Development of International Relations on the maps (1)

What is Geopolitics?

• Geopolitics examines the geographical assumptions, designations, and understandings that enter into world politics (J. Agnew).
• It's a discourse, a culturally and politically varied way of describing, representing, and writing about geography and international politics (G. O´Tuathail).
• Geopolitics is synonymous with global equilibrium and permanent national interests in the world balance of power, focusing on the requirements of equilibrium (H. Kissinger).
• Geopolitics analyzes the distribution of power within space, emphasizing that political predominance depends on the geographical context in which power is exercised.
• Power has a material basis.

What is Geography?

• Geography is not an innocent science about Earth, but is fundamentally about power.
• It's a product of histories of struggle between competing authorities over the power to organize, occupy, and administer space.
• Geography was actively created by expanding, centralizing imperial states, not merely something already possessed by the Earth.
• The term "geo-graphing" emphasizes the active writing of the Earth.

Beyond the Pale

• By the 14th century, the Norman invasion of Ireland was faltering due to Norman assimilation into Irish life.
• The king's territory was marked by wooden fences called "pales" (from the Latin palus, meaning "stake").
• These pales aimed to deter raiders rather than form an impregnable wall.
• Settlers within the Pale were under the crown's protection, while those "beyond the pale" were outside English law's safety and subject to rural Ireland's dangers.
• The phrase "beyond the pale" became a colloquialism meaning "outside the limits of acceptable behavior or judgment."

Development of Thinking About the Earth

• Mythical Way:
  • Based on tradition and imagination, relies on the suggestive power of images.
• Geographical Way:
  • Based on free scientific (mathematical) cognition.
  • Science redrew the "colorful and graceful" world of myth.
  • Geography describes the world objectively as it is, while myth is culturally conditioned and secondary.
  • Myth interprets the world.

Maps and Organization of Space

• Maps are the most visible product of geography.
• Medieval conceptualization and organization of space was religious (vertical), representing the divine order.
• Modern organization of space is horizontal, strongly associated with state sovereignty as emerged from the Treaty of Westphalia.

What We Will Try to Deal With in the Course

• History is traditionally divided into antiquity, the Middle Ages, and the modern age, with each epoch divided into centuries.
• However, this can obscure significant formative events that fall in the middle of centuries.
• European history is often presented from the viewpoint of great powers like Britain, France, Germany, and Russia, marginalizing or ignoring smaller states.

Church and Political Geography of Europe: From Christendom to Europe

• Europe as Christendom is the initial foundation for Europe's political formation.
• Crucial period: the development between the 5th and 8th centuries AD, after the collapse of the Western Roman Empire (476) and rise of the Byzantine Empire/Eastern Roman Empire (395 – 1453).
• Islam's defining role was vital; it overtook Christianity's original home in the Holy Land, determining the ideological and geographical limits of Christendom on the European peninsula.

The City of God (Civitas Dei) vs. The Earthly City (Civitas Terraena)

• On the City of God Against the Pagans (De civitate Dei contra paganos) by Augustine of Hippo presents human history as a conflict between the Earthly City and the City of God.
• The conflict is destined to end in victory for the City of God.
• History is the realization of God's plan, from Creation to the second coming of Christ.
• Augustine depicts the world's history as universal warfare between God and the Devil, geographically limited to Earth but not by time.
• God moves governments and military forces aligned with the Catholic Church (the City of God) to oppose those aligned with the Devil.

Dar al-islam – Dar al-sulh – Dar al-harb

• In classical Islamic law, major divisions are:
  • dar al-islam: territory of Islam/voluntary submission to God, where Islamic law prevails.
  • dar al-sulh: territory of treaty, non-Islamic lands with an armistice with a Muslim government.
  • dar al-harb: territory of war, adjoining non-Islamic lands called upon to accept Islam.
• The Arabic term dar refers to a part of the world in Islamic jurisprudence.

Geography is About Power

• Geography is a product of histories of struggle between competing authorities organizing space.
• Geography was actively created by expanding imperial states.

Caesaropapism

• Caesaropapism combines the political power of secular government with religious power, making secular authority superior to the Church.
• Max Weber: caesaropapism entails "the complete subordination of priests to secular power."
• In its extreme form, the head of state (emperor) is also the supreme head of the church, inverting theocracy.
• Both caesaropapism and theocracy lack separation of church and state.

