6 - 1 to 2 paragraph answers for 6 questions Modern History

Royal Absolutism

I. Elements of Absolutism

· Divine Right of Kings Theory: similar to the "Mandate of Heaven" concept from the Zhou Dynasty in China;  the monarch was supposedly divinely appointed by God, thus the monarch was responsible to no one but God Himself;  allowed for unlimited power for the monarch--a blank check for power

· Regulation of Religious Groups:  monarch strongly believed in the promotion of one state church; often believed that policies of religious toleration were signs of weakness, thus religious minorities were either persecuted or expelled from the nation

· Civil liberties: there were no such things as individual freedoms and liberties in continental Europe until after the 18th century Enlightenment

· Legislative bodies: if a nation had a legislative body, the absolute monarch did his best to ignore or avoid summoning the legislature into session; the absolute monarch did not want to share powers with anyone, including a legislature, thus there were no avenues for the lower classes to become involved in the political process and have a voice in government

· Nobility: the nobility became the target of the monarchy--the absolute monarch wanted to keep the nobility as far away from politics and political power, and made every attempt to control their every move

· Fiscal policies: the absolute monarch made every attempt to control every and all fiscal policies, including the power of taxation; also relied heavily on the economic theory of mercantilism; this tight control is broken in the 18th century with the rise of capitalism and free market economies

· Rise of modern bureaucracies:  these bodies were generally staffed by the growing middle class--the monarch did not want the nobility involved; these bodies grew rapidly throughout the 17th century and were quite extensive by the 18th century and eventually needed huge reforms to end corruption

· Modern Armies: the absolute monarchs were concerned with raising and maintaining large and professionally trained armies; in the 17th century modern uniforms were developed and the use of regimental flags became important;  these large armies eventually became a significant section in the national budgets

· Secret Police: these feared and hated people became the eyes and ears of the absolute monarch; they were a separate part of the civilian government and spied on all classes of citizens;  they remained part of European governments well into the 20th century

Versailles in the early 18th Century

II. Louis XIV (1643-1715)

· In addition to his nickname, "The Sun King," Louis was also known as "The Gift From God;" he was born 23 years into his parents' marriage--they had concluded that they would remain childless

· His father died when he was five, and his mother and Cardinal Mazarin ruled as his regents

· Grew up hating the nobility because of the political intrigues that surrounded the court; became very secretive and trusted few people--his standard reply to direct questions:"We shall see!"

· Grew up to be 6'5" and a rather handsome young man; launched a new fashion trend for 17th century men--shoulder-length hair for men became a symbol of virility; most men could not grow their hair so long, thus wig-making became a lucrative business for the next 150 years

· Developed a sophisticated and cosmopolitan court; during his reign, the French language came to replace Latin as the language of culture and business; his court became the model for all of western Europe

· Built the Versailles complex as a lavish playground to keep the nobility busy and out of his political structure; required that the nobility live at Versailles for 10 months out of the year; his secret police censored all of the mail coming in and going out of Versailles

· Jean Baptiste Colbert, the minister of finance, was one of the few people Louis trusted; France experienced an economic Golden Age while Colbert was alive--Louis made several bad financial decisions after Colbert died and led to long-term financial causes of the French Revolution

· In 1685 Louis revoked the Edict of Nantes which had granted religious toleration to the Hugenots (French Calvinists); this led to a mass exodus of a significant section of the skilled labor in France--Colbert would have never advised Louis to make such a decision

· Louis was responsible for building the modern French Army, and used it extensively throughout his long reign; he fought nearly every nation in western Europe and by 1701 several nations were tired of fighting and formed an alliance against Louis

· Louis was forced to end his fighting in 1714; the wars were ended with the Peace of Utrecht which set the tone for 18th century European diplomacy

· Beginning in 1715 and continuing for the next 199 years, the goal in European diplomacy became "The Balance of Power;" Europeans were concerned that one nation could become too powerful and dominant, so they began forming alliances that would keep the diplomatic scales balanced 

