scholarly journals THE CONSTITUTION OF THE HOLY ROMAN EMPIRE AFTER 1648: SAMUEL PUFENDORF'S ASSESSMENT IN HIS MONZAMBANO

1999 ◽  
Vol 42 (4) ◽  
pp. 961-983 ◽  
Author(s):  
PETER SCHRÖDER
Keyword(s):  
Roman Empire ◽  
Seventeenth Century ◽  
Political Thought ◽  
Political System ◽  
Holy Roman Empire ◽  
Considerable Degree ◽  
Philosophical Discussion ◽  
History Of Political Thought ◽  
New Approach ◽  
History Of

The examination of Pufendorf's Monzambano shows that he was strongly interested in the question of sovereignty, and that the complex reality of the Holy Roman Empire demanded a completely new approach to the question of where sovereignty within the Empire lay. Pufendorf developed his account of the Empire as an irregular political system by using essential aspects of Hobbes's theory and thus departed from all previous writers on the forma imperii. But Pufendorf's writing on the Empire has not only to be linked with political and philosophical discussion about sovereignty within the Empire but also with his own main writings where he developed a more detailed theory regarding the issue of sovereignty in general. The peace of Westphalia was not only an international settlement but it also shaped the constitution of the Empire to a considerable degree, and this is of crucial significance for the history of political thought during the seventeenth century.

Switzerland

2013 ◽  
Author(s):  
Randolph C. Head ◽  
David Y. Neufeld
Keyword(s):  
Roman Empire ◽  
Cultural History ◽  
French Revolution ◽  
Political System ◽  
Holy Roman Empire ◽  
Printing Industry ◽  
Administrative Records ◽  
Dutch Revolt ◽  
15Th Century ◽  
History Of

The Swiss Confederacy was a product of the late 14th and 15th centuries that occupied an increasingly anomalous place within the mostly Germanic Holy Roman Empire and the European political system during the 16th and 17th centuries. The evolution of its complex political and institutional fabric, which long rested on late medieval feudal and communal practices, was accompanied by the emergence of a distinctive historical mythology, centered on the figure of William Tell and the three “Urschweizer” forest cantons, that profoundly shaped understandings of the Confederacy both inside and outside its boundaries. The Confederacy garnered attention from European thinkers from time to time as a model alternative to the emerging system of absolute sovereign states—for example, during the Dutch Revolt and before the French Revolution—but otherwise remained little more than a footnote in broader histories of Europe. The extraordinary richness of Swiss source material, ranging from the early medieval holdings of abbeys such as St. Gall to the extraordinary illustrated urban chronicles of the 15th century to the remarkably intact series of administrative records of the Swiss cantons from the 16th century onward, also contributed to various historiographical movements as historians’ interests changed. Inside Switzerland, a dense tradition of local and regional history grappled with the epistemic potency of Swiss historical mythology through repeated waves of revision and restatement, beginning in the first published overview by Petermann Etterlin in 1507 (Kronica von der loblichen Eydtgnoschaft, jr harkommen und sust seltzam strittenn und geschichten [Basel, Switzerland: Mich. Furtter, 1507]) and continuing to the present. The profoundly federal nature of Swiss politics always shaped Swiss historical practice as well, however, so that even today, much of the best historical writing on Switzerland is cantonal or local in focus, even as it embodies larger historiographical currents. This article seeks to provide access to this complex historical terrain by concentrating on the political, social, and cultural history of the Swiss region in particular. Larger European movements with significant Swiss components—including Humanism, particularly in the person of Erasmus of Rotterdam; the printing industry, which flourished early on in Basel; and the artistic currents of the northern Renaissance—are not included, since they are better comprehended in their European scope. Many publications on Swiss history carry titles in German and French, and often also in Italian; here, only one title is given in most cases, depending on the origin and focus of the reference.

Humanism and Empire

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alexander Lee
Keyword(s):  
Roman Empire ◽  
Fourteenth Century ◽  
Political Thought ◽  
Holy Roman Empire ◽  
Imperial Authority ◽  
History Of ◽  
New Interpretation ◽  
City States ◽  
Renaissance Italy ◽  
Political Conviction

For more than a century, scholars have believed that Italian humanism was predominantly ‘civic’ in outlook. Often serving in communal government, fourteenth-century humanists like Albertino Mussato and Coluccio Salutati are said to have derived from their reading of the Latin classics a rhetoric of republican liberty that was opposed to the ‘tyranny’ of neighbouring signori and of the German emperors. In this groundbreaking study, Alexander Lee challenges this long-held belief. From the death of Frederick II in 1250 to the failure of Rupert of the Palatinate’s ill-fated expedition in 1402, Lee argues, the humanists nurtured a consistent and powerful affection for the Holy Roman Empire. Though this was articulated in a variety of different ways, it was nevertheless driven more by political conviction than by cultural concerns. Surrounded by endless conflict—both within and between city states—the humanists eagerly embraced the Empire as the surest guarantee of peace and liberty, and lost no opportunity to invoke its protection. Indeed, as Lee shows, the most ardent appeals to imperial authority were made not by ‘signorial’ humanists, but by humanists in the service of communal regimes. The first comprehensive, synoptic study of humanistic ideas of Empire in the period c.1250–1402, this volume offers a radically new interpretation of fourteenth-century political thought, and raises wide-ranging questions about the foundations of modern constitutional ideas. As such, it is essential reading not just for students of Renaissance Italy and the history of political thought, but for all those interested in understanding the origins of liberty.

