SIXTEENTH CENTURY POLITICS

Question 1

What is the key takeaway?

Answer 1

• European politics shifted towards centralized
• More “modern” ideas of international law
• Tensions of reformation sometimes broke out into open war and often left rulers torn between their faith and their political interests

Question 2

What was happening in Spain?

Answer 2

• Spanish Crown suffers bankruptcies (1557- 1647)

*Spain also struggles diplomatically = should it ally with Catholic states OR should it do what’s best for Spain

Question 3

How did Spain and Portugal avoid the religious fragmentation that rocks Western Europe?

Answer 3

*The Inquisition is a major factor in this

*Another factor is that Luther wrote primarily in German, which means his work always needs to be translated and diminishes his appeal

Question 3

What is happening in Italy? (Via religious conflict)

Answer 3

*There is a concerted Protestant movement in Italy (mostly Calvinist and Anabaptist, centred on Venice) but the efforts of the Catholic Church diminish it significant

Question 4

What’s the deal with the Holy Roman Empire and religion?

Answer 4

Confessional conflicts
- Holy Roman Empire has 3 archbishops (Catholic) and 4 electors
- Half the secular electors became protestant =Schmalkaldic War (1546-1547) and Second Schmalkaldic War (1552)
- Wanted everyone to be catholic

*The Holy Roman Emperor abdicates (of a monarch renounce one’s throne) in the messy aftermath
*1555: Peace of Augsburg grants princes the right to choose their religion

Question 5

What is the Peace of Augsburg?

Answer 5

1555: grants princes the right to choose their religion

Question 5

Which country was the powerhouse of europe?

Answer 5

French Wars of Religion weaken French monarchy, but it still remains the strongest state in Europe

Question 6

What happened in Dutch Revolt (1566–1648)? And how did that lead to a conflict with Spain?

Answer 6

• Charles 5th of Spain inherits the Netherlands (through his paternal Habsburg family when he ascends the throne of Spain in 1515)
• Netherlands became heavily Protestant following the Reformation and eventually becomes majority-Calvinist (Dutch Reformed
  
  • Dutch Calvinism escalates into the beeldenstorm riots (Retaliation by the forces of the Spanish Duke of Alba)
• conflict would continue in multiple phases for roughly 80 years as the nascent Dutch Republic pushed out Spain bit by bit

Question 7

What was happening in Eastern Europe? (Polish-Lithuania - Political system)

Answer 7

• Union of the Kingdom of Poland and Grand Duchy of Lithuania (1569)
  
  • Before 1569 they were governed by union (marriage) -> officially united by their son
• Used system: Parliamentary system (Sejm) and elective monarch
• King is Elected by Nobels (if he dies, maybe son rules, maybe not)
• The General Sejm (commonwealth parliament) met at least every 2 years and could veto the king

Question 8

What was happening in Eastern Europe? (Polish-Lithuania - Facts about it)

Answer 8

• Largest and richest country in Europe = close to silk road
• Most religiously diverse (best place to be jewish)
• Unlike anything else happening in Europe
• Expansion of serfdom in the sixteenth century

Question 9

What is happening in Northern Europe? ( Norway-Denmark)

Question 10

What is happening in Northern Europe? ( Sweden)

Answer 10

Economy runs on mineral extraction

Question 11

What happened with scandinavian monarchs and religon? (Northern region in Europe)

Answer 11

Over the course of the sixteenth century, all Scandinavian monarchs adopt Lutheranism and make it the state religion

Question 12

Explain the Breakup of the Kalmar Union?

Answer 12

*The Kalmar Union: a series of marriages mean that between 1397-1520 the three kingdoms of Norway, Denmark, and Sweden were ruled by the same monarch

*Divergent interests within the three countries (especially Sweden’s dissatisfaction) leads to rebellion, the dissolution of the Kalmar Union, and the installation of Gustav I as King of Sweden

*Norway and Denmark split up as well

Question 13

What is happening in England with Tudor dynasty?

Answer 13

New, young dynasty that has come to power via the War of the Roses; somewhat seen as upstarts initially; really clear branding
(The House of Tudor was an English and Welsh dynasty that held the throne of England from 1485 to 1603)

Question 14

What’s happening in Scotland with the Stuart dynasty?

Answer 14

established dynasty dating to the 14th century

• The House of Stuart, originally spelled Stewart, was a royal house of Scotland, England, Ireland and later Great Britain.
  Important people: James 5th, Mary I (Mary, Queen of Scots, and James 4th

Question 15

What’s happening in Ireland?

