Unit 3 DW
Absolutism and European Dynasties (1550–1851)
Divine Right: The political doctrine asserting that a monarch's authority comes directly from God, justifying their absolute rule.
Charles V: A prominent Hapsburg ruler who became King of Spain in (as Charles I) and Holy Roman Emperor in before his abdication in .
Spanish Armada: A formidable naval fleet consisting of over ships, sailors, and cannons, prepared by King Philip II in to invade England.
Spanish Inquisition: A powerful institution established to root out heresy, particularly targeting and expelling Muslims, Jews, and Protestant reformers from Spain, which resulted in significant economic decline.
Huguenots: French Protestants who engaged in violent religious conflicts against Catholics throughout France during the 1500s.
St. Bartholomew's Day Massacre: A tragic event on August 24, , when Catholics massacred over Huguenot wedding guests, leading to widespread violence across France.
Edict of Nantes: A significant decree issued by King Henry IV that granted French Protestants (Huguenots) the right to worship freely and protected their civil rights.
The Fronde: A series of uprisings in France during the 1640s, involving nobles, merchants, peasants, and urban poor protesting against royal absolutism.
Estates General (Absolutist Era): The legislative assembly in France representing the three estates (nobility, clergy, and commoners), which King Louis XIV chose not to convene.
Jean-Baptiste Colbert: The finance minister under King Louis XIV who implemented measures to promote economic prosperity through industry, trade regulation, tariffs, and mercantilism.
Versailles: An opulent palace constructed by King Louis XIV in a Paris suburb, designed to centralize his power by keeping the nobility close and under his direct control.
Treaty of Utrecht: The agreement that concluded the War of Spanish Succession, allowing Philip V to remain King of Spain but forbidding any union between the French and Spanish crowns.
Electors: Influential German princes responsible for electing the Holy Roman Emperor, wielding significant power within the empire.
Thirty Years' War: A protracted conflict from to fought primarily in the German states, rooted in religious disputes between Catholics and Protestants.
Peace of Westphalia: A series of treaties signed in that brought an end to the Thirty Years' War, resulting in the division of German territories and the cessation of major European religious conflicts.
Treaty of Aix-la-Chapelle: The treaty that ended the War of Austrian Succession, returning all captured territories, apart from Silesia, to their original owners.
Junkers: The Prussian nobility who were granted high-ranking governmental and military positions by Frederick William I in exchange for their loyalty to the crown.
Boyars: The traditional noble class in Russia who frequently opposed many established social reforms aimed at Westernization by Tsar Peter I (Peter the Great).
Great Northern War: A major conflict initiated in in which Tsar Peter the Great successfully fought against Sweden to secure land for Russia, including a warm-water port and the site for St. Petersburg.
Partitions of Poland: The disintegration of Polish territory among Prussia, Russia, and Austria, which occurred between and , ultimately leading to Poland's total disappearance.
Constitutional Monarchy and Revolutions in England
Petition of Right: A pivotal agreement signed by King Charles I requiring parliamentary approval for tax raises and establishing legal protections against unlawful imprisonment.
Long Parliament: The English Parliament summoned in , which persisted intermittently for and played a key role in the rebellion against King Charles I.
Cavaliers: The wealthy noble faction that supported King Charles I during the English Civil War, characterized by their royalist sympathies.
Roundheads: The opposing faction in the English Civil War, primarily composed of country gentry, townsfolk, and Puritan clergy, led by Oliver Cromwell.
The Commonwealth: The republican government established in England following the execution of King Charles I, which abolished both the monarchy and the House of Lords.
Glorious Revolution: The bloodless transition of power in when Parliament invited William and Mary to assume the throne, leading to the establishment of a constitutional monarchy.
English Bill of Rights: A foundational document accepted by William and Mary in that affirmed parliamentary sovereignty and outlined individual legal rights.
Toleration Act: The legislation in England granting religious freedom to non-Catholic Protestant groups, such as Quakers and Puritans.
The Scientific Revolution
Geocentric Model: A model of the universe developed by Ptolemy stating that Earth was at the center of the universe.
Heliocentric Model: A model proposed by Nicolaus Copernicus in stating that the Sun was at the center of the universe and that planets revolved around it.
Johannes Kepler: An astronomer who used mathematics to show that planets orbit the Sun in elliptical (oval-shaped) paths, a concept known as Kepler's First Law.
Galileo Galilei: The first European to use a telescope for space observations, author of Starry Messenger (), and a supporter of the heliocentric model whose ideas conflicted with the Catholic Church.
