Diplomatic History of Europe 1500 - 2000 | The Thirty Years’ War (Lecture 5)

Lecture 5: The trauma of the Thirty Years’ War from 1618 to 1648 was profound. Intertwining explosive elements of religion and politics, the conflict (touched off by a diplomatic incident in Bohemia) raged for a generation across the center of Europe, devastating and depopulating many German lands. When it seemed that the Holy Roman Emperor might establish durable power, the war was internationalized and drew in even more major European powers, with intervention by Denmark, Sweden, and France. Even as the war raged, ongoing diplomatic negotiations changed its character, and political imperatives soon displaced original religious loyalties. The result of this devastation was ultimately exhaustion, which would produce an epochal change in how international politics was understood and practiced.

Essential Reading:
Paul Kennedy, The Rise and Fall of the Great Powers, pp. 31–72

Supplementary Reading:
Stephen J. Lee, The Thirty Years War.