The Thirty Years War began in 1618 and ended in 1648, giving the war its name. The war began in response to the newly elected Head of State of the Holy Roman Empire, Ferdinand II’s declaration forcing all within the empire to follow Roman Catholicism. This was declared despite religious freedom being stated and given in the Peace of Augsburg in 1555. After this decree was issued the Bohemian nobility in what is now present-day Czech Republic and Austria, refused to abide by this decree and showed their displeasure with it by throwing Holy Roman Empire (HRE) representatives out of the window of the Castle of Prague. This came to be known as the Defenestration of Prague and began the outright and open revolt of the Bohemian states in the HRE. The war began as a fight for religious freedom for Protestant states within the HRE, but as it went on it became less about religion and more centered upon which group within the HRE would end up governing Europe. The Habsburg dynasty, a Catholic family, was one of these groups that leveraged the war to attempt to earn more power. Much of the war was fought in Germany, and pretty much every powerful state in Europe became entangled in the war including France, Spain and eventually Sweden. The war today is remembered as one of the longest and most brutal in history with over eight million casualties, a large number of these from the battles themselves, but many also came from the disease that was spread and famine that occurred as a result of the war. Like all wars, the results of these battles not only affected the soldiers fighting but also the surrounding communities of civilians, ranging across social classes. Based on the documents provided in Experiencing the Thirty Years War, the war exposed the differences in social rank between civilians and soldiers, classes within civilian society, especially concerning the Jewish populations, and differences in treatment within the military itself based on rank.
The militaries during the Thirty Years War were formed and operated vastly different than they are today. The Early Modern States that existed during this period didn’t have the vast financial resources that were required to raise and organize armies for a war so intense both in its casualties and length. They used a system in which men referred to as military entrepreneurs would recruit troops by using their own credit to raise the money, and in exchange for this they took command of the troops and also received the privilege of collecting taxes in areas which their armies occupied. The Duke of Friedland, Albrecht von Wallenstein characterized the war with the phrase “War nourishes war”, referring to the taking of goods by the armies from civilians as well as the use of regional and local taxation. Before going into the the resources that were demanded of cities and townships during the Thirty Years War, the relationships between civilians and soldiers will be mentioned. In Document 21, Christoph Brandis, wrote in his diary in 1936 about a scarring event that took place in his household as he was forced to house a Protestant Hesian soldier, Mathes. The soldier had many demands and had already done a lot of harm to Brandis’s property so when he called down from the loft demanding a pitcher of milk Brandis obeyed and sent his daughter to retrieve it. As the soldier was getting more and more impatient his daughter returned and he swiftly had her bring the milk up to him not thinking about what could go wrong. Upon entering the room, the soldier locked his door and began having his way with the seventeen year old girl. “The poor parents could only watch, through a hole which Mathes had already previously hacked in the door, as their own child was raped” (Marschke and Medick 81). During the rape she was mutilated and died of her injuries two weeks later, when the father went and complained to this soldiers commander he received the response that if she was already dead there was nothing he could do, and Mathes was not punished at all. This not only shows a disregard for the honor of civilians, especially this father, but it really shows how the soldiers were at a level of almost being untouchable and weren’t held responsible for any crimes they committed for the most part, reducing the citizens to nothing more than a tool to be utilized by the armies. According to Document 29 by Johann Georg Maul, in the Saxan city of Naumburg, the Swedish General Johann Baner demanded that the city and its civilians pay a fee of 24,000 Florins to prevent the burning and plunder of the city. Not only were they forced to pay this fee but the citizens were also responsible for housing and feeding the entire army, soldiers, generals and even judges who traveled with the regiments. In Document 30, Thomas Schmidt, the Mayor of Wernigerode, outlines the demands that were made by the army to the city and that he agreed to fulfill as Mayor. There were 130 soldiers that had to be taken care of as well as the colonels who demanded far more as they were of a higher rank. Each soldier was to be provided with two pounds of meat a day and a pound and a fourth of bread, allotting to 1,820 pounds per week of meat and 1,085 pounds of bread, which was a huge demand for the citizenship as they also had to provide for themselves and their families. The abbot of Heiligenberg, Maurus Friesenegger described the extreme famine around and even within his monastery during the winter of 1633-1634 in Document 37. Upon hearing of soldiers approaching, a majority of the peasants living in the surrounding countryside fled their dwellings with their grain supplies and livestock to the monastery where they thought they’d be safe from the pillaging and appropriation of their property to the soldiers. At this point it didn’t matter which sides army was approaching, whether they were friend or enemy, the civilians were still subject to the armies demands and violence. Instead of becoming a safe haven, the monastery became the site of fighting between soldiers and civilians over the last cow, pig, grain and any other food source. While all civilians were subjected to the demands of the armies there were certain groups within the civilian population that were subject to even further quartering of soldiers and payments.
