ABSOLUTE MONARCHS

IN EUROPE

Group 5
 Lesson Outline
• Spain’s Empire and European Absolutism
• The Reign of Louis XIV
• Central European Monarchs Clash
• Absolute Rulers of Russia
• Parliament Limits the English Monarchy
A Powerful Spanish
Empire
Philip II’s Empire
• Philip was shy, serious, and like his
father, deeply religious.
• Philip could be aggressive for the sake
of his empire.
• Philip’s empire provided him with
incredible wealth.
• Philip believed it was his duty to
defend Catholicism against the
Muslims of the Ottoman Empire and
the Protestants of Europe.
Golden Age of Spanish
Art and Literature

El Greco
• His real name was Domenikos
Theotokopoulos.
• El Greco, meaning “the Greek.”
• He chose brilliant, sometimes clashing
colors, distorted the human figure, and
expressed emotion symbolically in his
paintings.
Christ Healing the Blind
ca. 1570
Golden Age of
Spanish Art and
Literature
Diego Velázquez
• He was the court painter to Philip
IV of Spain.
• He is best known for his portraits
of the royal family and scenes of
court life.
• He was noted for using rich
colors.
‘Las Meninas’ by Diego Velázquez
1656
Golden Age of Spanish
Art and Literature
Don Quixote
• Published in 1605
• Often called the birth of the modern
European novel.
The Spanish Empire Weakens
Inflation and Taxes Inflation in Spain had two main
causes:

INFLATION - a decline in the value 1. Spain’s population had

of money, accompanied by a rise been growing.
in the prices of goods and
services. 2. As silver bullion flooded
the market, its value
dropped.
The Spanish Empire Weakens
Making Spain’s Enemies Rich The Dutch Revolt

• Guilds that had emerged in • While Spain had a sluggish

the Middle Ages still economy, the Dutch had a
dominated business in Spain. prosperous middle class.
• To finance their wars, Spanish • In 1579, the seven northern
kings borrowed money from provinces of the Netherlands,
German and Italian bankers. which were largely Protestant,
united and declared their
independence from Spain.
The
Independent
Dutch The Night Watch
1642

Prosper
Dutch Art

• Rembrandt van Rijn - was the greatest Dutch

artist of the period.
 The Independent
Dutch Prosper

Girl with a Pearl Earing

1665
The Independent Dutch Prosper
Dutch Trading Empire

• The stability of the government allowed the Dutch people to

concentrate on economic growth.
• The Dutch had the largest fleet of ships in the world—perhaps
4,800 ships in 1636.
• Gradually, the Dutch replaced the Italians as the bankers of
Europe.
Absolutism in Europe
Absolutism The Theory of Absolutism

• Absolutism was the political • Absolute monarchs believed

belief that one ruler should in divine right, the idea that
hold all of the power within God created the monarchy
the boundaries of a country. and that the monarch acted
as God’s representative on
Earth.
Absolutism in Europe
Growing Power of Europe’s Monarchs

• The decline of feudalism, the rise of cities, and the growth of national
kingdoms all helped to centralize authority.
• Monarchs used the wealth of colonies to pay for their ambitions.
• Church authority also broke down during the late Middle Ages and
the Reformation. That opened the way for monarchs to assume even
greater control.
Absolutism in Europe
Crises Lead to Absolutism

• Religious and territorial conflicts between states led to almost

continuous warfare. This caused governments to build huge armies
and to levy even heavier taxes on an already suffering population.
These pressures in turn brought about widespread unrest. Sometimes
peasants revolted.
The Reign of Louis XIV
Henry of Navarre

• Descended from the popular medieval

king Louis IX.
• In 1589, when both Catherine and her
last son died, Prince Henry inherited
the throne.
• He became Henry IV, the first king of
the Bourbon dynasty in France.
• Aided by an adviser who enacted wise
financial policies, Henry devoted his
reign to rebuilding France and its
prosperity. He restored the French
monarchy to a strong position.
 Louis XIII and Cardinal Richelieu

Louis XIII Cardinal Richelieu

• After Henry IV’s death, • became, in effect, the ruler
his son Louis XIII of France.
reigned. Louis was a • As Louis XIII’s minister, he
weak king, but in was able to pursue his
1624, he appointed a ambitions in the political
strong minister who arena.
made up for all of
Louis’s weaknesses. • Richelieu took two steps to
increase the power of the
Bourbon monarchy. First, he
moved against Huguenots.
Second, he sought to
weaken the nobles’ power.
Writers Turn Toward Skepticism
Montaigne and Descartes

