Link to Chronology
In which we rush to an unsatisfying conclusion
A History of Europe by Henri Pirenne
University Books, first published 1938 but written during the Great War
Book Nine
The Renaissance and the Reformation
Chapter III
The European States From the Middle of the Fifteenth to the Middle of the Sixteenth Century
1. International Politics
p587 ...The fifty years which had elapsed since the end of the Hundred Years' War had sufficed to revolutionize the traditional order of politics. The conclusion of the great struggle between France and England merely confronted the European community with unexpected problems. While in the West new powers had made their appearance -- the Burgundian State on the shores of the North Sea, and to the south of the Pyrenees the Spanish State, henceforth including Castile and Aragon in a single monarchical bloc -- in the East the Turkish Empire was threatening the Christian world with a new Islamic invasion...
p588 The Turkish invasion was undoubtedly the greatest misfortune to afflict Europe since the end of the Roman Empire. Wherever the invaders advanced they brought with them economic ruin and moral decadence. All those peoples which were subjected to the Turkish yoke -- Bulgars, Serbs, Rumanians, Albanians, and Greeks -- relapsed into a state verging upon barbarism, from which they never emerged until the beginning of the 19th century... Between the Islamism of the Turks ... and the Christianity of their subjects no reconciliation was possible... With the exception of a portion of the Albanian people, not one of the nations subjected to the Sultan was converted to Islam, and for that matter the Turks made no effort to convert them... their religion, by depriving them of all rights of whatever kind, helped to ensure their servitude... The only means of successfully resisting the Turkish offensive would have been a general European league combining the financial and military resources of the Continent for a period of several years... But the States of the 15th century were materially incapable of such an effort... [the most powerful States] left the burden of the conflict to those who were directly involved.
p589 ...By uniting their forces, the Republic of Venice, the Habsburgs of Austria, and the kings of Bohemia, Hungary, and Poland could have opposed [?] an effective barrier to the enemy. But instead of doing this, each State allowed itself to be guided by its ambitions or its interests; they never acted with one common accord...
p590 ...This battle [Mohacz (1526)] was a magnificent triumph for Austria, for it gave her the long-coveted crowns of Bohemia and Hungary, at last assured by the victory of the Turks... [Louis II, their king, was killed at Mohacz.] Soliman... advanced without difficulty as far as Pest, and in 1529 he reached the walls of Vienna, which the inclement weather and sickness in his army prevented him from capturing. [I believe this is when coffee first reached Europe.] However, he retained all Hungary as far as the Enns...
p592 Under... [Soliman's] reign (1520-1556) the Turkish Empire covered the largest area it was ever to attain. The shores of the Black Sea had already been occupied under Selim I (1512-1520), and the Tartars of the Crimea were subjected to tribute. Rhodes, in the Aegean, was conquered in 1522, and the Knights of St John, who had heroically defended it, removed to Malta, whither Charles V had summoned them, and which they were to retain until the French Revolution. Mesopotamia, Syria, and Egypt were annexed (1512-1520) [why aren't we focusing on Selim I? Oh, Vienna.] Algiers and Tunis, conquered by the renegade corsair Barbarossa, became the outposts of the Grand Seigneur in the eastern Mediterranean... [But in the middle of the 16th century] The moment of its apogee was also the moment of its decline... [Isn't that implicit in the word "apogee?"] Financial disorder and fiscal oppression, with all their political, economic, and moral consequences, made their appearance in Turkey directly her expansion was checked... as a whole, the history of Turkey after the death of Soliman II was that of an incurable decline. She would have disappeared long ago as a State if the European powers had not safeguarded her existence, because they could not agree upon the partition of the spoils... Did not Francis I seek the help of Soliman II against Charles V?
p593 This alliance, so monstrous at first sight, was only one of the consequences of the political disorder of Christianity since the middle of the 15th century.
Pirenne has many opinions about Turkey -- currently one of the Central Powers. What I've quoted here seems to me to be true, but it's amazing what he's left out.
Pirenne's written enough about coinage -- minting and debasement for example -- and about economies in general that you would think he would be alive to the consequences of the influx of American silver starting during the 16th century. The Ottoman regime, so brilliantly buttressed as a dynasty and in so many other ways, seems to have been unable to respond and recover from the devaluation of silver coinage. She continued to collect the usual taxes, yet was able to buy less and less with the proceeds.