The Jewish population in Europe during the Thirty Years War was small in comparison to the Christian populations but much more was demanded of them by occupying armies, solely because they were Jews and not Christians. Johann Georg Pforr, depicts some of these extra demands in a chronicle of his hometown Schmalkalden, Document 31. Within the town many council members and citizens blamed the Jews for the woes financially that the town was experiencing and wanted them to be expelled from the city. His Princely Highness Count Georg ordered the city to pay 10,000 talers to him within two months, and stated that any complaining would be met with prosecution and severe punishment, he also assessed a four percent property tax and an demanded that each Jewish citizen pay five extra talers as a Jewish head tax. Document 32, also refers to the extra demands that were made of the Jews this time in quartering the military. This took place in the town of Dülmen, after appealing to the high bailiff as well as the mayor and city councilors of the town in reference to their wish to not be burdened with quartering soldiers, these three Jewish heads of household received two or three soldiers each as well as being demanded to pay extra to the Colonels. Other Jews within the city were also selected to quarter soldiers and pay extra fines, despite being a small percentage of the cities population. The town gave them no protection from these extra demands despite the clear unfairness of this situation. Not only were they demanded more from but they also were forced to do things for the Commander and his soldiers on their Holy day, the Sabbath, which was meant for rest and prayer. Later in the year many of the council members passed away and when new members were installed they demanded more from the Jews and seized goods from them, claiming that past contributions weren’t enough. Despite quartering three different commands they weren’t spared as another approached on the 15th of June, “seventy soldiers were quartered in the city, which was fewer than before, but all three of us and everyone of us Jews got a soldier to quarter, although the city, as is known, is several hundred citizens and houses” (Marschke 104). Along with this they were also ordered to pay a contribution of around 700 talers in four days to the council. This really highlights the vast inequality in what was demanded from the Jews in comparison to their Christian neighbors and fellow citizens, seemingly putting them in a social class equal to or even below peasants during this period. During this period towns and cities higher authority often collaborated with occupying armies to exploit the Jewish population. A year later, after once again asking the Archbishop and Elector of Cologne, he issued an order that special taxes weren’t to be ordered from the Jews in Dülmen. This really exemplifies how low of a priority they were to everyone including the overarching rulers, despite their abiding by the law and their willingness to make monetary contributions which should’ve if anything given them a higher status in society. Much like treatment in this era depended on religion, treatment within the military depended on the social perceptions of status and rank.
Even within the armies of the Thirty Years War, conditions depended on social class and status but this time within the military itself. Common soldiers were often very underprivileged and had to make better conditions for themselves by taking from civilian populations whether that be food, possessions or even money as they were often not paid but instead paid with free reign of the occupied territory. This resulted in conditions like described in the paragraphs above for civilians, despite the soldiers often doing this in order to feed themselves and stay alive. Document 33, which is an excerpt from Peter Hagendorfs’ diary depicting the everyday life of a common soldier during the war. These soldiers underwent a everyday struggle to make a living in the horrible conditions of war, and when abundance was found it was often quickly followed by scarcity and hunger. They lived day to day when not being quartered by towns or cities, searching for shelter and food, attempting to avoid the plethora of illnesses that were being spread across the HRE by warfare and famine. A quote from Hagendorfs’ diary exemplifies this struggle, “On Good Friday we had enough bread and meat, and on Holy Easter we couldn’t get a mouthful of bread” (Marschke 105). Often times when towns couldn’t house whole armies the captains and high ranked officials would be housed, while the company was forced to stay in the countryside. In returning to Document 37, the monastery grounds were depicted as a place of violence between civilians and soldiers over the “last” of the food that was available. “Half filled companies with blackened and jaundiced faces, starved bodies, half-clothed or bedecked in rags and stolen women’s clothing. It was the face of hunger and famine. Next to them the officers appeared well fed and elegantly dressed” (Marschke 121), this really depicts the class differences. Despite the fact that the officers are in command of these common soldiers they’re much more concerned for their own well being as opposed to the men that they’re in command of. When returning to Document 30, you can really see this difference as the common soldiers were required to be given a good amount bread and meat but the amount that the mayor agreed to provide the colonels is a vast amount more. The colonels demanded two jugs of wine daily, two rams that must be fat, one whole cow per week, as well as six riding horses and eight wagon horses as well as vast amounts of grain whether that be oats, straw or wheat. These officers and colonels viewed themselves as more important than not only the citizens of the HRE but also more important than the soldiers under them that were looking to their command and guidance for survival.
The Thirty Years War really exemplified many of the social issues in the 17th century, whether that be bias based on religion or bias based on social class. If you look at this period in history you can trace a lot of what happened here to what happened in later dates such as the persecution of Jews in Germany during the Second World War, as they again blamed them for the financial issues the nation was experiencing. The rest of the war really exemplifies how unimportant the lower classes and common soldiers were to the nobility whether that be the Holy Roman Emperor himself or officers in armies on both sides. The Thirty Years War began as a war over religious ideologies but became a power struggle between empires and ended with the establishment of Protestant states and the Peace of Westphalia, with the Hapsburg losing the most. Though it can be argued that all of Europe lost, as it took centuries for certain areas to recover economically and the same amount of time for the population to recover after losing eight million people across the battlegrounds of Europe.