Thirty+Year's+War

Emily Liu

__Religious rivalries__
 * Evaluate the relative importance of the religious rivalries and dynastic ambitions that shaped the course of the Thirty Years' War.**
 * Thesis: Between 1618 and 1648, the Thiry Years' War that started off as a war of religious issues between Catholic and Protestants and became a war based on dynastic ambitions between France and Spain allowed the Europeans to realize that every state had the right to choose their own religion.**
 * AKA "last o the religiou wars"
 * Catholics vs. Calvinism
 * Catholic League - Duke Maximilian vs. Protestant Union - Elector Palatine Frederick IV
 * In the Bohemian phase, Bohemian Estates(Calvinists) accepted the Habsburg Archduke Ferdinand(devout Catholic) as their king, but they regretted their decision because Ferdinand started to re-Catholicizing Bohemia
 * When Ferdinand became the Holy Roman Emperor, he took over Bohemia and established Catholicism as the sole religion, causing 30,000 Protestant families to emigrate
 * Ferdinand II issued the Edict of Restitution in March 1629 = prohibited Calvinist worship and restored to the Catholic church all confiscated property taken by the Protestants
 * Battle of Nordlingen (Swedes vs. Bohemians) 1934 - Southern Germany remained Catholic ---> annulled the Edict Restitution

__Dynastic ambitions__
 * Ferdinand became king of Spain and acquired Habsburg lands in Austria and E. Euro > France was surrounded by Spanish properties
 * Spain planned to retract the 12-year negotiation with Netherlands and planned to take the northern Dutch provinces
 * Austrian HabsburgsWanted to consolidate their holdings in Austria and Bohemia by eliminating Protestantism and establishing stronger central authority
 * Spain under Ferdinand II took Bohemia and Palatinate
 * In the Danish phase, King Christian IV of Denmark wanted to annex territories in northern Germany that would give him control of the southern Baltic
 * Ferdinand sent Bohemian noble, Albrecht von Wallenstein, who defeated King Christian IV and occupied parts of northern Germany
 * Swedish phase: Gustavus Adolphus, king of Sweden, revived Sweden and made it into a great power
 * Franco-Swedish phase: France and Swedes vs. Catholic Habsburgs of Germany and Spain

__How do these components shape the course of the war?__
 * First started off as a religious war, then it became a dynastic war (ie: Catholic French and Protestant Swedes vs. Catholic Habsburgs of Germany and Spain)
 * This war was based on dynastic power politics fueled by religious rivalries between opposing countries
 * Peace of Westphalia - ensured all German states to determine their own religion
 * Peace of the Pyrenees - peace between France and Spain