a modern state. It is
39:58true, clearly. Which power at this
40:00point becomes very concerned? France.
40:04Who was in power in France? And at the
40:06moment Henry II is dead, killed in the
40:08meantime. His son became sovereign, his
40:11name is Louis XIII, who however chose
40:14to govern by entrusting many powers to
40:16a prime minister whom we will talk
40:18about soon, named Richelieu, who is a
40:20Catholic cardinal. You may have already
40:25heard him mentioned because he is among
40:27the protagonists of, uh, The Three
40:29Musketeers, that famous adventurous
40:31novel saga from which numerous films
40:33have also been drawn. It is clear that
40:37the historical Richelieu is not exactly
40:39the same as the Richelieu of the novels
40:41, but he was certainly a very powerful
40:43character. Now, the role of Richelieu
40:47and Louis XIII will be better addressed
40:49when we talk about France and its
40:51internal politics, but let's see now
40:53how he intervenes, because Richelieu,
40:55despite being a Catholic cardinal,
40:57decides to side with the Protestants.
41:00Why does he do this? Basically because
41:03he is worried that Germany might
41:06strengthen itself enough to threaten
41:09France. Keep in mind, as usual, that
41:12Germany, the Habsburg Empire, is
41:14closely related to Spain. If a strong
41:18Germany were to form in the east,
41:19France would be surrounded, having
41:21Germany on one side and Spain on the
41:23other, both Habsburg, both Catholic,
41:25which is something France does not want
41:26at all. France then decides to enter
41:31the war alongside what remains of the
41:33Evangelical Union, that is, the
41:35Protestant princes, and does so by
41:38siding against Spain and the Empire, in
41:41reality mostly against Spain because
41:43France decides to concentrate its
41:46forces on its western enemy, primarily
41:48to create difficulties for Spain, which
41:51at this moment is actually fighting on
41:54three different fronts: it must fight
41:58against France, against the Protestant
42:01princes in Germany, and against the
42:03Netherlands in the United Provinces.
42:07This war on three fronts puts Spain in
42:10great difficulty; it still has a strong
42:13army and had major victories in
42:16previous years, but it is now extremely
42:19weak from an economic standpoint. We
42:23already mentioned with Philip II in the
42:26second half of the 16th century that
42:29Spanish gold did not fuel a thriving or
42:32lively economy; on the contrary, for
42:34many reasons, Spain lacked a strong
42:37production base. And these flaws, which
42:41were already emerging in the late 16th
42:43century, by the mid-17th century—
42:45where we are now—have become
42:46unsustainable. Spain’s economy is
42:49failing, also because the gold flowing
42:52in from America has decreased, yet
42:54Spain is waging war everywhere. These
42:57wars are extremely expensive. So much
43:01so that the Spanish crown is forced to
43:03raise taxes massively on its own
43:05citizens to maintain armies on three
43:07fronts, which leads to internal revolts
43:10. In particular, Catalonia revolts—
43:14the area around Barcelona, which as you
43:16know has been quite rebellious toward
43:19central authority in recent years—and
43:21Portugal also revolts, which, as you
43:23recall, had come under the Spanish
43:25crown during the time of Philip II.
43:29Therefore, Spain, while fighting on
43:31three fronts, nears collapse because it
43:33can no longer even maintain its
43:35internal policy. Thus, in 1643, a
43:39decisive clash between the French and
43:42Spanish took place at Rocroi, which is
43:44in the Ardennes, practically between
43:46modern-day France and Belgium. You must
43:50keep in mind that Belgium at the time
43:52was Spanish territory because it was
43:53part of the so-called Spanish
43:55Netherlands. Do you remember the Union
43:58of Arras? We had already spoken about
43:59it in the 16th century. Now, in that
44:03location, at Rocroi, the French and
44:06Spanish face off, but the French
44:08inflict a heavy defeat on the enemy
44:11army, partly thanks to spies who had
44:13infiltrated the Spanish army and
44:16allowed them to learn the Spaniards'
44:18war tactics. So Spain, which had a very
44:24strong army, is soundly defeated for
44:26the first time, and this effectively
44:29marks, in a certain sense, a passing of
44:32the torch: because if until the mid-
44:341600s the strongest power in Europe was
44:37Spain, now the scales begin to tip
44:40toward France. At this point, the ones
44:44who became worried were the United
44:45Provinces, that is, present-day Holland
44:47, which, if you recall, was Calvinist
44:49and had broken away from Spain. They
44:52were no longer so worried about the
44:54Spaniards, who seemed severely weakened
44:56. By now, the Spaniards no longer
44:58seemed to pose a threat to the United
44:59Provinces, or perhaps to anyone in
45:01Europe. But the Dutch worried about
45:05France, because France was suddenly
45:07becoming a very strong power and seemed
45:10to be advancing, setting its sights on
45:12Belgium—that is, on the Spanish
45:14Netherlands—and the United Provinces
45:16did not want the French as neighbors at
45:19all. It was better to have the
45:22Spaniards at this point, because the
45:24Spaniards were no longer a problem; the
45:26French, on the other hand, were an
45:28increasingly strong rising power that
45:30could, in some way, get their hands on
45:32Holland too. So, for these reasons, the
45:35United Provinces decided to sign a
45:36peace treaty with the Spaniards,
45:38somewhat unexpectedly, let's say. They
45:40signed it in 1648, something to
45:44remember, because as we will see, other
45:46things also happen, in Münster, that
45:48German city near the border where we
45:50had talked about the Anabaptists,
45:52remember, right there they signed a
45:54peace treaty establishing the end of
45:56the war between the United Provinces
45:58and Spain. This peace is important,
46:01also because for the first time, Spain
46:03officially recognized the existence of
46:05the United Provinces. I had told you
46:08earlier that in the 1500s the provinces
46:10had de facto autonomy, de facto
46:12independence, but it wasn't yet
46:13legalized, not yet fully recognized by
46:16Spain. Now, however, it is. Now the
46:18United Provinces were born as a new
46:20autonomous state, and Spain would no
46:22longer interfere. Furthermore, other
46:25events also took place on the scene.
