The Thirty Years' War

Rating:
Summary: Skip This One
Review: There are few books in English on one of the most important, complex, and fascinating episodes in European history since the Renaissance. Most on Amazon's list are special order or out of print. Unfortunately, Parker and his writers produced a dry, dull, tedious tome that will bore even serious 30YW enthusiasts. Novices should special-order Wedgwood instead; enthusiasts will want to read S.R. Gardiner.

Rating:
Summary: Good Introduction to Complex Topic
Review: This book is a concise introduction to the Thirty Years War. It is written primarily by Geoffrey Parker, though he recruited expert colleagues to assist on some chapters. Parker is a careful editor, as the book has a uniform style and reads like a single author text. I suspect its target audience is advanced undergraduates, and grad students and scholars specializing in other areas seeking an entry into the extensive literature on the Thirty Years War. It is not a comprehensive and detailed narrative history. Military history aficionados, in particular, will be disappointed because there is little coverage of campaigns and battles. There is, however, a nice chapter analyzing the nature of warfare during the Thirty Years War. The book is devoted primarly to political history, diplomatic history, and the structural effects of the Thirty Years War on the European State System and the organization of individual states. These topics are addressed very well. Of particular interest to the authors is the question of why the Thirty Years War lasted so long. Wars were very common in Early Modern Europe both before and after this conflict but usually of shorter duration. The answer(s) appear to be a combination of factors including changes in military technology, the organizational immaturity of states that precluded decisive victory, the religous dimension of the war, and unwillingness of key actors to compromise. Often presented as a pointless and exhausting conflict, the Thirty Years War did produce lasting effects; for example, the Austrian Hapsburgs would never again try to impose hegemony on Germany. In exchange, however, their grip on the core lands of Austria, Bohemia, and Hungary tightened. The alliance between the Austrian and Spanish Hapsburgs was severed and France emerged as the preeminent continental European Power. One aspect that the authors slight is the international, indeed, intercontinental aspects of the Thirty Years War. Implicit in the narrative is the fact that events all over the world, such as conflict between the Dutch and Spanish/Portugese in South America, and Ottoman-Persian rivalries in the Near East had a huge impact on the Thirty Years War. A very attractive feature is an excellent annotated bibliography written by Professor Parker that will take interested readers deeper into the literature. This book fulfills its goal of being a concise introduction but there is still a need for a substantial narrative history based on modern scholarship.

Rating:
Summary: Good Introduction to Complex Topic
Review: This book is a concise introduction to the Thirty Years War. It is written primarily by Geoffrey Parker, though he recruited expert colleagues to assist on some chapters. Parker is a careful editor, as the book has a uniform style and reads like a single author text. I suspect its target audience is advanced undergraduates, and grad students and scholars specializing in other areas seeking an entry into the extensive literature on the Thirty Years War. It is not a comprehensive and detailed narrative history. Military history aficionados, in particular, will be disappointed because there is little coverage of campaigns and battles. There is, however, a nice chapter analyzing the nature of warfare during the Thirty Years War. The book is devoted primarly to political history, diplomatic history, and the structural effects of the Thirty Years War on the European State System and the organization of individual states. These topics are addressed very well. Of particular interest to the authors is the question of why the Thirty Years War lasted so long. Wars were very common in Early Modern Europe both before and after this conflict but usually of shorter duration. The answer(s) appear to be a combination of factors including changes in military technology, the organizational immaturity of states that precluded decisive victory, the religous dimension of the war, and unwillingness of key actors to compromise. Often presented as a pointless and exhausting conflict, the Thirty Years War did produce lasting effects; for example, the Austrian Hapsburgs would never again try to impose hegemony on Germany. In exchange, however, their grip on the core lands of Austria, Bohemia, and Hungary tightened. The alliance between the Austrian and Spanish Hapsburgs was severed and France emerged as the preeminent continental European Power. One aspect that the authors slight is the international, indeed, intercontinental aspects of the Thirty Years War. Implicit in the narrative is the fact that events all over the world, such as conflict between the Dutch and Spanish/Portugese in South America, and Ottoman-Persian rivalries in the Near East had a huge impact on the Thirty Years War. A very attractive feature is an excellent annotated bibliography written by Professor Parker that will take interested readers deeper into the literature. This book fulfills its goal of being a concise introduction but there is still a need for a substantial narrative history based on modern scholarship.

Rating:
Summary: This is an exallent book on The Thirty Years War.
Review: This book is an exallent book on The Thirty Years War. It begins its narative in 1608 to show some of the background of the War. The Thirty Years War was an very complex war; Mr. Parker tries to examine the War from all of the sides invovled. He doesn't take any side. The two drawbacks of the book are that it is written by a number of different authors and is a bit choppy because of this. The other drawback is that it is quite terse. Each major incedent is described in in a brief and acurate way. In order to understand the book, one has to either read it very carefully or read the book a number of times. While the main focus of the book is the political incedents, there is an appendix which discusses the major military changes that occured in the War.