The Habsburg emperors
innate desire to penalize Protestants. These punitive measures included the public execution of 27 Bohem ian leaders in June 1621, the establishment of a ‘Commission of Confiscation’ to oversee the transfer of rebel Bohemian lands, and later those nobles who refused to convert to Catholicism, to Ferdinand’s supporters further confirming the notion of an under lying religious motive. By 1630, 500 of 930 estates in Bohemia had changed hands. 8 To further consolidate the Counter-Reformation in Bohemia a series of laws between 1620-1627 authorized the closure of Protestant churches and heavy fiscal sanctions upon t hose who refused to convert. By 1627, the revocation of the ‘Letter of Majesty’ marked the pinnacle of Ferdinand’s Counter -Reformation, causing 4% of the Bohemian population to migrate elsewhere; 9 Ferdinand III was eventually able to secure the exemption of freedom of worship within the Habsburg lands during the Peace of Westphalia (1648), allowing the Counter-Reformation in Bohemia to be sustained. 10 In effect, since both Emperors viewed their enemies as heretical rebels they felt justified in depriving their titles and property, as by revolting they had voided their individual privileges. 11 Equally, Ferdinand II’s inability to secure a feasible settlement to hostilities, despite being given multiple opportunities to achieve peace, demonstrates his continued pursuit of the Counter- Reformation to the detriment of the Empire’s welfare. The Emperor’s ‘inabilit y . . . to make a realistic peac e proposal’ was the basis for the war’s continuation, as conveyed through his decision to award Maximilian I of Bavaria the Upper Palatinate in 1623, despite the regions restoration to Frederick V being essential to any cessation of hostilities. 12 By 1629, the Emperor’s triumph over the rebelling Princes, as well as the intervening Danes in 1625, provided an ample opportunity for settlement; indeed, if some accommodation could have been created, through a guarantee of freedom of religion and retainership of ecclesiastical lands seized by Protestants during the Reformation, a workable settlement may have been secured. Yet, Ferdinand once again would accept nothing less than unconditional surrender and the establishment of religious uniformity, despite a tangible Habsburg supremacy that would have come from a settlement with the Protestants at this stage. 13 By issuing the Edict of Restitution in 1629, necessitating the transfer of all seized ecclesiastical lands since the Treaty of Passau (1552) to the Catholic Church, Ferdinand destroyed the possibility of settlement with the Protestant Princes and invoked the 1630 intervention of Gustavus Adolphus of Sweden. 14 Indeed, many Protestant leaders would have been willing to resolve their disputes with the Emperor had it not been for his insistence on the Edict. 15 Furthermore, following the Imperial victory in 1634 at Nördlingen, negotiations led by John George of Saxony were met by tentative engagement from Ferdinand. His assessment of the moral and theological arguments of peace were rooted in a sentiment that he had fought since 1618 to ‘restore the ascendancy of Catholicism’ and thereby enforce the Edict. 16 Hence, this consideration of religious motivations in negotiations vindicates the notion that the Habsburg Emperors were committed to invoking the Counter-Reformation, even at the expense of political expediency.
8 Sturdy 2002: 39. 9 Ibid: 40. 10 Rady 2020. 11 Wilson 2018. 12 Gutmann 1988: 765-766. 13 Kissinger 1994: 61. 14 Sturdy 2002: 55. 15 Gutmann 1988: 766. 16 Sturdy 2002: 64.
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