The work offers a new interpretation of the development of German-speaking central Europe and the Holy Roman Empire or German Reich from the great reforms of 1495-1500 to its dissolution in 1806 after the turmoil of the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars. This is traditionally regarded as a long period of decline, but this work shows how imperial institutions developed in response to the crises of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, notably the Reformation and Thirty Years War, and assesses the impact of international developments on the Reich. Central themes are the tension between ... More

The work offers a new interpretation of the development of German-speaking central Europe and the Holy Roman Empire or German Reich from the great reforms of 1495-1500 to its dissolution in 1806 after the turmoil of the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars. This is traditionally regarded as a long period of decline, but this work shows how imperial institutions developed in response to the crises of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, notably the Reformation and Thirty Years War, and assesses the impact of international developments on the Reich. Central themes are the tension between Habsburg aspirations to create a German monarchy and the desire of the German princes and cities to maintain their traditional rights and how the Reich developed the functions of a state during this period. The work also illuminates the development of the German territories subordinate to the Reich. It explores the implications of the Reformation and subsequent religious reform movements – both Protestant and Catholic – and the Enlightenment, for the government of both secular and ecclesiastical principalities, the minor territories of counts and knights, and the cities. The Reich and the territories formed a coherent and workable system and, as a polity, the Reich developed its own distinctive political culture and traditions of German patriotism over the early modern period.