The Great Schism of 1054

• The East–West Schism (Great Schism or Schism of 1054) resulted from theological and political differences between Eastern and Western Christianity.
• Key issues: procession of the Holy Spirit, use of leavened or unleavened bread in the Eucharist, the Bishop of Rome's claim to universal jurisdiction, and the place of Constantinople in the pentarchy.
• Pentarchy: Church organization model in the Eastern Orthodox Church, formulated in the laws of Emperor Justinian I (527–565).
  • The Christian church is governed by the heads (patriarchs) of the five major episcopal sees of the Roman Empire: Rome, Constantinople, Alexandria, Antioch, and Jerusalem.

Charlemagne and Power Separation of the West from the East

• In 799, Pope Leo III, after being assaulted, fled to Charlemagne, who traveled to Rome in 800.
• On December 23, Leo swore an oath of innocence to Charlemagne, then on Christmas Day, Leo crowned Charlemagne Imperator Romanorum ("Emperor of the Romans") in Saint Peter's Basilica.
• Charlemagne's coronation set up two separate Empires and competing claims to imperial authority, leading to war in 802 and centuries of disputes.

The Investiture Controversy

• The Investiture Controversy was a conflict between church and state in medieval Europe over the selection and installation of bishops and abbots.
• Popes in the 11th and 12th centuries challenged the power of the Holy Roman Emperor, leading to nearly 50 years of civil war in Germany.
• The conflict began between Pope Gregory VI and Henry IV in 1076 and ended with the Concordat of Worms in 1122.
• The agreement required bishops to swear fealty to the monarch but left selection to the church, affirming the church's right to invest bishops with sacred authority, confirmed by the monarch.

The Road to Canossa

• The Road to Canossa was Emperor Henry IV's journey to Canossa Castle in 1077 to submit to Pope Gregory VII during the Investiture Controversy.
• He sought absolution and revocation of his excommunication.
• Henry was forced to wait for three days and nights before the castle gate in a blizzard.

From Unam Sanctam to Outrage of Anagni

• In 1300, conflict began between Pope Boniface VIII and King Philip the Fair of France, who taxed the French clergy.
• Boniface responded with the papal bull Clericis laicos in 1296, forbidding clerics from paying taxes to temporal rulers without papal authority.
• In 1302, Boniface issued the Bull Unam Sanctam, asserting absolute papal supremacy over earthly power.
• Philip organized an expedition to arrest Boniface; in 1303, Guillaume de Nogaret and Sciarra Colonna attacked the papal palaces in Anagni.
• Boniface was held prisoner for three days, starved of food and drink; this incident is called the Outrage of Anagni.

European Wars of Religion

• The European wars of religion were a series of wars in Europe during the 16th, 17th, and early 18th centuries, following the Protestant Reformation in 1517.
• The wars disrupted the religious and political order in Catholic countries, though religion was not always the primary factor.
• The French Wars of Religion (1562-1598) caused an estimated three million deaths.
• Warfare intensified after the Catholic Church began the Counter-Reformation in 1545.
• The Peace of Westphalia (1648) ended the wars by recognizing Roman Catholicism, Lutheranism, and Calvinism in the Holy Roman Empire.

Transformation of Christendom into Europe

• As a result of wars of religion, the idea of Christian unity disappeared.
• Europeans stopped referring to their civilization as Christendom, instead choosing the label Europe.
• The last official document mentioning "princes of Christendom" was the Treaty of Utrecht in 1713.

Eastern Dimension of Wars of Religion

• Conflict between Catholics and Orthodox Christians led to the fall of Constantinople to Crusaders in 1204.
• In 1453, the Ottoman Turks conquered Constantinople, but Western aid was insufficient.
• Some Orthodox Christians preferred "a turban in their city than a papal mitre."
• There was a long-lasting conflict between the Polish-Lithuanian state (Catholic) and the Grand Duchy of Moscow/Tsardom of Russia (Orthodox).

