Fall of Holy Roman Empire

643 Words3 Pages
One of Europe’s biggest powers before its fall was the Holy Roman Empire. There were multiple events that contributed to the fall, but most of them started to occur in 1517. In 1648 the empire had completely fallen due to this series of events. The three major events that encouraged the fall of the empire were Thirty Years’ War, the religious reformations/war, and the Peace of Westphalia. One of the major events that assisted the fall of the Holy Roman Empire was Thirty Years’ War. The event that started the Thirty Years’ War was “defenestration of Prague.” Two of Ferdinand’s officials were thrown out a window. The Lutherans violated the Peace of Augsburg by acquiring German Bishops, Calvinists converting princes, and Jesuits reconverting princes to Catholicism. The Calvinists and Catholics had many advantages because of that which made the Lutherans fear the Peace of Augsburg would be negatively impaired. The Lutheran Princes felt it necessary to create the Protestant Union and in retaliation the Catholics formed to Catholic League. They agreed that neither of them should make a religious or territorial move. Protestant Churches were closed my Ferdinand of Styria, which caused the first outbreak of violence in 1617. Europe began to struggle through inflation. This was because the war had been fought on German soil, causing them to lose money in agriculture; also the trade routes had shifted. In 1648, they found peace, although the Holy Roman Empire was still marred. Another cause that attributed to the fall of the Holy Roman Empire was the religious reformations and religious wars. In the 16th century, calls for reformation began because criticism of the church was so widespread. In 1517 when Martin Luther posted the “Ninety-Five-Theses,” he started a chain reaction. He wrote them to express his disagreement with the church and the Popes who were
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