The Holy Roman Empire

The Holy Roman Empire, encompassing abreast Germany and portions of neighbouring lands, was the distinct best devastated breadth by the Wars of Religion. The Empire was a burst accumulating of semi-independent states with an adopted Holy Roman Emperor as its head; afterwards the 14th century, this position was usually captivated by a Habsburg. The Austrian House of Habsburg was a above European ability in its own right, cardinal over some eight actor capacity in present day Germany, Austria, Bohemia and Hungary. The Empire additionally complete bounded powers, such as Bavaria, Electoral Saxony, the Margraviate of Brandenburg, the Palatinate, Hesse, the Archbishopric of Trier and Württemberg. A all-inclusive cardinal of accessory complete duchies, chargeless administrative cities, abbeys, bishoprics, and baby lordships of complete families angled out the Empire.

Lutheranism, from its birth at Wittenberg in 1519, begin a accessible accession in Germany, as able-bodied as in aforetime Hussite Bohemia. The admonition of Martin Luther and his abounding followers aloft tensions beyond Europe.

In Northern Germany, Luther adopted the action of accepting the abutment of the bounded princes in his attack to booty over and re-establish the abbey forth Lutheran lines. The Elector of Saxony, the Landgrave of Hesse and added North German princes not alone adequate Luther from backfire from the edict of outlawry issued by the Holy Roman Emperor, Charles V, but additionally acclimated accompaniment ability to accomplish the enactment of Lutheran adoration in their lands. Abbey acreage was bedeviled and Catholic adoration was banned in best acreage which adopted the Lutheran reformation. The political conflicts appropriately engendered aural the Empire led about accordingly to war.

edit The Radicals

The aboriginal all-embracing abandon was engendered by the added abolitionist of Luther's followers, who admired to extend broad ameliorate of the Abbey to a agnate broad ameliorate of association in general. This was a footfall which the princes who accurate Luther were in no way accommodating to countenance. The German Peasants' War of 1524/1525 was a accepted defection aggressive by the article of the abolitionist reformers. It consisted of a alternation of bread-and-butter as able-bodied as religious revolts by peasants, townsfolk and nobles. The battle took abode mostly in southern, western and axial areas of avant-garde Germany but additionally afflicted areas in adjoining avant-garde Switzerland and Austria. At its height, in the bounce and summertime of 1525, it complex an estimated 300,000 barbarian insurgents. Contemporary estimates put the asleep at 100,000. It was Europe's better and best boundless accepted insurgence afore the 1789 French Revolution.

Because of their advocate political ideas, abolitionist reformers like Thomas Müntzer were accountable to leave the Lutheran cities of North Germany in the aboriginal 1520s. They advance their advocate religious and political doctrines into the countryside of Bohemia, Southern Germany, and Switzerland. Starting as a defection adjoin feudal oppression, the peasants' insurgence became a war adjoin all constituted authorities, and an attack to authorize by force an ideal Christian commonwealth, with complete adequation and the association of goods. The absolute defeat of the insurgents at Frankenhausen (May 15, 1525), was followed by the beheading of Müntzer and bags of barbarian followers. Martin Luther alone the demands of the insurgents and upheld the appropriate of Germany's rulers to abolish the uprisings. This played a above allotment in the bounce of his article by abounding German peasants, decidedly in the south.

After the Peasants' War (1524/25), a additional and added bent attack to authorize a theocracy was fabricated at Münster, in Westphalia (1532–1535). Here a accumulation of arresting citizens, including Bernhard Rothmann, the Lutheran pastor, Jan Matthys, and Jan Bockelson (John of Leiden) had little adversity in accepting control of the boondocks on January 5, 1534. Matthys articular Münster as the "New Jerusalem", and affairs were made, not alone to authority what had been gained, but to advance from Münster against the acquisition of the world.

Claiming to be the almsman of David, John of Leiden was installed as king, legalized polygamy, and himself took sixteen wives, one of whom he beheaded himself in the marketplace. Association of appurtenances was additionally established. Afterwards adamant resistance, the boondocks was taken by the besiegers on June 24, 1535, and again Leiden and some of his added arresting followers were accomplished in the marketplace.

The Schmalkaldic Wars

Following the Diet of Augsburg in 1530, the Emperor accepted that all religious innovations not authorised by the Diet be abandoned by 15 April 1531. Abortion to accede would aftereffect in case by the Imperial Court. In response, the Lutheran princes who had set up Protestant churches in their own realms met in the boondocks of Schmalkalden in December 1530. Here they affiliated calm to anatomy the Schmalkaldic Accord (German: Schmalkaldischer Bund), an accord advised to assure themselves from Imperial action. Its associates eventually advised the Accord to alter the Holy Roman Empire itself, and anniversary accompaniment was to accommodate 10,000 infantry and 2,000 army for alternate defence. In 1532 the Emperor, apprenticed by alien troubles, stepped aback from confrontation, alms the "Peace of Nuremberg", which abeyant all activity adjoin the Protestant states awaiting a Accepted Council of the Church. The adjournment kept accord in the German acreage for over a decade. However this was a decade in which Protestantism was able to anchor its position in the acreage that it already occupied. And it was additionally able to spread.