Moscow the Third Rome

• During the Reformation, many Western European states broke with Rome.
• Henry VIII invented a new version of English history claiming the English crown was never a dependency of the pope.
• A grand politico-ecclesiastical scheme was introduced in Muscovy by Ivan the Terrible, based on monk Philotheus of Pskov's prophecy that Muscovy was the Third Rome after Constantinople fell to the Ottomans.
• The theory claimed the patriarch of Moscow had supreme authority over the patriarch of Constantinople, and all Orthodox Slavs should submit to Muscovite allegiance.

Royal Intermarriage: Marriage of State

• A marriage of state is a diplomatic union between members of different states, dating back to ancient times.
• In Europe, it was most prevalent from the medieval era until World War I.
• Marriage between dynasties could initiate, reinforce, or guarantee peace between nations.
• The legend of Helen of Troy illustrates the importance of marriage in history.
• Important factors in arranging royal marriages:
  • Size of the land governed or controlled.
  • Stability of control over that territory.
  • Increasing the dynasty's prestige.
  • Political alliance: marriage was an important way to bind together royal families and their countries during peace and war and could justify political decisions. It could also enhance territorial acquisition.

Marriage and Religion

• Religion has always been tied to political affairs.
• Religious considerations were important in royal marriages, especially in lands with an established religion.
• Prospective spouses had to follow the same religion or convert before the wedding.
• Marrying a Catholic was particularly undesirable for non-Catholic royal families; some countries barred those marrying Catholics from the throne (e.g., the British Act of Settlement 1701).
• Foreign princesses marrying into the Russian dynasty had to convert to Russian Orthodoxy.
• Roman Catholic countries had similar laws.
• Major principles of royal marriage policy:
  • Focus on daughters who inherited territory.
  • Engagement or marriage of infants to ensure territorial integrity or gain alliances.
  • Marriage had to be fulfilled (consumed).
  • Marriage became a political act, sometimes with public consumption (intercourse of newlyweds in the presence of witnesses).
  • The birth of a child was a public policy matter.
• Republics don't have princes and princesses to offer for marriage.

Eleanor of Aquitaine

• Eleanor of Aquitaine (1122–1204) was queen consort of France (1137–1152) and England (1154–1189) and duchess of Aquitaine in her own right (1137–1204).
• As the heir of the House of Poitiers, she was one of the wealthiest and most powerful women in western Europe.

Eleanor and Louis

• Three months after becoming duchess, she married King Louis VII of France.
• As queen of France, she participated in the unsuccessful Second Crusade.
• Eleanor sought an annulment, but Pope Eugene III rejected her request; after the birth of her second daughter, Louis agreed to an annulment because their marriage had not produced a son.
• The marriage was annulled on grounds of consanguinity, and Eleanor's lands were restored to her.

Eleanor and Henry

• As soon as the annulment was granted, Eleanor became engaged to Henry Duke of Normandy.
• The couple married eight weeks after the annulment of Eleanor's first marriage.
• Her husband became King Henry II of England in 1154.
• Over the next 13 years, she bore eight children.
• Henry imprisoned her in 1173 for supporting their son Henry's revolt against him; she was released after Henry's death in 1189.
• As queen dowager, Eleanor acted as regent while Richard went on the Third Crusade.

The Angevin Empire

• The Angevins of the House of Plantagenet ruled over roughly half of France, all of England, and parts of Ireland and Wales.
• The empire was established by Henry II, as King of England, Duke of Normandy, Count of Anjou.
• They held court at Angers in Anjou, and Chinon in Touraine.
• The House of Anjou conflicted with the kings of France of the House of Capet.
• Henry's son, John, was defeated in the Anglo-French War (1213–1214), setting the stage for further conflicts like the Hundred Years' War (1337 – 1453).

Let Others Wage War. You, Happy Austria, Marry!

• Royal intermarriage often resulted in lands passing into the hands of foreign houses.
• The Habsburgs expanded their influence through arranged marriages and political privileges.
• The motto associated with their dynasty: Bella gerant alii, tu, felix Austria, nube! (Let others wage war, you, happy Austria, marry!).

Marriage Policy of Charles IV

• Margaret of Bohemia married Louis I of Hungary.
• Sigismund, son of Charles IV, married Queen Mary of Hungary and became King of Hungary and Holy Roman Emperor.

