European History Study Guide
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History of Reaction and Revolution. 1815-1848.
Two important ideologies, nationalism and liberalism, emerged to have a significant effect on Europe during the nineteenth century. The Congress of Vienna and the Concerts of Europe were a conservative response to these ideas. After Napoleon’s fall, most European nations wanted to restore the old order and prevent future revolutionary outbreaks. Great Britain, Austria,…
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History of the French Revolution. 1803-1815. III.
Regardless of the questions of whether the liberties given to the French people were provided by a despot, Napoleon considered himself to be an extension of the revolution, and intended to take it abroad through advantageously taking rapid military action with support from military conscription and a cohesive command system. Napoleon planned to invade England…
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History of the French Revolution. 1793-1802. II.
A second phase of the revolution began from 10 August 1792, when the king was suspended from office, and from 21 September when a new legislative body called the National Convention was assembled for the first time after being chosen on the basis of universal male suffrage, although only a small proportion of the eligible…
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History of the French Revolution. 1789-1792. I.
There could theoretically be two major underlying themes in European history from between 1789 to 1914: the spread and transformation of industrialism in Britain, where it first assumed modern forms, and the spread and transformation of the liberal, democratic ideals for society and politics that were first given practical expression through the American and French…
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History of the Scientific Revolution and the Enlightenment.
Key individuals who devoted themselves to scientific research introduced progress in collective thought that would change the world more than the destruction that was taking place during the years of religious warfare. These individuals saw that the books of ancient writers, especially Aristotle, which were used as textbooks in universities, were full of statements that…
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History of the Age of Exploration.
There were rapid strides in technological inventions made during the Middle Ages, which led to the age of exploration, beginning in the fifteenth century when first Portuguese ships then Spanish and later British, French and Dutch ships set out to discover the world. The compass was first widely adopted as an aid to navigation after…
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History of the Age of Absolutism.
The history of monarchy in Europe from the late Middle Ages tended toward greater political unification, and increasingly greater subordination of feudal intermediate authorities to the control of a central monarchy. Most European states experienced a steady growth in the power of the central governmental authority from approximately the beginning of the fifteenth to the…
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History of the Consequences of the Protestant Reformation.
The Protestant movement led to different consequences on the course of European history. The Middle Ages essentially ended in the German states, where the Holy Roman Empire, which had already previously been an amalgamation of hundreds of regional authorities, was no longer theoretically a universal monarchy, which was further fragmented as a result of…
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History of the Protestant Reformation.
There was a widespread call for reform among various regional populations after the church as a result of various crises, such as the failure to stop the Black Death plague, and crises within the church itself such as the Babylonian Captivity and the Great Schism. Early reformers questioned the authority of the pope argued for…
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History of the Late Middle Ages.
The period from the end of the thirteenth century to the beginning of the sixteenth was mainly one of general distension. The balance between local and universal political institutions that had existed in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries was upset by the rising power of the national monarchies. At the beginning of the fourteenth century,…
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