Isaac Newton: Scientist born in who wrote Principia and developed the Three Laws of Motion and the Universal Law of Gravitation.
William Harvey: Physician who advanced the study of the human body through human dissection.
Robert Boyle: Scientist who developed Boyle's Law, establishing that the volume of a gas changes as its pressure changes.
Antoine Lavoisier: Known as the father of modern chemistry, he developed a systematic method for naming chemical elements.
Margaret Cavendish: An English aristocrat and author of Observations upon Experimental Philosophy, who argued that humans could not completely control nature through science.
Maria Winkelmann: A German astronomer who discovered a comet and faced systemic discrimination solely because she was a woman.
René Descartes: A 17th-century philosopher famous for the statement 'I think, therefore I am' and considered the father of modern rationalism.
Rationalism: The philosophical belief that reason is a major source of knowledge.
Francis Bacon: An English thinker who developed the scientific method and advocated for evidence-based science rather than reliance on ancient authorities.
Inductive Reasoning: A reasoning process moving from specific observations to a general conclusion.
The Enlightenment and Political Philosophy
Tabula Rasa: John Locke's belief that the human mind is a 'blank slate' at birth and that people are shaped entirely by their experiences.
Philosophes: Enlightenment thinkers who met in French salons to discuss politics, science, and philosophy.
Montesquieu: Enlightenment thinker who advocated for the separation of powers and checks and balances across three branches of government: Executive, Legislative, and Judicial.
Voltaire: Enlightenment philosopher who challenged church authority and strongly supported Deism.
Deism: An 18th-century religious philosophy based on the belief that God created the world and allowed it to operate according to natural laws.
Denis Diderot: Enlightenment figure who created a encyclopedia to spread ideas about society, politics, religion, and science.
Laissez-faire: An economic doctrine meaning little or no government regulation of the economy.
Cesare Beccaria: Enlightenment figure who opposed capital punishment and argued that punishments should not be cruel or disproportionate to the crime.
Jean-Jacques Rousseau: Philosopher who proposed the Social Contract, stating that government exists by consent of the governed and should follow the general will.
Mary Wollstonecraft: An early advocate for women's equality who argued for equal political, educational, and economic rights.
Enlightened Absolutism: A system where absolute monarchs attempted to govern by Enlightenment principles while keeping their full royal power.
Frederick the Great: Prussian absolute monarch (Frederick II) who abolished torture in most cases and increased religious tolerance while maintaining serfdom.
Catherine the Great: Empress of Russia (Catherine II) who engaged with Enlightenment thinkers like Diderot but enacted little actual reform due to reliance on nobility.
Joseph II: Austrian monarch who abolished serfdom and the death penalty, often considered the only truly enlightened ruler despite many failed reforms.
Artistic Styles:
Baroque: An artistic and architectural style characterized by grandeur, power, scale, and drama.
Rococo: An artistic style developed around the 1730s that emphasized grace, charm, style, happiness, and pleasure.
The American Revolution and Constitutional Governance
Stamp Act: A British law requiring American colonists to pay a tax on legal and published documents, repealed one year later following protests.
First Continental Congress: A meeting of colonial representatives who urged colonists to form militias and prepare to fight Britain.
Lexington & Concord: Massachusetts locations where the first shots of the American Revolution were fired in April 1775$.\n* **Declaration of Independence**: A foundational document written by Thomas Jefferson and adopted on July 4, 1776, declaring the American colonies independent from Britain.\n* **Battle of Saratoga**: A battle recognized as a major turning point in the Revolutionary War.\n* **Battle of Yorktown**: A 1781 battle in which American forces and the French navy defeated the British, marking a major turning point in the war.\n* **Treaty of Paris**: A 1783 peace treaty recognizing American independence and setting U.S. territory from the Appalachian Mountains to the Mississippi River.\n* **Federalism**: A government system in which power is divided between the national government and state governments.\n\n# The French Revolution and Radicalism\n\n* **Social Class Structure in Pre-Revolutionary France**:\n * **First Estate**: The social class made up of the clergy, numbering about 130{,}0000.5\%10\% of the land, and paying no taxes.\n * **Second Estate**: The social class made up of the nobility, numbering about 350{,}0001.5\%30\% of the land, holding leading positions in government, military, and church, and paying no taxes.\n * **Taille**: An annual direct tax in France from which both the First and Second Estates were exempt.\n * **Third Estate**: The diverse social class making up over 98\% of the French population, including peasants, merchants, doctors, lawyers, and businessmen, who carried the tax burden.\n* **Monarchy and Financial Crisis**:\n * **Louis XVI**: King of France from 177417911793$.