46:26Ferdinand II died. In the meantime, his
46:30son, named Ferdinand III, succeeded him
46:32, and this son had great difficulties
46:34because the Swedes had recovered,
46:36returned to the scene, invaded Germany
46:38again, and occupied, above all, a part
46:40of Bohemia, and they seemed strong. On
46:44the other side, the French themselves,
46:46after beating the Spaniards, invaded
46:48Germany, and they also seemed very
46:49strong. In short, Ferdinand III now
46:53understood that he could no longer
46:55sustain this war that had been going on
46:57for 30 years and which now seemed to
46:58bode ill for the empire, so he resigned
47:00himself to signing a peace treaty. This
47:04peace, the definitive one at least
47:06regarding the Thirty Years 'War, was
47:08signed in 1648 in Westphalia, a German
47:11region, which is why it is famous as
47:13the Peace of Westphalia. Actually, it
47:17was in two Westphalian cities: one is
47:19Münster, where the Dutch and Spanish
47:20had just reached an agreement, and the
47:22other is Osnabrück, which is quite
47:24close. So, Peace of Westphalia—
47:28remember it this way—is a peace
47:30treaty by which Ferdinand II
47:31effectively renounces his hegemonic
47:33claims, both from a religious and
47:35political standpoint. That is, Germany
47:39will not become entirely Catholic—
47:42that project is set aside—nor will it
47:44become a unified state. The plan to
47:47transform Germany into a modern state
47:49fades away. It fades for at least a
47:52couple of centuries, as German unity
47:54will only be achieved towards the end
47:57of the 1800s by the Prussians. However,
48:02it is a peace that establishes many
48:04things; in the first place, it takes up
48:06what was established in the Peace of
48:08Augsburg almost a century earlier, and
48:11it establishes that Catholicism,
48:13Lutheranism, and finally Calvinism are
48:15admitted in Germany as recognized
48:17religions. Furthermore, the principle
48:21of "cuius regio, eius religio" is
48:23emptied of its meaning—do you
48:24remember it? I just mentioned it, we
48:28studied it a while ago: this principle,
48:31also established in the Peace of
48:33Augsburg, provided that the prince
48:35effectively chose the religion of his
48:37principality; that is, he chose whether
48:40to be Lutheran or Catholic, and all the
48:42inhabitants of his region had to become
48:45Lutheran or Catholic just like their
48:47prince. Now, this principle is
48:51superseded by the Peace of Westphalia,
48:54because it establishes that the prince
48:57chooses the religion among Lutheranism,
49:00Calvinism, and Catholicism to be the
49:02official one of the region; that is,
49:05publicly, the inhabitants of that
49:08region must practice the official
49:10religion chosen by the prince, but it
49:13also admits that privately, citizens
49:16may practice whichever of these three
49:19religions they want. What does this
49:22mean? Let's give an example. It might
49:25be that the Prince of Bavaria chooses,
49:28as he does, to be Catholic. So, he
49:33declares the official religion of
49:35Bavaria to be Catholicism, and every
49:38Bavarian citizen must profess to be
49:40Catholic in public, but in private, if
49:42someone feels Lutheran, they can
49:45practice the rites and follow the
49:47dogmas of the Lutheran faith in their
49:49own home. The same thing if, say, the
49:53Palatinate becomes Calvinist. Very well
49:55. The prince is Calvinist, so the
49:56official religion is Calvinism. But if
49:58there were a Catholic minority within
50:00the Palatinate, what would they have to
50:02do? should practice Calvinism publicly,
50:05meaning there would be Calvinist
50:07churches around, for example, but at
50:10home he could set up a small chapel
50:12with an image of the Madonna and
50:14practice Catholicism privately. There
50:17were, however, some exceptions to this
50:19general principle. The first concerned
50:22the Habsburgs, because it was decided
50:24with the peace that in the lands
50:26controlled directly by the Habsburgs—
50:28namely Austria, Bohemia, and Hungary—
50:31religious freedom would not be
50:32permitted in those territories; that is
50:35, the Habsburgs were Catholic, so
50:36everyone had to be Catholic, even
50:38privately. Therefore, the Habsburg
50:41territories were an exception. Indeed,
50:43from then on, they would have a history
50:44that was, at least in part, their own.