       III. Peter the Great (1689-1725)

· Peter, the third leader of the Romanov dynasty, was never expected to become the tsar of Russia; he was the first child of his father's, Tsar Alexis I, second marriage--Peter had two older half brothers and his life was carefree for the first four years;

· Tsar Alexis died when Peter was four, and Peter's older half brother became Tsar; five years passed but unfortunately Tsar Feodor died without an heir

· A bloody rebellion and political crisis developed when Peter's older half sister, Sophia, spread rumors that Peter's mother had killed Sophia's younger brother, Ivan

· The young Peter watched as several of his relatives were slaughtered in Red Square; the mob hysteria subsided when Peter's mother took him and his half brother out on a balcony, proving that the young Ivan was very much alive

· Peter became a co-Tsar with Ivan (who suffered from mental handicaps and could never rule alone) and Sophia was named as the regent

· Though Peter had the title of tsar, he spent very little time in Moscow over the next six years; he came to hate Moscow due to the violence he witnessed as a child and came to regard the city as a backward and medieval 

· Peter spent his adolescence in a suburb of Moscow were all of the foreign merchant and tradesmen lived; grew to love western European culture and came to regard Russia as a primitive nation in desperate need of modernization

· Peter also spent a significant amount of time playing war games; as the co-Tsar of Russia he had access to the weapon arsenals and thus he and his young friends used real weapons in their games--he gained incredible military knowledge as a young person that he later put to use as Tsar

· He grew up to be 6'8" and physically towered over his court

· In 1689 Peter took full political power from Sophia and began to rule Russia independently

· He soon realized how much crucial political knowledge he lacked as Tsar, so he planned a large-scale educational tour of W. Europe; His Grand Embassy, the European tour lasted for 18 months and he traveled to all of the major European capital cities

· Peter spent over half of his time in the Netherlands where he personally learned to build a ship and earned the title, "Shipwright"

· He was on his way to Vienna when he learned that Sophia had initiated another rebellion and headed back to Russia to end the rebellion

· Sophia was banished to a convent and 1200 rebels were tortured and killed--several were hanged and their bodies left outside of Sophia's window; during this rebellion Peter also divorced his first wife, Eudoxia and sent her to another convent for the rest of her life

· Peter wanted to expand into the Baltic Sea region, so he launched the Great Northern War with Sweden and ultimately conquered the land that became his new capital city, St. Petersburg

· Peter is hailed as the Great Modernizer who Westernized Russia; one of his more visible changes was to force the men in his court to shave their beards and dress like Western European men

· Peter also reformed Russia in several ways

· Importation of Western though

· Primary educational reform

· Creation of the Table of Ranks--forerunner to the modern civil service--was used for both the military and civil government--means of upward mobility for the lower classes

· Created Russia's modern bureaucracy

· Imported skilled foreign labor--even toyed with the idea of making Dutch the official language of Russia!

· Created Russia's modern Army and Navy

· Developed new tax collection system

· Developed mining and industry

· Annexed huge sections of new territory for the Russian empire

· Russia unfortunately experienced a dynastic crisis at his death--he had no living male heirs--10 years before his death his only living son, Alexis attempted to leave Russia;  Peter stopped him and accused him of treason; Alexis was tortured and ultimately executed--thus Peter ultimately set the stage for a shaky political situation that lasted for nearly 15 years until one of his daughter, Elizabeth took the throne

Constitutionalism and England

I. Development of a constitutional monarchy

· England developed the world's first modern constitutional monarchy in the late medieval period and set England on a vastly different political road than the other nations of continental Europe

· Magna Carta --the Great Charter, became the basis of England's constitution;  King John II was forced to sign the document in 1215, and thus limited royal power was established in England; called for 1) no taxation without representation, 2) justice could not be sold or denied to freed men, 3) no one could be imprisoned without a trial, 4) property could not be taken without just compensation and 5) long-term basis of individual freedoms

