8.5. Germany

For several centuries, Germany was part of the Holy Roman Empire, formed by the German King Otto I in 962 and existed before 1806. However, by the XIII century. the power of the emperor became nominal, as the empire gradually disintegrated into separate principalities. The collapse of the principality took place in Germany, which occupied a dominant position in the Holy Roman Empire.

The reasons for the economic lag Germany. In the XV-XVII centuries., Ie on the threshold of a new time, Germany was experiencing an economic decline due to several reasons. As already noted, as a result of the Great Geographic Discoveries, trade routes shifted from the Baltic and Mediterranean seas to the Atlantic Ocean. The Hanseatic League, which united the cities of Northern Germany, fell into decay, lost its farmsteads. At the end of the XVI century. in its composition remained only three cities Hamburg, Bremen and Lübeck. Due to the beginning of the decline of Northern Italy, trade in South German cities has declined. The process of decentralization of Germany also had an effect. It remained politically fragmented, the autonomy of cities strengthened. The separatism of the feudal lords and religious wars were the main reason. Germany could not participate in geographical expeditions, world trade, colonial seizures, and, therefore, did not have external sources of initial accumulation of capital. It was influenced by the conservative features of the shop system. In the late Middle Ages (XVI-XVII cc.), Personal serfdom was revived in Germany, the corvée exploitation expanded, and the influence of landlords increased. These processes led to a lower mobility of the peasantry, which delayed the disintegration of feudalism and the development of capitalism.

The most important events in the history of Germany in the XVI century. Steel Reformation and the Peasant War of 1524-1526

Reformation The Reformation in Western and Central Europe represented a broad social movement, which was essentially anti-feudal in nature. In form, it was a struggle against the Catholic Church, as is known, which was the main ideological pillar of the feudal system.

Homeland of the Reformation was Germany. Then it quickly spread to Switzerland, the Netherlands, France, England, Italy. In Germany, the Reformation was accompanied by the Peasant War - the largest social movement of the Middle Ages.

The beginning of the Reformation is considered to be the speeches of Martin Luther (1483-1546) in Wittenberg in 1517 with 95 theses against indulgences, from the 12th-13th centuries. served as a means of enriching the clergy. The second largest center of the Reformation is Switzerland, where Reformation views of Frenchman Jean Calvin, who escaped from persecution (1509-1564), were formed.

The ideologists of the Reformation, in the theses put forward by them, denied the necessity of the Catholic Church with its hierarchical structure. In their opinion, a person is not attached to the grace of the sacraments of the church, but by personal faith, therefore supporters of the renewal of the church have denied the clergy and its mediation role between God and people. The only authoritative source for a Christian, they recognized the Scripture, and not the decrees of the popes. They demanded a reduction in requisitions for the maintenance of the ministers of the church, denied its rights to the land. Therefore, Luther argued that it was necessary to secularize church property, dissolve monasteries and place schools and hospitals in them.

The following main directions of the Reformation are distinguished: bourgeois (M. Luther, J. Calvin, Ulrich Zwingli (1484-1531)); popular, connecting the requirement of abolition of the Catholic Church with the struggle for the destruction of feudal exploitation, for the establishment of equality (Thomas Munzer, Anabaptists ¹ ); royal-princely, reflecting the interests of monarchs and secular feudal lords, who sought to strengthen their power and seize the land wealth of the church. As already noted, the Netherlands and English revolutions took place under the ideological banner of the Reformation.

Peasant war. AT period The Reformation took place in Germany and the Peasant War (1524-1526) against the strengthening of feudal oppression, which swept a vast part of the territory of Germany. Peasants, supported by part of the townspeople, stormed noble castles and monasteries, captured many cities. In the program of the rebels of the Schwab-Schwarzwald district “The Twelve Articles”, there was a demand to abolish personal dependence, return captured communal lands, reduce feudal extortion and serfdom, eliminate tithing, and abolish the posthumous dues. Franconian peasants were more moderate in their demands, their position was bourgeois in content. They also put forward demands for the liberation of the peasants from serfdom, but the peasants had to buy the land for a large fee (20 times the rent).

The leader and ideologist of the peasant camp, T. Munzer (c. 1490-1525), called for the overthrow of the feudal system and the establishment of a just order. Tactics agreement with the feudal lords adhered to part of the burghers and chivalry, which joined the Peasant War. The peasant war was brutally suppressed by the troops of the Swabian alliance, consisting of the knights of the imperial cities and the princes of southwestern Germany. There were gallows erected everywhere, torture was used on the captives, they were burned, they were hung up. More than 100 thousand people died. The peasants in Tyrol resisted the longest. The defeat of the Peasant War led to an increase in the feudal reaction, an increase in serfdom, the power of the princes, and the consolidation of Germany’s political fragmentation.