Answer 15

Ireland had been under at least partial English colonization for centuries, becomes referred to as a kingdom under Henry VIII

Question 16

What happened with the Tutors and the English reformation? (Henry 8th)

Answer 16

*1532: Henry VIII broke with the Catholic Church over the Pope’s refusal to grant him a divorce from Catherine of Aragon
*Establishes the Church of England with the English monarch as its head
*Dissolves all Church institutions in England, confiscates anything of value (land, buildings, loot)
*Demands clergy convert, persecutes those who refuse

Question 17

Explain differences in Ruling between Henry, Edward, Mary and Elizabeth?

Answer 17

Henry engages in a program of moderate reforms,

Edward’s reforms are more significant (including iconoclasm(assertively rejecting cherished beliefs and institutions or established values and practices.) and the imposition of a prayerbook),

Mary is Catholic and persecutes Protestants and the Church of England, (married to Spain king) (Infertile)

Elizabeth reinstates the Church of England
- Repels Invaders - Influenced by Calvinism
- Sisters with Mary

Question 18

How is the Church of England influenced?

Answer 18

theology maintains different factions but became increasingly influenced by Calvinism

Question 19

How did the state start to grow (three main ways)? - Start to Bureaucracy and Centralization

Answer 19

1. Centralization
   - Like Henry 8th, attempts to take control over Church power (power under one)
2. Development of Political Administration
   - order for a state to be centralized, it has to enact its authority at the local level
   *Gradual shift from a society in which the sovereign was just represented to people via the exercise of authority to one in which the people interact with the state via bureaucracy
3. Demography - we want to know who actually lives here

Question 20

What were the 3 focus points of demography in state growth?

Answer 20

*Poor relief
*Regulating state and church charity, regulating the movement of destitute people (“good” poors get relief)

*Cultural conformity
*This is the era of confessional riots, witch hunts, and expulsions of Jews

*Growth of state surveillance = lots of records for historians

Question 21

What was unique about monarchs in this era?

Answer 21

European pattern of Queenship
*England: Mary I, Jane Grey (for 9 days), Elizabeth I

*France: Catherine de’ Medici (the Queen Mother and regent)

*Navarre: Jeanne III

*Scotland: Mary Queen of Scots (also Queen of France through her first husband, Francis I)

Question 22

What is the Zero-sum game of colonialism?

Answer 22

If someone takes territory - must either take it, or you wont have it. (goes to someone else)

Question 23

What is the Globalizing economic system?

Answer 23

Commodities and monopolies
- Certain countries taking control of resources depending on what they colonized (ex. silver)

Question 24

Whats going on with Privateering and piracy?

Answer 24

*State-sponsored piracy

*Elizabeth I supported piratical attacks on Spanish ships returning from the Caribbean

Question 25

Explain the Growth of international law?

Answer 25

*Who owns the ocean? What are the rules of warfare and conquest? Who enforces anti-piracy law?

*Hugo Grotius pioneers the idea of international waters and the right to free passage on those waters

Question 26

Explain guy in pic (guy who’s in pirate slide , kinda balding), and what’s important about his appearance?

Answer 26

His earrings are pearls

• ATP in time pearls are a sign of wealth and status + signify the colonial enterprise he’s supporting

Question 27

What are the major developments with space? (2)

Answer 27

1. Rise of geocentrism: the Earth is not the centre of the universe
   *Copernicus proposes that the sun is the centre of the universe in 1543
   *The Church does not initially censor the book, assuming it is theoretical and hypothetical, but does once Galileo endorses heliocentrism in 1610
2. Astronomical discoveries include numerous planets and stars

Question 28

What does Astronomy cause?

Answer 28

causes religious and political problems
*How is it possible for the Earth not to be the center of the universe? What does this mean for Creation? If our political structures are ordained by God, what does it mean if the Bible isn’t true

Question 29

(European Fragmentation)

Confessional crises lead to? (“loss of the sense of sin.”)

Answer 29

1. More International law
2. Violent Conflict
3. Compromise

Question 30

What is going on with European population?

Answer 30

Increase: European population estimates: 61.6 million in 1500, 70.2 million in 1550, and 78.0 million in 1600

Question 31

What’s with the wealth gap in Europe?

Answer 31

Gaps between rich and poor keep growing, despite the gradual emergence of a middle class

Question 32

What is happening with Ottoman empire?

Answer 32

*Large, wealthy, centralized empire centred in Turkey and extending into the Balkans

*Poland-Lithuania has trading and cultural ties to the east, but also fears invasion

*The Pope is extremely afraid of repeating the Fall of Constantinople

*Powerful rulers in Western Europe see opportunities:
*Francis I of France concludes an alliance with the Ottomans
*Elizabeth I has a lengthy correspondence with the Sultan