Kaiser Ferdinand III. (1608-1657)

eBook

Kaiser Ferdinand III. (1608-1657)

Böhlau

9783205777656

2012

2012

1 electronic resource (580 Seiten p.)

German

Ferdinand III. inherited the Thirty Years war from its father, Ferdinand II.. In the centre of his reign, the war ended in 1648 with the Peace of Westphalia and thereby the long time of the confessional arguments going along with denomination questions. The Peace of Westphalia was at the same time an important stage in the decay of the alliance of the Spanish and Austrian Habsburger which had emerged under Karl of the V. and which had polarised Europe about for one century. Now the Peace helped to create sovereign member states in Europe. For Ferdinand III. this multilayered epoch change presented itself as a number of dilemmas.-

These resulted from his search for peace and at the same time his attempts to fight for more favourable peace conditions; his separation from Spain against his consent and nevertheless his attempts to hold on to his Iberian relatives which were nevertheless slipping away; his timid protection of peace after 1648 and nevertheless his return against his consent to the European wars of the 1650er-Jahre. For a new comprehension of the time of Ferdinand III, it seemed important it to me to particularly stress some structural aspects, above all the close entwinement of the controversy over denominations and rule rights. In his elective monarchies, in the Empire, and in Hungary, Ferdinand III. pursued a pragmatically moderated confessional policy, in his hereditary countries, Austria and Bohemia, he was a rigid counter reformer.-

His counter reformation however was not only motivated religiously, but it was directed at the same time against the almost autonomous rule of the aristocracy over the rural subjects. Both confessional pragmatism and the counter reformation based on the regionally established church were a burden on the relationship Ferdinand III. to the papacy, who anyhow resisted to the dominance of the house of Habsbourg in Italy. The manuscript also provides new aspects regarding the cultural dimension of early-modern rule. The text essential stresses the pictures and terms, the symbols and rituals on which the Emperors self understanding and his relation to the world was based and lived accordingly. Education, environment and ceremoniality take therefore much space. Rulers of the early modern times knew themselves observed and acted thereafter. If it is so difficult to determine precisely the share of Ferdinands III.-

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