· Parliament--first met in 1295 and was originally comprised of just nobility; within a century, the House of Commons was added and gave voice and political participation to England's lower classes

II. The Stuart Dynasty

· With the death of Elizabeth I and her lack of children, Parliament named Elizabeth's Scottish cousin, King James as the new king of England--he became the founder of the Stuart dynasty

· James I (1603-1625)

· He was the only child of Mary, Queen of Scots and became the King of Scotland at 13 months; he grew up as a Protestant and married Anne of Denmark

· He came across as a proud and arrogant man; he was a strong supporter of the Divine Right of Kings theory and wrote two books arguing in favor of the theory--he believed that 1) God had made kings to be higher beings than the average mortal man, 2) Kings should have sole power to write the laws, and 3) Parliament should be ignored and summoned as infrequently as possible

· Including the significant debt that James inherited from Elizabeth, he spent huge amounts of money on clothing, art and decorations for his palaces and created 200 new landed titles and gave them financial perks

· Eventually angered the Puritan sector of the population with his bisexual lifestyle; as one person commented, "Elizabeth was King, now James is Queen!"

· James openly flaunted his relationship with George Villiers--made him the first duke of Buckingham and virtually turned his foreign policy over to George

· Villiers negotiated the engagement of Charles, Prince of Wales to the Catholic French Princess, Henrietta Maria

· James died in 1625 from a stroke and is buried in Westminster Abbey between two of his male favorites

· Charles I (1625-1649)

· He was the frail, sickly second son of James who could not walk or talk until he was three; became the Prince of Wales at 12 when his older brother died

· He was a quiet, intellectual who inherited his father's love of art--his collections rivaled his fathers

· Married Henrietta Maria of France and eventually had a successful marriage with her--had 9 children together--he was a family man, the opposite of his father

· Read his father's writings and took them to heart;  by 1629 he determined to rule without Parliament and did not summon them for 11 years

· Tried to implement levies to raise money because of his exploding levels of debt

· Eventually forced to call Parliament in 1640 ( he tried to disband them but they kept meeting) and they officially met for 20 years--The Long Parliament

· The Long Parliament was primarily comprised of Puritans: 1) abolished Charles sources of revenues, 2) began drafting the Triennial Act (monarch would have to summon Parliament at a minimum of every three years), 3) deposed the Archbishop of Canterbury and 4) passed taxes to raise of Parliamentary army

· English Civil War broke out in 1642, primarily between Parliament and the King (the Roundheads vs. the Royalists); the war was fought sporadically from 1642-1646 and in 1648-1649

· Charles was captured and tried by Parliament for treason; he refused to answer their charges--said they had no right to try their king; the trial lasted for 9 days and Charles was sentenced to death; he was beheaded on Jan. 30, 1649, thus ending the English Civil War

· For the next 11 years, England had no king--instead they had a Lord Protector;  Oliver Cromwell served as the only Lord Protector in English history

· With the death of Oliver Cromwell, Parliament decided to restore the monarchy and invited Charles I's son--Charles II to return to England and restore the Stuart dynasty

· Charles II (1660-1685)

· He was a shrewd and cautious man--he learned from his father's mistakes

· In addition to the Stuart perpetual growing debt his reign included the Great Plague of London in 1665 when close to 10,000 died and the Great Fire of London in 1666--13,000 homes were destroyed and 87 churches were burned

· In attempt to solve some of the money problems, Charles entered into a secret treaty (Treaty of Dover) with his cousin, Louis XIV in 1670: Louis would give Charles £ 160,000 per year in exchange for 1) English troops for Louis' perpetual wars, and 2) Charles would officially convert to Catholicism

· England learned of the treaty in 1678 and hostility began to grow

· Charles' wife, Catherine of Portugal, was unable to produce a living heir (Charles kept 7 known mistresses very busy and through them had 14 illegitimate children!) so Parliament decided the line of succession would continue through his brother and his children