Michel de Montaigne René Descartes

• After the death of a dear friend, • In his Meditations on First
Montaigne thought deeply about Philosophy, Descartes examined
life’s meaning. To communicate the skeptical argument that one
his ideas, Montaigne developed a could never be certain of anything.
new form of literature, the essay. • He created a philosophy that
• An essay is a brief work that influenced modern thinkers and
expresses a person’s thoughts and helped to develop the scientific
opinions. method.
Louis XIV Comes to Power

Louis, the Boy King

• Louis became king in 1643 after the death of his father, Louis XIII
• The efforts of Henry IV and Richelieu to strengthen the French monarchy paved
the way for the most powerful ruler in French history—Louis XIV.

Louis Weakens the Nobles’ Authority

• When Cardinal Mazarin died in 1661, the 22-year-old Louis took control of the
government himself. He weakened the power of the nobles by excluding them
from his councils.
• In contrast, he increased the power of the government agents called intendants,
who collected taxes and administered justice.
Louis XIV Comes to Power
Louis Controls the Nobility
• Every morning, the chief valet woke Louis at 8:30. Outside the curtains of Louis’s
canopy bed stood at least 100 of the most privileged nobles at court. They were
waiting to help the great king dress. Only four would be allowed the honor of
handing Louis his slippers or holding his sleeves for him.

Patronage of the Arts

• Versailles was a center of the arts
during Louis’s reign. Louis made
opera and ballet more popular. He
even danced the title role in the
ballet The Sun King.
 Louis Fights Disastrous
Wars
Attempts to Expand France’s Boundaries
• In 1667, just six years after Mazarin’s death, Louis
invaded the Spanish Netherlands to expand France’s
boundaries. Through this campaign, he gained 12
towns. Encouraged by his success, he personally led an
army into the Dutch Netherlands in 1672. The Dutch
saved their country by opening the dikes and flooding
the countryside. This was the same tactic they had used
in their revolt against Spain a century earlier. The war
ended in 1678 with the Treaty of Nijmegen. France
gained several towns and a region called Franche-
Comté.
Was of the Spanish Succesion Louis’s Death and Legacy

• The French people, tired of misery, • The previous years were more tragic
yearned for peace during the War of than wonderful. Recognizing that his
the Spanish Succession. What they wars had destroyed France, he was
got instead was another war. sorry for the agony he had caused his
people.
• The war that ensued is known as the
War of the Spanish Succession. The
expensive conflict continued until
1714.
Central European
Monarchs Clash
The Thirty Years’ War

• Both Lutheran and Catholic rulers attempted to acquire disciples.

Furthermore, both parties felt threatened by Calvinism, which was
growing and gaining supporters throughout Germany. As tensions
rose, the Lutherans formed the Protestant Union in 1608.
 The Bohemian Protestant Revolt began in 1618.
Hapsburg Triumphs
• The Thirty Years’ War lasted from 1618 to 1648.
During the first 12 years, Hapsburg armies from
Austria and Spain crushed the troops hired by
the Protestant princes.

Hapsburg Defeats
• The Protestant Gustavus Adolphus of Sweden
and his disciplined army of 23,000 shifted the
tide of war in 1630. They drove the Hapsburg
armies out of northern Germany. However,
Gustavus Adolphus was killed in battle in 1632.
Peace of Westphalia
• The war did great damage to Germany. Its population dropped from 20 million to
about 16 million. Both trade and agriculture were disrupted, and Germany’s
economy was ruined. Germany had a long, difficult recovery from this devastation.
That is a major reason it did not become a unified state until the 1800s.

Beginning of Modern States

• The treaty thus abandoned the idea of a Catholic empire that would rule most of
Europe. It acknowledged Europe as a collection of equal and sovereign states. This
signaled the start of the modern state structure and was the most significant
outcome of the Thirty Years' War.
 States Form in Central Europe

• Strong states formed more slowly in central Europe than in western Europe. The
major powers of this region were the kingdom of Poland, the Holy Roman Empire,
and the Ottoman Empire. None of them was very strong in the mid-1600s.