The Wettins as “Stud Farm” of Europe

• The House of Wettin is a German dynasty that ruled territories in Saxony, Saxony-Anhalt, and Thuringia.
• It is one of the oldest dynasties in Europe.
• The family divided into the Ernestine and Albertine branches in 1485.
  • Ernestine branch: Played a key role during the Protestant Reformation; many ruling monarchs outside Germany were tied to the House of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha.
  • Albertine branch: Ruled most of Saxony and played a part in Polish history.
• Members of the House of Wettin ascended the thrones of the United Kingdom, Portugal, Bulgaria, Poland, Saxony, and Belgium.

Grandma and Father-in-Law of Europe

• Royal descendants of Queen Victoria and King Christian IX occupy the thrones of Belgium, Denmark, Luxembourg, Norway, Spain, Sweden, and the United Kingdom.
• At the outbreak of World War I, their grandchildren occupied the thrones of Denmark, Greece, Norway, Germany, Romania, Russia, Spain, and the United Kingdom.
• Queen Victoria was nicknamed "the grandmother of Europe," while King Christian IX was nicknamed "father-in-law of Europe."
• Only Willem-Alexander of the Netherlands descends neither from Queen Victoria nor King Christian IX.

The House of Windsor

• The House of Windsor is the reigning royal house of the United Kingdom and the Commonwealth realms.
• In 1901, the House of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha (a branch of the House of Wettin) succeeded the House of Hanover to the British monarchy.
• In 1917, the name was changed to Windsor because of anti-German sentiment during World War I.
• The German emperor joked about a performance of "The Merry Wives of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha."
• In February 1917, Tsar Nicholas I was overthrown, and the British government refused him exile.

Delimitation of Space

• Europe emerged from a vertical to horizontal organization of space.
• Larger empires leave longer aftershadows.

What is an Empire?

• A very great power that has left its mark on international relations.
• A polity that rules over wide territories and many peoples.
• The most interesting empires are linked to great religion and high culture (Dominic Lieven).

What is Europe?

• Three variants:
  • Geographical
  • Civilizational
  • Political

Geographical Europe

• The present frontier of Europe on the Ural Mountains is arbitrary.
• It was created in the 18th century by a Swedish surveyor working for Catherine the Great of Russia.

Frontiers and Borders of Europe

• Political/state border is the most visible political phenomenon on the map; it is a clear demarcation of sovereign territory.
• Border is the political isobar that fixes the equilibrium between competing political forces (Jacques Ancel).

Civilizational Europe

• Europe as a civilizational entity has three pillars: Ancient Greece, Ancient Rome, and Judeo-Christian tradition.
• None of these pillars was exclusively or predominantly European.
• The center of gravity of Hellenic civilization was located in "Asia Minor."
• The center of gravity of Roman civilization was the Mediterranean Sea basin.
• Judeo-Christian tradition was not European in its beginning; it was born from Judaism in Judaea.

Roman Roads

• Three main types of roads in Ancient Rome:
  • Viae publicae: Public highways maintained by the military.
  • Viae privatae: Private roads financed to connect towns to the viae publicae.
  • Viae vicinales: Tertiary roads connecting villages.
• This network allowed for quick troop movement and development of a mail system.
• It laid the foundation for development across Europe.

Roman Church

• The state church of the Roman Empire refers to the Nicene church associated with Roman emperors after the Edict of Thessalonica in 380 by Theodosius I.

From Christendom to Europe

• Europe as Christendom is the first layer and prerequisite for the formation of Europe in a political sense.
• The critical period is the development between the fifth and eighth centuries after the collapse of the Western Roman Empire (476) and the rise of the Byzantine Empire (395–1453).
• Islam's role was vital in defining the ideological and geographical limits of Christendom.

Cities and Trade in Europe

• Roman cities were supplied with water by aqueducts.
• Large estates in the countryside used slave labor to produce food for the cities.
• This structure collapsed with the fall of the Roman Empire.

Early Medieval Europe

• The Scandinavians used routes for trading and raiding.
• There was not a single place in the West with 15,000 inhabitants; the biggest was Venice with 8–9,000 people.