· Charles suffered a stroke in 1685 and was confirmed into the Catholic Church on his death bed; he was succeeded by his brother, James

· James II (1685-1688)

· James was by far the least popular of the Stuarts; one of his biographers described him as "stogy, dull and stupid"

· Like his father and grandfather, he strongly believed in absolute government and made his thoughts known to the public

· His first wife gave him two daughter, Mary and Anne;  Parliament officially named them as his heirs because they had been raised Protestant

· James had secretly converted to Catholicism in 1668 and kept the secret until 1676

· Parliament realized that their king was a Catholic, but kept close watch on him

· With the death of his first wife, James remarried a young Italian Catholic girl, but she suffered one miscarriage after another

· James believed his ultimate triumph came on the June 10, 1688 with the birth of James Francis Edward

· Parliament feared that James would insist that the boy be named as his heir, so sent an invitation to James' elder daughter Mary and her husband, William Duke of Orange to come and reign in England

  

                                                                                                                                                William and Mary III. The Glorious Revolution (1688)

· England's bloodless revolution that began in June 1688 by sending James II, his wife and infant son into exile

· By December 1688 all English forces had surrendered and Mary II and William III were proclaimed the monarchs of England

· A Bill of Rights was added to the English Constitution in 1689 and included the following clauses: 1) No royal interference with the law, 2) taxation was controlled solely by Parliament, 3) freedom to petition the monarch without fear of retribution, 4) freedom of the people to own weapons for their defense, 5) no royal interference in the elections of members of Parliament, 6) freedom of speech and debate, and 7) no excessive bail or cruel and unusual punishments

· Many of the freedoms in the English Bill of Rights were included in the writing of the American Bill of Rights one century later

The Scientific Revolution

Origins of the Scientific Revolution

· First began in the closing years of the Renaissance in the fields of astronomy and physics

· Gained momentum from the successful challenge to authority demonstrated in the Protestant Reformation

· Freedom of inquiry was not only tolerated, but encouraged by Protestant educators

Francis Bacon (1561-1626)

· Known as the "Father of the Scientific Method" and as "The Father of Empiricism"

· Educated at Cambridge; served in Parliament, became Attorney General under Elizabeth I and ultimately the Lord Chancellor for James I

· Called for government support of science and technology

· Argued for the use of inductive reasoning

· A very prolific writer, he authored Novum Organum along with numerous other philosophical essays

Rene Descartes (1596-1650)

· Frenchman who was educated in law and mathematics; studied optics as a personal hobby

· Supported Bacon's call for the scientific method

· Became the first European intellectual to explore man's rational skills--led to his famous quote "I think, therefore I am"

· Like Bacon, he was also a prolific writer and focused on works of philosophy and analytical geometry

Galilei Galileo (1564-1642)

· Italian scientist who was educated in mathematics and medicine

· Became a math professor at the age of 25

· Became interested in astronomy and built his own telescope; with his telescope he sighted 1) several new stars, 2) observed the surface of the moon, 3) studied the moons of Jupiter

· Also studied physics and produced some of the earliest works on the concept of inertia

· Came to support the heliocentric theory and was condemned by the Inquisition for his belief in 1616

· Eventually tried and condemned for heresy (due to his position on the heliocentric theory); the Pope intervened and his life was spared

· Spent the final 9 years of his life in house arrest

William Harvey (1578-1657)

· English physician trained at Oxford and in Italy; became the court physician for both James I and Charles I

· Made huge advances in research on the circulatory system--became the leading 17th century scholar in anatomy and physiology

· His research inspired the next generation in research in physiology, chemistry and physics

· Unfortunately during the English Civil War in the 1640s, due to his position as court physician, a mob trashed his home and lab and destroyed a significant section of his research

Sir Isaac Newton (1642-1727)

· A middle-class Englishman who studied at Cambridge; came to regard Copernicus and Descartes as his heroes

· He majored in mathematics and physics, but had side interests in religion, history, astronomy and optics

· Became a math professor at Cambridge and in 1687 published, Principia, his leading mathematical work