scholarly journals Liberalism's Historical Diversity

2013 ◽  
Vol 8 (2) ◽  
pp. 67-82 ◽  
Author(s):  
José María Rosales
Keyword(s):  
Nineteenth Century ◽  
Seventeenth Century ◽  
Political Thought ◽  
Political Movement ◽  
History Of Political Thought ◽  
Introductory Article ◽  
History Of ◽  
Concept Theory ◽  
Political Economic ◽  
Conceptual Research

Rooted in late seventeenth-century theories of rights, liberal ideas have brought forth since the nineteenth century a full-edged complex of traditions in moral, political, economic, social, and legal thought. Yet in historiographical debates such complexity is often blurred by presenting it under the uniform terms of a canon. Along with other methods, conceptual history is contributing to the rediscovery of liberalism's diversity. This group of articles compiles three conceptual studies on scarcely explored aspects of the history of liberalism in Denmark, Finland, and Hungary—countries whose political past has only occasionally figured in mainstream accounts of European liberalism. This introductory article is a methodological discussion of the rationale and forms in which liberalism's historical diversity is rendered through comparative conceptual research. After reflecting on the limits of the Anglophone history of political thought to grasp the plurality of liberal traditions, the article examines how transnational conceptual histories recast the understanding of liberalism as a concept, theory, ideology, and political movement.

scholarly journals Brittany: Pay d’États and Don Gratuit (1648–1652)

2021 ◽  
pp. 159-187
Author(s):  
Christel Annemieke Romein
Keyword(s):  
Roman Empire ◽  
Seventeenth Century ◽  
Legal Status ◽  
Holy Roman Empire ◽  
History Of

AbstractI start this chapter by introducing the history of Brittany which was independent until 1492 when it became linked to France, and 1532 it became a French pays d’état. Brittany itself did not have any direct experiences with warfare during the mid-seventeenth century, and hence this chapter shows how a particularist province reacted to tax-requests, without the immediate threat of warfare. Nonetheless, taxation had to be paid in order to finance warfare with Spain and the Holy Roman Empire. Central to this chapter is how the nobility responded to these requests. The noblemen strove to uphold their legal status, and heavy taxations could jeopardise their income. Hence, the records of the Breton assemblies do give much information about the tax-negotiations that went on and the underlying noble privileges and conflicts. Especially between 1648 and 1652, when Brittany found itself close to bankruptcy and needed to curtail their expenditure. The used terminology does give away information about the threatened autonomy and means to protect privileges.

Reformierte Eliten im Preußenland: Religion, Politik und Loyalitäten in der Familie Dohna (1560–1660)

2004 ◽  
Vol 95 (1) ◽  
pp. 210-239
Author(s):  
Hans-Jürgen Bömelburg
Keyword(s):  
Roman Empire ◽  
Seventeenth Century ◽  
Central Europe ◽  
Close Contact ◽  
Religious History ◽  
Holy Roman Empire ◽  
Religious Symbolism ◽  
Religious Influences ◽  
History Of ◽  
Early Establishment

ABSTRACT The archives of the Dohna family contain materials on the efforts at creating a “Second Reformation” in the Duchy of Prussia, where the early establishment of a Lutheran confessional foundation (the Corpus doctrinae pruthenicum| of 1567/68) and a solid ecclesiastical constitution prevented Calvinism from gaining a foothold. The Reformed creed found followers among the nobility through connections with the Reformed territories in the Holy Roman Empire, by close contact with Reformed theologians in royal Prussia, and by connections with the Calvinist church of the nobility in Poland and Lithuania. This network radiated into ducal Prussia, where the Dohnas became Calvinists. During the first three decades of the seventeenth century this led to a conflict between the Reformed party and the Lutheran majority among the theologians and the lower nobility. Drawing on the support of the Polish king, the Lutheran party succeeded between 1610 and 1620 in shutting out the Reformed officeholders by means of lawsuits and unequivocal oath formulas. The Reformed nobility were not helped by the connection they forged in 1613 with the equally Reformed territorial ruler because he had to take into account the Polish crown as well as ecclesiastical legal determinations in ducal Prussia.The Dohnas, who stood close to the Calvinist “party of movement,” tried nevertheless to introduce elements of the Reformed faith or to engage men who were inclined toward the Reformed creed into the churches within their patronage. In this context, the Dohnas argued with the noble concepts of patronage held by the Lithuanian Radziwiłłs, who used their rights of patronage to introduce Calvinist pastors. Repeated conflicts arose with the Ko¨ nigsberg consistory and neighboring Lutheran pastors, in the course of which both sides adhered to their positions. On the level of religious symbolism, the Dohnas removed images of saints and programmatically transformed older works of art to conform to Calvinism.The confessional disputes in the Duchy of Prussia are typologically similar to those in the Prussian cities (Elbing, Danzig, Thorn), except that in the former noble patronage and in the latter bourgeois patronage was contested. It is evident that in eastern Prussia, too, along with Lutheran confessionalization, numerous other religious influences were felt. Therefore, the region can be included more definitely than previously thought in the religious history of eastern central Europe.

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