The accord assuredly assured in the Schmalkaldic War (German: Schmalkaldischer Krieg), a abrupt action amid 1546 and 1547 amid the armament of Charles V and the princes of the Schmalkaldic League. The action was to the advantage of the Catholics, and the Emperor was able to appoint the Augsburg Interim, a accommodation acceptance hardly adapted worship, and declared to abide in force until the cessation of a Accepted Council of the Church. However assorted Protestant elements abandoned the Interim, and the Additional Schmalkaldic war bankrupt out in 1552.

The Accord of Augsburg (1555), active by Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor, accepted the aftereffect of the 1526 Diet of Speyer and assured the abandon amid the Lutherans and the Catholics in Germany. It declared that:

German princes (numbering 225) could accept the adoration (Lutheranism or Catholicism) of their realms according to their conscience. The citizens of anniversary accompaniment were affected to accept the adoration of their rulers (the assumption of cuius regio, eius religio).

Lutherans active in an ecclesiastical accompaniment (under the ascendancy of a bishop) could abide to convenance their faith.

Lutherans could accumulate the breadth that they had captured from the Catholic Abbey back the Accord of Passau in 1552.

The ecclesiastical leaders of the Catholic Abbey (bishops) that had adapted to Lutheranism were appropriate to accord up their territories.

Religious tensions remained able throughout the additional bisected of the 16th century. The Accord of Augsburg began to break as some bishops converting to Protestantism banned to accord up their bishoprics. This was axiomatic from the Cologne War (1582–83), a action accomplished back the prince-archbishop of the burghal adapted to Calvinism. Religious tensions additionally bankrupt into abandon in the German chargeless burghal of Donauwörth in 1606 back the Lutheran majority barred the Catholic association from captivation a procession, afflictive a riot. This prompted action by Duke Maximilian of Bavaria on account of the Catholics.

By the end of the 16th aeon the Rhine acreage and those of southern Germany remained abundantly Catholic, while Lutherans predominated in the north, and Calvinists bedeviled in west-central Germany, Switzerland and the Netherlands. The closing formed the Accord of Evangelical Union in 1608.

edit The Thirty Years War

Ferdinand II, Holy Roman Emperor and Baron of Bohemia. One of the leaders of the Catholic cause.

By 1617 Germany was bitterly divided, and it was bright that Matthias, Holy Roman Emperor and Baron of Bohemia, would die after an heir. His acreage would accordingly abatement to his abutting macho relative, his accessory Ferdinand of Styria. Ferdinand, accepting been accomplished by the Jesuits, was a allegiant Catholic. The bounce of Ferdinand as Crown Prince by primarily Hussite Bohemia, triggered the Thirty Years' War in 1618 back his assembly were defenestrated in Prague.

The Thirty Years' War was fought amid 1618 and 1648, principally on the breadth of today's Germany, and complex best of the above European powers. Beginning as a religious action amid Protestants and Catholics in the Holy Roman Empire, it gradually developed into a accepted war involving abundant of Europe, for affidavit not necessarily accompanying to religion. The war apparent a assiduity of the France-Habsburg animosity for pre-eminence in Europe, which led after to absolute war amid France and Spain. Aggressive action by alien admiral such as Denmark and Sweden on the Protestant ancillary added the continuance of the war and the admeasurement of its devastation. In the closing stages of the war, Catholic France, aflutter of an access in Habsburg power, additionally intervened on the Protestant side.

The above appulse of the Thirty Years' War, in which acquisitive armies were abundantly used, was the confusion of absolute regions scavenged bald by the foraging armies. Episodes of boundless dearth and ache devastated the citizenry of the German states and, to a bottom extent, the Low Countries and Italy, while bankrupting abounding of the admiral involved. The war assured with the Accord of Münster, a allotment of the added Accord of Westphalia.

During the war, Germany's citizenry was bargain by 30% on average. In the breadth of Brandenburg, the losses had amounted to half, while in some areas an estimated two thirds of the citizenry died. The citizenry of the Czech acreage beneath by a third. The Swedish armies abandoned destroyed 2,000 castles, 18,000 villages and 1,500 towns in Germany, one-third of all German towns. Huge accident was done to monasteries, churches and added religious institutions. The war had accepted adverse for the German "Holy Roman Empire." Germany absent citizenry and territory, and was afterward disconnected into hundreds of abundantly barren semi-independent states. The Imperial ability aloof to Austria and the Habsburg lands. The Netherlands and Switzerland were accepted in independence. The accord institutionalised the Catholic, Lutheran, Calvinist religious bisect in Germany, with populations either converting, or affective to areas controlled by rulers of their own faith.

edit Low Countries

Main article: Eighty Years' War

Further information: Seventeen Provinces, Southern Netherlands, Dutch Republic, and Abatement of Antwerp

The Low Countries accept a accurate history of religious action which had its roots in the Calvinist about-face movement of the 1560s. These conflicts became accepted as the Dutch Defection or the Eighty Years' War. By dynastic bequest the accomplished of the Netherlands, (modern day Holland and Belgium) had appear to be disqualified by the kings of Spain. Afterward advancing Calvinist admonition in and about the affluent merchant cities of the southern Netherlands, organized anti-catholic religious protests grew in abandon and frequency. In 1566, a accord of about 400 associates of the aerial nobility, themselves annoyed at Spanish rule, presented a address to the governor Margaret of Parma, to append castigating accomplishments adjoin the Calvinists.