And then there's the geopolitical reality that there's really no excuse for Pirenne not being aware of. Like Germany, the Ottoman Empire was located in the center, not on an edge. The Turks could dominate the Habsburgs, or they could dominate the Persians, but it was next to impossible for them to do both at the same time. Austria and Persia were the same kind of natural allies, versus the Ottomans, that France and the Ottomans were vs Habsburg Austria. (Or that France and Russia were vs Germany in the Great War.) Yet another instance of an empire being faced with greater and greater inertia the more extensive its conquests extend. And this contradicts Pirenne's claim that it was their failure to continue expanding that was the problem. You can't be strong everywhere, and every conquest gives you more places to defend.
I'm going to really abbreviate the brief history of England and France.
p594 ...since the end of the 12th century... [France's] foreign policy had always been determined by the vital necessity of expelling England from the soil of France... England was not only the essential enemy: she was the only enemy of France. She had no enemies on the Continent, or only such as were incited against her by England... Now, directly the Hundred Years' War came to and end this state of affairs ceased for good... Henceforth she would have to fight upon her land frontiers, and by a complete reversal of tradition England would never attack her in future except by entering into a coalition with the European enemies of France.
The formation of the Burgundian State marked the beginning of this new orientation of political history...
...The Low Countries emerged from their feudal subdivision to unite themselves, under a single dynasty, in a single State, the common ancestor of Belgium and modern Holland... flourishing cities, famed throughout the world for their cloth industry or their commerce, one of which, Bruges, had been for three centuries the great international port of the Occident, while another, Antwerp, was entering upon an even more astonishing period of prosperity... But the wealthier and more powerful this new neighbor became, the more dangerous was it to France. Whether it would or not, it was a permanent menace. From Amiens its troops, in two days' march, could appear under the walls of Paris; and above all, owing to its situation it imposed itself upon England as a natural ally...
p597 [After Charles VII, Duke of Burgundy, is killed fighting the Swiss near Nancy, French King Louis XI is about to dismember the Burgundy State in the Low Countries when] ...In order to escape from the attempts of Louis XI, ... [Marie of Burgundy] offered her hand to the Austrian. [Maximilian of the House Habsburg] The opportunity was too good to miss. Maximilian hastened to her side, and the marriage was concluded at Bruge on August 28th, 1477. This was an expedient hastily devised under the pressure of necessity; yet never has a political marriage exercised such an influence over the future of Europe. By bringing the young Burgundian State into the hybrid complex of the Habsburg domain, not only did it condemn it to suffer henceforth the repercussions of the various schemes of the most ambitious and greedy of dynasties, but at the same time it opened between France and the House of Habsburg the long conflict which came to an end only in the 19th century. [Why not include Austria's role in The Great War?] ...her only purpose was to keep them [the Low Countries] for herself, and it was always her endeavor to separate them from Germany... For the interests of the princes and those of the peoples to be completely divergent has always, in any period of history, been disastrous. Of this the history of the House of Habsburg is the most striking proof. By its acquisition of the Low Countries it found itself drawn into that career of aggrandizement, in which nations were reckoned only as heritages and countries as domains, and which was to make the Habsburgs, down to our own days, the sworn enemy of all national aspirations and all public liberties.
p600 ...Until... [the marriage of Isabella of Castile and Ferdinand of Aragon (1469)] the Spanish kingdoms had been too weak to intervene actively in the destinies of Europe... but the doubly national union of Ferdinand and Isabella, while it put an end to the long mutual conflict which was exhausting their kingdoms, enabled them also first to rally and then to subordinate the peoples to their power. So completely did they subject them to their guidance in every domain that assuredly, in no country and at no period of history, have sovereigns exercised so profound an influence. In the Spanish State, as established by them, Catholic and political sentiment were associated so completely that it was impossible to dissever them. The monarchy summoned to its aid the old religious fanaticism of its subjects, and in their eyes its cause was identified with that of the Faith. Its zeal for orthodoxy had rendered it profoundly national, and now, surrounded by the most intolerant of peoples, its intolerance was the instrument of its success. From 1480 onwards the Inquisition, entrusted with the task of watching over the converted Jews (maranos), became, without losing its ecclesiastical character, a State institution, since the State appointed the Grand Inquisitor and there was no appeal to Rome against sentences which he pronounced. The figure of Torquemada is inseparable from the figures of Ferdinand and Isabella. All three were sincere in their hatred of heresy, and while the Crown confiscated for its own benefit the property of the victims who died at the stake, enriching itself by their agonies, it employed this wealth only in fresh enterprises, which were as profitable to itself as they were to the Church. [I had forgotten, if I ever knew, that the Spanish Inquisition predates the Reformation.] The Holy War, long interrupted, was resumed against the Moors, so that the final constitution of the national territory seemed like the result of a Crusade. But it was not enough to fight the Musulmans; the Jews, no less than they, were the enemies of Christ. In 1492, the very year of the conquest of Granada, they were expelled from the State. This conquest and this expulsion swelled the treasury to overflowing, and provided the necessary resources for further political and religious expansion. While Christopher Columbus set forth to discover a new world to subject and convert, the expeditions against the coasts of Morocco, Algeria, and Tunis seemed to announce that all the forces of Spain were about to league themselves against Islam... But having arrived at this decisive moment of her history, Spain turned aside. She turned aside from the Holy War and allowed herself to be involved in the dynastic ambitions of her princes. Without understanding that she was renouncing her mission, she proceeded to concentrate all the energies which she had acquired in her secular conflicts with the Crescent in order to subject the Christian Continent to her princes; only in the end to collapse, ruined and exhausted by two hundred years of effort, almost as barren as the neighboring shores of that Morocco whose certain and profitable conquest she had sacrificed to her sovereigns' dreams of universal dominion.