Marie Antoinette: Queen of France and daughter of Maria Theresa, who was widely resented for her extravagant spending and lavish lifestyle.
Outbreak of Revolutionary Events ():
Estates General: The representative assembly of all three estates that met on May 5, , for the first time since to address France's financial crisis.
National Assembly: The revolutionary assembly proclaimed on June 17, , by representatives of the Third Estate after demanding individual deputy voting rights to draft a constitution.
Tennis Court Oath: The pledge taken by the Third Estate on an indoor tennis court after being locked out of their meeting hall, vowing to meet until a new constitution was written.
The Bastille: A French prison stormed by a mob of about peasants on July 14, , to obtain arms and ammunition, resulting in its capture after .
Great Fear: A panic that spread across France following peasant revolts, marked by anti-noble violence, destruction of legal records, and formation of citizen militias.
Declaration of the Rights of Man and the Citizen: A charter adopted by the National Assembly on August 4, , that outlined natural rights for men, excluding women initially.
Legislative Restructuring and Radical Factions:
Legislative Assembly: The body created by the Constitution to enact laws under a limited monarchy, elected by tax-paying men over age 25$.\n * **The Commune**: A radical political group organized by the Paris poor who seized power in the city after raiding the royal palace and Legislative Assembly.\n * **Sans-Culottes**: Radical revolutionaries in Paris whose name literally meant 'those without fancy pants.'\n * **Georges Danton**: Minister of justice who led the Sans-culottes in attacking the royal palace and imprisoning King Louis XVI.\n * **Jean-Paul Marat**: A radical Paris leader who published works advocating violence and rapid political transformation.\n * **Jacobins**: A highly radical political network within the National Convention that demanded the execution of King Louis XVI.\n * **The Mountain**: A radical faction within the National Convention that successfully persuaded the assembly to execute Louis XVI.\n* **The Reign of Terror and Government Structure**:\n * **Guillotine**: A machine used for beheadings, utilized for executions including Louis XVI on January 21, 1793, and thousands during the Reign of Terror.\n * **Committee on Public Safety**: A committee granted broad executive powers by the National Convention, led by Danton, Marat, and Robespierre, which orchestrated the Reign of Terror.\n * **Maximilien Robespierre**: Radical leader and major figure during the Reign of Terror who governed France through the Committee on Public Safety until his execution on June 28, 1794$.
Olympe de Gouges: Prominent historical figure cited specifically as a victim of the Reign of Terror.
Reign of Terror: A period of state-sanctioned violence during which over people were executed by guillotine or killed by mobs to protect the republic.
Council of 500: The lower house created under the French Constitution responsible for drafting legislation.
Council of Elders: An upper house of members established by the Constitution that voted to accept or reject laws drafted by the Council of 500.
The Directory: A five-member executive body chosen by the Council of Elders from a list drafted by the Council of 500, known for corruption during its five-year reign.
The Era of Napoleon Bonaparte
Rise to Power and Domestic Policy:
Napoleon Bonaparte: Military leader who seized power in through a coup d'état.
Coup d'état: A sudden overthrow of the government, executed in by General Napoleon Bonaparte to overthrow the Directory.
Consulate: The regime established by Napoleon in after his coup d'état, structured nominally as a republic but controlled authoritatively by Napoleon.
Civil Code (Napoleonic Code): A uniform system of law created in that guaranteed legal equality, religious tolerance, and abolition of serfdom, while curtailing women's rights.
Anne-Louise-Germaine de Staël: A prominent writer who publicly criticized Napoleon's autocratic rule and strict censorship of books and press.
Imperial Expansion and Conflict:
Dependent States: Nations ruled by Napoleon's relatives, including Spain, Holland, Italy, Naples, Switzerland, Warsaw, and the Confederation of the Rhine.
Continental System: An economic blockade designed by Napoleon to stop trade between continental Europe and Great Britain in order to weaken the British war economy.
Russian Campaign of 1812: Napoleon's failed invasion of Russia in which over troops entered in June , but severe winter weather and evasion tactics reduced them to by December 1812$.\n* **Downfall and Exile**:\n * **Elba**: An island off the northwest coast of Italy where Napoleon was exiled following the fall of Paris in March 1814$.
Louis XVIII: Brother of Louis XVI who was placed on the French throne by Allied forces after Napoleon's first exile.
Battle of Waterloo: The engagement in Belgium on June 18, , in which combined British and Prussian forces permanently defeated Napoleon Bonaparte.
St. Helena: A remote island in the Atlantic Ocean where Napoleon was exiled after his final defeat at Waterloo, remaining there until his death in $$1821$.