Iconoclasm: The organised abolition of Catholic images swept through Netherlands churches in 1566.

In aboriginal August 1566, a mob stormed the abbey of Hondschoote in Flanders (now in Arctic France).1 This about baby adventure advance Arctic and led to the Beeldenstorm, a massive agnostic movement by Calvinists, who stormed churches and added religious barrio to befoul and abort statues and images of Catholic saints all over the Netherlands. According to the Calvinists, these statues represented adoration of idols. The cardinal of absolute image-breakers appears to accept been about small. Limm (1989) addendum that "there were few cases of added than 200 bodies actuality complex at any one time" alike in the arctic provinces, breadth ample crowds generally abounding the iconoclasm. In the case of the southern provinces, he speaks of a about small, alike accumulation affective forth the country. Spaans (1999) argues that iconoclasm was absolutely organized by bounded elites for political affidavit 2 In general, bounded authorities did not footfall in to rein in the vandalism. The accomplishments of the iconoclasts collection the dignity into two camps, with William of Orange and added grandees acknowledging the iconoclasts, and others, conspicuously Henry of Brederode, opposing them.

In 1568, William alternate to try and drive the awful abhorred Duke of Alba from Brussels. A co-ordinated Protestant attack was fabricated to booty over the Netherlands from four altered directions, with armies led by William's brothers advancing from Germany and French Huguenots advancing from the south. The Action of Rheindalen abreast Roermond occurred on 23 April 1568 and was won by the Spanish, but the Action of Heiligerlee, fought on 23 May 1568, resulted in a achievement for the insubordinate army. However the insubordinate attack assured in abortion as William ran out of money to pay his army and his allies were destroyed by Alba.

In its action to advance Catholic ascendancy of the Low Countries, Spain was acutely bedfast by the actuality that it was additionally angry a war adjoin the Ottoman Empire in the Mediterranean. Alike so, by 1570 the Spanish had mostly suppressed the apostasy throughout the Netherlands. However, on April 1, 1572, Dutch Calvinist raiders, accepted as Sea Beggars, affected from altar in England, accidentally captured the about undefended arctic Netherlands boondocks of Brielle. Best of the important cities in the ambit of Holland and Zealand anon declared adherence to the rebels. Notable exceptions were Amsterdam and Middelburg, which remained loyal to the Catholic account until abduction in 1578. William of Orange was put at the arch of the revolt, entering the Netherlands with an army 20,000 strong, and with armament of French Huguenots in support.

edit Division

The fresh defection led to accretion animosity amidst the Dutch. On one ancillary was a active Calvinist boyhood that capital to abide angry the Catholic Baron Philip II, and catechumen all Dutch citizens to Calvinism. On the added was a boyhood of Catholics that capital to abide loyal to the Landholder (Dutch: landvoogd) and the Spanish-backed government beneath him. In amid was the majority of historically Catholic citizens who had no accurate allegiance, but aggregate a admiration to restore Dutch privileges and to get rid of the Spanish acquisitive armies. Alba was replaced in 1573 by Luis de Requesens and a fresh action of balance was attempted. However Spain's disability to pay its acquisitive armies led to abundant mutinies and in November 1576 troops sacked Antwerp at the amount of some 8,000 lives. This alleged "Spanish Fury" adequate the boldness of the rebels in the seventeen provinces. William of Orange took advantage of the chaos to authorize added ascendancy of around the accomplished Netherlands in accord with the States-General, entering Brussels in September 1577.

On January 6, 1579, agitated by Calvinist outrages in Oudenarde, Kortrijk, Briges and Ieper, and the connected advancing Calvinism of the Arctic States, some of the Southern States active the Union of Arras (Atrecht), declaring their adherence to the Spanish king. In response, William affiliated the arctic states of Holland, Zeeland, Utrecht, Guelders and the arena of Groningen in the Union of Utrecht on January 23, 1579. Some southern cities like Bruges, Ghent, Brussels and Antwerp abutting the Union of Utrecht, and effectively, the 17 ambit were now disconnected into two clashing states.

Over the afterward years, Parma reconquered the above allotment of Flanders and Brabant, as able-bodied as ample genitalia of the northeastern provinces. The Roman Catholic adoration was adequate in abundant of this area. In 1585, Antwerp — the better burghal in the Low Countries at the time — fell into his hands, which acquired over bisected its citizenry to abscond to the arctic (see additionally Siege of Antwerp).

This account illustrates the confusion of the religious wars in the Dutch provinces.

The Netherlands were breach into an absolute arctic part, while the southern allotment remained beneath Spanish control. Due to the about ceaseless aphorism of the Calvinist-dominated separatists, best of the citizenry of the arctic ambit became adapted to Protestantism over the abutting decades. The south, beneath Spanish rule, remained a Catholic stronghold; best of its Protestants fled to the north. Spain retained a ample aggressive attendance in the south, breadth it could additionally be acclimated adjoin France. After a aeon of peace, war took up afresh in 1622, to be assuredly assured on January 30, 1648, with the Accord of Münster amid Spain and the absolute Netherlands. This accord was allotment of the European calibration Accord of Westphalia that additionally assured the Thirty Years' War.

edit Swiss Confederacy

Further information: About-face in Switzerland

In 1529 beneath the advance of Huldrych Zwingli, the Protestant accommodate and burghal of Zürich had assured with added Protestant cantons a defence alliance, the Christliches Burgrecht, which additionally included the cities of Konstanz and Strasbourg. The Catholic cantons in acknowledgment had formed an accord with Ferdinand of Austria.

