Chapter 5 Notes

Crisis & Absolutism in Europe 1550-1715

Spain’s Conflicts

• Calvinism & Catholics wanted to win converts - militant (combative) religious wars
• economic, social and political forces also cause conflicts

Section 1

Spain’s militant Catholicism

• King Philip II - supporter of militant Catholicism
• Required conformity to Catholicism
• Called the “most Catholic king”
• Championed Catholic causes
• had resistance in the Netherlands
• finally got a 12 year truce - ended the war

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Protestantism in England

• Elizabeth Tudor - got throne after Queen Mary Tudor
• moved quickly to solve religious problems
• repealed laws favoring Catholics
• Act of Supremacy - named Elizabeth as the only supreme governor of both church and state
• moderate in foreign policy
• tried to keep Spain and France from becoming too powerful
• England would support weaker nation so neither would become too powerful

Defeat of the Spanish Armada

• Philip II sent an armada - fleet of warships- to invade England
• sent to overthrow Protestantism
• didn’t have ships or manpower to do this
• By end of Philip II’s reign Spain was the most populous but bankrupt
• Spain remained power but real power in Europe shifted to England and France

The French Wars of Religion

• French Civil Wars = French Wars of Religion
• Huguenots - French Protestants influenced by John Calvin
• Only 7% of French population
• but 40-50% of the nobility became Huguenots
• Ultra-Catholics - extreme Catholic party - opposed Huguenots
• Religion biggest cause of wars

Henry IV and the Edict of Nantes

• Henry of Navarre AKA Henry IV
• Converted from Protestantism to Catholicism so taken seriously in Catholic dominated France
• Issued Edict of Nantes to stop religious wars
• recognized Catholicism as official religion of France
• gave the Huguenots the right to worship and to enjoy all political privileges such as holding public offices

Social Crisis, War, and Revolution

• 1560-1650 Europe had severe economic and social crisis
• Inflation - rising prices
• increased population = demand for land and food = drove prices up

Economic and Social Crises

• By 1600 economic slowdown
• Spain’s economy slowing down - dependant on silver production - low and pirate attacks
• population leveled off now
• warfare, plague and famine

The Witchcraft Trials

• Witchcraft - magic - had been a part of village culture
• 16th & 17th Centuries = hysteria for heretics caused an Inquisition - including witchcraft
• More than 100,000 people charged with witchcraft

The Witchcraft Trials continued

• fear of witches grew as more brought to trial - also fear of being accused
• By 1650 witchcraft hysteria lessened
• Governments became stronger and didn’t want to disrupt societies with trials of witches
• Also less people believed in world haunted by evil

The Thirty Years’ War

• Religious disputes continued in Germany even after the Peace of Augsburg in 1555
• did not recognize Calvinism
• Causes of the war:
• religion - last of the religious wars
• Political and territorial motives

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Effects of the War

• all except England involved
• Peace of Westphalia
• officially ended war in Germany in 1648
• divided more than 300 states of Holy Roman Empire into independent states
• gave them right to choose own religion and conduct own foreign affairs
• this was end of HRE as a political entity
• Germany not united for another 200 years

Revolutions in England

• English Revolution = civil war
• King vs. Parliament
• struggle to determine what role each should play

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Section 2

The Stuarts and Divine Right

• King James I took throne when Elizabeth I died
• King James I believed in divine right of kings - the idea that kings receive their power from God
• Parliament believed they and Queen/King ruled England

The Stuarts and Divine Right continued

• Puritans - Protestants in England inspired by Calvinist ideas - didn’t like king’s defense of the Church of England
• wanted church to be more Protestant
• Struggle started with King James I and ended with his son Charles I - also believed in divine rights of kings

The Stuarts and Divine Right continued

• Parliament passed Petition of Right - limit king's power
• Charles I accepted Petition of Right - but later rejected it
• tried to impose more rituals on Church of England and when he tried to get Puritans to follow - thousands went to America

Civil War and Commonwealth

• Complaints until Civil war broke out
• Cavaliers (king supports) vs Roundheads (parliamentary forces)
• Oliver Cromwell - led parliamentary forces with his New Model Army
• Cromwell rid parliament of those who didn’t support him - Rump Parliament

Civil War and Commonwealth continued

• Rump Parliament had King Charles I executed which horrified much of Europe
• Parliament abolished the monarchy and the House of Lords
• Declared England a commonwealth - a type of republic
• Cromwell dispersed the Parliament and set up a military dictatorship

The Restoration

• Cromwell ruled til his death
• the restoration of the Stuart monarchy - AKA the Restoration period still kept Parliament's power
• Charles II accepted Parliament’s power
• but pushed his own ideas
• Catholicism
• Parliament didn’t like this passed Test Act

The Restoration continued

• James II took the throne after Charles II died
• open and devout Catholic
• religion a cause of conflict between king and Parliament - again!
• named Catholic to high positions

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A Glorious Revolution

• Glorious Revolution - the invasion of England by William of Orange
• English nobles invited Dutch leader to invade England
• Invasion overthrew King James II with virtually no bloodshed

A Glorious Revolution continued

• Parliament offered throne to William and Mary
• accepted along with Bill of Rights - laid the foundation for a constitutional monarchy in England
• Parliament passed the Toleration Act of 1689 - granted Puritans, but not Catholics, the right to free public worship

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English Parliament’s Bill of Rights

What did it do?

