Iron and Blood: A Military History of the German-speaking Peoples Since 1500

Peter H. Wilson

Penguin Books, Ltd.

<p>A DAILY TELEGRAPH BOOK OF THE YEAR 2022'No one interested in the history of Europe can afford not to read this stupendous book' Simon Heffer, Daily Telegraph'Endlessly fascinating ... History has returned to Europe, and Iron and Blood is an excellent place to start getting reacquainted with it' The TimesFrom the acclaimed author of Europe's Tragedy and The Holy Roman Empire , a powerful account of German-speaking Europe through five centuries of military historyFor most of its existence German-speaking Europe has been splintered into innumerable states - some substantial (such as Austria and Prussia) and some consisting of just a few Alpine meadows. Its military experience has also been extraordinarily threatened and threatening; a mere buffer-zone, and a global threat.Iron and Blood is a startlingly ambitious and absorbing book. It encompasses five centuries of political, military, technological and economic change to tell the story of the German-speaking lands, from the Rhine to the Balkan frontier, from Switzerland to the North Sea. Wilson's narrative considers everything from weapons development to recruitment to battlefield strategy. Germans' military impact on the rest of Europe has been immense. If there is one constant it has been the sense of being beset by seemingly more powerful enemies - France or Russia or Turkey - and the need to strike a rapid knockout blow to ensure a favourable result. Almost inevitably, this has in practice meant protracted, relentless and often unwinnable wars, and - in 1939-1945 - moral catastrophe.The author of definitive books on the Holy Roman Empire and the Thirty Years War, Peter Wilson has with Iron and Blood written his masterpiece.'Hugely impressive' Richard J. Evans, Times Literary Supplement</p>

Iron and Blood

Allen Lane.

Over the last forty years or so, research on the history of the Holy Roman Empire of the German Nation (1495-1806) has been transformed almost beyond recognition. Once derided as a political non-entity, a chaotic assemblage of countless principalities and statelets that lacked coercive power and was stifled by encrusted structures and procedures, the Reich  has been fully rehabilitated by more recent historiography. It is now being hailed by some as a model of peaceful conflict resolution in the centre of Europe which, in the long run, was able to defuse the religious tensions created by the confessional divide of the sixteenth century and to protect its smaller members against the voracious appetite of more powerful neighbours. Some historians even draw lessons from the history of the Holy Roman Empire for our present. The multi-layered, federal structure of the old Empire and its system of collective decision-making have been held up as a model for a peace-loving, multi-ethnic Europe, a European Union avant la lettre. Other historians have described the Reich  as the first German nation-state, a political configuration based not on power and expansion, but on rights and liberties, the rule of law and a structural lack of capacity for aggression. This volume takes stock of this research, particularly in the critical areas of the Empire's constitutional, religious and social history. A notable feature is the presentation of several decades of research in concise, accessible essays by continental scholars, much of it appearing in English for the first time.

The Holy Roman Empire, 1495-1806 (Studies in European History)

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Books by Peter H. Wilson