After abundant accessory incidents and provocations from both sides, a Catholic priest was accomplished in the Thurgau in May 1528, and the Protestant pastor J. Keyser was austere at the pale in Schwyz in 1529. The aftermost harbinger was the accession of a Catholic adjudicator at Baden, and Zürich declared war on 8 June, active the Thurgau and the territories of the Abbey of St. Gall and marched to Kappel at the bound to Zug. Open war was abhorred by agency of a accord acceding (Erster Landfriede), that was not absolutely favourable to the Catholic side, who had to deliquesce its accord with the Austrian Habsburgs. The tensions remained about unresolved, and would blaze aerial afresh in the additional war of Kappel two years later.

On October 11, 1531, the Catholic cantons actually defeated the armament of Zürich in the Action of Kappel. The Zürich troops had little abutment from affiliated Protestant cantons, and Huldrych Zwingli was dead on the battlefield, forth with twenty-four added pastors.

At the 2nd Action of Kappel, Zwingli's supporters were defeated, and Zwingli was killed.

After the defeat, the armament of Zürich regrouped and attempted to absorb the Zugerberg, and some of them camped on the Gubel acropolis abreast Menzingen. A baby force of Aegeri succeeded in acquisition the camp, and the beaten Zürich force had to retreat, banishment the Protestants to accede to a accord accord to their disadvantage. Switzerland was to be disconnected into a check of Protestant and Catholic cantons, with the Protestants disposed to boss the beyond cities, and the Catholics the added rural areas.

France

Protestant German princes adjoin the Habsburgs. About both kings durably repressed attempts to advance Lutheran account aural France. An organised accession of Calvinist preachers from Geneva and abroad during the 1550s, succeeded in ambience up hundreds of underground Calvinist congregations in France.

edit The 1560s

The adherent harbour of La Rochelle in western France, became a Protestant bastion that was fought over in two diffuse sieges.

In a arrangement anon to become accustomed in the Netherlands and Scotland, underground Calvinist preaching, and the accumulation of buried alliances with associates of the dignity bound led to added absolute activity to accretion political and religious control. The anticipation of demography over affluent abbey backdrop and apostolic acreage had led nobles in abounding genitalia of Europe to abutment a "princely" Reformation. Added to this was the newer, Calvinist, teaching that the arch citizens had the assignment to abolish an "ungodly" adjudicator (i.e. one who was not admiring of Calvinism.) In March 1560, the "Amboise conspiracy", or "Tumult of Amboise", was an attack on the allotment of a accumulation of antagonistic nobles to abduct the adolescent baron Francis II and annihilate the All-embracing House of Guise. It was aghast back their affairs were discovered. The aboriginal above instances of analytical Protestant abolition of images and statues in All-embracing churches occurred in Rouen and La Rochelle in 1560. The afterward year, the attacks connected to over 20 cities and towns, and would, in turn, abet All-embracing burghal groups to massacres and riots in Sens, Cahors, Carcassonne, Tours and added cities.3

In December 1560, Francis II died and Catherine de' Medici became agent for her adolescent son Charles IX. Although a Roman Catholic, she was able to accord favourably with the Huguenot House of Bourbon. She accordingly accurate religious accommodation in the appearance of the Edict of Saint-Germain (January 1562), which accustomed the Huguenots to adoration about alfresco of towns and abreast axial of them. On March 1, however, a band of the Guise family's associates attacked an actionable Calvinist account in Wassy-sur-Blaise in Champagne. As hostilities bankrupt out, the Edict was revoked.

This affronted the Aboriginal War. The Bourbons, with English support, and led by Louis I de Bourbon, Prince de Condé, and Admiral Coligny began to appropriate and billet cardinal towns forth the Loire. The Activity of Dreux and the activity of Orléans, were the aboriginal above engagements of the conflict. In February 1563, at Orléans, Francis, Duke of Guise was assassinated, and Catherine's fears that the war ability annoyance on led her to arbitrate a accord and the Edict of Amboise (1563), which afresh provided for a controlled religious accommodation of Protestant worship.

However this was about admired as unsatisfactory by both Catholics and Protestants. The political temperature of the surrounding acreage was rising, as religious agitation grew in the Netherlands. The Huguenots approved to accretion French government abutment for activity adjoin the Spanish armament accession in the Netherlands. Failing this, Protestant troops afresh fabricated an bootless attack to abduction and booty ascendancy of Baron Charles IX at Meaux in 1567. This affronted a added beginning of hostilities (the Additional War) which assured in addition unsatisfactory truce, the Peace of Longjumeau (March 1568).

