"In the last 80 years, few histories have stood the test of time as splendidly as this one—the more so as it was written at a time when women academic historians were a rarity. It remains amazingly fresh and insightful today. Chapter VII, 'The King of Sweden,' with its stirring and moving accounts of the destruction of Magdeburg and the battles of Breitenfeld and Lutzen, is simply a masterpiece of historical writing and could easily be read on its own. Some recent historians have criticized her German-centered focus on the war at the expense of other areas, but on the whole it holds up magnificently."
Publisher NYRB Classics
Publication Date 2005-03-10
Section European History / All Staff Suggestions / Nonfiction Suggestions / Alan H.
Format Paperback
ISBN 9781590171462
Europe in 1618 was divided between Protestants and Catholics, and Bourbon and Hapsburg — as well as empires, kingdoms, and countless independent states. After angry Protestants tossed three representatives of the Holy Roman Empire out the window of the royal castle in Prague, world war spread from Bohemia with similar abandon and relentless persistence, destroying European powers from Spain to Sweden as they marched on the contested soil of Germany. Fanatics, speculators, and ordinary people found themselves trapped in a nightmarish world of famine, disease, and seemingly unstoppable destruction. The Thirty Years War was a turning point in the making of modern Europe and the modern world: out of it came the system of nation-states that remains fundamental to international law. C. V. Wedgewood's magisterial book is the only comprehensive account of the war in English, as well as a triumph of scholarship and literature. Includes maps and charts.