XIII. Century Europe

• In the 11th century, Flemish weavers started producing moderately priced woolen cloth.
• Local farmers could not meet the demand for wool; England was the primary producer, and the southern Netherlands was the manufacturing center.
• The largest cities in Western Europe were Milan and Venice.
• The seamen of Pisa, Genoa, and Venice exploited opportunities created by the First Crusade.
• The Scandinavians' role was declining, but they maintained their hold on the fishing industry.
• New opportunities lay on the Baltic littoral, where new routes and markets were opened by the Northern Crusade; Denmark was the hegemon on the Baltics.
• The Levantine countries had a trade monopoly on oriental spices.

XIV. Century Europe

• After Denmark's Baltic hegemony collapsed in the 1220s, merchants from Lubeck transformed the association of German merchants trading with Novgorod into the Hansa.
• Genoa had ten times the trade of Lubeck.
• Italian cities began minting gold coins and became the Continent's banker.
• Banking houses like the Bardi and Peruzzi of Florence had incomes beyond those of most monarchs.
• It became clear that business could be even more profitable than land ownership.

German Colonization of East and Central Europe

• Ostsiedlung is the term for the High Medieval migration of ethnic Germans to territories at the eastern periphery of the Holy Roman Empire.
• The area included regions east of the Saale and Elbe rivers, Lower Austria, Styria, the Baltics, modern Poland, Bohemia, Slovakia, Slovenia, Hungary, and Transylvania.
• Settlers were encouraged by Slavic princes and regional lords.
• The movement caused changes in culture, religion, law, administration, trade, and agriculture until the 20th century.

Town Law

• Town privileges or borough rights were features of European towns during the second millennium.
• A borough was distinguished from the countryside by means of a charter from the ruling monarch that defined its privileges and laws.
• Common privileges involved trade and the establishment of guilds.
• Some privileges were permanent and implied the right to be called a borough.
• Some degree of self-government, representation by diet, and tax relief could also be granted.

German Town Law

• As Germans established towns throughout northern Europe in the 10th century, they received town privileges.
• Privileges often included self-governance, economic autonomy, criminal courts, and militia.
• Colonists modeled town laws on the laws of Cologne, Lubeck (Lübeck law), Magdeburg (Magdeburg rights), and Nuremberg or Vienna.

Communication in the World During the Middle Ages

• The Mongol Empire, Marco Polo, Ibn Battuta

The Eurasian Steppe

• The Eurasian Steppe stretches from Bulgaria, Romania, Moldova, Ukraine, Western Russia, Siberia, Kazakhstan, Xinjiang, Mongolia, and Manchuria, with an exclave in Hungary.

The Silk Road

• The Silk Road was a network of trade routes connecting the East and West, central to economic, cultural, political, and religious interactions from the 2nd century BCE to the 18th century.
• It derives its name from the lucrative trade in silk from China.
• The Chinese extended the Great Wall to protect the trade route.
• Goods and ideas, including religions (Buddhism), philosophies, sciences, and technologies like paper and gunpowder, were exchanged.
• Diseases, notably plague, also spread along the Silk Road.

Mongol Invasion and “Pax Mongolica”

• The Mongol invasions and conquests took place during the 13th and 14th centuries, creating the largest contiguous empire in history.
• The Mongol Empire developed through campaigns throughout Asia, reaching Eastern Europe by the 1240s.
• It was a land power fueled by Mongol cavalry and cattle.
• Mongol conquest and plundering took place during warmer seasons.
• As the Mongol Empire fragmented from 1260, conflict between Mongols and Eastern European polities continued.
• Mongols ruled China into the 14th century under the Yuan dynasty, and Mongol rule in Persia persisted into the 15th century under the Timurid Empire.
• The Mughal Empire in India survived into the 19th century.
• The Pax Mongolica describes the stabilizing effects of the Mongol Empire's conquests, easing communication and commerce.

The End of the Pax Mongolica

• The end of the Pax Mongolica was marked by the disintegration of the khanates and the outbreak of the Black Death in Asia in the mid-14th century.

Organization of Mongol Army

• The Mongol military organization was based on the decimal system: squads of ten men each, arbans (10), zuuns (100), Mingghans (1000), and tumen (10,000).
• The Mongols were famous for their horse archers and lance-armed troops.
• They recruited military specialists from conquered lands and used Chinese engineers for siege warfare.
• Forces were trained and equipped for mobility and speed and functioned independently of supply lines.
• Skillful use of couriers enabled leaders to maintain contact, and campaigns were preceded by planning and reconnaissance.
• All adult males up to 60 were eligible for conscription.