Thirty Years War

Thirty Years War. The main event in the history of Germany XVII. became Thirty Years old the war (1618-1648). Many countries joined the war, uniting into two blocs: the Habsburg and anti-Habsburg. The Habsburg bloc included the Spanish and Austrian Hapsburgs, the Catholic princes of Germany, they were supported by the papacy and the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth. The anti-Habsburg coalition united the German Protestant princes, France, Sweden, Denmark; she was supported by England, Holland, Russia. If the Habsburg bloc acted under the banner of Catholicism, then the anti-Habsburg block (especially at the beginning) of Protestantism. So the Thirty Years War was a pan-European war.

The Thirty Years War is divided into periods: Czech (1618-1623) - the Czech uprising against the Habsburgs, the defeat of the Czechs in 1620 near White Mountain; Danish (1625-1629) - the troops of the Habsburg bloc (under the command of A. Wallenstein and I. Tille) defeated Denmark, the Danish troops were expelled from the territory of Germany; Swedish (1630-1635) - The Swedish army under the command of Gustav III Adolf invaded Germany, she won at Breitenfeld (1631) and Lutzen (1632), but was defeated at Nerdlingen (1634); Franco-Swedish (1635-1648) - the clear superiority of the anti-Habsburg coalition with the entry into the war of France was determined. The result was the collapse of the reactionary plans of the Habsburgs to create a "world empire" and the subordination of European states; political authority passed to France. The war ended with the conclusion of the Peace of Westphalia in 1648.

Germany suffered from this war more than all the warring states. The development of serfdom in Germany intensified. F. Engels noted that after the Thirty Years War in this country "a free peasant became ... just as rare as the white crow" ¹ . Many Saxon and Czech mines were put out of action. In some parts of the country, the population has decreased by half. The ruined peasants were forced to seek refuge from the landlords. This was especially characteristic of eastern Germany, where every landowner was the absolute master of his territory.

In the XVI-XVII centuries. in Germany, the process of joining peasant holdings to estates increased. The landlords' lands expanded due to the annexation of plots of peasants who left for the cities or failed to perform duties. Landowners could increase the land at the expense of the villages that had become desolate during the Thirty Years' War, on which empty plots colonists were invited on temporary holding. Their property was considered only the harvest, and the houses and lands belonged to the landowners. According to the laws of Pomerania (1616), Mecklenburg (1621, 1633, 1654), such peasants were allowed to be driven from land. Fixed corvee was 5-6 days a week. Thus, in the late Middle Ages in Germany, serfdom took on particularly severe forms.

At the same time, contacts with the countries of Western Europe led the Germans to the success of commercial and industrial development. The growth of cities in Western European countries generated a great demand for consumer goods - bread, cattle, leather, wool, flax, etc. Considering this, the German feudal lords began to adapt to the world market, to use it, although not yet on a capitalist, but on a feudal basis - by expanding the domain economy and exploiting corvee labor.

The transition of Western Europe to the New time was characterized by significant changes in all areas of public life - socio-economic, political, religious, scientific. The process of establishing new capitalist relations has become irreversible.

At this stage, the countries of the first echelon of capitalism emerged, where the bourgeois revolutions took place earlier - Holland and England, which had corresponding prerequisites for this.

The consequence of bourgeois revolutions were not only the freedom of economic activity, but also changes in the forms of government and the advancement to the formation of the rule of law and civil society.

In France, the absolute monarchy still remained, a peculiar social structure emerged, in which it was not entrepreneurs who prevailed, but usurers, repurchase operations, the largest administrative-state apparatus was formed. Such historical features led to a significant participation in the economic processes of the French state, supporting the development of manufactures, and an active foreign trade policy.

A feature of Germany’s development was the preservation of the country's political fragmentation, which, along with other factors, slowed the development of capitalist relations and caused the plight of the peasantry.

The largest historical events of the XVI-XVII centuries. in Germany, the Reformation, the Peasant War, and the Thirty Years War of European scale.

As a result of these shocks, the transition to the New time in Germany was characterized by the establishment of the most severe forms of serfdom.

Questions for self-test

1. 1. What factors contributed to the breakthrough of Europe to the New time in the XV-XVII centuries?

2. 2. Tell us about the causes and consequences of the bourgeois revolution in the Netherlands and explain why the economic flourishing of this country was short?

3. 3. What is primitive accumulation of capital and why is England considered a classic country of this process?

4. 4. What caused the English bourgeois revolution, what stages did it include, what were its main results?

5. 5. Tell us about the state structure of the leading countries of Europe of the XV-XVII centuries. and its differences.

6. 6. What were the features of the socio-economic development of France in the transition to the New time?

7. 7. Explain the reasons for the economic lag of Germany in the XV-XVII centuries. and describe the main events of its socio-political development.