Economic Contrasts with Several Weak Empires Austria Grows Stronger

the West
• The landowning nobles in central
• One reason for this is that the • One of these families
Europe not only held down the serfs
economy of central Europe was the Hapsburgs of
developed differently from but also blocked the development of Austria. The Austrian
that of Western Europe. strong kings. For example, the Polish Hapsburgs took several
nobility elected the Polish king and steps to become
sharply limited his power. They absolute monarchs.
allowed the king little income, no law
courts, and no standing army.
 Maria Theresa Inherits
the Austrian Throne

• Charles VI spent his entire reign working out an answer

to this problem. With endless arm-twisting, he
persuaded other leaders of Europe to sign an
agreement that declared they would recognize
Charles’s eldest daughter as the heir to all his Hapsburg
territories. That heir was a young woman named Maria
Theresa. In theory, this agreement guaranteed Maria
Theresa a peaceful reign. Instead, she faced years of
war. Her main enemy was Prussia, a state to the north
of Austria.
 Prussia Challenges Austria
Prussia rose to power in the late 1600s

The Rise of Prussia

• The Hohenzollerns built up their state from a number of small holdings,
beginning with the German states of Brandenburg and Prussia.

Frederick the Great

• Frederick William worried that his son,

Frederick, was not military enough to rule.
The prince loved music, philosophy, and
poetry.
War of the Austrian Succession
• In 1740, Maria Theresa succeeded her father, just five months after Frederick II
became King of Prussia. Frederick wanted the Austrian land of Silesia, which
bordered Prussia.

The Seven Years’

• War Maria Theresa decided that the French kings were no longer Austria’s chief
enemies. She made an alliance with them. The result was a diplomatic revolution.
When Frederick heard of her actions, he signed a treaty with Britain, Austria’s
former ally.
ABSOLUTE RULERS OF
RUSSIA
The First Czar

• Ivan IV, called Ivan the terrible, came to

throne in 1533 when he was only three
years old.
• 1547–1560 are often called Ivan’s “good
period”
• Ivan executed many boyars, their families,
and the peasants who worked their lands.
• He also killed his oldest son and heir
during the violent quarrel in 1581.
• Rise of the Romanovs ruled by Ivan’s weak
son.
Peter the Great Comes
to Power
• Russia contrast with Europe, when Peter
I came to power, Russia was still a land of
boyars and serfs.
• Peter visits west in the 1680s, people in
the German quarter of Moscow were
accustomed to seeing the young Peter.
• Peter was 24 when he became the sole
ruler of Russia.
Peter Rules Absolutely

• Inspired by his trip to the west, Peter resolved that Russia would
compete with Europe on both military and commercial terms.
• Peter’s Reform, he believed that Russia need to change , he knew
that many of his people disagreed.
• Peter brought Russian Orthodox Church under state control.
• Like Ivan the terrible, Peter reduced the power of the Great
landowners.
• Westernizing Russia
• Establishing St. Petersburg, to promote education and growth.
 Parliament Limits the English Monarchy
Monarchs Defy Parliament English Civil War
• James problem, he inherited the • War topples a King, during the autumn of 1641,
unsettled issues of Elizabeth’s reign. Parliament passed laws to limit royal power.
• Charles I fights Parliament in 1625, • From 1642–1649, supporters and opponents of King
James dried his son Charles I took the Charles fought the English Civil War.
throne. • In 1649, Cromwell and the Puritans brought Charles to
• By 1628, Charles was forced to call trial for treason against Parliament.
Parliament again.
• Cromwell’s Rule, now held the reins of power. In 1649,
he abolished the monarch and the house of Lord’s.
• Cromwell almost immediately had to put down a
rebellion in Ireland.
• Puritans Morality in England, Cromwell and the Puritans
sought to reform society.
Restoration and Revolution

• Charles II reigns when prince Charles entered London in 1660, crowds shouted joyfully and bells
rang. On this note of celebration, the reign of Charles II began.
• During Charles II reign, Parliament passed and important guarantee of freedom, habeas corpus
(to have the body)
• Parliament debated who should inherit Charles throne. Because he has no legitimate child.
• James II and the Glorious Revolution in 1685, Charles II died, and James II became the king.
Soon he offended his subjects by displaying his Catholicism.
• He also had an older daughter, Mary, who was a Protestant.
Limits on Monarchs Power

• Bill of rights to make clear the limits of royal power, Parliament drafted a bill of
rights in 1689.
• Cabinet System Develops after 1688, no British Monarchs could rule without the
consent of Parliament.
ABSOLUTE MONARCHS
IN EUROPE

END
Group 5