Yam Postal System/Supply Point

• The Mongols established the Yam, a communication system connecting the Far East and the West.
• Relay stations were set up every 25–30 miles, supplying fresh horses and fodder.
• The Yam stretched across Mongol territory from Eastern Europe to the Pacific Ocean.
• The system made it easy to send messages and travel long distances.

Mongol Destruction

• The Mongol conquests resulted in widespread destruction and mass killings.
• It has been estimated that approximately 11% of the world's population was killed during or immediately after the invasions.
• China suffered a drastic decline in population, though some historians attribute this decline to the Black Death spread by the Mongols.

Marco Polo

• Marco Polo was a Venetian merchant, explorer, and writer who travelled through Asia along the Silk Road between 1271 and 1295.
• He lived in China for 17 years, and traveled extensively inside the emperor's lands.
• Around 1291, the Polos accompanied a Mongol princess to Persia, then traveled overland to Constantinople and Venice.
• His travel book inspired Christopher Columbus and other travelers.

Ibn Battuta, The Prince of Travelers

• Ibn Battuta was a Muslim Berber-Moroccan scholar and explorer who travelled the Old World, covering 117,000 km.
• He visited most of the Old World, including Central Asia, Southeast Asia, South Asia, China, and the Iberian Peninsula.

Europe in the Time of the Thirty Years' War

• Religion, the struggle for dominance, and the birth of modern states.

What was the Thirty Years War About?

• Today, it is considered its main driver was the long-running contest for European dominance between Habsburgs in Austria and Spain, and the French House of Bourbon.
• The fighting can be divided into two main parts.
  • The first phase from 1618 to 1635 was primarily a struggle between the emperor Ferdinand II and his German opponents, with external powers playing a supportive role

Post 1635

• Post 1635, fighting in Germany became part of a wider European struggle, with Sweden and France on one side, the Emperor and his allies on the other. The conflict concluded with the 1648 Peace of Westphalia.
• The Peace reconfirmed "German liberties", ending Habsburg attempts to convert the Holy Roman Empire into an absolutist state similar to Spain

Results of the Thirty Years´ War

• This allowed Bavaria, Brandenburg-Prussia, Saxony and others to pursue their own policies, while Sweden gained a permanent foothold in the Empire
• Despite these setbacks, the Habsburg lands suffered less from the war than many others and became a far more coherent bloc with the absorption of Bohemia, and restoration of Catholicism throughout their territories.
• By laying the foundations of the modern nation state, Westphalia changed the relationship of subjects and their rulers
• Previously, many had overlapping, sometimes conflicting political and religious allegiances; they were now understood to be subject first and foremost to the laws and edicts of their respective state authority, not to the claims of any other entity, be it religious or secular
• The benefits of Westphalia for the Swedes proved short-lived. Unlike French gains which were incorporated into France, Swedish territories remained part of the Empire, and they became members of the Lower and Upper Saxon kreis. While this gave them seats in the Imperial Diet, it also brought them conflict with both Brandenburg-Prussia and Saxony, who were competitors in Pomerania.
• Arguably, France gained more from the Thirty Years' War than any other power; by 1648, most of Richelieu's objectives had been achieved.

They Included

• They included separation of the Spanish and Austrian Habsburgs, expansion of the French frontier into the Empire, and an end to Spanish military supremacy in Northern Europe
• Although the Franco-Spanish conflict continued until 1659, Westphalia allowed Louis XIV of France to complete the process of replacing Spain as the predominant European power

Advantages and Problems of the Global Position of Spain

• In 1580, Philip II of Spain became ruler of the Portuguese Empire; long-standing commercial rivals, the 1602 to 1663 Dutch–Portuguese War was an offshoot of the Dutch fight for independence from Spain.
• The Portuguese dominated the trans-Atlantic economy known as the Triangular trade, in which slaves were transported from West Africa and Portuguese Angola to work on plantations in Portuguese Brazil, which exported sugar and tobacco to Europe

Known by Dutch historians as the 'Great Design"?