50:47This is a first, a first exception. And
50:50then they also tried to regulate the
50:53issue of the lands. Do you remember
50:56that discussion about the lands that
50:58must be returned to the Catholic Church
51:00or not? The Peace of Augsburg had
51:02established 1552, then no one had
51:04respected it, then Ferdinand II had
51:06tried to re-establish '52, but it had
51:09remained a bit up in the air. In the
51:11Peace of Westphalia, it is established
51:14that the year for the restitution of
51:16lands, the cutoff year, would become
51:191624. So what does that mean? That all
51:23the princes who requisitioned lands
51:24before 1624 can keep them; they do not
51:26have to return them. Those princes,
51:30however, who requisitioned lands after
51:321624 must return them to the Catholic
51:34Church. Furthermore, from a political
51:37point of view, the Peace of Westphalia
51:39brings very important changes. The most
51:41important of all is the substantial
51:44dissolution of the empire; that is, the
51:46Holy Roman Empire, the Germanic empire,
51:48remains formally in place. It still
51:52exists, the title of emperor exists,
51:54the borders exist, but the title of
51:56emperor means almost nothing anymore;
51:58that is, in fact, it progressively
52:00becomes, from then on, an entity more
52:02symbolic and traditional than effective
52:04. The emperor no longer has real power,
52:08so much so that every principality,
52:10every small German state can even
52:12launch its own autonomous foreign
52:14policy—that is, it can make alliances
52:17with other states, it can choose almost
52:19everything in total autonomy—and
52:21therefore the imperial title becomes a
52:23...becomes an elective office,
52:25prestigious indeed, but without real
52:28power. This will mean that, in the
52:32following decades and centuries, the
52:34Habsburgs, who will still often be
52:36named emperors, will occupy themselves
52:39less and less with the empire and rely,
52:41above all, on turning their attention
52:43to their hereditary possessions—that
52:46is, as I was telling you, Austria,
52:48Bohemia, and Hungary—attempting also
52:50to expand these hereditary possessions,
52:53that is, to conquer lands to control
52:55directly. And effectively, we will see
53:00that between the 1700s and 1800s, the
53:02Habsburgs expanded toward Italy—which
53:04became important for our history—or
53:07toward the territories of the Ottoman
53:09Empire, for example toward the east or
53:11the Balkans, the territories of the
53:13former Yugoslavia, Croatia, and those
53:16areas; however, it was a progressive
53:18shift. Furthermore, also from the Peace
53:23of Westphalia, two new powers emerged
53:25that gained quite significant
53:27territorial advantages. The first was
53:32Sweden, which, thanks to its victories
53:34and the strength of its army, secured
53:37dominance over the Baltic, gaining
53:39important ports; for some time, Swedish
53:41ships had no rivals on the Baltic Sea.
53:46The other territory that gained
53:48advantages was Prussia, a still quite
53:50small state that began to grow slowly
53:52and gradually, especially by expanding
53:54toward the west, that is, toward the
53:56European scene. Prussia, in fact, was a
54:00small, very eastern, German-speaking
54:02state, but it was located so far east
54:05that it roughly corresponds to
54:06modern-day eastern Poland and areas
54:09near the Baltic states, namely Latvia,
54:11Estonia, and Lithuania. From there, its
54:15original area, thanks also to the Peace
54:17of Westphalia, it began to expand its
54:20territories toward the west and thus
54:22fully enter the center of Europe. We
54:24will see that, especially in the 1700s,
54:26it played an important role, and later
54:28in the 1800s, a decisive one for German
54:30unification. The true winner of the
54:33conflict, however, was France, which
54:35had entered the Thirty Years' War quite
54:38late but emerged as the clear victor,
54:40obtaining several important cities on
54:42the border with Germany—cities in the
54:45Alsace-Lorraine region, near Strasbourg
54:47, the border area between France and
54:49Germany that would long be contested
54:52between the two nations. It gained
54:56these territories, but above all, it
54:59gained the role of the hegemonic power
55:01of Europe because Spain was by then
55:04heavily downsized, the Empire
55:06practically ceased to exist, and France
55:09had an open field to dominate Europe
55:11until the 1700s, which is exactly what
55:14it did. It must be said that the war
55:17between France and Spain did not fully
55:19conclude, because while the Peace of
55:21Westphalia ended the war within the
55:23Empire, the conflict between France and
55:25Spain remained open and was only
55:27concluded about ten years later, in
55:291659, with the Peace of the Pyrenees. A
55:31peace that was still advantageous for
55:33France. The Peace of Westphalia is
55:36important not only for this shift in
55:38the center of gravity, hegemony, and
55:40roles in Europe, but also because it
55:41was the last great religious war,
55:43perhaps the biggest one, marking the
55:45end of an era. From here on, there will
55:50still be fighting in Europe and many
55:52more wars, but the religious aspect
55:54will become secondary; it might still
55:57be present in certain cases, but we
55:59will see Catholics allied with
56:01Protestants without any further issues
56:03of that kind. There will no longer be a
56:06religious unity of Catholics on one
56:07side and Protestants on the other. And
56:10why? Because by now, the religious
56:12issue has become a secondary matter.
