THE THIRTY YEARS WAR 1618-48
The 1600’s was a funny old time for the continent of Europe. Like most other centuries before and since, it was positively stuffed with tales of great kings, exciting new ideas and the kind of opulent fashion you just don’t see nowadays (for better or worse). Yet there’s one major chapter of the era that doesn’t seem to get much of a shout out these days, which is weird considering how formative it was in the building blocks of modern Europe. I’m talking of course about the great big barrel of laughs called the Thirty Years War.
Now I think you’ll all agree that thirty years of war is an absurdly long time, longer still if you’re forced to live through it. But what kind of conflict could possibly last so arduously long? The answer will probably come as no surprise whatsoever. Granted whenever we think about the eye watering madness that is ‘holy’ war, the mind inevitably drifts to some kind of epic battle between the forces of Saladin and Richard I. Which is interesting because the last of the crusades ended some 750 years ago and the thirty years war took place a mere 400 years ago. The big difference of course is that this war wasn’t fought between Christians and Muslims, but rather Christians and other Christians.
Despite only kicking off in the early 17th Century, the conflict actually had deep roots stretching back to the Protestant Reformation nearly 100 years beforehand – where folk such as Martin Luther began to challenge the almighty influence of the Catholic Church. The resulting discord created by these ideas was like forcing everyone in Europe to support either Manchester United or Liverpool and culminated in a massive theological rift. By now rather peeved at this blatant sacrilege, the Catholics instigated a Counter Reformation, aiming to bring its wayward flock back into the loving arms of the Pope – at sword point if necessary.
So when brand new Holy Roman Emperor Ferdinand II (of Bohemia) rose to power, he decided to do pretty much that, sporting the classic ‘join or die’ mentality that everyone loves so much. After some early success that included the put down of a rebellion in Bohemia (1618-21), the Emperor turned to Germany at large and prepared to get everyone wearing ‘I heart Catholicism’ t-shirts in due course. Naturally in doing so, the Protestant community of Europe had something of a bone to pick with the Emperor, eager to remind him that ‘yeah nice try fella, but we’ll do what we want, thanks’. They were able to back this up more convincingly when the Swedes rolled into town, routing Imperial forces in 1631. But far from being the end of the matter, Sweden’s arrival, as one of the major military powerhouses of the age, was swiftly followed by other nations wanting to get in on the action. What followed was something of a bizarre, continental tag team match, lining up all of the big players of the 1600’s.
Following Sweden’s knockout punch in 1631, the Austrians tag in the Catholic juggernaut of Spain while they recover. Eager to take the Protestants down a peg, Spain rushes into the ring and violently spears Sweden to floor (Nordlingen 1634). Watching from the sidelines, France gets anxious that Spain and Austria might actually win and leaps into action (1635). Consequently, France and Spain end up slogging it out in a bitter fight which puts everything back up for grabs. With Spain eventually subdued by France (Rocroi 1643), Sweden is finally free to take out Austria with a finisher and pins them for the win (Jankau 1645).
The conflict eventually ended in 1648 with the Peace of Westphalia, so at this point it would probably be fair to ask exactly who won. The truth is somewhat of a grey area, considering that there were winners and losers all over the place and not all of them were on the same team. More to the point, there could be no illusion that by the end of the war, Religion had become increasingly secondary to good old political manoeuvring. This is how France, as a Catholic power, wound up fighting with Protestants against other Catholic powers in a war originally started to forcibly re-impose Catholicism on Protestants living in loosely connected Empire of both Catholics and Protestants.
Ultimately it was a victory for the Protestant cause, as they emerged from the war without having to suffer any kind of enforced Catholicism and it was Sweden who survived as the victorious representative of the faith. Yet the consequences went far, far deeper. France, to their credit, came out of the ordeal better than anyone and this was ironic because they seemingly had no dog in the fight, but decided to get involved anyway. At the other end of the spectrum Spain, Denmark and The Holy Roman Empire (who gave way to a patchwork of autonomous states) were well and truly on the ropes, losing massive influence on the grand stage. But prestige aside, it was the German states that easily suffered the most.
As the war progressed, there appeared to be some kind of morbid one-upmanship on who could be the most obnoxious guest to German lands (allies and enemies alike). Of course being that most of the armies casually strolling through peoples livelihoods were paid mercenaries, they didn’t seem to think twice about committing the most horrific atrocities against the locals. To compound the total misery, with the land ravaged and lives in ruins, disease then cut through whole regions like a knife through butter. With a fifth of the German population dead as a result, it’s not hard to see how this ranks as one of Europe’s most brutal wars.
The final and most enduring consequence of the war was how it reshaped the nature of politics. Having embroiled themselves in such a long and bitter conflict, all the great powers had started to put nationalism a solid first on the agenda and soon matters of religion took a backseat to totally innocent empire building. It could actually be argued that the war was pretty much a ‘last hurrah’ for anyone with a religious agenda to just ‘get it out of their systems’, being that after this final religious war, the issue would be removed as a threat to relative peace on the continent.