p603 [Not going to go into detail about the dynastic struggle in Italy but...] Regarded against the entire background of French history, the Italian expeditions of Charles VIII and Louis XII had the appearance of mere excursions. They were not related to any national necessity. Inspired purely and simply by dynastic ambition, they were "wars of magnificence"; which is to say, useless wars... But the policy which they inaugurated... had no other consequence than a futile waste of men and money. Their only lasting result was that they oriented Spain toward Italy, and so, as an inevitable consequence, produced a rapprochement with the House of Habsburg.
It seems to me that Pirenne is confusing himself here by thinking "Spain" when he should be thinking "Ferdinand of Aragon." As the Romans -- and even the Carthaginians -- could have told you, nothing makes more sense than to unite the countries on either side of the Western Mediterranean Sea. Pirenne is right that including the South shore would also have made sense.
It was evident... that between Maximilian, fighting against France in the Low Countries, and the Catholic kings, fighting against France in the Kingdom of Naples, a political alliance and its inevitable consequence, a dynastic alliance, was imminent. In 1496 the double marriage of Don Juan, the heir of Ferdinand and Isabella, with Margaret, the daughter of Maximilian, and of Philip, the son of Maximilian, with the Infanta Juana bound the two families closely together... once more Nature favored the Habsburgs... The successive deaths of Don Juan (1497), and of his elder sister Isabella (1498), and of Isabella's son, Don Miguel (1500), resulted in the inheritance by Philip and Juana of the succession to the Spanish kingdoms. Six years later Philip was unexpectedly carried off by inflammation of the lungs, bequeathing his rights to his son Charles, then barely seven years of age...
No one expects the luck of the Habsburgs. (Monty Python reference.)
Charles V was one of those very rare characters of modern history whose name was to become universally known. [I've always associated the beginning of "modern" history with Frederick the Great, or at least that century.] He became very nearly as famous as Charlemagne or Napoleon. Yet it was not to his genius but to his heritage that he owned his eminence. With no more that mediocre abilities, he was raised by circumstances to such a position that only Charlemagne before him, and Napoleon after him, exercised such an influence over Europe. He was the meeting point of three dynasties and three histories: those of Austria, Burgundy, and Spain. The grandson of Maximilian of Habsburg and Marie of Burgundy, [Valois?] and also of Ferdinand of Aragon and Isabella of Castile, he found himself in possession of so many portions of Europe that it seemed as though his power would finally extend over the whole Continent... And to all this must be added the new world which the conquistadors had laid at his feet. Fernando Cortez made himself master of Mexico between 1519 and 1527, and Pizarro of Peru between 1531 and 1541. The astonishing conquest of South America was completed before Charles died... Its consequences became manifest only under his son...