56:14Instead, political and economic
56:16problems will emerge to take center
56:18stage. A sign that the outcomes of the
56:21Reformation, nearly a century and a
56:23half after Luther's first preaching,
56:24are by now accepted. Europe is divided
56:28between Catholics, Lutherans,
56:31Calvinists, and a myriad of other
56:33religions or faiths scattered here and
56:36there. This is a fact that everyone now
56:39essentially accepts. Furthermore, it
56:42must be said that while one phase did
56:44close, it closed in a very dramatic way
56:46, because the Thirty Years 'War was a
56:47disastrous war for everyone, really,
56:49except for France, which entered at the
56:51very end. Disastrous from an economic
56:54point of view, and also from a
56:56demographic point of view. In fact, the
56:591600s were a century of crisis, a very
57:01heavy crisis, which we will discuss in
57:03detail in the next lesson. However,
57:06this crisis was motivated by various
57:08factors, but certainly, the war had an
57:11important role because it was extremely
57:13costly. I have already told you: the
57:17various sovereigns in Spain, in Germany
57:19, but not only there, raised taxes
57:22sharply to be able to finance this war
57:24and pay for the army, and so
57:26significant economic problems were
57:28created; but it was also disastrous
57:30from an environmental point of view, we
57:33could say, because these armies that
57:35were constantly fighting and moving
57:38throughout Germany and not only in
57:40Germany, caused disasters, looted,
57:44destroyed fields, destroyed cities, and
57:46in this way, the whole system was
57:48clearly damaged, the whole society, not
57:51only German but European. Finally,
57:54these large movements of armies and the
57:57precarious conditions from a hygienic
57:59point of view favored the spread of
58:01many diseases. The 1600s were a century
58:04of a resurgence of the plague. The
58:06plague that we had seen in the 1300s
58:08had caused millions of deaths and then
58:10remained somewhat under the radar in
58:11Europe, but in the 1600s, it exploded
58:13again. It is no coincidence, if you
58:15remember*The Betrothed*where there is
58:17talk of the plague in Milan, that we
58:18are still in the 1600s. Indeed, the
58:21plague returned to claim victims in
58:23Europe, but besides the plague, other
58:25very serious infectious diseases spread
58:27. The most—the novelty of the century
58:31was syphilis in particular, which was
58:33carried around by the armies and which
58:35was particularly degrading,
58:37particularly shameful. So the paradox
58:40is that every country started
58:42describing syphilis as a disease of
58:45their neighbor, meaning the French
58:47called it the Germans' disease, the
58:49Germans the French disease, and so on.
58:52And this makes us think a little bit
58:55about what is happening today with the
58:57coronavirus, where every country blames
59:00their neighbor for spreading the virus.
59:03First we blamed it on the Chinese, then
59:05it was the Italians, the
59:07plague-spreaders, and so on. Well, this
59:10psychosis of the plague-spreader that
59:13we see in Manzoni’s "The Betrothed"
59:15was actually present in 17 th-century
59:17Europe and is connected to the plague,
59:20but especially to other new diseases,
59:22and in particular, to syphilis. This
59:26last topic concludes the overview we
59:28tried to provide of Germany in the
59:301600s and, in particular, the Thirty
59:32Years 'War. As I told you, we have thus
59:34concluded the wars of religion, but
59:36next time we will talk about the crisis
59:39of the 17th century and address new
59:41issues. These will be issues that
59:44connect back to what we have done
59:46previously, but partly new, as usual. I
59:49advise you to keep pace, keep up with
59:51the lessons we are doing, study from
59:54the book, take some notes, and if
59:56necessary, ask questions about points
59:58in the explanation that are not clear.
1:00:01We will meet here again in a few days
1:00:04for a new episode of our history course
1:00:06. Until next time.

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