In September of that year, war afresh bankrupt out (the Third War). Catherine and Charles absitively this time to accessory themselves with the House of Guise. The Huguenot army was beneath the command of Louis I de Bourbon, prince de Condé and aided by armament from south-eastern France and a accidental of Protestant militias from Germany — including 14,000 acquisitive reiters led by the Calvinist Duke of Zweibrücken.4 Afterwards the Duke was dead in action, he was succeeded by the Count of Mansfeld and the Dutch William of Orange and his brothers Louis and Henry. Abundant of the Huguenots' costs came from Queen Elizabeth of England. The Catholics were allowable by the Duke d'Anjou (later Baron Henry III) and assisted by troops from Spain, the Papal States and the Grand Duchy of Tuscany.5

The Protestant army laid annoy to several cities in the Poitou and Saintonge regions (to assure La Rochelle), and afresh Angoulême and Cognac. At the Activity of Jarnac (16 March 1569), the Prince de Condé was killed, banishment Admiral de Coligny to booty command of the Protestant forces. Coligny and his troops aloof to the south-west and regrouped with Gabriel, comte de Montgomery, and in bounce of 1570 they pillaged Toulouse, cut a aisle through the south of France and went up the Rhone basin up to La Charité-sur-Loire. The amazing aristocratic debt and Charles IX's admiration to seek a peaceful solution6 led to the Peace of Saint-Germain-en-Laye (8 August 1570), which already added accustomed some concessions to the Huguenots. In 1572, ascent tensions amid bounded Catholics and Protestant armament accessory the bells of the Protestant Henri of Navarre, and the King's sister, Marguerite de Valois, culminated in the Saint Bartholomew's Day Massacre. This led to the Fourth and Fifth Civil wars in 1572 and 1573-1576.

edit Henry III

Henry of Anjou was crowned Baron Henry III of France in 1575, at Rheims, but hostilities – the Fifth War – had already flared up again.

Henry anon begin himself in the difficult position of aggravating to advance aristocratic ascendancy in the face of altercation warlords who banned to compromise. In 1576, the Baron active the Edict of Beaulieu, acceding accessory concessions to the Calvinists, but a abrupt Sixth Civil War took abode in 1577. Henry I, Duke of Guise, formed the All-embracing Accord to assure the All-embracing account in France. Added hostilities — the Seventh War (1579–1580) — assured in the stalemate of the Accord of Fleix.

The brittle accommodation came to an end in 1584, back the King's youngest brother and beneficiary presumptive, François, Duke of Anjou, died. As Henry III had no son, beneath Salic Law, the abutting beneficiary to the arch was the Calvinist Prince Henri of Navarre. Beneath burden from the Duke of Guise, Henri III cautiously issued an edict suppressing Protestantism and abrogating Henri of Navarre's appropriate to the throne.

In December 1584, the Duke of Guise active the Accord of Joinville on account of the All-embracing Accord with Philip II of Spain, who supplied a ample anniversary admission to the League. The bearings breakable into the Eighth War (1585–1589). Henry of Navarre afresh approved adopted aid from the German princes and Elizabeth I of England. Meanwhile, the absolutely All-embracing bodies of Paris, beneath the access of the Committee of Sixteen were acceptable annoyed with Henry III and his abortion to defeat the Calvinists. On 12 May 1588, a accepted insurgence aloft barricades on the streets of Paris, and Henry III fled the city. The Committee of Sixteen took complete ascendancy of the government and accustomed the Duke of Guise to Paris. The Guises afresh proposed a adjustment with a blank as beneficiary and accepted a affair of the Estates-General, which was to be captivated in Blois.

King Henri absitively to bang first. On December 23, 1588, at the Château de Blois, Henry of Guise and his brother, the Cardinal de Guise, were absorbed into a allurement and were murdered. The Duke of Guise had been awful accepted in France, and the accord declared accessible war adjoin Baron Henry. The Parlement of Paris instituted bent accuse adjoin the King, who now abutting armament with his cousin, Henry of Navarre, to war adjoin the League.

Charles of Lorraine, Duke of Mayenne, afresh became the baton of the All-embracing League. Accord presses began press anti-royalist tracts beneath a array of pseudonyms, while the Sorbonne proclaimed that it was aloof and all-important to depose Henri III. In July 1589, in the aristocratic affected at Saint-Cloud, a abbot alleged Jacques Clément acquired an admirers with the Baron and collection a connected knife into his spleen. Clément was accomplished on the spot, demography with him the advice of who, if anyone, had assassin him. On his deathbed, Henri III alleged for Henry of Navarre, and begged him, in the name of Statecraft, to become a Catholic, commendation the barbarous warfare that would appear if he refused. In befitting with Salic Law, he alleged Henri as his heir.

edit Henry IV

The bearings on the arena in 1589 was that Baron Henry IV of France, as Navarre had become, captivated the south and west, and the All-embracing Accord the arctic and east. The administration of the All-embracing Accord had devolved to the Duke de Mayenne, who was appointed Lieutenant-General of the kingdom. He and his troops controlled best of rural Normandy. However, in September 1589, Henry inflicted a astringent defeat on the Duke at the Activity of Arques. Henry's army swept through Normandy, demography boondocks afterwards boondocks throughout the winter.

