The Winter King Frederick V Of The Palatinate And The Coming Of The Thirty Years War Brennan C Pursell by Brennan C. Pursell 9781351880428, 135188042X instant download after payment.

This study is a contribution to the historiography of the Thirty Years’ War, the worst military, economic, and demographic disaster to befall Europe during the early modern period. The basic subject is the nature of the war in its crucial, developmental stages. The work questions whether it is entirely correct to classify this immensely complicated conflict as a ‘war of religion’. The ostensible subject of the book, the means to approach the problem of classification, is the life and career of Elector Palatine Frederick V, a prince much neglected by professional historians but nonetheless a figure of central importance during the war’s inception, intensification, and internationalization. The twentieth century has seen the publication of a handful of articles about Frederick V, but because his role has been misunderstood, we do not have a monograph of this ruler whose aims and actions were very different from what has been assumed, and very important as well.
The subject matter demands that the work combine the elements of biography and political analysis. In historiography, the greatest significance of Frederick V was his role in the development of the Thirty Years’ War, and any satisfactory understanding of the international political crisis that he helped to induce must take his personality into account. His character, values, and beliefs contributed much to the formation of his political policy. Frederick was only known as ‘the Winter King’ during the latter portion of his short, troubled life. He never considered himself deserving of this derogatory title, but the course of events and his contribution to them determined that his reign as King of Bohemia would never see more than the passing of a single winter.