· With his interest in optics, he eventually developed Newton's Theory of Color

· Remembered in the scientific community for his Newtonian Synthesis where he utilized the works of previous generations of scientists and finalized the laws of gravitation and motion

· In his later years he served one term in Parliament and as the Master of the Mint

· Knighted by Queen Anne in 1705 for his considerable intellectual contributions

Consequences of the Scientific Revolution

· New rising social group--the scientific community

· Rise of the scientific methodology in several disciplines

· Improvements in navigation and industrial technology

· Greatest era of scientific achievements since the Hellenistic World

· Set the stages for the Enlightenment and the Industrial Revolution

The European Enlightenment

Central Themes

1. Commitment to Scientific Methodology

2. Celebration of Human intellect and strong commitment to education

3. Commitment to progress--very hopeful for the future of humankind

The Philosophes

· French for "philosopher," earliest members emerged as a reaction against Louis XIV and royal absolutism

· Thought of themselves as "thinkers" and "critics"--believed that humans had been bogged in ignorance for many centuries

· Believed that the Catholic church and autocratic government were the blame for holding people back from progress

· Became the ultimate social and intellectual movement on both sides of the Atlantic in the 18th century

The Leading Contributors 

· John Locke (1632-1704)                                                            

· Came from a middle-class Puritan English family; studied medicine and philosophy at Oxford--huge fan of Bacon and Descartes

· Served as private physician to the Lord Chancellor of England and became interested in political theory

· Fled to the Netherlands during the reign of James II and returned home with William and Mary in 1688

· Helped to draft the English Bill of Rights in 1689

· Wrote A Treatise of Civil Government in 1690 and argued 1) that all persons are created equal, 2) all persons are due 3 natural rights--life, liberty and property, 3) made a strong argument for a constitutional monarchy--lower classes have a voice in government, and 4) believed government was legitimate as long as it protected citizens and their natural rights--people had the right to rebel when a government crossed the line and became a tyranny

· Also authored An Essay Concerning Human Understanding, an essay still discussed by modern educators; argued that all humans are born like a blank slate (Tabla raisa), that people have no innate principles, rather all ideas are developed from experience

· Influenced most of the Enlightenment writers of the 18th century and impacted most of America's founding fathers

· Baron de Montesquieu (1689-1755

· Came from an aristocratic French family; became even wealthier with his marriage;

· Became known for his political satires; because of rigid French censorship any political writing that criticized or critiqued the government had to be presented as fiction and alternative forms of literature

· Developed an interest in political history and analysis

· In 1748 he published The Spirit of the Laws, a study of historical and contemporary political structures and argued: 1) Republics were the best form of government, 2) supported Constitutionalism because government was limited by law and common people could have a voice in government, 3) believed in separation of powers, and 4) for the rule of law and preservation of civil liberties

· Heavily influenced America's founding fathers, especially James Madison and the other contributors to the U.S. Constitution

· Voltaire (1694-1778)                                                                      

· Born into middle-class French family; his birth name was Francois-Marie Arouet--in 1718 he selected "Voltaire" as his pen-name and that name is how he is remembered in history

· One of the most prolific writers of the Enlightenment--wrote plays, epic poetry and political and philosophical essays

· Became pen-pals with several monarchs and influential figures in all levels of society

· Came to be an early champion of freedom of speech--lesson learned from verbally insulting a member of French nobility and serving a year in prison; he did not learn his lesson and insulted a second aristocrat, this second offense gave him two years of exile in Great Britain

· Came to support constitutional monarchies from his time spent in Great Britain

· Disagreed with France's state church and came to be a champion of religious freedom

· His writings were widely read on both sides of the Atlantic

· Jean Jacques Rousseau (1712-1778)                                            

· Serves as a transitional intellectual figure--member of both the Enlightenment and early leading figure of Romanticism

· Came from a poor and dysfunctional Swiss family; though primarily self-educated he possessed a brilliant mind