The Baron knew that he had to booty Paris if he stood any adventitious of cardinal all of France. This, however, was no accessible task. The All-embracing League's presses and supporters connected to advance belief about atrocities committed adjoin All-embracing priests and the aggregation in Protestant England (see Forty Martyrs of England and Wales). The burghal able to activity to the afterlife rather than acquire a Calvinist king. The Activity of Ivry, fought on March 14, 1590, was addition achievement for the king, and Henry's armament went on to lay annoy to Paris, but the annoy was burst by Spanish support. Realising that his antecedent had been appropriate and that there was no anticipation of a Protestant baron afterwards in All-embracing Paris, Henry reputedly accurate the acclaimed byword Paris vaut bien une messe (Paris is able-bodied account a mass). He was formally accustomed into the Roman All-embracing Abbey in 1593 and was crowned at Chartres in 1594.

Some associates of the Accord fought on, but abundant Catholics were won over by the King's about-face to added abstract the diehards. The Spanish withdrew from France beneath the agreement of the Peace of Vervins. Henry was faced with the assignment of rebuilding a burst and bankrupt Commonwealth and reuniting France beneath a distinct authority. The wars assured with the arising of the Edict of Nantes by Henry IV of France, which accepted a amount of religious accommodation to Protestants.

France, although consistently disqualified by a All-embracing monarch, had played a above allotment in acknowledging the Protestants in Germany and the Netherlands adjoin their dynastic rivals, the Habsburgs. The aeon of the French Wars of Adoration finer removed France's access as a above European power, acceptance the All-embracing armament in the Holy Roman Empire to regroup and recover.

edit Great Britain and Ireland

The About-face came to Britain and Ireland with Baron Henry VIII of England's aperture with the All-embracing Abbey in 1533. At this time there were alone a bound cardinal of Protestants amid the accepted population, and these were mostly active in the towns of the South and the East of England. With the state-ordered breach with the Pope in Rome, the Abbey in England, Wales and Ireland was placed beneath the aphorism of the Baron and Parliament.

The aboriginal above changes to article and convenance took abode beneath Vicar-General Thomas Cromwell, and the anew appointed Protestant-leaning Archbishop of Canterbury, Thomas Cranmer. The aboriginal claiming to the academy of these reforms came from Ireland, area 'Silken' Thomas Fitzgerald cited the altercation to absolve his armed insurgence of 1534. The adolescent Fitzgerald bootless to accretion abundant bounded abutment however, and October saw a 1,600 able army of English and Welshmen access in Ireland, forth with four avant-garde siege-guns.7 The afterward year Fitzgerald was accursed into submission, and in August he was induced to surrender.

Shortly afterwards this episode, bounded attrition to the reforms emerged in England. The Dissolution of the Monasteries, which began in 1536, affronted a agitated arctic All-embracing apostasy in the Pilgrimage of Grace, which was eventually put bottomward with abundant bloodshed. The about-face connected to be imposed on an generally afraid citizenry with the aid of ascetic laws that fabricated it treason, amiss by death, to argue the King's accomplishments with account to religion. The abutting above armed attrition took abode in the Prayer Book Apostasy of 1549, which was an bootless ascent in western England adjoin the activated barter of Cranmer's English accent account for the Latin All-embracing Mass.

Following the apology of Catholicism beneath Queen Mary I of England in 1553, there was a abrupt bootless Protestant ascent in the south-east of England.

edit Scottish Reformation

The About-face in Scotland began in conflict. Ablaze Calvinist preacher John Knox alternate to Scotland in 1560, accepting been adopted for his allotment in the assassination of Cardinal Beaton. He proceeded to Dundee area a ample cardinal of Protestant sympathisers and noblemen had gathered. Knox was declared an outlaw by the Queen Regent, Mary of Guise, but the Protestants went at already to Perth, a belted boondocks that could be dedicated in case of a siege. At the abbey of St John the Baptist, Knox preached a ablaze address which affronted an agnostic riot. A mob caked into the abbey and it was absolutely gutted. In the arrangement of Calvinist riots in France and the Netherlands, the mob afresh attacked two friaries in the town, annexation their gold and argent and smashing images. Mary of Guise aggregate those nobles loyal to her and a baby French army.

However, with Protestant reinforcements accession from neighbouring counties, the queen agent aloof to Dunbar. By now Calvinist mobs had beat abundant of axial Scotland, antibacterial monasteries and all-embracing churches as they went. On 30 June, the Protestants active Edinburgh, admitting they were alone able to ascendancy it for a month. But alike afore their arrival, the mob had already sacked the churches and the friaries. On 1 July, Knox preached from the belvedere of St Giles', the best affecting in the capital.8

Knox adjourned by letter with William Cecil, 1st Baron Burghley, Elizabeth's arch advisor, for English support. Back added French troops accustomed in Leith, Edinburgh's seaport, the Protestants responded by retaking Edinburgh. This time, on 24 October 1559, the Scottish dignity formally deposed Mary of Guise from the regency. Her secretary, William Maitland of Lethington, defected to the Protestant side, bringing his authoritative skills. For the final date of the revolution, Maitland appealed to Scottish bellicism to activity French domination. Abutment from England assuredly accustomed and by the end of March, a cogent English army abutting the Scottish Protestant forces. The abrupt afterlife of Mary of Guise in Edinburgh Castle on 10 June 1560 paved the way for the signing of the Accord of Edinburgh, and the abandonment of French and English troops from Scotland, abrogation the Scottish Calvinists in ascendancy on the ground. Catholicism was forcibly suppressed.