• Known by Dutch historians as the 'Great Design", control of this trade would not only be extremely profitable but also deprive the Spanish of funds needed to finance their war in the Netherlands
• The Dutch West India Company was formed in 1621 to achieve this purpose and a Dutch fleet captured the Brazilian port of Salvador, Bahia in 1624. After it was retaken by the Portuguese in 1625, a second fleet established Dutch Brazil in 1630, which was not returned until 1654
• Spain's inability or unwillingness to provide protection against these attacks increased Portuguese resentment and were major factors in the outbreak of the Portuguese Restoration War in 1640.
• Although ultimately expelled from Brazil, Angola and São Tomé, the Dutch retained the Cape of Good Hope, as well as Portuguese trading posts in Malacca, the Malabar Coast, the Moluccas and Ceylon.

The Time of Troubles

• The Time of Troubles, was a period of political crisis during the Tsardom of Russia which began in 1598 with the death of Fyodor I (the last of the Rurik dynasty)
• By this time, Russia was a failed state; the throne was vacant, the nobility quarreled among themselves, the Orthodox Patriarch Hermogenes was imprisoned, Catholic Poles occupied the Kremlin, Smolensk was still besieged, and Protestant Swedes occupied Novgorod
• Tens of thousands died in battles and riots as bands of brigands swarmed, and Tatar raids depopulated and devastated Russia's southern borderlands Russia experienced the famine of 1601–03, which killed a third of the population, within three years of Fyodor's death.
• Russia was occupied by the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth during the Polish–Muscovite War until it was expelled in 1612

The Time of Troubles Ended

• The Time of Troubles ended with the election of Michael Romanov as tsar by the Zemsky Sobor in 1613, establishing the Romanov dynasty which ruled Russia until the February Revolution in 1917
• There was a strong religious component in that struggle as king Sigismund III. opposed the compromise, deciding to seize the throne and convert Russia to Roman Catholicism
• This aroused anti-Catholic and anti-Polish sentiment in Russia and infuriated the pro-Polish boyars who supported him
• Sweden strongly disapproved of the move, fighting the Polish–Swedish wars on the Baltic coast, ending their military alliance and beginning the Ingrian War. The Swedes supported their False Dmitry III.

French – Habsburg Rivalry

• House of Valois/House of Bourbon (France) versus House of Habsburg (Spain, the Netherlands, Austria…)

Who Sought Dominance in European History?

• The history of international relations in Europe, in the period from the late Middle Ages and throughout the Modern Age, can be interpreted as several unsuccessful attempts to establish hegemony
• Against a power that sought hegemony Europeans always managed to create an alliance of countries that did not want such a development
• Although individually not as powerful, their combined potential ultimately always prevented the emergence of hegemony.

French - Habsburg Clash Over Dominance

• The term France–Habsburg rivalry describes the rivalry between royal houses of France (Valois, Bourbon) and the House of Habsburg which controlled Empire that included, at various times, the Holy Roman Empire and the Spanish Empire
• In addition to holding the Austrian hereditary lands, the Habsburg dynasty ruled the Low Countries (1482-1794), Spain (1504–1700) and the Holy Roman Empire (1438–1806). All these lands were notably in personal union under Emperor Charles V and formed the "Habsburg ring" around France

As The House of Habsburg Expanded

• As the House of Habsburg expanded into western Europe, border friction began with the Kingdom of France
• The subsequent rivalry between the two powers became a cause for several conflicts
• These include the Italian Wars (1494–1559), the Thirty Years' War (1618–1648), the Nine Years' War (1688–1697), the War of Spanish Succession, the War of Austrian Succession (1740-1748), the Coalition Wars (1792-1815), the Franco-Austrian War (1859) and World War I (1914-1918)

My Biggest Enemies Were Heretics and Debts…Emperor Charles V

• Every European monarchy in the XV. - XVIII. century had to face several challenges at the same time:
  • 1. How to maintain and strengthen the authority of the monarch within the state.
  • 2. Where to get resources for ever-increasing state administration.
  • 3. How to withstand external pressures.
• The enemies and allies of the state were:
  • High nobility, country nobility, church, cities.
  • Providers of financial loans (Jews, bankers, cities).
  • Rival powers.
    *Bella gerant alii, tu, felix Austria,