· In 1762 he wrote The Social Contract, his most significant political essay; clearly Rousseau had read Locke's writings and were impacted by them; he argued: 1) that an unwritten, but understood contract existed between a monarch and the people, 2) that a representative government was necessary in order for the common people to have a voice in government, 3) for a direct democracy because the people, not the monarch, are sovereign, and 4) it was the people's  duty  to rebel when the government violated their rights

· The Social Contract was read on both sides of the Atlantic and impacted the growing revolutionary movement of the 1760s in the American colonies

The Enlightened Despots

· Frederick the Great (1740-1786)

· Born the eldest son and heir of Frederick I of Prussia; grew up loving music, art and the French language--nearly everything his militaristic father hated

· Cultivated and hid from his father a secret library of 3000 works of poetry, Greek and Roman classics and French philosophy; he spoke 6 languages and understood two more

· Played the flute at a professional level and composed 100 sonatas for the flute and 4 symphonies

· Came to the throne in 1740 and used his father's war machine against Austria and grabbed the wealthy region of Silesia; a decade later he took on most of western Europe in the Seven Years' War--by the end of his reign he had doubled the size of Prussia

· Reforms: 1) supported new Prussian industries, 2) developed new tax collection system, 3) modernized the Prussian bureaucracy, 4) educational reform--developed some of the best schools in Europe, 4) except for the Jews, practiced religious toleration, 5) abolished most forms of torture, and 6) issued a new standardized currency

· Outlived most of his contemporaries--known as "Old Fritz"

· Catherine the Great (1762-1796)

· Born into a minor Prussian family, her mother was a distant cousin of Empress Elizabeth of Russia;  Elizabeth had no children and designated her nephew Peter as her heir and began searching for a suitable wife for him

· At 14 Catherine was invited to Russia to meet Peter; the Empress chose Catherine to be Peter's wife--an ill-fated relationship, due to Peter's mental instabilities and personality issues

· Catherine immersed herself in studying the Russian language and reading as much of Enlightenment literature as possible--considered to be a very educated woman

· Eventually had a son Paul--his father was most likely Catherine's Polish lover--with the death of the Empress in 1762, the Russian Romanovs ceased to exist--the Romanovs who ruled until 1918 were a mixture of Prussian and Polish descent

· With the death of Elizabeth in 1762, Peter took the throne and managed to alienate the Russian people almost immediately with his polices

· With the help of the current lover (Gregorii Orlov) and his brothers, Catherine launched a coup in June 1762, deposed Peter and seized control of the government--she claimed that she was serving as a regent only until Paul came of age, but she never relinquished the throne until her death--Paul virtually hated her for most of his life

· For the first 11 years she attempted to implement numerous enlightened reforms: 1) opened hospitals, orphanages and schools, 2) except for the Jews she practiced religious toleration, 3) encouraged freedom of the press, 4) new codification of Russian laws, 5) abolished most forms of torture and capital punishment, and 6) allowed for lower classes to have a voice in local government

· Her reforms were halted in 1773 with the Pugachev Rebellion--one of the best organized peasant rebellions in European history; took her armies a year to end the rebellion; the rebellion scared her and she began to turn away from Enlightened principles

· For her any thoughts of the Enlightenment ended during the French Rebellion and the execution of the royal family

· Along with her reforms Catherine should be remembered for 1) gaining more territory for Russian than any of her predecessors or successors, and 2) culturally she completed Peter the Great's westernization of Russia  

Significance of the Enlightenment

· Produced 150 years of revolutions on both sides of the Atlantic

· Brought an end to absolute forms of government in most of Europe

· Supported the rise of individual freedoms and liberties around the world

· Led to the development of several constitutional monarchies and republics

In your opinion which member of the Scientific Revolution contributed the most to the world of science?  How has this person impacted the modern world?

In your opinion, which enlightened despot (Frederick the Great or Catherine the Great) utilized more of the principles of the Enlightenment in his/her reign? Why and how so?