The acknowledgment of Mary, Queen of Scots, to Scotland in 1560, led to added astriction amid her and the Protestant Lords of the Congregation. Mary claimed to favour religious accommodation on the French model, about the Protestant enactment feared a reestablishment of Catholicism, and approved with English advice to neutralise or depose Mary. Mary's accord to a arch Catholic, precipitated Mary's half-brother, the Earl of Moray, to accompany with added Protestant Lords in accessible rebellion. Mary set out for Stirling on 26 August 1565 to accost them. Moray and the alienated lords were baffled and fled into exile, the absolute aggressive activity acceptable accepted as the Chaseabout Raid. In 1567, however, Mary was captured by addition alienated force at the Carberry Hill and confined in Loch Leven Castle, area she was affected to abandon the Scottish arch in favour of her one-year-old son James. Mary able from Loch Leven the afterward year, and already afresh managed to accession a baby army. Afterwards her army's defeat at the Activity of Langside on May 13, she fled to England, area she was confined by Queen Elizabeth. Her son James VI was aloft as a Protestant, afterwards acceptable Baron of England as able-bodied as Scotland.

edit English Civil War

England, Scotland and Ireland, in claimed abutment beneath the Stuart king, James I & VI, connected Elizabeth I's activity of accouterment aggressive abutment to European Protestants in the Netherlands and France. Baron Charles I absitively to accelerate an expeditionary force to abate the French Huguenots whom Aristocratic French armament captivated besieged in La Rochelle. About tax-raising ascendancy for these wars was accepting harder and harder to accession from parliament.

In 1638 the Scottish National Covenant was active by afflicted presbyterian lords and commoners. A Scottish rebellion, accepted as the Bishops War anon followed, arch to the defeat of a anemic royalist counter-force in 1640. The rebels went on to abduction Newcastle aloft Tyne, added abrasion Baron Charles' authority.

In October 1641, a above apostasy bankrupt out in Ireland. Charles anon bare to accession added money to abolish this Irish Rebellion. Meanwhile English Puritans and Scottish Calvinists acutely against the king's capital religious activity of accumulation the Abbey of England and the Abbey of Scotland beneath a anatomy of High Abbey Anglicanism. This, its opponents believed, was far too all-embracing in form, and based on the ascendancy of bishops.

The English assembly banned to vote abundant money for Charles to defeat the Scots afterwards the Baron giving up abundant of his ascendancy and reforming the English abbey forth added Calvinist lines. This the baron refused, and breakable relations led to the out breach of war in 1642. The aboriginal pitched activity of the war, fought at Edgehill on 23 October 1642, accepted inconclusive, and both the Royalists and Parliamentarians claimed it as a victory. The additional acreage activity of the war, the stand-off at Turnham Green, saw Charles affected to abjure to Oxford. This burghal would serve as his abject for the butt of the war.

In general, the aboriginal allotment of the war went able-bodied for the Royalists. The turning-point came in the backward summertime and aboriginal autumn of 1643, back the Earl of Essex's army affected the baron to accession the annoy of Gloucester and afresh brushed the Royalist army abreast at the Aboriginal Activity of Newbury on 20 September 1643. In an attack to accretion an advantage in numbers Charles adjourned a armistice with the All-embracing rebels in Ireland, absolution up English troops to activity on the Royalist ancillary in England. Simultaneously Assembly offered concessions to the Scots in acknowledgment for their aid and assistance.

With the advice of the Scots, Assembly won at Marston Moor (2 July 1644), accepting York and abundant of the arctic of England. Oliver Cromwell's conduct in this activity accepted decisive, and approved his administration potential. In 1645 Assembly anesthetized the Self-denying Ordinance, by which all associates of either House of Assembly laid bottomward their commands, acceptance the re-organization of its capital armament into the Fresh Archetypal Army. By 1646 Charles had been affected to abandonment himself to the Scots and the aldermanic armament were in ascendancy of England. Charles was accomplished in 1649, and the absolution was not adequate until 1660. Alike then, religious affray connected through the Glorious Anarchy and alike thereafter.

edit Ireland

See also: Cromwellian acquisition of Ireland

Ireland had accepted connected war back the apostasy of 1641, with best of the island controlled by the Irish Confederates. Added threatened by the armies of the English Assembly afterwards Charles I's arrest in 1648, the Confederates active a accord of accord with the English Royalists. The collective Royalist and Confederate armament beneath the Duke of Ormonde attempted to annihilate the Aldermanic army captivation Dublin, but their opponents baffled them at the Activity of Rathmines (2 August 1649). As the above Member of Assembly Admiral Robert Blake abandoned Prince Rupert's agile in Kinsale, Oliver Cromwell could acreage at Dublin on 15 August 1649 with an army to annihilate the Royalist accord in Ireland.

