Leseprobe

65 FIG. 4 Diego Velázquez, Don Gaspar de Guzmán, Count-Duke of Olivares , Madrid, 1624, oil on canvas, h. 202 cm, w. 105.5 cm, Museu de Arte de São Paulo, inv. no. MASP.00171 lution of the Union was therefore a further step in the Euro- peanisation of the war. At the end of March 1621, King Philip III of Spain died. There had already been discussions in Madrid in 1620 about whether the twelve-year truce between the United Provinces of the Netherlands and the Habsburgs, which was set to expire in 1621, should be renewed. Archduke Albrecht of Austria and Archduchess Isabella spoke out in Brussels in favour of peace with the Northern Netherlands.22 However, the military successes of 1620 led the government of the young King Philip IV to allow the truce concluded in 1609 to expire.23 Since Spain held strong military positions from the North Sea to Italy, Gaspar de Guzmán, Count-Duke of Olivares, the chief minister in Philip IV’s government, pur- sued a hegemonic policy (fig. 4).Olivares wanted to win back the renegade Northern Netherlands for Spain and to extend Spanish dominance in Europe. Accordingly, Spain supported Austria and Bavaria in their struggle for supremacy in the Empire.24 An essential part of this strategy was to conquer the Dutch outposts in north-western Germany and establish Spanish hegemony over Westphalia and the Lower Rhine. Thus, in the spring of 1622, Spanish troops conquered the fortress at Jülich and the Pfaffenmütz fortress, which the Dutch had built on an island in the Rhine north of Bonn in order to keep a watch on the Archbishop of Cologne.25 The Palatinate Campaign In the Palatinate Campaign,Tilly—after suffering an initial defeat at Wiesloch against the army of General Ernst von Mansfeld, who was fighting on the Protestant side with financial support from England—succeeded in defeating the Margrave of Baden-Durlach at Wimpfen on 5 May 1622. A little later, another ally of the Elector Palatine, Christian of Brunswick-Wolfenbüttel, nicknamed the “madman of Halberstadt”, was defeated by Tilly’s army at Höchst am Main.26 The weakened remnants of the armies of Mansfeld and Christian of Brunswick, having united, retreated into Alsace. During the same year, Spanish troops laid siege to the Dutch fortress of Bergen op Zoom, the loss of which would have seriously undermined the strategic position of the Northern Netherlands. To obtain their help in relieving the fortress, the Dutch hired the troops of Mansfeld and Christian of Brunswick. Advancing from Lorraine, the Prot- estant mercenary army broke through the Spanish lines of General Gonzalo Fernández de Córdoba at Fleurus.Threat- commander-in-chief of the Catholic League, Johann Tserclaes, Count of Tilly, succeeded in defeating the Bohe- mian rebel army at the Battle of White Mountain near Prague on 8 November 1620 (fig. 3).19 The defeated ‘Winter King’ Friedrich V fled with his family to the Calvinist court of the stadtholder of the Dutch Republic in The Hague.20 On 14 May 1621 the Protestant Union was formally dis- solved.21 Thenceforth, the Protestant princes were only able to act militarily in the Empire with foreign aid. The disso-