Germany Rises - The Wise World Traveler: Becoming a Part of All that You Meet - page 112

Thanks to Gutenberg's printing press and Luther's translation of the Bible into Ger-
man, Luther's ideas and pronouncements spread across Germany and Scandinavia. As a
general rule, northern German states, kingdoms, and dukedoms chose to follow Luther's
teachings, while southern states remained loyal to Rome. Given the intensity of conviction,
war between Lutheran and Catholic domains erupted in a series of battles and campaigns
that moved across Europe for thirty years, from 1618 to 1648, with Sweden, Denmark,
France, and Austria commanding the largest armies. The Thirty Years' War was fought
mostly in Germany. Castles were besieged, towns and villages laid waste, and peasants
starved as crops were stolen and burned. Some districts lost half their population, while
others counted themselves lucky if only 20 percent died. After the war, the Peace of West-
phalia (1648) treaties ended the Thirty Years' War and formally pushed the Pope out of
secular world affairs.
The consequences of the Lutheran challenge to Roman Catholicism were profound.
Luther's translation of the Bible created a standard written language all across German-
speaking lands, helping to unite those who spoke different German dialects. Prussia
emerged as Protestant Germany's leading state and, as will be shortly noted, fought a war
to keep Catholic Austria out of the nineteenth century unification of Germany. And when
Protestant Prussia invaded Roman Catholic France, French mistrust of German motives be-
came a pivot of international diplomacy for almost a century.
THE RISE OF MODERN GERMANY
Phoenix: A mythical bird of great beauty. Said to live 500 years, in a nest of spices.
Then burns itself on a funeral pyre, and arises again from the ashes in the bloom of
youth and lives again through another cycle. [103]
One place to begin tracing the rise of modern Germany is the early victories of Napoleon.
By 1806, he had defeated the armies of Austria, Russia, and Prussia. He then reorganized
the states of Germany to bring them within the French sphere of influence. As members
of his newly formed Confederation of the Rhine, Wurttemberg and Bavaria became king-
doms, and Hesse-Darmstadt, Nassau, and Berg were constituted as dukedoms, with Prussia,
Baden, and Hanover given enlarged territories. Even more important, the many dozens of
independent cities and baronies were obliterated.
After Napoleon's defeat at Waterloo (1815), the map of Europe was redrawn by the
victors at the Congress of Vienna. Germany was reconstituted as a confederation of thirty-
nine independent states. Austria was the largest German-speaking state in Europe and was
also its most territorially aggressive. Acceding to Austria's demands, the Confederation of
the Rhine was dismembered. Its territory reverted to a congeries of independent kingdoms,