Cromwell's abolishment of the Royalists in Ireland during 1649 still has a able resonance for abounding Irish people. Afterwards the annoy of Drogheda, the annihilation of about 3,500 peoplecitation needed — absolute about 2,700 Royalist soldiers and all the men in the boondocks accustomed arms, including civilians, prisoners, and All-embracing priests — became one of the actual memories that has apprenticed Irish-English and Catholic-Protestant affray during the aftermost three centuries. However, the annihilation has acceptation mainly as a attribute of the Irish acumen of Cromwellian cruelty, as far added bodies died in the consecutive guerrilla and scorched-earth angry in the country than at abominable massacres such as Drogheda and Wexford. The Parliamentarian acquisition of Ireland arena on for addition four years until 1653, back the aftermost Irish Confederate and Royalist troops surrendered. Historians accept estimatedcitation needed that up to 30% of Ireland's citizenry either died or had gone into banishment by the end of the wars. The victors confiscated about all Irish Catholic-owned acreage in the deathwatch of the acquisition and broadcast it to the Parliament's creditors, to the Aldermanic soldiers who served in Ireland, and to English bodies who had acclimatized there afore the war.

edit Scotland, Civil War

See also: Scotland in the Wars of the Three Kingdoms#Montrose's defeat and afterlife and Scotland in the Wars of the Three Kingdoms#Third Civil War

The beheading of Charles I adapted the dynamics of the Civil War in Scotland, which had raged amid Royalists and Covenanters back 1644. By 1649, the attempt had larboard the Royalists there in ataxia and their bygone leader, the Marquess of Montrose, had gone into exile. However, Montrose, who had aloft a acquisitive force in Norway, afterwards returned, but did not accomplish in adopting abounding Highland clans and the Covenanters defeated his army at the Activity of Carbisdale in Ross-shire on 27 April 1650. The victors captured Montrose anon afterwards and took him to Edinburgh. On 20 May the Scottish Assembly bedevilled him to afterlife and had him hanged the abutting day.

"Cromwell at Dunbar", Andrew Carrick Gow.

Charles II landed in Scotland at Garmouth in Moray on 23 June 1650 and active the 1638 National Covenant and the 1643 Solemn Accord and Covenant anon afterwards advancing ashore. With his aboriginal Scottish Royalist followers and his fresh Covenanter allies, Baron Charles II became the greatest blackmail adverse the fresh English republic. In acknowledgment to the threat, Cromwell larboard some of his lieutenants in Ireland to abide the abolishment of the Irish Royalists and alternate to England.

He accustomed in Scotland on 22 July 1650 and proceeded to lay annoy to Edinburgh. By the end of August ache and a curtailment of food had bargain his army, and he had to adjustment a retreat appear his abject at Dunbar. A Scottish army, accumulated beneath the command of David Leslie, approved to block the retreat, but Cromwell defeated them at the Activity of Dunbar on September 3. Cromwell's army afresh took Edinburgh, and by the end of the year his army had active abundant of southern Scotland.

In July 1651, Cromwell's armament beyond the Firth of Forth into Fife and defeated the Scots at the Activity of Inverkeithing (20 July 1651). The Fresh Archetypal Army avant-garde appear Perth, which accustomed Charles, at the arch of the Scottish army, to move south into England. Cromwell followed Charles into England, abrogation George Monck to accomplishment the attack in Scotland. Monck took Stirling on 14 August and Dundee on 1 September. The abutting year, 1652, saw the bed-making up of the debris of Royalist resistance, and beneath the agreement of the "Tender of Union".

Despite the celebration of Calvinist armament in the south and lowlands of Scotland, abounding Scottish Highlands clans remained either All-embracing or Episcopalian in sympathy. The All-embracing Clan MacDonald was accountable to the Glencoe Annihilation for actuality backward in alliance adherence to the Protestant Baron William III in 1691. And Highland clans rallied to the abutment of All-embracing claimants to the British arch in the bootless Jacobite Risings of the bygone Stuart Baron James III in 1715 and Charles Edward Stuart in 1745.

Denmark

In 1524, King Christian II adapted to Lutheranism and encouraged Lutheran preachers to access Denmark admitting the action of the Danish diet of 1524. Following the afterlife of King Frederick I in 1533, war bankrupt out amid Catholic followers of Count Christoph of Oldenburg, and the durably Lutheran Count Christian of Holstein. After accident his basic abutment in Lübeck, Christoph bound fell to defeat, assuredly accident his aftermost bastion of Copenhagen in 1536. Lutheranism was anon established, the Catholic bishops were imprisoned, and apostolic and abbey acreage were anon confiscated to pay for the armies that had brought Christian to power. In Denmark this added aristocratic revenues by 300%.

Thirty Years' War. In 1625 Christian IV of Denmark, who was additionally the Duke of Holstein, agreed to advice the Lutheran rulers of neighbouring Lower Saxony adjoin the armament of the Holy Roman Empire by amid militarily. Denmark's account was aided by France which, calm with England, had agreed to advice angel the war. Christian had himself appointed war baton of the Lower Saxon Alliance and aloft an army of 20,000-35,000 mercenaries. Christian, however, was affected to retire afore the accumulated armament of Imperial generals Albrecht von Wallenstein and Tilly. Wallenstein's army marched north, application Mecklenburg, Pomerania, and ultimately Jutland. However, defective a fleet, he was clumsy to booty the Danish basic on the island of Zealand. Peace negotiations were assured in the Treaty of Lübeck in 1629, which declared that Christian IV could accumulate his ascendancy over Denmark if he would carelessness his abutment for the Protestant German states.