European wars of religion
The Battle of the White Mountain in Bohemia
(1620) - one of the decisive battles of the
Thirty Years War.
The name Wars of Religion has been given
to a series of European wars of the Sixteenth
and Seventeenth Centuries, following the on-
set of the Protestant Reformation. Although
sometimes unconnected, all of these wars
were strongly influenced by the religious
change of the period, and the conflict and
rivalry that it produced.
Wars that can be placed in this category
took place in Switzerland, France, Germany,
Austria, Bohemia, the Netherlands, England,
Scotland, Ireland and Denmark.
Germany and Bohemia
The Holy Roman Empire with present day na-
tional boundaries
The Holy Roman Empire, encompassing
present-day Germany and portions of neigh-
bouring lands, was the single most devast-
ated area by the so-called "Wars of Religion."
The Empire was a fragmented collection of
semi-independent states with the Habsburg
Holy Roman Emperor as its head. The Austri-
an House of Habsburg was a major European
power in its own right, ruling over some
eight million subjects in present day Ger-
many, Austria, Bohemia and Hungary. The
Empire also contained regional powers, such
as Bavaria, Electoral Saxony, the Margravi-
ate of Brandenburg, the Palatinate, Hesse,
the Archbishopric of Trier and Württemberg.
A vast number of minor independent duchies,
free cities, abbeys, bishoprics, and petty
lords rounded out the Empire.
Lutheranism from its inception at Witten-
berg in 1519, found a ready reception in Ger-
many, as well as in formerly Hussite Bo-
hemia. The aggressive anti-catholic preach-
ing of Martin Luther and his many followers
sowed the seeds of future conflict.
In Northern Germany, Luther adopted the
stratagem of gaining the support of the local
princes in his struggle to take over and re-es-
tablish the church along Lutheran lines. The
Elector of Saxony, the Landgrave of Hesse
and other North German princes not only
protected Luther from retaliation from the
edict of outlawry issued by the Hol