Early Modern History Winter 2024

The Thirty Years War, which would later become one of the deadliest wars in European history, initially started as a clash between Protestant and Catholic states. After his appointment as the king of Bohemia, Ferdinand of Styria “began to close Protestant churches, [which] Bohemian officials objected, and threw two of his representatives out of a window in Prague” (Wiesner-Hanks, 343). This event led to civil war within Bohemia, where armies of the Catholic League and the Protestant Union joined. The Catholics experienced overwhelming success, which demonstrated the possibility of a “large, strong Catholic state in central Europe under Habsburg rule” (Wiesner-Hanks, 343). This prospect alarmed both Protestants and Catholics opposed to Habsburg power, and what ensued was a cascading cataclysm of conflict that would engulf Europe for three decades. Although religion served as the preliminary spark that initiated the conflict leading to the Thirty Years War, it would become more of a hallmark banner rather than the core issue underlying the war. Countries that were eager to challenge Habsburg domination, such as France, Denmark, and Sweden, joined the fight, transforming the conflict into a brutal, multifaceted struggle for political and territorial control of Europe. This war pitted ambitious empires and states against one another, quickly evolving into a complex interplay of shifting alliances based upon changing interests. As the war dragged on for three long decades, every country involved experienced devastating effects. Exhausted and weary, every affected party finally took steps towards achieving peace in 1648 with the Peace of Westphalia.

The Peace of Westphalia, which took three years to agree upon, attempted to resolve the current political realities of Europe. This treaty recognized the sovereignty and independence of disputed territories, gave “territorial rulers… the right to choose the religion of their territories… [and] more than a hundred other clauses, largely confirming various princes’ rights over certain territories” (Wiesner-Hanks, 344). One such clause was the addition of Calvinism, alongside Lutheranism and Catholicism, as an acceptable religion to be chosen by a territory’s ruler. This revoked Ferdinand II’s Edict of Restitution (which restored Catholicism to protestant lands transferred after the Peace of Augsburg) and appeased the increasing number of Calvinists in Europe. The Holy Roman Empire had to recognize the independence of the “United Provinces of the Netherlands and Switzerland as fully independent,” while the Habsburgs retained their “family holdings and claims on the imperial title” (Wiesner-Hanks 345).The Peace of Westphalia symbolizes a conclusion to religious disputes (which took hundreds of years to settle) while transitioning toward the new wave of European territorial conflicts. This treaty not only secured religious tolerance within the Holy Roman Empire, but also established principles of state sovereignty and non-interference, setting the foundations for the nation-state system and modern international law as we know it today.

* Credit to Zach Hill

The Thirty Years war was ultimately one of the deadliest wars in European history, and was definitively the deadliest during the 17th century. It is estimated that as much as “one-third of the population of the [Holy Roman] Empire died during the course of the war. Such civilian losses would not be matched again until the wars of the twentieth century” (Wiesner-Hanks, 344). During this war, there were no clear rules of engagement, thus “mercenary armies indiscriminately burned crops and villages, slaughtered animals, and terrorized and killed people” (Wiesner-Hanks, 344). Additionally, “hunger and disease… accompanied the troops and the refugees who fled from place to place, killing far more of them than did battle wounds” (Wiesner-Hanks, 344). Consequently, cities were destroyed and left in ruins, economies crumbled, and widespread populations dwindled. As the war drew to an end and the Peace of Westphalia was reached, early modern Europe was relieved of this monumental strain on development and could begin rebuilding.

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Connor Richards