The Thirty Years' War began in Bohemia, when Protestant nobles threw two imperial officials out of a window of Prague Castle, an event known as the Defenestration of Prague, and rebelled against the Catholic Habsburg ruler. The conflict spread across the Holy Roman Empire and drew in Denmark, Sweden under Gustavus Adolphus, and Catholic France under Cardinal Richelieu, so that religious loyalties were mixed with political rivalries. Armies lived off the land, and the war brought famine, disease and destruction, killing a large share of the population in parts of Germany. It ended with the Peace of Westphalia, negotiated in Osnabruck and Munster, which confirmed the independence of many German states and is often seen as an origin of the modern system of sovereign states.
Before and after
- 1616Construction of Sultan Ahmed Mosque
- from 1616 to 1912Qing dynasty
- 22 April 1616Death of Miguel de Cervantes
- 23 April 1616Death of William Shakespeare
- from 1618 to 1648Thirty Years' War
- 1619Manneken Pis
- August 1619The first enslaved Africans arrive in English Virginia
- from 1620 to 1621Polish–Ottoman War of 1620–1621
- 1620Construction of Luxembourg Palace
More in Wars, politics & history
- from 23 May 1568 to 30 January 1648Eighty Years' War
- 13 April 1598Edict of Nantes
- 24 October 1648Peace of Westphalia
- from 22 February 1700 to 10 September 1721Great Northern War
- from March 1701 to September 1714War of the Spanish Succession
- from 17 May 1756 to 15 February 1763Seven Years' War
The era
This moment belongs to the Early modern world (1500 CE to 1760 CE), voyages, printing and new ideas. You can also browse everything in the 17th century.