At the moment when Spain fell into his hands through the death of Ferdinand (January 23rd, 1516), and Austria through the death of Maximilian (January 12th, 1519) he knew no more of the one country than of the other. Educated in the Low Countries by Belgian seigeneurs, who, regarded him merely as "their natural prince," did not even think to have him taught German -- and he never did learn it -- nor Spanish, he so shocked the Castilians when he appeared among them in 1517, speaking only French and surrounded by Flemish and Walloon favorites, that they welcomed him by the revolt of the Comuneros. But it did not take him long to adopt the distant, cold, and impersonal attitude which seemed necessary in a prince destined to reign over such a variety of countries and peoples... he did not really belong to any of the peoples whose crowns he inherited, and he found it easy to treat them all with an impartiality which arose from his indifference. Insensible to all national feeling, he thought of nothing but the greatness of his house... There was a striking contrast between him and his contemporaries, Francis I and Henry VIII, who seemed the very incarnation of France and England...
p605 ...His policy was not and could not be that of a King of Spain; it was and it had to be the policy of a Habsburg, and Spain, under his guidance, devoted her energies to the realization of schemes that were not only alien but opposed to her true interests.
p606 ...Hemmed in on every side by the domains of Charles... France found herself in danger of being stifled by an adversary who, once he had triumphed over her, would exercise universal dominion over Europe...
...the defeat of the King of France at Pavia (February 25th, 1525)... had startled the whole world, and France now appeared as the champion of European liberty. Pope Clement VII, in order to free Italy from the Spanish yoke, made approaches to France, and after the sack of Rome by the German troops of the Emperor [Charles V] he formally entered into an alliance with that country. Henry VIII did the same... the outbreak of Protestantism in Germany, and the invasion of Hungary by the Turks, ensured the neutrality of the Empire. Equilibrium was re-established. In 1529 the Peace of Cambrai restored Burgundy to France, who on her side renounced her lapsed suzerainty over Flanders and Artois, as well as her claims in Italy... [This peace didn't hold] ...in order to wage war upon the Catholic king [Charles] who had recently sacked Rome, the Most Christian king, allied himself with heretics [Lutherans] and Musulmans! The Peace of Crespy... (1544), left matters in statu quo... [Charles uses this peace to defeat the Lutheran princes.] In order to obtain the assistance of the successor to Francis I -- Henri II, who in his own country was cruelly persecuting the heretics -- they offered him the three bishoprics, Metz, Toul, and Verdun (1552). This finally directed French policy to one of the aims which it had envisaged... since the 13th century with a view to restoring the frontier traced in 843 by the Treaty of Verdun... Before abdicating... [Charles V] concluded with his adversary the Truce of Vaucelles (1556).
p608 ...The succession which transmitted to his son Philip II comprised, in addition to Spain, the Kingdom of Naples, the Milanese State, the Franche Comte of Burgundy, and the Low Countries, without speaking of his immense possessions in the New World. Italy, subjected in the north and the south, bade farewell to the dreams of liberation... Italy, until the modern era, was to be no more than a geographical expression... The States of the Pope, and those of the Venetian Republic, alone preserved their independence... As for the Low Countries, enlarged by the final annexation of the Duchy of Guelders and the Frisian provinces, they were henceforth to constitute in the north of Europe the "citadel of steel" of the Spanish kings. The Imperial dignity had served him [Charles] only to assure the future of his house. He had not only taken the Low Countries from Germany; he had even obtained for his brother Ferdinand, in 1521, the crown of the King of the Romans, and had ceded to him the patrimonial duchies of Austria, which together with the crowns of Bohemia and Hungary that fell to Ferdinand in 1526, finally safeguarded the Habsburg power in Central Europe. Divided into two branches, the family none the less remained united by its dynastic interests...
2. Internal Politics
This section seems very repetitive to me. Pirenne is arguing that both the Renaissance and the Reformation contributed to the strengthening of the great kings.
p612 The Reformation, in fact, at all events in its beginnings, shared no less than the Renaissance in this conspiracy of all the great social forces on behalf of the sovereign power. Whether the princes protected it or fought against it, they none the less profited by it.
And with that we end. Damn the Armistice!
I wonder if anyone had ever considered taking up where Pirenne left off? This must have been frustrating even for Pirenne, as the history of the Low Countries was just getting really interesting at this point. The Wars of Religion were about to begin, while the Wars of Dynastic Domination (or against Dynastic Domination) were only getting started. Likewise, international maritime trade and commerce was about to explode. And, once again, the profits of that trade would generate unprecedented wealth and capital formation. In general, the history of Europe was about to jump into high gear and to become the history of the world.
Already, though Pirenne hasn't gotten into this at all, European navigation has become the dominant vector for change on the planet. Initially as a vector for disease to and from the Americas, but soon as a vector for the dissemination of biological diversity (those potatoes, again, plus all the other plants and animals that would become established in new homes after a voyage inside the hulls of European ships).
What I would most like to see continued, however, is the history of ideas, religion, dynasties, cities, and capitalism... is that asking so much?