• Bill of Rights - contained many of the same ideas as petition of rights - set forth parliament’s right to make laws and levy taxes
• made it impossible for kings to oppose or to do without Parliament by stating that standing armies could be raised only with Parliament consent
• rights of citizens to keep arms and have a jury trial
• helped create a system of government based on the rule of law and a freely elected Parliament
• By deposing one King and establishing another, Parliament destroyed the divine-right theory of kingship
• over the next century parliament would prove to be the true power in the English system of constitutional monarchy

Political thought Hobbes vs. Locke

• Thomas Hobbes -
• alarmed by upheavals in England
• argued that a ruler with absolute power was needed to preserve order
• Wrote Leviathan

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Political thought Hobbes vs. Locke

• John Locke - disagreed with Hobbes
• argued against absolute power - believed in natural rights - rights people are born with
• believed in contract between people and government needed mutual obligations
• Government = protect rights of people - if govt. broke contract people could form new govt.
• people = act reasonably toward the govt.
• His ideas were important to both America (Declaration of Independence/Constitution) and the French

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Response to Crisis: Absolutism

• Absolutism - system of government in which a ruler holds total power
• in 17th century Europe this was tied to the idea of the divine right of kings
• reign of Louis XIV = best example of absolutism

Section 3

Richelieu and Mazarin

• Louis XIII & Louis XIV came to throne as boys
• Royal ministers played important roles in preserving the authority of the monarchy
• Cardinal Richelieu - Louis XIII’s chief minister
• Cardinal Mazarin - Louis XIV’s chief minister

Louis comes to Power

• Mazarin died when Louis XIV was 23 - Louis took control
• Louis XIV = sun king - source of light for all of his people
• Established royal court at Versailles

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Louis XIV government & religion

• High nobles and royal princes thought they should play a role in government
• instead Louis removed from royal council
• King's chief administrative council ruled
• To keep nobles and princes happy he kept them busy with court life and out of politics
• government ministers followed Louis XIV every will
• complete authority over foreign policy, the church and taxes

Louis XIV government & religion continued

• did not have control at local level
• nobles, local officials and town councils had more influence
• so king bribed locals to see his policies carried out
• had anti-Protestant policy
• aimed to convert Huguenots to Catholicism

Louis XIV - economy and war

• cost of palaces, war and maintaining court cost a bunch!
• Jean-Baptiste Colbert - controller general of finances
• sought to increase France’s wealth and power by following the ideas of mercantilism
• Louis built up army and waged 4 wars
• nations formed coalition to prevent him from dominating Europe

Legacy of Louis XIV

• left France with debts and surrounded by enemies

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Absolutism in Central and Eastern Europe

• After Thirty Years’ War over 300 German States
• Emergence of Prussia - Frederick William the Great Elector
• The New Austrian Empire - the Hapsburgs

Peter the Great

• New Russian state emerged in 15th century
• Ivan IV first ruler to take title of czar - Russian word for caesar
• expanded territories eastward
• crushed Russian nobility - boyars
• AKA Ivan the Terrible because of ruthless deeds (stabbed/killed own son)
• Time of Trouble - period after his death in anarchy
• National assembly chose Michael Romanov as new czar

Romanov dynasty

• Peter the Great - czar in 1689
• absolute monarch - claimed divine right
• he introduced Western customs and ways of doing things to Russia
• wanted to westernize (Europeanize) Russia

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The World of European Culture

• Mannerism - artistic movement - emerged in Italy - marked end of artistic Renaissance
• Wanted to show emotion and suffering not balance and harmony
• El Greco - his work reflected high point of Mannerism

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Section 4

Baroque Period

• Mannerism replaced by Baroque
• Baroque - reflected a search for power
• Gian Lorenzo Bernini - completed Saint Peter’s Basilica in Rome -

Baroque Music

• Johann Sebastian Bach - German composer - Mass in B minor
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7F7TVM8m95Y
• George Frederick Handel - German - wrote mostly secular music - Messiah
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=71NCzuDNUcg&t=4902s

Golden Age of Literature

• Elizabethan Era - during Queen Elizabeth’s reign - drama
• William Shakespeare - best example of Elizabethan literature
• Keen insight into human nature
• Miguel de Cervantes - wrote Don Quixote
• both visionary dreams and reality of hard work are necessary to the human condition

Golden Age of Literature continued

• Lope de Vega - Spanish playwright who composed up to 1,500 plays in all