History J300-9867 (Spang) Enlightenment? Culture and Knowledge in Eighteenth-Century Europe 20 October 2009 Enlightened States and Benighted Peoples Engraving: Military Arts, Infantry Exercises from the Encyclopédie
What is a state? What is a nation? State = political, administrative entity; formed through law and bureaucracy city-states imperial states ancient Athens or Sparta; medieval Venice; eighteenth-century Geneva or Hamburg Roman Empire; Russian Empire; British Empire federal states United States of America; Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR); Switzerland nation-states France, Spain, Portugal Nation = group of people who are believed to have something in common ( ethnicity, language, culture, history)
How are states and nations related to each other? State = political, administrative entity; formed through law and bureaucracy Nation = group of people who are believed to have something in common ( ethnicity, language, culture, history) Nation-State = ideal of making political and ethnic boundaries coincide nationalism = ideology that argues that a nation has the right to political self-determination (most historians would say that this develops in the nineteenth century) (please note) nationalism is not necessarily the same thing as patriotism or xenophobia (hatred/fear of foreigners)
Europe in the 1780s yellow=holy Roman Empire red=kingdom of Prussia green=austrian Empire
Europe, approx. 1460
Military Revolution, 1500-1650?* new technologies (mobile cannons, granulated powder) bayonets and pistols replace pikes and lances (iron cannonballs could travel 750 feet/second; musket balls went much more slowly than modern bullets, so made messier wounds) new forms of fortification fighting forces more specialized and much larger Approximate number of men in military: 1470s 1590s 1650s 1700 Spain 20,000 200,000 50,000 France 80,000 100,000 400,000 Sweden 15,000 70,000 100,000 Russia 35,000 170,000 * argument developed by the historians, Geoffrey Parker and Michael Roberts
1715-1815: The Second Hundred Years War? 1701-1714 War of Spanish Succession 1700-1721 Great Northern War 1716-1718 Third Turkish War 1733-1735 War of Polish Succession 1737-1739 Fourth Turkish War 1740-1748 War of Austrian Succession 1756-1763 Seven Years War 1776-1781 War of American Independence 1792-1802 French revolutionary wars 1803-1815 Napoleonic Wars Frederick II ( the Great ) of Prussia leading the cavalry charge at the Battle of Mollwitz, 1741 (late 18 th -cy image)
Henry Humphrey Evans Lloyd (1718-1783) born in Wales, studied at Oxford early 1740s worked as a tutor in France 1745 captain in French army 1746 part of French forces that accompany Young Pretender 1747-1753 major in Prussian army 1754 French officer 1757-60 Austrian lieutenant-colonel 1760-63 Prussian major-general late 1760s British diplomat 1773 Russian general 1740-1748 War of Austrian Succession (France, Prussia, Spain, Bavaria against Austria, Great Britain, Hanover, Russia) 1757-1763 Seven Years War (Great Britain, Hanover, Prussia, Portugal against France, Austria, Russia, Sweden)
Enlightenment and Absolutism? today, we expect a state to have a single legal system for all citizens this was not the case in the eighteenth century one set of laws (and punishments) for the princes of the blood another for the aristocracy overlap of local, royal, and/or imperial jurisdictions commanding officers in much of Europe owned their regiments in central and Eastern Europe, more people were enserfed, as population growth in the West meant increased demand for grain a legal system structured by the idea of privilege not rights
Charles III of Spain Catherine II of Russia Leopold II of Austria (Holy Roman Empire) Louis XVI (France) make efforts to encourage industry and education attempt to produce a written legal code support free trade (especially in grain) strengthen state against religious institutions Charles and Leopold expel the Jesuits; Leopold closes many monasteries and grants toleration to Jews, Protestants, and Moslems;